Guy dashed around his bedroom looking for any and every single possible item that he might need during his vacation. Basic hygiene items, snacks, money, maybe a hat, Guy frantically shoved everything he could into his suitcase. The last thing he wanted was to have to come back early to get something he forgot, after all. This was the first time in a while Guy had shown anything close to enthusiasm for something, and even Guy himself was surprised at this. He was remarkably confident that this was exactly what he needed, to the point where he still hadn't even considered what, exactly, he was actually going to do on his vacation.
The possibilities are endless! Guy thought to himself, stopping his packing for a moment to ponder. Okay, maybe the possibilities being endless is a bit of an exaggeration. He was going to Ponyville. While nice, it is just a typical town. Heck, it was in the name. It was a town with ponies in it. Nothing especially notable to say otherwise. What did it have that Canterlot didn't?
Guy thought about this question before coming to a sudden realization. Oh, right!
The bearers of the Elements of Harmony, of course. That was the answer to the question he didn't ask anyone. Those six ponies who have saved this entire kingdom time and time again all resided in or around Ponyville. This was Guy's chance to finally meet them, and maybe also give them a proper, formal thanks for what they've done.
"Maybe not that exact last thing there. Sounds a bit mushy," said Guy, struggling to close his suitcase. "But hey, maybe the 'don't meet your heroes' thing doesn't count for actual heroes." He managed to get the lid closed with a satisfying click, and with that he was already prepared to head out.
"Jeez, I can't believe I'm doing this. Actually taking initiative for once. Imagine that," said Guy, sitting down on his bed. Still, though, even with the idea of what he'd do now fresh in his mind, something still felt... missing.
Still not sure how this'll be life changing, though. Guy mentally asked himself. I'll go there for like, a week, meet them, come back, they'll probably forget I exist, and then I'll return to my old life.
Guy really didn't want that. He wanted some kind of substantial, permanent change to his lifestyle - something that would serve as a permanent cure to his never-ending boredom. Frankly, he'd be happy if he never had to wash a window again.
For no apparent reason, Guy hopped off his bed and went over to his closet, opening it and removing from it a small stack of newspapers. There weren't a lot of newspapers in Guy's collection, and the few newspapers that did have the honor of his closet space had one thing in common. They were all newspapers that covered the heroics of the Element Bearers. Guy spread the newspapers out over the floor, trying to decide which stories seemed the most notable.
That's a pretty nice picture of Discord. I wonder how they got it, Guy thought to himself. He was looking at a particularly old newspaper from a few years ago, one that covered the aforementioned villain's defeat and petrification at the hooves of Twilight and co. As much as Guy appreciated their efforts, he still had a bit of a strange admiration for the villains they tussled with, Discord especially. Other villains had real, malicious plans in mind, but everything Discord did made it seem like he was really... having fun. At least, it definitely looked fun.
It's not that Guy personally approved of everything Discord did, mind you, but he had a real appreciation for his complete lack of regard for authority. That, and his pure dedication for just, well, screwing with ponies. It reminded him of himself, in his earlier years. The days when he seemingly had no restraint for messing with authority figures really were the best days of his life.
Not that he had anything specific against authority figures, mind you, but heck if he didn't enjoy playing jokes on them. The authority aspect added a certain degree of danger to his pranks, and he really loved that, no matter how high that authority went.
Hence why it was such a shame that Guy had pretty much exhausted his pranking potential here in Canterlot. Almost everypony there was fully aware of his reputation, and so if something went wrong, ponies had a tendency to blame him for it - even if he really didn't have anything to do with it.
Guy shooed that annoying thought out of his mind and tried to think about his situation from a logical perspective. While everypony was fully aware of his past reputation of getting into trouble, Ponyville would be a complete clean slate, wouldn't it? He could start fully anew, with a whole fresh set of victims just waiting to be antagonized.
He didn't want to just retread the past, though. He wanted this to be a life-changing experience, after all. He needed to do something more significant than some dumb pranks. Something that would be remembered by others. Something that would be, like, covered in the newspaper or something.
Guy continued scanning over his own newspapers. Discord's got a pretty good picture on the front page there, he thought, Almost as big as the picture of Twilight and her friends.
Somehow, Guy managed to connect this idea with another in his mind, and the resulting idea was as follows: What if... What if I were to try this villain thing?
That idea got Guy's full attention almost instantly, either because it was so ridiculous or because it was, somehow, legitimately something he was considering. How would that even work, really? He was just an earth pony. And he certainly wasn't evil. He didn't want to take over Equestria or spread chaos throughout the land, and he certainly didn't want to cause legitimate harm to anypony. How could he possibly balance villainy with a basic conscience?
Guy got up and began pacing around his room, albeit very awkwardly as he tried to avoid the newspapers and his bed. He's an earth pony, and he has a conscience. Maybe those two facts could work to his advantage? He didn't have to be a real threat, just something ponies would take at least a little seriously. He just had to be real theatrical with it. Introduce himself formally as a villain, with... some kind of evil-sounding goal, and just, well, screw with everypony. Just not enough to actually get him in, like, legal trouble, or anything. The last place he needed to be during his vacation was a jail.
Still, though, his antics were always the most fun when they were at the expense of some kind of authority figure. Who in Ponyville holds any kind of authority or power?
After a short moment of considering the question, Guy's head snapped upwards in a moment of realization. "...Oh." He stared off into nothing as a grin formed on his face. "Now that is an interesting idea."
While by this point in time Guy had packed everything up and made it onto the train to Ponyville, he was still pacing back and forth in his train car, garnering some odd looks from the only other pony in the car with him. He had made sure he'd packed everything he needed - including a cape, just in case he needed a villain costume - and he even left a note on his front door for anyone that might be looking for him, saying "Gone on vacation. I'll be back in, like, maybe a week or something. I don't know.". He'd even taken one of his old newspapers with him, just for the heck of it.
Still, even having taken care of these things, Guy was still worrying about a few things. One thing he was trying to subdue was his conscience telling him that what he was doing wasn't one hundred percent morally sound. Guy did still appreciate what Twilight and her friends have done, of course, he just wanted to have a little fun with them. Was that really so wrong?
Hey, this could be good for them! Maybe they'd get another spot in the newspaper. "Twilight and Co. Stop Idiot Villain". There's a headline for you. Guy ultimately dismissed the thought and moved on to the second thing bugging him - mainly how he was going to even begin with this villainy thing. How do villains introduce themselves? It's not like he should just waltz up to Twilight's house, knock on her door, and say "Hey, Twilight, I'm Guy Pony, your new nemesis! Just thought I'l tell you."
No, no. Guy had to do better than that. After all, his pranks only went well whenever he actually bothered to plan them out beforehand. He wasn't so great at thinking on his feet. But, come on. He was so excited to try this out, he really didn't feel like waiting until he had a proper plan for it. He just wanted to go for it.
But he was just an earth pony, and by extension, not a unicorn. He couldn't just go "Abracadabra, suckers!" and make bad things happen. Given that he didn't have that kind of simplicity at his hooves, it meant he had to plot out exactly how he was going to do this, and then execute each part of the plan in such a manner that every aspect of it falls into place and gives him his desired result.
...Or maybe he'd just ring Twilight's doorbell and run away. That works too.
By the time the train made it into Ponyville, Guy had made little to no progress on how he was going to begin his campaign of villainy. Essentially, he had writer's block. Or, rather, in his case, villain's block. That wasn't really an established term, but it was accurate, more or less.
Guy stumbled off the train, pulling his suitcase along behind him and still not fully paying attention to reality as his mind was still preoccupied. The moment the fresh air hit his nostrils, however, his mind was immediately cleared of stress, and he let out a long sigh. Wow. The air was always nice in Canterlot, but not this nice.
Guy had better things to do than get high off of plain air, though. He was in Ponyville - There were buildings, houses, and roads as far as he could see, and many, many ponies walking the streets, just going about their day as usual. It all felt very homey. The only thing that particularly stood out to him was a huge, crystal castle out in the distance - Twilight's castle, the so-called "Castle of Friendship". A little garish-looking, he thought, but whatever. While it was pretty far away, it was at least a fairly impressive sight. Guy decided that would be his first destination - that is, after he found a place to stay and deposit his belongings. Dragging a wheeled suitcase around doesn't really add much to the villain aesthetic.
After a bit of wandering around the town, Guy managed to find a small motel. That was all he needed, and really, a non-conspicuous place like this served his purposes well. The last thing he needed was unwanted attention, after all. Guy made his way into the motel and up to the front desk, but stopped himself as he saw something out of the corner of his eye. Guy turned his head only to see a certain purple-maned white-coated unicorn step into the lobby.
Celestia help him, that was Rarity.
Guy swung his suitcase around in a panic and slammed it onto the ground in front of him, proceeding to hide behind it to the best of his ability. Oh, come on! He thought, peeking out a bit to make sure that was, in fact, Rarity, local seamstress and, more importantly, Element Bearer. You have to be kidding me. I've been in town for like, twenty minutes, and I already come across one of them?!
Rarity, thankfully, didn't see him, being too busy talking to whom Guy assumed was some friend of hers he didn't recognize. That at least served as some relief for Guy. That would seriously screw up his introduction later if she saw him here.
"Uh, sir?" The pony working the front desk said, peering down at Guy. "What are you doing?"
"Shut up! You're gonna blow my cover!" whispered Guy, still trying to get a look at Rarity without being seen. "Just give me a minute. Tell me when that white unicorn is gone."
"What, you mean Rarity?" the pony said, glancing over at her. "Well, okay, if you say so."
After a few more minutes, Rarity finished up her conversation and left through the front door. "Sir? She's gone now," said the front desk pony, gesturing at the door.
Guy stepped out from behind his suitcase, stretching his limbs out of the weird positioning he had to do to fit behind it. "Alright," he said, rummaging through his suitcase and taking a large bag of bits out. "I don't know how long I'll be staying. Just take these bits and give me however many days this pays for," he said, dumping a decent portion of the bag onto the counter.
The front desk pony looked at the bits in shock for a moment before looking back up at Guy. "Er, are you sure about this, sir? This is a lot of bits."
"Yeah, yeah, it's fine, I'll stay as many days as that'll get me."
"Well, if you say so," said the pony, grabbing a pencil and opening the book on the desk. "And, can I get a name for that?"
Oh, right. I probably shouldn't use my real name for this. "Uh, does it have to be a real name?"
The pony eyed him for a good few seconds before responding. "No, I suppose not. Just whatever you'd like to put it under."
"Okay, how about just... 'Fake Name'. That works, right?"
"I... suppose so." The pony was gradually growing rather suspicious of him, but given that he didn't really have any idea what he was suspecting, he simply wrote the name down, grabbed a key from under the desk, and handed it to Guy. "Alright, you're set. Just remember, you can always get a refund for any days you don't end up staying. Your room's number 16."
"Yeah, alright, thanks," said Guy, grabbing the key and putting it in his bag.
"Also, if you don't mind me asking, sir, what was that all about with Rarity?"
"Oh, you'll understand soon enough, don't you worry," said Guy, conjuring up a slightly evil-sounding chuckle. "Wait, no, that doesn't sound quite right. Let me try that again." He let out a second chuckle, this one sounding a decent bit more menacing. "Yeah, that's much better."
The front desk pony didn't respond, choosing only to stare at him confusedly as he walked out the door.