The Perfect Little Village of Ponyville

by McPoodle

Epilogue: Post-Mortem (and Credits)

Twilight Sparkle woke up.

She was back in the teleportation room in Canterlot Castle.

Waking up at the exact same instant was Vinyl Scratch.

No other ponies were in the room.

“Greetings, Twilight Sparkle,” said the voice of Cecil. “Welcome back, Vinyl.”

Twilight had no idea why the talking rock had poured so much more emotion into Vinyl’s salutation than into hers.

She tried to sit up, and immediately hissed in pain. She summoned an ice pack to wrap around her haunches.

Vinyl Scratch winced in sympathy. “I hope you’re not hurt too badly, Twilight.”

“Don’t worry about it, it’s just a bruise,” said Twilight. “I’ll just be walking funny for a while. After all, I’m the one who almost killed you all.” The weight of what she said suddenly sunk in. “I am so sorry, Vinyl,” she pleaded.

“It’s alright,” Vinyl said, carefully adjusting her sunglasses. “I’ve always wondered what it would be like to see.”

This wasn’t quite the response Twilight was expecting. “Um...and what did you think? Of seeing, that is.”

“You can keep it. I’m much more comfortable with my darkness.” Vinyl then got up and walked over to the wall, feeling her way around until she reached the door.

“So what happens now?” Twilight asked. “And where are the others? Are...are we awake?”

Vinyl Scratch tried to open the door, and failed, using both her hooves and her magic. She then pounded on it. “Do you hear that?” she asked. “No echo. There’s solid stone behind that door. I think that means that this isn’t the real room, just a dream version.”

Vinyl reached back with her mind, and realized that the details of the dream she had just experienced were fading, just like any other dream.

“Am I dreaming?” asked Cecil, unnoticed by the ponies. “It doesn’t feel like a dream...”

“I believe you, Vinyl,” Twilight said, nodding. “We’re in a dream trap chain. The only way out is through. If only we could control which pony’s dream we visit next...”

“Well, that depends,” said Vinyl. “What do you think of the song ‘25 or 6 to 4’, by Sheeka-Go? Or was it Chicago? I’m not quite sure how to pronounce it.”

“The group’s name is pronounced ‘Chicacolt’, and the song is my favorite one out of Pinkie Pie’s collection.”

Vinyl Scratch just had to know. “Does the title mean anything?”

Twilight scratched her head. “Well it’s about staying up late studying...I think,” she said. “So why did you ask about that song?”

“When Cecil’s spell failed to work on me, I used that song to dance my way in.”

“Dance your way...into my dream?” asked Twilight incredulously.

“Indeed!” exclaimed Cecil. “It was amazing!”

The sheer amount of passion the rock had put into that last word slightly unnerved Twilight.

Vinyl on the other hoof didn’t seem to notice. She said, “I think we can repeat that technique to target any pony’s dream we want, just so long as we know their favorite songs.”

“And this should get easier as we go on,” said Twilight, getting excited. “In my dream, only you knew that anything was wrong at the start, and you lacked your memories. Well next time, you’ll know who you are, and so will I. We wake that dreamer up, and there will be three of us in the next dream, and four in the next, and five in the final dream. And after that...the Dragon Emperor.”

“So whose dream do we invade first?” asked Vinyl.

“We’re going to be visiting the dark secrets and mad dreamscapes of each of our friends. Now who is the best possible navigator to bring along on our journey?”

“Pinkie Pie.”

“Exactly.”

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic is copyright Hasbro, with extra credit given to Lauren Faust for the specifics of the series. The characters of DJ Pon-3 (aka Vinyl Scratch), Spike, Rarity, Applejack, Pinkie Pie/Pinkamena, Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy, Twilight Sparkle, Nightmare Moon/Princess Luna/Black Snooty, Princess Celestia, Mayor Mare, Graphite (the fan name of a real background character from the show; he was officially named Dark Moon two years after I wrote this story), Doctor Whooves, Caramel, Big Mac, Soarin’, Applebloom, the Diamond Dogs, the locations of Equestria, Canterlot, Ponyville, Appleloosa, Manehattan, Fillydelphia, the Everfree Forest and the Castle of the Royal Pony Sisters, and the concepts of the Summer Sun Celebration, Winter Wrap-Up, and the Elements of Harmony (and their reference guide) are taken from that source, although the radically-different interpretations of all of these is my doing. Stalliongrad is a fan creation. The characters of the Dragon Emperor (both of them), Waking Terror and Cecil, and the concepts of the Draconic Bloodline Code, using “diamond dust” as a mind-control agent, “The Number 11”, the Gifts of the Ancients, Skybreak, the Dream Trap and Dream Trap Chain spells, the location of Castle by the Sea, and the company Equestria Acoustics are my creations. As for Apple Incorporated, their trademarked Applebug and their copywrited phrase “Appletastic Treats”...anybody wanna buy some stock in an imaginary pony fruit conglomerate?

“25 or 6 to 4” is a 1969 song by Chicago. The blistering performance used here is from the 1969 Toronto Rock and Roll Revival concert. The sunrise song is the first movement of Symphony No. 6 in D (1761) by Franz Joseph Haydn, nicknamed the “Morning” (performed by Adam Fischer and the Austro-Hungarian Haydn Orchestra). “Once Upon a December” is from the soundtrack of Anastasia (recording is a remix by D3Y Featuring Lauren). The songs sung in the prison are “Ol’ Man River” (from Show Boat, 1927—here’s one of Paul Robeson’s performances of the song), “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” (traditional—here’s a performance by Louis Armstrong), “Amazing Grace” (John Newton, 1779—here’s a performance by Nana Mouskouri), “Danny Boy” (Frederic Weatherly, 1913—here’s a performance by the three least articulate characters ever “The Leprechaun Brothers”...)

...and “River of Jordan” [“There is only one river...”] (Peter, Paul and Mary, 1972—the performance is by Lorna Patterson from the movie Airplane!, 1980). “The Smile Song” is from the Friendship Is Magic episode “A Friend In Deed” (2012); it was written by Amy Keating Rogers and Daniel Ingram and was sung by Shannon Chan-Kent and Andrea Libman. “Wake, Awake” is the English translation of “Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme”, a chorale by Philipp Nicolai (1599). Here is a performance of the English chorale by the Wartburg Choir, and here is the fantastic Bach version of the second verse (1731) performed by the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra led by Ton Koopman.

I probably forgot a lot of the inside jokes I snuck into this story, but here are the ones where I remember where they come from. “Who’s a silly pony” is the name of a Generation 1 My Little Pony song. “It’s a funny-sounding word: Obey” is from a Bill Cosby routine about marriage vows. “A word of kindness is better than a fat pie” is a Russian proverb (although I’m sure I got it from a movie or something...). “Kneel Before Zod” of course is from Superman (1978). “The Dreaded Pinkamena Diana Pie” has been said to have been inspired by “The Dread Pirate Roberts” from The Princess Bride (1987), but the characters differ from each other as much as they are similar—I just thought that “dread” went well with P.D.P.’s name. Her sign is an example of the “Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking” TV Trope (and yes, I was evil enough just now to drop a TV Tropes link in here to suck up all your free time). Poncho is more than a little inspired by the alter ego of the Hanna-Barbera cartoon character Quick Draw McGraw: El Kabong. Pinkamena’s manifesto is based on Tom Joad’s speech at the end of The Grapes of Wrath. Toronado is Zorro’s horse (character created by Johnston McCulley, 1919). The “Hounds” that Cecil says possess the unconscious in the Astral Planes were inspired by the short story “The Hounds of Tindalos” by Frank Belknap Long (1931). The idea that you can get anything you want by lying down in a field and wishing really hard is from A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs . Each and every use of the number 42 ever are inspired by The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (1978). The “Bigby” from Bigby’s Book of Non-Unicorn Mental Magic is a reference to the Dungeons & Dragons non-player character created by Rob Kurtz in 1973 and for whom so many wizard spells were named. The Mystery Spot is the name of several tourist attractions (I’ve been to the one in Santa Cruz, California) but is more memorably known from the PC game Sam & Max Hit the Road (1993)—of course in the end it turns out to be YouTube (2005-present; the cat/breakfast pastry is of course Nyan Cat, and the Liopleurodon was most-memorably from “Charlie the Unicorn”). The idea of “Shave and a Haircut” being irresistible for toons comes from Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988). Pinkamena’s rant ending in “Mass hysteria!” is derived from Ghostbusters (1984). And talk of villains preparing to kill someone while offering to give them their “Eternal reward” always makes me think of Jafar from Aladdin (1992). The Army of Darkness is just an army of darkness—no relation to the 1992 Evil Dead sequel. Goodnight Moon is a children’s book by Margaret Wise Brown (1947).

Finally, compact discs were developed by the Philips and Sony companies in partnership in 1979.