Written by: Autocharth
Iron Will was a creature of many things. He was a creature of hardened muscle, of fierce business principals and of strong morals. Most importantly, as far as this rather nice morning was concerned, he was a creature of habit.
“If in the mornings you’re a bore, greet the day with a roar!” was one of his habits and catchphrases both.
Unfortunately, he was also a creature of one more thing this fine morning. He was a creature of – or rather, with – a hangover. Iron Will greeted the day with a roar out of habit and in turn the day greeted him by banging large metal pans over the inside of his skull.
Gripping his head Iron Will gave a very loud cry of distress. In what was perhaps typical of the days like this, this simply made the problem worse and so another loud sound of pain was emitted by the monster- the minotaur. Theoretically this could have gone on for several more hours, since Iron Will’s name was rather to the point and accurate in terms of a willpower he would have employed in refusing to fall unconscious at the mounting torment of his own screams punching him in the inside of the skull.
There are an infinite number of parallel universes and eventually you can find one in which any given event is occurring, or so some say. Whether this is true or not there was a parallel universe in which the theory postulated above about his day spent in pain did in fact happen. The destruction both wide-scale and personal was amusing and breathtakingly hilarious but since that would be much too exciting, this story isn’t concerned with that particular universe.
As Iron Will inhaled to let out another throat stretching bellow of agony there was a moment of silence that a quiet ‘eep’ and a thud managed to fill. Iron Will’s air intake valve, or rather his mouth, stopped sucking in oxygen as he became confused.
‘That wasn’t a very Iron Will-like sound to make.’ He managed to think through the gong going off between his ears. It occurred to him that perhaps he hadn’t actually been the one to make it. Opening his eyes in one go to look proved to be not the wisest decision and he only just avoided starting the entire cycle of yelling and being in pain again. Taking a deep breath, Iron Will slowly, so very slowly, opened one eye at a time, letting it adjust to the light gradually.
His first coherent thought on seeing the room around him was that it looked...girly. The walls were painted a soft yellow and the curtains on the little window not far away were pink. The roof was also very close to his head although Iron Will had to admit that wasn’t really an indication of girliness so much as the world being too small for Iron Will. It did bring to light the other problem; the room was very small.
Shifting slightly, the minotaur learned the additional fact that he was on a bed of some kind, doubtless also far too small for him and likely now with its warranty voided. Between the two of them it must have been rather strained.
‘Wait, two? Why did I think that?’ He wondered, scratching his forehead. Normally he would slap it a bit to get his brain going but this morning he decided not to do so for various reasons. One was the monkey kicking the back of his eyes from the inside.
“Get it together minotaur,” He ordered himself, slapping a hand against his knee. “C’mon Iron Will, I wanna hear you ROAargh!”
Trying to remember that shouting was not a good idea, which cut out most of his personal slogans and motivational sayings, Iron Will looked around the room a bit further once the pain from his aborted roar faded. There had been an ‘eep’ he had been trying to find the source of.
The bed creaked under his weight as Iron Will stepped off, crouching beneath the low roof. He decided not to take the creaking personally since it was clearly a bed meant for a pony.
‘Wait, a pony?’
He looked at the bed again. Yes, it was definitely a pony’s bed. A mare’s bed, if the yellow sheets with pink butterflies was any indication. To Iron Will, it was.
“Iron Will is confused,” He muttered, scratching his chin, tugging lightly on his goatee. “When you’re confused...defuse? Refuse? Huh, needa work on that one. Wish I had my notepad.”
So focused on trying to word a new phrase, Iron Will nearly missed the little pink mane peeking over the other side of the bed and the wide eyes staring at him. When he turned to look they retreated. That answered the question of if he had broken into somepony’s home while he was drunk.
Actually it didn’t. There was a pony and this was a house but he couldn’t remember how he got there. For all he knew he had been drunk enough to acquire ninja-like stealth and sneak in but quite frankly there hasn’t been a minotaur with a reputation for stealth. Not since Soft Noodle anyway, and they didn’t talk about him.
“Um, hello?” Iron Will began awkwardly. He didn’t go on benders often so he wasn’t all that used to waking up in a pony’s bedroom. “Iron Will, well, I’m not sure quite su-”
He made the mistake of taking a step around the bed to get a better view of the pony as he talked and mid-word a blur of yellow and pink shot through his legs and out the door. He followed it, lowering his head and smacking it against the bed frame.
Rubbing his forehead wearily and pulling the blanket his horn had pierced off it, Iron Will snorted. “Iron Will thinks that was rude.” He did note that he was in the room – which now that he thought about it had a strangely familiar colour pattern to it, as did the blur – of somepony he couldn’t remember so he wasn’t exactly in any position to judge.
Taking a deep breath, he turned to pursue this pony and get some answers. His progress was made a tad more difficult by doors half his size. Once again in his travels across Equestria to bring assertiveness to the masses, Iron Will cursed all pony door makers and their lack of foresight.
“When somepony’s rude, don’t be crude,” He mumbled, reminding himself that just smashing through the door and wall would be bad. Iron Will was finding his new ‘soft assertiveness’ that he was preparing rather helpful himself. It was sometimes hard to remember that ponies didn’t lock horns and try pushing each other over in bouts of pure aggression to resolve problems like his kind did. He assumed this had to do with a lack of more than one horn, and then only a third of their population had horns so it just wasn’t viable.
He still thought getting kicked out of Canterlot for encouraging feuding ponies to try ramming each other in games of ‘chicken’ was unfair. So a few ponies got concussions and that one mare’s eyes got a bit wonky, progress isn’t smooth.
Iron Will wondered if maybe he should try his new soft assertive workshop there first. Maybe with two Princesses – or was it three? – they’d be a little more relaxed.
After navigating his way through the very, very small house Iron Will came to what looked like a living room. He assumed it did under the living carpet of animals. Critters, really, the sort of woodland creatures that frolicked...
‘Wait, what? Why does that sound familiar....’ Iron Will rubbed his forehead again, wishing the ape throwing barrels around would leave his brain alone. It hurt.
He took a step into the room, avoiding the critters out of common curtesy. It wasn’t good form to wake up in somepony’s house and leave smoshed animals all over the floor. To Iron Will’s annoyance, the animals seemed to occupy every spot he tried to go even when he was fairly certain they hadn’t been there a second before.
“When somepony tries to block, show them that you ro-” He began to intone to himself as he prepared to sweep them out of the way. A carrot interrupted him, smacking the minotaur on the snout. It did nothing for his headache.
‘What is it with interrupting Iron Will this morning?’
Looking for the source of the vitamin A-filled projectile Iron Will found instead a looming realisation.
‘Why are all the animals staring at me?’
A little white bunny seemed to be the ring leader and source of the carrot. He was bouncing another carrot in one of his paws while glaring at Iron Will. The look on the rabbit’s face could have qualified for assault and battery all on its own.
“Err...”
The sight that would have greeted anypony passing Fluttershy’s out of the way cottage would garner two kinds of reactions, depending on how long the viewer had been in Ponyville. ‘Veteran’ inhabitants of Ponyville would just sigh or maybe watch for a minute out of mild interest. Newcomers would probably find the sight of a massive, muscle bound minotaur fleeing from a delicate, dreamy cottage as various vegetables and pieces of animal feed were thrown at him en masse by apparently enraged woodland critters to be one worth a few minutes of confused staring or panicked fleeing.
Iron Will burst through the door, possibly taking it off its hinges. He was standing at the top of a gently sloping path on one side, the other a rise nearly his height from the top of the hill the house was built on directly in front of him. Being the direct and to the point creature he was, Iron Will leapt from it. Looking back he recognised the place at last. Fluttershy, the first pony to not be one-hundred percent satisfied with his work. He distantly remembered dropping a bright pink pony off the edge he had just jumped.
There were two things about that last part he remembered. His goats kept telling him they should come back, because her tail tasted like cotton candy and the actual important fact that she had landed in muddy water. Looking down with nearly a whole second to spare Iron Will was just happy the stream wasn’t muddy anymore.
Water went flying in every direction. The impact jarred Iron Will more than it normally would. The water was shallow enough it didn’t even reach the top of his hooves. But he felt the landing in every part of his body thanks to a bad landing. Most importantly he felt it in his head.
Angel Bunny stood on one of the fence posts at the top of the rise, smirking down at the minotaur clutching his head and moaning in pain. He might not be able to get rid of him forever but that would teach the monster to steal his pony. With one last carrot thrown at his vanquished foe, Angel Bunny hoped down and went back inside, dismissing his militia with an arrogant twitch of his whiskers.
Slowly staggering out of the stream, his fur dripping slightly as he stomped out wincing at every step, Iron Will sat on the grass and stared up at the house. How could he have forgotten! Fluttershy was pink and yellow, and it was her house. Clearly he had...ended up in her house? Iron Will scratched his chin thoughtfully.
“If you’ve done a wrong, try to make a right,” He came up with on the fly despite his pounding skull. He nodded in satisfaction at the slogan, making the steel balls in his head bounce around some more. Rubbing his forehead again Iron Will thanked whatever made minotaurs for making them so much better at handling things like nausea than ponies or most other races. He couldn’t quite remember how much he drunk but Iron Will was certain any non-minotaur would be puking or something like that.
Strong of constitution minotaurs might be but they were not known for their abilities to fight off things like headaches. Pony scholars suspected it was something to do with the horns, which in their impartial and unbiased opinions were clearly over-compensation.
The fact that nearly
Staggering to his hooves, Iron Will decided to look for Fluttershy. Since he didn’t know which way she went, he would just have to follow the path to Ponyville. Trudging along he tried to remember why he was here...oh, right; he had been coming to celebrate New Years in the place where the idea for his new workshop had come from. It made sense, or it had to him before, to greet the year he launched his new series of seminars there. Iron Will had also heard that Sweet Apple Hard Cider was made here and it was New Years after all.
So there had been cider. A lot of it. And something called ‘scrumpy’ but his memories were still fuzzy on that. For all the minotaur knew that was the name of a pony.
“Scrumpy...why does Iron Will remember ‘scrumpy’...” He wondered aloud.
“Surprised you want more of the stuff after last night!”
Iron Will kept walking for a moment, until he realised the comment had been directed at him. Or so he assumed since a pony was now walking next to him. She looked vaguely familiar, with a berry cutie mark.
“Um...hello?” Normally Iron Will’s greetings were a tad more verbose. “Iron Will is not sure if you were addressing him. Were you?”
The pony nodded cheerfully. “Sure was big guy! Just sayin’ after the amount you put away last night I didn’t think you’d be wanting more so soon.” She shrugged. “But hey, I thought you’d be dead.”
“Dead? I’m conf- I mean, Iron Will is confused.” The minotaur groaned. “Why would Iron Will be dead?”
“Colt please, you drank enough special Mac Attack scrumpy to kill anypony, even Big Mac himself. As Ponyville’s foremost drunk, I was impressed.” The mare didn’t seem to mind naming herself a drunk.
“Huh?” The pony looked confused now. “The bird? Uh, don’t know about minotaur but I don’t know any ponies who carry birds with them and I think they’d protested if you tried to flip them.”
“No no, flip them the bird! Give them the finger!” Iron Will demonstrated at the pony.
She looked from his outstretched hand to his face and back again. “Uh....” She lifted a hoof and waggled it at him. “...hooves?”
Iron Will’s expression dropped. Now that explained why that slogan had never caught on! “Of course, hooves! Oh, why did Iron Will not see it before?” He let out a loud groan, hanging his head. “Iron Will is too head painy to deal with this. Strange drunkard pony, have you seen Fluttershy?”
“The name’s Berry Punch, not surprised you forgot.” Berry Punch shrugged and pointed down a road. “Think I saw a Fluttershy coloured blur going that way, but I’m still drunk from last night so who knows.” She laughed as though she didn’t have a care in the world. As far as she was concerned, she didn’t right now.
Deciding not to question this possibly crazy pony, Iron Will nodded his thanks, cursed the ball and chain swinging around his brain again and set off. Looking back, the apparent coherency of Berry Punch vanished when she tried to walk without anything to focus on.
Iron Will found ponies waving to him and saying hello quite frequently. A few showed signs of suffering a hangover of their own. He assumed he had met them last night. His memory still remained fuzzy, although he had managed to think for long enough without falling to the ground with his hands against his head to remember arriving in town just before sunset and a bubbling mass of pink pony had come along to invite him to something. After a gasp they had a conversation he was fairly certain involved him discussing that no, he was not here for revenge or anything silly like that. She gave him a cupcake for that.
It was a very nice cupcake too. He missed it.
Just thinking about that soft, moist cupcake made his stomach grumble but he kept on going. Apologising for breaking and entering was more important. Pausing to ask directions at the first intersection he was sent down another road and, strangely received a congratulations. Iron Will just shrugged and walked on.
Now that he thought about it, ponies had been congratulating him for some reason. He mostly ignored it since half their words were blocked out by the throbbing, pounding ache.
Iron Will grabbed a bottle of water from a passing pony, who was gleefully selling to every hungover pony he could find. The minotaur threw him a few bits and kept on going. Even his steps were heavy enough to send vibrations up into his skull and set of the explosives carefully left there by the cider. Eventually he was heading out of town again, towards a place that looked like it was full of apple trees.
Halfway down the dirt track, something bumped into his back. The normally immovably huge Iron Will stumbled, staggering slightly. He turned, looking tiredly down at the grey pegasus who seemed to have run into him. She got up, dusting her mailmare’s hat and mailbag before looking up at him with a smile.
Iron Will didn’t like that the first thing he noticed were her eyes. He liked to think he was better than that. But they were wonky. The next minute or so consisted of him trying to meet her gaze. ‘Don’t be shy, look ‘em in the eye’ after all. It was hard and his eyes began to ache anew until he gave up.
“Iron Will’s eyes hurt,” He grumbled, not realising he had said it aloud until too late. His cheeks went red under his fur. “Er, sorry.”
The mailmare shrugged. “I thought we were having a staring contest. Nopony ever wants to play me for some reason.” She pouted before brightening. “Hi again! You might not remember but I’m Derpy.”
She lifted a hoof, which he shook awkwardly.
“Iron Will is...Iron Will.” He looked down at her. “So, Iron Will met you last night?”
Derpy nodded, smiling, one of her eyes looked off to the side. “Yep, at the big New Years party. I didn’t stay long, so I missed the big event. Congratulations by the way.”
“...Thanks. What exactly are you congratulating Iron Will f-”
“Oh!” She interrupted, diving into her mailbag. “I just remembered why I was looking for you. Since nopony was at home would you be able to drop this off with Fluttershy? It’s just a record of her being one of Twilight’s character references for that application of hers. You must be pleased she got it.”
Iron Will was not pleased, mostly because he had no idea what she meant but he took the large yellow envelope anyway. “Application, right. What were you congra-“
Derpy spread her wings and hovered in front of him. “Sorry Mister Will, but I gotta go. Say hi to Fluttershy for me.” With a flap she was gone, zooming away and letting out a few squeaks as she tore through the branches of a tree until she came out the other side.
He watched her leave with an expression of either confused annoyance or annoyed confusion, which strictly speaking wasn’t entirely unusual after a conversation with Derpy.
Looking at what Derpy gave him, Iron Will wondered how she knew he was looking for Fluttershy. Maybe he didn’t break into her house and she offered him someplace to sleep while he was drunk the night before? Of course she might not remember, so he decided to keep looking just in case.
The apples and path led Iron Will to a farmstead and barn. He stepped over the fence, not bothering to open it. Each cluck of the chickens running around was like a knife in his head. They clustered curiously around his hooves until he sent them clucking away with a grunt and snort from his nose.
Iron Will stepped towards the house, letter in hand, when he heard...giggles? Yes, giggles and definitely female. He couldn’t remember Fluttershy giggling much but he knew she was female. Looking for the sound his gaze was drawn to the barn. Its doors were ajar slightly, enough for him to hear the sound of giggling coming from within.
The door slid open easily at Iron Will’s touch, like its hinges had been oiled recently. “Hey, anypony there?” He called, standing in the open doorway. “Iron Will is here!”
This statement didn’t have quite the reaction he was looking for from the mysterious mare giggling away in the barn.
A blue pony with a rainbow mane popped her head out of a hay stack. “Hey, Iron Will! Didn’t think we’d see you up after last night. And not just ‘cause of the cider.” Her expression was lecherous. That was the only word he could give it. “Have fun after the party?”
A Stetson that Iron Will assumed had been left on the hay rose, revealing an orange mare with a blonde mane. “Rainbow, y’all knew perfectly well we were gonna see ‘im after-” A blue hoof cut her hoof.
These two ponies were vaguely familiar and Iron Will guessed he met them last night as well.
“Don’t tell him!” Rainbow-mane hissed.
Stetson rolled her eyes. “Sugarcube, he prolly don’t wanna wait ta talk to her,” She said disapprovingly before looking back to Iron Will. “Howdy Mister Will. Fluttershy’s here, she’s just a lil’...nervous.”
Rainbow-mane was the one to roll her eyes. “Yeah, nervous. Come on, big guy, get in here and sweet talk her out!” She opened a hole in the thick hay stack.
“Iron Will doesn’t think he’ll fit, can you just bring her out. Iron Will needs to apologise for invading her home while drunk.” He dismissed the ‘sweet talk’ comment. He really did.
The ponies exchanged looks.
“....he doesn’t remember?”
“He don’t remember.”
Rainbow-mane looked like she was about to burst into laughter or tears. “Oh Celestia, this is gonna be awkward. Here, let me get ‘Shy.” She reached into the hay and pulled out a pony that was certainly pink, but too pink.
“Pinkie...” Rainbow-mane sighed and shoved the snoozing pink pony with icing around her mouth back into the hay stack. “Ah HA!” She pulled another pony out, but this one was a stallion. “Caramel!”
Iron Will and Stetson watched for a few seconds.
With a snarl she kept digging through the hay stack. “How many ponies fell asleep in this thing last night?” She demanded, pulling up the wrong pony every time.
“So...” Iron Will looked at Stetson. He focused on her. “Iron Will, uh, isn’t sure he got your name. Something....jack?” It sounded nearly right.
Stetson snorted. “Half there sugarcube. This is mah family’s farm, an’ the first part o’ mah name is a fruit. Take a wild swing.”
“....Bananajack?”
“Ha!” They looked back at Rainbow-mane, who had stopped her search to laugh. “Bananajack! That’s great!”
Stetson sighed deeply. “Mah name,” she said somewhat unhappily to Iron Will, “Is Applejack. As in all the apple trees outside, ya see?”
Iron Will nodded. “Right, Applejack. What happened last night? Iron Will’s head hurts.”
“Dude, you can’t remember at all?” Rainbow-mane asked, looking through the stack again. She had moved further into the barn, where the hay seemed to have spilled into a two pony deep sea over the floor. “Nothing? Wow.”
Looking over the mess that was her barn Applejack vaguely recalled suspiciously Twilight-like magic on her single stack of hay at some time last night. She had to remember that Twilight was not meant to cast spells while drunk.
“Yeah, so...ya don’t remember the propos-”
“Found her!” Rainbow-mane interrupted them. She erupted from the hay in front of Iron Will with Fluttershy in her hooves. “Seriously, keep track of your mare.”
Iron Will froze. He couldn’t easily dismiss that. His brain was trying.
Fluttershy blushed and looked down.
Applejack glared at Rainbow-mane.
Rainbow-mane laughed.
“....Iron Will proposed when he was drunk, didn’t he?” Iron Will asked eventually.
“Um.....yes.” squeaked Fluttershy, trying to sink into the hay. “A-and, uh....”
“Twilight got this whole civil minister or whatever you call it back yesterday. She can totally marry ponies.” Rainbow-mane added, keeping her friend from hiding. “Guess who her first couple was? Three guesses, first two don’t count.”
“....I’m not a pony.” Iron Will managed to point out.
Shrugging, Applejack looked at him sympathetically. “Well, turns out she can marry minotaurs too.”
“Huh...” Looking down at the nervous Fluttershy, Iron Will decided on two things he needed to do. “Mailmare gave me this for you.” He grunted.
Hesitantly Fluttershy took the letter, still not looking at his face. “T-thank you.” Her voice hitched and she stared at the ground in shame or embarrassment.
That done, Iron Will did the second thing he needed to do. He reached up to loosen his tie. It wasn’t there, so he did the next best thing. He’d never done it before; it might be an interesting experience.
He fainted.
The three ponies stared at the heap of unconscious minotaur.
In response to her unintended husband fainting, Fluttershy apparently decided to follow his example, perhaps in the name of marital bonding. She also fainted. Fortunately she was still on the hay so she wasn’t going to wake up with a headache from banging her head on the ground like Iron Will was.
Applejack and Rainbow-mane stared at the two.
“...Y’know, until just now I didn’t see how good they were for each other,” Rainbow Dash remarked.
“Uh-huh,” Applejack replied dully.
Silence stretched out.
“Heh....hey, AJ...”
“...What is it Dash?”
“If I asked Twilight real nice, do you think she’d give me a real ‘banana’ you could j-”
“Finish that an’ y’all ain’t sleepin’ in our trees ever again.”
“Awww.”