Today had been awful. Mayor Mare had drawn the short straw as far as the workload today. All of her secretaries and aides had gone home many hours ago, and were now most definitely asleep in their comfy beds. Mayor Mare was not. She was doing paperwork. Her desk was piled high with parchments and scrolls that needed to be done by tomorrow. She lightly ran a hoof through her mane and slumped down a little lower while staring at an official complaint document. It was describing something about a certain pink Element of Harmony waking up their foal in the middle of the night with her loud ‘noises’. Why did I ever get involved in politics? she thought. I just want to go home and deal with all of this tomorrow.
Just then, the door to her office slammed open. She jumped a bit at the sudden noise. In the doorway stood a large imposing figure with small eyes, pale skin with no fur, and a patch of mane on the top of its head. It was standing on its two hind legs, wearing a blue robe, and staring right at her. "H-Hello? Can I help you?" Mayor Mare asked, hoping that it, whatever it was, could understand her.
It just continued to stand there for a minute staring at her. She started inching away, withering under the creature's gaze and cautiously said, "Um, the town hall is closed, so… if you could come back tomorrow morning… maybe I could help you out?" She was about to wave a hoof in front of the face of the creature since it seemed to be totally blanking out, only to have it suddenly have what looked like a sign in its hand and turn completely around. She leaned to the side to see if she could peek around and see what the creature was doing. It took the sign and slammed the post into the ground with one hand, firmly staking it. It then stood still staring at the sign.
She was about to say something to the creature about ruining her floor when it sidestepped and turned to face her. She looked at the sign again to see that the question 'Is this your town?' was burned into the surface of the sign.
"Y-yes, I suppose it is," she stuttered nervously. "I am the mayor of this town."
She noticed the creature once again just staring at her. It turned around again, slamming another sign through the floorboards. This sign asked, ‘Did you zone this build?’
Mayor Mare read this sign and was confused. What does this creature mean by “zone”?"Um, what do you mean?" she asked.
The creature turned again to the signs. She braced herself for another loud hole in her floor. Instead of slamming another sign down, the creature punched one of the signs. It shredded apart on contact with its fist, showering the larger room outside the office with splinters. The second one soon followed. Mayor Mare's eyes widened at the realization that that could have been her, and she may have just made it angry considering how it hit the signs.
The creature wasted no time in slamming another sign perfectly into the hole the first one was in. It paused for a moment before doing the same with three more. The first, again, was perfectly stuck in the other existing hole, and the other two were seemingly attached onto the walls of the office, despite the fact that no nails could be seen. It turned to face her once again and sidestepped to let her read the signs.
They read, 'Look, I know this town isn't zoned. Just get it zoned and approved by the Owner by tomorrow night and there won’t be any issues. I am giving you a rule book containing all the information you need to get it zoned.' The creature then tossed a book unceremoniously on the floor, causing Mayor Mare to flinch.
She picked up the book tentatively and set it on her desk. "Thank you…" she half asked. "…I suppose?" she added under her breath. Hoping to let some of the tension that had built up in the room she asked, "Um, could I get your name?"
Immediately she regretted the decision as the creature slammed yet another sign through the floor. A short time passed, and it moved aside so she could see the sign: 'ADMIN:NotDustYet.' She subconsciously shuffled nervously at the strange but intimidating sounding title. Under the name was more: 'What is yours? I can't seem to see your name tag.'
She didn't know why it thought she would be wearing a name tag, but she answered anyway. "Mayor Mare," she said with a slightly nervous edge to her voice. She was about to ask it to elaborate on the 'zoning' thing when it stabbed another sign into the ground, effectively ruining more of her office floor. This one said, 'I'm going to bed. See you tomorrow.'
Without further delay, the being turned and quickly walked out of the building. Mayor Mare watched it exit the front door and abruptly disappear. She just stood there, looking at the spot that the 'ADMIN' was standing in as if something was going to happen. Nothing happened. She shook her head to clear her thoughts. She closed the front door and turned around to assess the damaged floor. There were splinters everywhere and the signs were still stuck fast in the places where the creature had put them. Mayor Mare threw her hooves up and cried in defeat, "I give up. I'll get somepony to deal with it tomorrow."
Morning
Dante stirred in his sleep. Something wasn't right. It was too bright and his bed was too hard. He rolled over, only to get a mouthful of dirt and gravel. "Ack," Dante gagged as he sat upright and spit out the foul taste of earth. He opened his eyes and was met with the sight of a dirt road. "Where the heck am I?! How did I get here?" Dante cried as he quickly scanned his surroundings. Was I kidnapped in my sleep? Did the government do this? What is going on? his mind raced. When he looked down, he was shocked to see nothing. He practically screamed in alarm, "AM I DEAD?!"
Calm down, calm down… Panicking does nothing for anyone. Well, I can feel my limbs and taste the dirt. I must just not be able to see them, he rationalized. It's as if I'm in /vanish. He reached over to pick up a rock, but it seemed to slip right through his fingers and not move at all. Huh, just like /vanish. I can observe but not interact. He looked up to the sky to see the sun was near its peak. He guessed it was about eleven-thirty or noon.
Just as he was starting to get his bearings, he heard footsteps behind him. He began to panic, but remembered that he was invisible. Probably, he thought. He turned around and saw a familiar building. Hey, it's that town hall from the… Mine… His thoughts broke up as the situation seemed to have made itself a little more complicated. The footsteps he was hearing were coming from around the side of the building. Around the corner came a very strange animal: a hot pink and somewhat disfigured horse with giant eyes.
"Hiya new pony, I'm-," the little pink horse started but abruptly stopped, seeing no one around. Dante felt his eyes nearly bug out of his head at the sight of a talking horse. What did I eat last night? he wondered as he watched the little crayon-colored equine look under a rock for something. "I could have sworn somepony new was in town! My Pinkie Sense is always right," the girl—Dante assumed it was a girl from its high-pitched voice—said aloud. "Guess they like to play hide and seek," she squeaked happily as she hopped away.
"That was bizarre," Dante said as he stood up. He dusted himself off out of habit and took a better look at the building. "Yeah, it looks like the one from the server, but it’s much more detailed and less… square," he said. Does that mean that I just went up to some random person and told them I would destroy their whole town if they didn't ask Sarah to spare it? he thought. I should probably go and apologize.
He walked up to the door and tried to knock on it. No sound. He tried pushing the door. It didn't budge an inch. Oh, right, /vanish. "Hmm," he hummed to himself, thinking of a way to un-vanish. "Un-vanish," he yelled. He looked down to see no change. Nice. He tried thinking of reappearing, but there was still no result. More small horses were walking up and down the road now. Since none of them paid him any mind, he dismissed them. Hmm, how would I do this normally… keyboard? Dante raised his hands up as if they were on a keyboard at stomach level.
The world immediately stopped around him. The colors were muted. All conversations from the horses and all noise, silenced. He could see his arms and body now. Under his hands was a black keyboard with glowing letters. In front of him was a white-bordered black box with a blinking white cursor in it. "Whoa," Dante awed. He poked the side of the keyboard, expecting it to bob around. It instead was static and didn't move at all. He pressed a key and the corresponding letter appeared in the black box. "OK, this works," he chuckled. He typed in /vanish and hit enter. The world resumed, color came back to life, and noise started right where it had left off. He looked down to see that he could still see himself. He was different from how he remembered, though.
He didn't have time to explore that, as he heard screams from the road behind him. He whipped his head around to see two more brightly colored horses running away full tilt, screaming their heads off. With the way they are screaming, I wouldn't be surprised to hear 'the horror!' or 'oh, the humanity!’, he thought jokingly.
"THE HORROR!" one of them wailed.
Dante then doubled over wheezing. Oh my god, did that really just happen? He had a hard time thinking through the convulsive laughing. "Oh, my stomach! *wheeze* It hurts! That's so *wheeze* dumb," he said, trying to calm himself. He took a deep breath and regained his composure. He turned back around to face the doors. "OK," he steeled himself for what might be torches and pitchforks.
Three knocks on the door was all it took for someone inside to holler, "This is a public building, door’s open." Dante pushed the door open and stepped inside the town hall. There were little horses of varying colors all over the large room, sweeping up splinters of wood and char. The office from before still had the signs in the doorway, seemingly preventing it from closing. He locked eyes with a light brown horse in the room. This seemed to send her into a panic because her pupils shrank and her bored look shifted to a visage of pure horror. All of the other equines in the room seemed to have noticed him at this point. Every single one stopped what they were doing and chose to instead silently move as far away as possible and hide behind or under something.
"Uh, is there one 'Mayor Mare' I can speak with?" Dante asked aloud. The light brown horse visibly flinched at that. "They are about six foot two, teal shirt, blue jeans…" he continued, "…Not a horse… Anyone seen 'em?"
"I'm Mayor Mare," the light brown one squeaked out.
"No, you aren't. Mayor Mare isn't a horse. I literally just said that," Dante countered.
"I'm a pony, not a horse, and yes, I am Mayor Mare," she retorted. Ah, pony. Yeah, that makes way more sense, Dante thought.
"OK, pony. What did I tell the mayor last night, then?" Dante knew he had her there.
"You told ME that I needed to get the town zoned," she said, a bit peeved at his attitude. She quickly realized her mistake as she once again noticed the bits and pieces of wood strewn about the floor. "Sorry, I didn't mean to be rude," she said, hoping to not have angered the creature—‘ADMIN:NotDustYet’ as she was reminded by the sign in front of her. She smiled nervously.
Dante noticed her unease. "It's OK. I still don't believe you though." He then put his hands up like they were on a keyboard again. The world froze once more. "Wow, that is so weird." He typed /tp NotDustYet <Mayor Mare> into the box and hit enter. The world resumed. Instead of feeling like he had moved, as he had expected, it felt like the world had moved to him. It was instantaneous and he was now behind the light brown pony, within arm’s reach. Huh, guess that works too. Neat, Dante thought.
Mayor Mare looked around and sighed. "Phew, glad that's over with," she said relaxing a bit. She heard the sound of rustling cloth behind her and turned around to see the 'ADMIN' creature right there. She shrieked as she jumped back and bumped her desk.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Calm down, Mayor Mare," Dante said, making a calming motion with his hands. "I believe you now. Also, we may have gotten off on the wrong foot. Can we talk?"
Mayor Mare did some breathing exercises and calmed down. After a bit, she shakily said, "Alright, I'm calm. We can talk."