“SURPRISE!”
Time seemed to slow for me as I looked from the, still mid-air, Pinkie to my squadmates. They all had their guns with them, as we had decided never to leave our little camp without them because of the Incident. With the clicking of safeties, I saw the plastic-wrapped pipes of death begin to be raised at the hyperactive mare.
The first weapon up was Kilborn's. Using my left hand, I continued to push up the weapon, hoping beyond hope that he wouldn't squeeze the trigger. Miraculously, my hopes were answered as the Sergeant just threw a death glare at me and then at Pinkie. Time returned to normal speed as the three other soldiers brought their guns to bear on the pink mare.
No shots were fired but I felt the night still as I looked around to clearing to see so many astonished and scared pony faces.
“God. Damn. It!” I shouted as I removed my hand from Kilborn's rifle and turned to face the, now frightened, Pinkie Pie. Her mane had deflated some as she looked from one gun to the next. Slowly, the weapons were lowered as the sense of where they were returned to my squad.
“I know you were told about us by your friends, or at least by somepony here!” I swept an arm out at the mass of ponies that were now, cautiously, stepping into the clearing, “So I have to ask. What part of 'Soldiers from another world' did you not get? You're lucky you don't look like fucking swiss cheese right now because you were damn close! Back in the hellhole we came from, when someone jumped at us from out of a bush he usually had a bomb strapped to his chest or a gun in his fucking hands!”
Her hair had deflated even more as her lip began to quiver, “I-I just w-wanted to throw a p-p-party.”
I sighed as most of my anger dissipated from seeing her like this. Looking around, I saw that some of the ponies were now glaring at me while most looked cautious and surprised. I looked to my squad for support.
Kilborn just nodded before he stepped to the pink mare and got onto one knee so he could look her in the eyes, “Miss, I know that you were probably trying to be neighborly by throwing us this party but Tyler is right. You could have gotten hurt jumping out at us like that,” he then looked around, “All of you. You all must remember where we come from. It is not Equestria. We do not live in peace. Even if we weren't soldiers, we would have still tensed in anticipation of a fight.”
Jones then stepped forward and knelt by Kilborn, wiping a tear from Pinkie's face,
“Hey. Why don't we try this again? This time without the startling us part?”
A couple seconds of silence before, “Can I use my party cannon?”
Jones looked confused when he looked back at me. “Say yes”, I mouthed. Turning back to the mare, Jones replied, “Sure, I don't see why not.”
In almost a nanosecond, Pinkie's hair returned to normal poofiness as she smiled widely and bounced into the air. As she bounced, she reached under her and pulled a cannon from out of thin air. With my teeth grinding at the breakage of simple science, I watched as the pink mare slammed it into the dirt and pulled the string with her hoof.
BANG!
With a spray of confetti shrapnel, the clearing was decorated for a party. Impossible? Yes but the decoration was uplifting for everyone present. However, I felt my teeth begin to grind once more when I saw that a DJ stage, speakers, turntable, and the DJ herself had also been launched from the cannon.
As if nothing happened, the DJ, DJ Pon3 if I remembered correctly, spun a record on her hoof before placing it on the turntable and shouting, “Let's get this party started!”
As the needle hit the record, happy techno music blasted from the speakers. It took a little longer for everyone else but soon the entire town was dancing to the beat in the clearing. I smirked as I saw Jones get dragged into the dancing crowd by Dash. With the other ponies standing on their hind legs, Jones seemingly disappeared into the crowd.
Gonz found himself dancing with the re-energized Pinkie, both making complete fools of themselves but having fun while doing so. I looked some more to see Kilborn offer to dance with Applejack who, surprisingly enough, accepted and the two began to dance more like the main of the pony crowd.
With a smile now on my face, I shook my head before walking out of the clearing and into the orchard a bit before coming upon a hill. Climbing the hill, I sat beneath the tree with my back against the trunk. I could still hear the music and see the lights but I was effectively out of the party. Looking up at the darkening sky, I sighed before reaching into a pouch on my armor. What I pulled out looked to be a little slip of paper. I looked at the picture, the three familiar faces smiling back at me.
One was myself, dressed in clean ACUs. Standing to my left, with his arm over my shoulders, was a man of about twenty-seven wearing the digital blue camouflage of the United States Navy. Finally, standing in front of us was a kid of about thirteen wearing normal civilian clothing.
“What are you doing up here?”
I turned to find Twilight walking up the hill to me. Looking up, I realized that it had become night as I had looked at the picture.
“Just wanted to... relax after the whole commotion down there,” I replied, resting my head against the tree and closing my eyes with a sigh.
I heard Twilight clear her throat, “Yeah, your reactions were startling but we should have know. I should have known.”
Opening my eyes, I looked to her to see that her head was now hanging low, “No Twilight, it wasn't all your fault. I'm partially to blame as well. I knew that it would happen sooner or later and I didn't warn my squad beforehand on account that they would think I was crazy if I tried to explain how Pinkie does... what she does.”
Twilight chuckled but her head stayed low, “I guess but you told me about your world and-EEP!”
I had grabbed Twilight by her foreleg and dragged her to me before wrapping my arms around her in a hug,
“It's not your fault,” I repeated, putting some emphasis behind my words. I let Twilight go from the hug to see that she was now smiling and had a soft blush on her cheeks. Her eyes glanced over my picture and, as if trying to derail her own thoughts, asked,
“Who are they?”
I chuckled as I pointed at myself, “That's me. The guy in the blue is my older brother, he was in my nation's Naval Forces. The one in front of us is my little brother.”
“You all look so happy together,” she mused with a smile.
“Oh, we do in this picture but we argued a lot. Even under the arguing though, I always knew that when push came to shove that they'd have my back, as I would with them,” I saddened a bit when I looked back at the picture, “This was from the last time we were together. It was only a couple days. Trevor had just gotten back from deployment and I was heading out.”
I felt something go over my shoulders. Looking to Twilight, I saw that she looked sad and had put a foreleg over my shoulders in an attempt to comfort me. I smiled sadly, “Most likely, they'll be told that I'm just 'Missing In Action'. Though, in the sandbox, that's basically the same as dead. I hope they won't miss me too much.”
After about a minute of silence, DJ Pon3's voice boomed out from the clearing, “Come on little ponies! This party is just getting started!”
Twilight smiled at me before removing her foreleg and stepping towards the clearing, “Come on.”
I smiled back as I stored the picture and picked myself to my feet. Nodding to her, we made our way back to the clearing. We stepped through the bushes to a very peculiar sight. Fluttershy and Smiley were talking to each other by the Humvee. No. They weren't just talking they were... flirting?
I wasn't sure but I saw that Fluttershy had a deep blush on her face. Smiley well... I could actually see his face and he was smiling. Without much noise, Gonz appeared at my side with a perplexed look on his face.
“Does Smiley have his-”
“Yep.”
“And he's-”
“Yep.”
“With-”
“Yep.”
We stood in silence, sharing our shock before the pink mare responsible for the party appeared before us. She smiled at me before talking rapid fire, “There you are Gonz-y wonzy! I was wondering where you had gone so I started looking and looking and looking and then I saw you standing by Tyler here so I decided to come over and tell you that I found you by saying, 'There you are G-'”
Before she could continue, Gonz had thrown a hand over her mouth. Even with the mouth in her way, she continued talking. I smirked at Gonz, who threw me a short glare as he pulled Pinkie away from me.
“Well, back to the partying!” the medic exclaimed as he, and by attachment Pinkie, disappeared into the crowd.
“Ooookay...”
“You'll get used to her,” Twilight said from my side. I smiled as I turned to the scholarly unicorn,
“Care to dance?” I asked. She looked at me, surprised before smiling.
“Lead the way.”
Smiling, I walked into the crowd with Twilight beside me, letting ourselves get swallowed by the mass of pure energy. As the night darkened, the music beat loudly and I thought to myself,
This is going to be one long night.