Hitch poked his head out from behind a tree with an explorer hat before hiding back, then he came from under a rock, and then popped out from hiding behind a bush with his bag, that had a robot claw holding a map.
"According to the map, the schmoogleberry bush should be riiigght, here!” Hitch called out reading the map. Once he putted it down, he saw Sunny and Knuckles with bored expressions, while Sunny had a raised eyebrow, since she and Knuckles were right next to the schmoogleberry bush with a basket. "Huh? How’d you get here so fast?" Hitch asked them.
"Um..." Sunny said with a cough. "We’re in our garden, Hitch" she pointed out with a smile.
"The Brighthouse it's literally over there" Knuckles added, holding a basket with grapes and still with a bored expression, while pointing to the Crystal Brighthouse that wasn't too far away from the garden.
"Huh... I definitely overpacked" Hitch said, as he brought out his adventurer's pack and opened it, bringing out his tent, two chairs and a fireplace that somehow lighted itself up, making the garden look like a campsite.
Knuckles leaned a little and whispered to Sunny's ear. "How's that this guy became the sheriff, again?" he asked her sarcastically, while Sunny just giggled a little.
"Well, let's get picking" Sunny announced as she turned to the bush. "That’s Schmoogleberry Pie isn’t going to 'schmoogle' make it self" she added with a smile and then laughed.
"Sweet Chaos, my humor it's so broken..." Knuckles said with a smirk, since he found the pun funny, even tho he knew it was terrible.
Sunny was about to grab a schmoogleberry, but gasped in surprise when the bush started to twitch.
"Watch out, Sunny!" Hitch warned and placed a hoof in front of Sunny for her safety, while the two ponies back up. "This bush could be dangerous!" he pointed out and took out a spork from his bag as a weapon. "Never trust anything that starts with schmoogle" he added with a frown.
"What are you going to do with a fork? Invite whatever is behind the bush to lunch?" Knuckles asked sarcastically, but Hitch ignored him and started to walk towards the bush.
As he got closer, he moved some of the bush open to reveal a raccoonicorn, wearing a hat and a badge, and a pegasnail, also wearing a hat, fighting over a schmoogleberry.
Sunny and Knuckles gave uncertain looks. "Huh. Not what I expected" Sunny said.
"I don't even know what I expected" Knuckles confessed.
While the critters continued fighting, Hitch turned to his friends with a smile. "Guys. You are about to see a master class in…uh..." he said, trying to come up with a name for his ability to talk to animals. "Critter Talkery" he said with a sheepish smile. He then turned to the critters, now with a normal smile. "Guys. What seems to be the problem?" he asked the two critters.
The raccoonicorn cleared his throat, although only Hitch could heard his voice, of course. "Well, you see us, raccoonicorns have been nibbling on these here branches for generations!" se answered to Hitch.
"Illegally, I might add" the pegasnail said. "We pegasnails have rights to all fruit-bearing plants in the garden. It says so here in the Great Snail Scroll" she added and lifted up said scroll, that was just a leaf with words and signature on it.
"That's just a rolled-up leaf!" the raccoonicorn pointed out with a glare.
"You're just a rolled-up leaf!" the pegasnail retorted as she glared back, and Raccoonicorn threw the leaf away.
The Lead Pegasnail and Lead Raccoonicorn tugged the berry they were both holding and broke it apart. The two critters glared and started to slap each other.
Knuckles, Sunny and Hitch looked at the critters with nervous expressions.
"We don't even need you to translate, Hitch" Knuckles assured. "We can see what's happening" he added.
"Anything we can do?" Sunny asked, as she pointed herself and Knuckles.
"Nope" Hitch answered with a confident smile. "All under control, guys. I got this" se assured to them.
"I highly doubt it..." Knuckles said with a glare. "Well, if you need me, I'm gonna be collecting some more grapes. Some for the pie and some for me" he added as he walked away.
"And I'm gonna go find some apples for the pie" Sunny added, as she took the empty basket and walked away as well.
The pegasnail and the raccoonicorn continued their slap fight, then Hitch came close to them.
"Look, there's gotta be a simple way to resolve this" Hitch said to them.
The Lead Raccoonicorn thought of what Hitch said and smiled. "You're right!" he said, then jumped to the ground and turned in a direction. "Raccoonicorns, assemble!" he announced, while three of his raccoonicorns comrades arrived with a homemade catapult behind them.
"Pegasnails, also assemble!" the Lead Pegasnail called out to her comrades, who popped up from behind the bushes and moved a catapult of their own as well, but at a slow paste, since they were snails. "We're going to need a minute..." the Lead Pegasnail said to the others, feeling embarrassed since she forgot that the Pegasnails are slow when they are trailing on the ground.
A few minutes later, Hitch and the Racconicorns were falling asleep from waiting for the Pegasnails. Once they were close enough, the raccoonicorns and pegasnails gave out challenging glares at each other.
Hitch saw that they were bout to fight, so he got in between the two sides. "Okay! This isn't what I had in mind!" he called out to them. "No fighting, no swords, and no unbelievably adorable catapults!" he scolded. "All we need is a schedule. The raccoonicorns can pick from the bush one day, and then the Pegasnails on the other. You'll take it in turns. I'll be watching to make sure you all stick to it" he declared with a smile.
One of the pegasnail soldiers was on the catapult and it accidentally tossed the pegasnail over them and crashed to the other side.
Later, Hitch finished the schedule and placed the sign down, with pictures of the Raccoonicorns and Pegasnails to take turns.
"Trust me. This is foolproof. Rules and regulations fix everything" Hitch assured with a smile, while the Lead Raccoonicorn and the Lead Pegasnail looked at each other, not really convinced on Hitch's idea.
Come on!
Got an issue (issue)? Got a problem (problem)?
Did you know I got the thing that's gonna solve 'em?
You need a guide, yeah, no substitutions
So listen here and I'll give you the solution
No time for playin', you must be selfless (yeah!)
So we can make sure that everypony benefits
And if we're gonna all win, no, we can't fool around
We just gotta make sure that we write it all down
We gotta all get along – we got a rule 4 that
That's why I'm singin' this song – we got a rule 4 that
We're gonna get the job done, don't forget to have fun
As a matter of fact, we got a rule 4 that
'Cause we all gotta learn – we got a rule 4 that
When everypony gets a turn – we got a rule 4 that
Things are much better when we all work together
Got a rule 4 that, we got a rule 4 that
Hey, hey! Hey, hey!
Oh-oh, oh-oh! (Come on!) Oh-oh, oh-oh!
Hey, hey! (We got a rule 4 that!) Hey, hey!
Oh-oh, oh-oh! Oh-oh, oh-oh!
Throughout the song, the raccoonicorns and pegasnails were sabotaging each other in various ways. Hitch would always catch them in the act and put up various signs prohibiting such acts, but to no avail, because the raccoonicorns and pegasnails kept fighting and fighting and fighting.
Hitch started to felt overwhelmed by this fight, since nothing that he did to prevent them from fighting was working.
A few moments later, Sunny came back with carrying a basket full of apples. Knuckles arrived as well, with a basket full of grapes on one hand and eating some with the other.
"Um, how's it going, Hitch?" Sunny asked as she and Knuckles came to view, only for them to widen their eyes in shock.
The raccoonicorns and pegasnails were fighting each other, while Hitch started to sweat and pant, after spending almost the whole day trying to calm them.
"It's, um... going pretty well?" Hitch tried to say and gave a weak laugh before he started to cry, loosing it completely since this was going terrible.
"Ha! Take that!" a pegasnail soldier called out as he and his comrade dropped dandelion against the Lead Raccoonicorn and one of his comrades, who were with the catapult.
"Dandelion incoming!" the Lead Raccoonicorn cried out, while his comrade launched the catapult at the incoming rival. The garden turned now into a small war zone, since projectiles came flying back-in-forth, and Hitch, Sunny and Knuckles watched with worried looks.
"What the heck it's going on here?!" Knuckles asked in panic.
"Ah! What did I do wrong?!" Hitch cried out panicked. "I thought I could use my new critter communication skills to really make a difference! But I just made things worse!" he cried out with a sad tone.
Sunny came to her friend and she placed a hoof on his shoulder for comfort. "It's okay, Hitch. You just gotta try a different approach" she suggested with a smile.
"And the quicker the better, all this war it's gonna mess up the berries" Knuckles pointed out.
"Like a weekly roster instead of a daily one?" Hitch asked.
"No" both Sunny and Knuckles said, since that idea already demonstrated that it's no use.
"Why don't you try seeing what they have in common?" Sunny suggested. "Remember, there's magic in unity" she added with a smile.
"Literally" Knuckles added with a little smirk.
"See what they have in common…" Hitch repeated, then looked at a raccoonicorn soldier being attacked by a pegasnail on top of him, while his head was covered in dandelion.
"Ooh! Ow! Ow! Watch the hair! Watch the fur!" the raccoonicorn cried out.
Hitch looked back at his friends and placed a hoof on his chin. "Hmmm…" he hummed to himself, thinking of what these critters could have in common.
The Lead Pegasnail led her comrades for a strike while carrying dandelions. "En masse! Pegasnails en masse!" she cried out.
"Raccoonicorns, attack!" the Lead Raccoonicorn cried out to his comrades as they charged at the pegasnails.
But before they crashed into each other, Hitch came in the middle of them with a table where he was standing, and looked at the two groups of critters with a frown, while the fractions stopped their strike.
"Hey, I'm battling here! What is this?" the Lead Raccoonicorn asked with a little anger.
"This is the talking table!" Hitch answered, having enough of this battle between the critters. "We're gonna sit around it, and we're gonna talk this thing out! Now!" he yelled out to them, very mad at their attitude.
The Lead Raccoonicorn and the Lead Pegasnail sat on the table with Hitch and started to spoke in their animal languages, discussing their differences about the berry bush they’ve been fighting for. They give out angry chatter as Sunny and Knuckles watched both worried and confused.
"You know, there's this weird aura around Hitch that I only see in him every time he talks to critters" Knuckles said suddenly.
"Aura? Like his sparkle?" Sunny questioned, since usually the referred to it as a sparkle, or at least Izzy does.
"No, not that thing Izzy sees in everyone else" Knuckles corrected. "It's... a weird aura that shines a little whenever he talks to animals. I don't know how to explain it better, it just shows up out of nowhere when he talk to the critters. It's like... like if he had this ability in another time..." he explained with a frown. "I don't know what else you expect me say..." he finished, as he and Sunny looked back at Hitch and the discussion between the critters
"I hear you, but we all have to work together if we want––" Hitch tried to state to the critters, but was cut off.
"Work together?! Ugh! Impossible!" the Lead Pegasnail protested, as she flew off the table.
"Hey!" the Lead Raccoonicorn yelled out with offense.
Lead Pegasnail and Lead Raccoonicorn yelled to each other animal languages again, while Sunny and Knuckles watched back-in-forth between the argument.
"Oh, come on now" Hitch broke the tension again, trying to calm the critters down. "There's gotta be something you both––" he tried to add, but again, he was cut off.
"Unless it's gotta do with baking, I don't wanna hear about it!" the Lead Raccoonicorn yelled out, with anger.
"Oh! Baking?" the Lead Pegasnail said in shock and surprise, as she landed back on the table. "I also love to bake!" she called out with a smile.
The Lead Raccoonicorn and the Lead Pegasnail looked at each other, then smiled with tears in their eyes and hugged each other as they cried with joy.
"Hey, bring it in here!" the Lead Raccoonicorn cried out as the Lead Pegasnail laughed.
Hitch gave the two critters a smile before turning to Sunny and Knuckles. "You were totally right, Sunny!" he said to his childhood friend as he walked to her and Knuckles, who were smiling at the new outcome. "Turns out they both love making berry-based treats, and now they're best friends!" he added, happy that the two critters fractions are now friends and are sharing the berries and other fruits for baking stuff.
"This is certainly an unexpected change of attitude, but a very welcome one as well!" Knuckles said with a smile.
"I'm proud of you, Hitch" Sunny said with a smile, placing a hoof on Hitch's shoulder.
"Me too, sheriff" Knuckles said, putting his hand on Hitch's back. "You truly are a creature charmer" he added.
Hitch smiled at his friend's comments. "Thanks, guys" he thanked with a smile, and then he turned to the other critters. "Hey. So, uh…" he started off with a nervous smile "... now can we pick some of those berries for our pie?" he asked them, since they still needed some of the berries.
The critters and the Leaders gave them looked at them, at first with a blank expression, but Sunny, Hitch and Knuckles perfectly knew what was about to happen, because the critters and Leaders glared at them, and started to throw multiple things at them.
Sunny and Hitch screamed as they ran away, while Knuckles followed and tried to avoid the attacks from the critters. "Forget what I say! They're not charmed at you at all!" he shouted in panic.
The three got lost on the sunset, while the raccoonicorns followed them very close and the pegasnails got behind since they were too slow.
And as the critters got away from the garden, Sonic and Pipp arrived at the garden a few seconds later, and saw all the signs and the mess that was in there.
"Uh... what happened here?" Pipp questioned with confusion.
"I have no idea" Sonic replied with honesty, as he ducked and grabbed the basket with apples that Sunny left behind. "But whatever problem got into the garden, those three were here. There's a basket with apples" he said, showing the basket to Pipp.
"And one with grapes" Pipp added, as she ducked and picked the basket with grapes that Knuckles also left behind. "They didn't even got the schmoogleberries" she pointed out, looking at the schmoogleberry bush.
"Well, wherever they are, we'll scold them later. Let's just pick the berries before Tails and Zipp lost their minds" Sonic said, as he took and empty basket and collected some schmoogleberries. "Again..." he added with a bored expression.
"Ugh, don't tell me! I don't wanna hear those two complaining" Pipp said, as she also grabbed a basket and collected some schmoogleberries as well.
THE END