“How in the world do you even make spaghettios?” Twilight asked frustratedly as she stood in the kitchen of Golden Oaks Library, Archard and a few of her friends with her. “What even is a spaghettio?”
“It’s little circles of pasta covered in sauce and served with meatballs,” Archard said happily with a smile, watching as the alicorn desperately tried to get the cooked spaghetti she made to form into a circle. “Sometimes those cans have hotdogs in them though, and that shit’s wacky. That’s not how I roll. It should be outlawed.”
“Well, this is completely impossible to make,” Twilight said, throwing her hooves in the air. “And I’m not using whatever animal a ‘meatball’ comes from. It’s inhumane.”
“If it’s inhumane, it’s the most delicious inhumane thing someone could possibly– hey, wait! How do you have the phrase ‘inhumane’ if there are no humans here?”
“Humans used to live here long ago, Archard,” Lyra said mystically from her position on the couch, writing down a whole list of notes on a piece of paper. “Ponies evolved from humans previously, which is why we say things like ‘inhumane’ or ‘give me a hand’. It’s part of our ancient culture.”
“Well, you should’ve kept spaghettios as part of human culture, too, if that’s true,” the human replied. “It’s a part of a balanced twelve year old’s diet.”
“Well, you’re ol’ pal Discord can make you some spaghettios, Archard,” the draconequus jumped in, appearing out of nowhere to enter the conversation. “But I don’t think I will, since you said you don’t want to be my friend. I might make some for myself and eat it in front of you just to prove how terrible you were for hanging me out to dry at that party I threw.”
“If that’s your prerogative, go right ahead,” Archard said casually. “I asked Twilight to make me spaghettios for a reason, and spaghettios are what she’s gonna make.”
“And you’re probably gonna have to wait until I learn a good cooking spell because these things are not coming together! Argh!”
“You know what? I’ll give you a pass since you apologized to me,” the human decided. He stretched his hand out to Twilight head and said, “We can move on to the second part of the agreement, which is–”
“Do you have to do this?” she asked, moving away before he could reach her ears. “I mean, come on! It’s unprofessional! And potentially sexual!”
“I don’t know what is going through your head that’s making you think that petting is some form of sexual activity. It’s not, and doubly so because horses are not attractive. Now get those disgusting lewd thoughts out of your head and bring your cute face over here for me to pet! Otherwise I’ll actually tie you up like we agreed to in the bet.”
She stared at Archard frustratedly, but the human said no more. He only stared back at her, extending his hand and waiting for her to bring her ears to it.
“Just do it, Twilight!” Lyra said. “Get it over with so we can get to interviewing him again. I have a whole list of questions to ask here!”
“Plus, it feels so amazing,” Fluttershy added gently. “You’re going to love it. Hopefully not enough to chase him around town like everypony else did earlier though.”
Her frustrated stare intensified, and she let out a little grumble of annoyance. “Look. I’ll let you pet me for one minute. One. After that, you have to stop immediately, and never ask to pet me again, okay? This is a one time thing!”
“Hehe, sure, if you say so. But don’t be surprised when you ask for more. Now get your stupid, dumb, cute muzzle over here right now.”
“Humph, rude.” She looked at his hand and lowered her ears, before carefully sticking her head under it and pressing against it. Just one second later, she gasped as Archard curled his fingers and gently began scratching her scalp. It took all her effort to not purr in response, but even still, she couldn’t help but arch her back and close her eyes. Still, she tried to contain herself as much as she could. She just knew that the human was enjoying her reaction.
“That feels good, doesn’t it?” Archard cooed like he would to a small foal. “You just sit there and enjoy it, you adorable little pony.”
“I– I’m not adorable… and you only have a minute.” She spoke breathlessly, breathing deeply as she let the wonderful sensation run over her. She was so into it that she didn’t hear Archard or Fluttershy giggling at her reaction. She tuned out everything except the sensation of his hands running through her mane, and then going down to her ears to scritch those, too. It was almost overwhelming when he brought his other hand to the other side of her head. She wasn’t ever going to admit that she wanted the feeling to last forever.
“I– I… okay,” she said, finally gathering the strength to pull away after a long minute. “Okay, that’s enough. I… wow. That… was okay. It wasn’t that great,” she lied. “Now let’s get down to business now that your minute is up.”
“Hehe, absolutely, although I bet that was the best fifteen minutes of your whole life, wasn’t it?”
“What? No, there’s no way that you pet me for fifteen minutes. Right Fluttershy? Lyra?”
Fluttershy giggled and nodded, and Lyra just shrugged, looking up for a second before turning her attention back to her pen and paper. Twilight looked to Pinkie Pie for an answer, who told her, “It wasn’t fifteen minutes, and I know that because I was keeping count in my head! It was actually seventeen minutes and thirty four seconds! And you were soooo cute the whole time! I didn’t think you’d like being pet that much, Twilight! But I guess even princesses need relief, don’t they?”
“She was absolutely adorable,” the human agreed. “I could tell she liked it a lot. But, uh, don't use the word relief to describe that ever again, thanks.”
Her ears flattened against her head again, her face going bright red as she stared at her hooves. “Yeah, well… I just lost track of time is all. It wasn’t that good.”
“Oh, of course it wasn’t, and that’s because I haven’t had time to scritch your wings and back and tummy yet. But I’ll let you go, since you fulfilled your obligation. Unless you want me to pet you more?”
“No!” she said quickly, blushing even more furiously. “Can we get on with interviewing you, please? I don’t want to waste all day.”
“Well, since you said please, sure.”
“I see. You’re going to spend time with Twilight Sparkle and not me?” Discord asked, putting a claw against his chest, appalled. “I’ll see myself out then. Don’t even consider asking me to send you home. Because I shan't be doing so.” Then he snapped a finger and vanished again.
“I didn’t expect you to,” Archard rolled his eyes. “Anyway, let’s get on with it, I guess. If I could get home sooner, that would be great. Don’t wanna be behind on bills and stuff if I can help it. And probation. Definitely can't skip seeing my probation officer.”
“We’re gonna try and send you back as soon as we can,” Lyra assured him as he sat down next to her. “I mean, it’d be nice to have you around forever so I can admire you and ask you questions and stare at your hands and stuff–”
“I am pretty admirable, and my hands are pretty great, according to the ladies and ponies.”
“–but you’re not a natural part of our ecosystem, so we can’t keep you here forever. Humans have very specific diets according to my studies.”
“We absolutely do. Chicken nuggets and macaroni, as good as they are, aren’t enough to sustain me. I need steak and potatoes and spinach and chocolate cake, too.” Twilight and Fluttershy made faces at the mention of steak and chicken nuggets, but Lyra kept her curious look on.
“Ooh, very interesting. I never imagined you’d like the same desserts as ponies do. Do you also eat hay?”
“I’m not really a hay man, but I’d say oatmeal is pretty–”
“I don’t mean to interrupt,” Twilight interrupted, “but can we actually start on what you know about our world instead of random dietary habits?”
“Hey, that’s right!” Lyra agreed. “If you’re from the past, then how can you have advanced knowledge of what’s gonna happen and know the things we did when none of it’s happened yet in the past?”
“Oh, that’s easy. I said it before. You’re all in a TV show… or, I thought you were. I guess this is an alternate universe based on a TV show? I don’t know how that would work, since it breaks basically all of the laws of physics that we know of, and is just a creation out of Lauren Faust’s brain, but… that’s how I know.”
“Mmm hmm, and what’s a TV again?”
“That would be a wonderful creation that delivers stories in play format, except with a much higher budget and higher quality, as well as motion picture illustrations. And also football.”
“Can you tell us what’s gonna happen in the future right now?” Twilight asked. “You said before that my library is gonna be destroyed. How is that gonna happen?”
“That… well, since I’m here and this isn’t all in my head, I’m wondering if it’s a good idea to tell you. It actually might not be, and when you throw in the fact that Discord seemed insistent on me not saying anything, it turns into an almost hard no on my part.”
“How is it not? If you can help us predict when disasters are going to strike, then–”
“Because it all works out in the end, so if I go and tell you what’s gonna happen, then it might change whether or not it works out. We can’t have that, because then we would never get my favorite episode ever, Yakkity Sax.”
“Well… do you promise it’s all gonna work out?” she asked. “I don’t want you to say this and then–”
“Twilight, it’s absolutely going to work out,” he said in assurance. “If it wasn’t going to, I’d let you know since I have to be here with you in Equestria right now. It’s all gonna be alright. Trust me.”
“But how can I trust you when–”
“Because that’s what friends do,” he told her. “And for us to be friends, there has to be some level of trust. It’s an important thing to have in any relationship.”
She let out a frustrated breath and opened her mouth to speak, but closed it a second later and sighed. She couldn’t beat that. It made sense, both what he said about trust and how, if he really did know the future, messing with it would bring nothing but chaos. But that didn’t mean it wasn’t going to drive her crazy to not know and make her paranoid and nervous.
“Okay. Okay, I’ll trust you. I don’t like it at all though, but I guess I can’t refute your advice.”
“I’m glad, because how you treated me yesterday was mean. Maybe by the end of this all, we can be friends and go out to eat some of that delicious macaroni Fluttershy cooked for me. Say, that makes me wonder: what kind of nutrition do ponies have?” Archard asked as a question of his own. “All I see Pinkie Pie eat is candy and sugar, and Applejack only eats apples, and yet they’re both healthy and fit. You wouldn’t be able to get away with that on Earth.”
“I don’t know, but it’s certainly not spaghettios,” Lyra answered. “Can you go into a little bit of an explanation about that? How does that fit into human culture? And how do you turn a string of spaghetti noodle into an O?”
Twilight rolled her eyes at the conversation. Yeah, he was still annoying. That hadn’t changed in the last twenty minutes. But maybe he wasn’t the worst thing in the entire world. After all, his hands did feel good.