//------------------------------// // Hello World, Hunter Says Hello -Chapter One // Story: Hunter's Story // by Horatiojones //------------------------------// Luna was dozing watching her night sky, while contemplating the way her day had gone, how she had woken up in the morning in the middle of a lake, with her wings strapped down and a magical stopper placed on her horn, before having to suck it up and swim in the frigid cold lake, and enter her and her sister’s castle, dripping wet and cold. By the time she had located her sister, finding her in one of the lesser used towers of the afore mentioned castle, she had calmed down slightly, but not enough to stop herself from throwing a large vat of honey on her sister and then throw feathers on her. This caused the two to begin a pillow fight that lasted hours, and only ended when both found themselves unable to see, because of the amount of feathers spread throughout the room. Luna chuckled, remembering her day and smiled, she had been so enjoying it, when she had realised it was time to raise the moon, and had done it, while feeling almost regretful for having to stop her fun, yet looking at her night now, she was happy she realised, and content. Right up till the moment of the explosion, right in the middle of the Canterlot gardens. Twilight awoke that morning to Spike shaking her vigorously, waving a recently received scroll in her face, which on closer inspection, said “Dear Twilight Sparkle, We have found something unknown, and wish to use your considerable abilities in scientific study to help us understand what has occurred, also please bring Spike with you to Canterlot, as we believe having a similar aged companion may help us communicate with the unknown in question, also if you could please bring your friend Fluttershy, as we have been told of her abilities with animals, we will have a coach sent to you in an hour, please be ready. Yours sincerely Luna and Cellestia P.S. Prepare yourself, he is utterly adorable-Luna” “That’s strange” Twilight thought, but then Spike told her that he had received the message 15 minutes ago, and she only had 45 minutes to, have breakfast, get Fluttershy, and prepare to be in the company of royalty and so any thoughts on what might have occurred where taken from her mind, as she was distracted by other things. 45 minutes later found Fluttershy, Spike and Twilight, standing outside Ponyville library, as two royal guards pulled up in front of them, Twilight and Spike entered the coach, while Fluttershy shook with fear as Twilight had only told her that her expertise with wild animals was needed, and so she was very afraid of what she might be about to meet. After a few minutes of Twilight and Spike looking at her expectantly, she boarded the coach and they set of for Canterlot Castle. An hour later they landed on the nursery tower of the castle, which to Twilights knowledge had not seen use since her own early days of studying under Cellestia’s tutelage. The trio of friends found both princesses waiting expectantly for them, and so they hurried of the coach, then the guards flew of back to the garage. After a quick exchange of hellos, the all entered the nursery where they were surprised to find a small hairless ape, who was standing throwing a ball against the wall, looking for all the world to not even care that he was surrounded by brightly coloured, talking ponies, but was rather concentrating on his game of personal catch, much like that which Steve Mcqueen entered in The Great Escape, although the child only knew the game from watching Chicken Run. However once Luna cleared her throat, the child looked over at the 4 ponies and a dragon, his eyes running over the three newcomers, when they finally alighted on the Spike, who was last, they opened in surprise, the child cried, “it’s, a dragon, can I play with him, please, Luna, pretty please” his excitement causing him to lisp slightly, and, not waiting for a response, he threw his ball at Spike, who moaned “ow” when he caught it, with his face. The child looked scared at this and started begging for the dragon not to burn him with his fire, at which point the five chuckled, as they knew Spike would never do such a thing. Luna began talking explaining the situation “he arrived him this morning, after his arrival caused a huge explosion in the garden’s centre square, where some policeponies found him sitting in the middle crying, completely unscathed, and asking for his daddy, as you can tell he is related to monkeys, but is vastly more intelligent than one. He has lived for 10 and half years, which is apparently very little, when compared to his father’s supposed age of 40, which has led us to believe that his species, which he claims are called hu-mans, age at the same rate as ponies such as yourselves, as to what brought him here, apparently his father was some form of scientist, investigated in finding other dimensions, this was all we could find out about this. Oh, and also, his names hunter, and he’s very hungry, because we don’t know what he eats, apart from that it isn’t hay or flowers, we haven’t tried anything else yet”. Fluttershy cried out at this and wandered over to the child, who had been nodding his head during the speech, as if to bolster that it was correct. She asked “hunter would it be alright if you could please show me your teeth, if that’s alright with you”, the child nodded and opened his mouth wide, showing both canines and molars, which slightly surprised Fluttershy, but, having dealt with omnivores before, she turned around and said “he is omnivorous, so I would try feeding him fish, if you could find any”, Luna immediately called for a servant and requested some of the fish they kept for when Griffin dignitaries visited. Throughout all of this Hunter looked at Spike expectantly, as the dragon now held his ball in his four clawed hand, Spike through the ball back and Hunter caught it, they did this a few times and then started bouncing it against the floor and walls of the room, laughing whenever the other didn’t catch it. So enthralled where they with their game, they didn’t realise when the adult ponies in the room began looking at hunters stature, as he was standing up straight, rather than the slight stoop that all known monkeys had, Twilight decided to figure out the intelligence level of the human, and so told Spike and Hunter to stop playing, which caused them both to complain. Twilight started asking him maths and equestrian questions, finding that his level of intelligence was only slightly above average to that of a pony of similar age. With the questioning done, Cellestia asked the question on everyone’s mind “what now”, and all but the one who said it where surprised when Fluttershy said “I’ll take him, at least, if that is okay with the princesses” when they agreed, arrangements were made for her to receive money for looking after him, and that she would legally adopt him as her son, the five seeming to realise that as they had never heard of this happening before, it was unlikely that Hunter would be able to return home, and that they should just wait and see what happened, with Twilight helping with the responsibilities of raising an unknown sentient creature. After these arrangements were made, Hunter’s fish arrived, grilled, at which point he dug in voraciously, somewhat surprised when no one offered nor told him, to use a knife and fork, happy that she had found something he ate, Fluttershy smiled, and said “I think everything will be fine, and it seems he should be able to learn at the Ponyville school” and nodded at this, looking at the others for confirmation, and when finding it smiling wider. Twilight was surprised by how assertive her good friend was acting, but decided that it had something to do with motherly feeling that Hunter seemed to be causing in her, she looked at her mentor, who was looking at Hunter with a mix of confusion, as well as, surprisingly sadness, Twilight noticed this and motioned to her teacher, that she wanted to talk outside. Once outside, she asked her long standing friend what was wrong, and was surprised when it was a confirmation of what she herself had been thinking “I'm just sad for him” Cellestia said “either he comes from a society which uses children in experiments, or something has gone seriously wrong, I would like you to slowly question him over the next few weeks, while whatever occurred is still fresh in his mind, as I would like to establish what occurred in his world”. Twilight agreed too and they re-entered the room, which had descended into madness when they had left, with an impromptu game of tag occurring with Fluttershy flying away from Luna, who was carrying the young human in her hooves, while Spike hid behind a small cot in the room, all with huge smiles on their faces. When everyone had calmed down, Hunter decided to spring a large question that was on his mind, “why isn’t anyone wearing clothes?” The rest of occupants looked surprised at this, wondering why the child thought this was a formal occasion, but after questioning Hunter, they found that on his home planet, called either Australia, or earth, depending on how you formed your question, they learned that as they did not have fur, the humans continually wore clothing, and Hunter had not mentioned this before because it was a particularly warm day, and he had decided that if no one else was wearing clothes, why should he, even if they were ponies and he was a human. Smiling they told him that Fluttershy would be taking him to her home as he would have to go to school, Hunter then asked a question everyone hoped to avoid “but when can I go home” he asked in a semi pleading, semi questioning tone. Fluttershy approached him, a sorrowful look on her face and said “Hunter I'm sorry to say but I don’t think you’re ever going to see your home again”. Hunter looked surprised at this but eventually smiled saying “so I get to play with my new friends for ever, yay”, the rest of them smiled sadly, agreeing with him, but all thinking about the day he would realise what this meant. Twilight eventually decided it was time to return to Ponyville, and to make preparations for Hunter’s new life, and so her, Fluttershy, Spike and Hunter bid the princesses farewell, and promised to keep them informed of how everything was going. When Hunter came to say goodbye, he hugged Luna tightly, and thanked her for being her friend thatday, as he put it, “had been having a very bad day until she showed up and made everything better”. Luna giggled lightly, happy to be seen as just a nice pony doing a nice thing, rather than with all the negative connotations she was used to her presence bringing. On the coach ride back to Ponyville, hunter sent the ride looking out the window, screaming with delight at flighting through the air. When they reached Ponyville, Twilight told the guards to drop of Fluttershy and Hunter at Fluttershy’s home, while she shopped for thing that Fluttershy now needed, if she were to raise a child, and to also tell Rarity to come to Fluttershy’s house, to make Hunter some new clothes, as she realised that, at the very least, he was going to need clothes at night, because of his hairless body. While Twilight was doing this, Fluttershy was introducing Hunter to her animal friends, who were all waiting patiently for her to feed them. Hunter asked if he could help, and was somewhat surprised when, not only was he allowed to help, but he was also allowed to cut up carrots with a knife. So shocked was he with this responsibility, he did it extremely carefully, and apparently perfectly, because once he had presented it to Angel, the small bunny went over and hugged his leg, as if deciding that, because of his chopping skills , the young human deserved his friendship. Fluttershy saw this and smiled, she had been worried about Angel’s jealous nature, but saw that the two were getting along famously. Twilight arrived later that night, with a new bed, some reading materials for children, an anatomy of omnivorous mammals’ book, and Rarity, in tow, having dropped of Spike at the library, deciding he had had enough excitement for one day. Rarity and herself stumbled upon a picture of a perfect family, with Angel, Hunter and Fluttershy all playing Monopony, with Angel winning but only by a small margin, and a small salad placed in front of them. Rarity, generous as ever, found herself at a loss when seeing the human, not knowing whether to go over and hug him or to cringe in fear because of his strangeness, but eventually decided to hug him, because of the way her good friend Fluttershy was acting around him. She walked up to Hunter and introduced herself, much surprised when the young child bowed to her and said “my dear Rarity, it is a boon upon my life to have made your acquaintance, I do so hope that you and myself can be friends” and then bursting out laughing, with Fluttershy doing the same, if a bit quieter, as they had planned the little welcome before her arrival. Rarity decided to ask the child what he usually wore, and was somewhat surprised when he said jeans, a t-shirt, and leather runners, Rarity knew what leather was, but also knew that it was a material that’s use was forbidden, most ponies cringing at the thought of wearing a dead animal. After hearing Hunter say this, Twilight took it upon herself to ask Hunter about the flora and fauna of where he came from, first she asked if there where ponies where he came from, pleasantly surprised when he answered in the affirmative, she asked them what they were like, but was soon sad that she had, as Hunter explained the differences between this new lands ponies, and those from where he came. He said “well there usually white or black or brown or a mix of that and there a lot bigger than you guys, at least 10 times the size, (although he said this in such a manner that Twilight though he must be exaggerating), and I rode one all by myself at a farm, it was lots of fun, but they didn’t talk which would have been cool”, this shocked Twilight, who immediately asked about all of Equestria’s other sentient creatures, and was somewhat shocked when she was told that they either did not appear to have sentience, or did not exist at all, she then asked how Hunter knew about dragons, which led to him telling her all about his favourite video game, ‘SPYRO’. This shocked the rest of the rooms occupants to silence, as they struggled to understand a world so different to theirs, but eventually Rarity snapped them out of it, deciding to take Hunter’s measurements, and designing him some clothes, while Fluttershy and Twilight asked him about his family, at which point Hunter released a bit of a bombshell, when he admitted “my mum passed away last year from cancer, but my dad says that he will find me a new mother, who will love me just as much, I just didn’t realise that this meant he would go away to” and then he started crying, all the mares found themselves, almost instinctively running over to the child, to offer him the consolation, Fluttershy was somewhat surprised when Angel also joined in the hugging, but took it in her stride and hugged what she realised now really was, for all intents and purposes, her new son. Eventually hunter stopped crying and said he was hungry. Fluttershy said she would cook them all something to eat, and would give hunter some of the fish that a friendly cat caught from a nearby pond whenever she was looking after meat eating animals. Rarity and Twilight meanwhile, were talking about how to introduce Hunter to the rest of the town, eventually deciding that a Pinkie Pie party would probably be the least threatening, to either group, way of introducing a new sentient creature to their neighbours. Fluttershy soon finished cooking, giving Hunter vegetables and fish, while she and her friends had daisy sandwiches. Her friends told her their plan, and she agreed after thinking it over, and they made plans to introduce Hunter to their friends tomorrow, and have a party at the end of the week to introduce him to the rest of the village, with Rarity saying she would ask her sister and her friends to come to, as they were almost exactly the same age to Hunter. The friends decided to wrap it up when Hunter started yawning loudly, rubbing his eyes to stay awake, but fighting and obviously losing a fight with the sandman. Twilight set up Hunter’s new bed in the living room, remarking that Fluttershy would have to get some builder ponies to put an additional room on her house. Then Rarity and she left, promising to meet there in the morning for breakfast, along with their friends and the cutie mark crusaders. Fluttershy tucked Hunter in, and then went off to her bed room, where she settled into her own bed, and deciding to read a romance novel, to take her mind of the events of the day, a she was so excited, she hadn’t woken up that morning expecting to become a mother, but now she was. Then she heard a knock on her door, when she said come in, Hunter walked in and said “please don’t be mad at me, but I'm really scared and I don’t want to be by myself, can I sleep with you”, Fluttershy smiled and nodded, shuffling slightly to the left so that Hunter could fit in her bed, when he crawled in he hugged her again, which she returned willingly, and then he rolled onto his side and started falling asleep, but not before asking “Fluttershy, are you my new mother”, Fluttershy whispered “yes”, to which hunter just nodded happily and dozed off. Fluttershy turned off her light, and smiled, her last word going through her head.