//------------------------------// // Claws in the Works // Story: Change in Perspective // by Quicksear //------------------------------// That night was the one memory of all his experiences in Equestria that would never dim in his mind. Something about the emotional overload combined with the special effort of a few ponies he had only known for a few days had combined to forge every note of Vinyl and Octavia's song into his mind. Which was why Marc woke up the next morning humming it. He was laying on a bed in the far east wing of Rosewood Cottage, one of at least a dozen in the same arched segment. Marc swung his head around, absorbing the bright an airy structure around him, utterly at ease. He dropped back to his pillow and thought back to the previous joyous evening. After the tear jolting finale of the melody, they had all of them, the musicians included, ended up walking through the luminescent night, first to Sugarcube Corner, where Pinkie had stopped off with a cheery farewell. Then they had slowly strolled to just under Rainbow's cloud-house. Palace more like, but it was easy to renovate and expand, being cloud, she had explained with a hint of pride. Marc said goodbye and somehow found himself attempting what had ended up being called a 'wing five' with the mare, whacking a hand into her feathered wings with a rather anticlimactic ‘thumph’, which resulted in some hilarity. Then Marc and Ditzy walked Vinyl and Octavia back to their cottage. Vinyl had looked abashed after all the praise she'd received for her work, but Octavia had taken enough for both of them and some to spare. Marc had, to their surprise, hugged them both before thanking them again and beginning the leg back to Rosewood. Not much had been said the entire night, and nothing at all once they reached the cottage. Ditzy stumbled over to Marc for a brief and surprising nuzzle, and then moved towards a light switch, which had been installed in a very awkward place in the wall. After a few attempts of pawing at the wall in an attempt to start the gas burners, she gave up in her tiredness and let Marc guide her down the east hall to a bed. Marc had fallen on the bed next to her, and had immediately passed out. With these memories running through his mind, Marc lay still for a moment, wondering how such serenity could have been born from such a stressful day. He was saved from his ruminations, however, by an excited call from the kitchen, "C'mon everypony! Muffins for breakfast!" Marc only then noticed the smoke pouring from the door a few metres from where he lay. He leapt up, worried, and scuttled over to the door. He came across a group of five ponies waiting there for some reason. As he tried to make sense of why these ponies he'd never seen before (aside from the two fillies from yesterday) were there, and more importantly, why they didn’t seem bothered by him in t he slightest, the group was bombarded with a stream of flying muffins from the kitchen. Marc saw one bedraggled unicorn take a direct hit in the face and fall over, thought not with beginning to eat the obviously delicious treat. When Marc got to look into the room, he wouldn't have been surprised to see Pinkie Pie standing there, but instead (thankfully) was a confused looking Ditzy spinning around and around, looking for something. "Ditzy, stop, you're gonna hurt yourself!" Marc jumped in and stopped her inches before she whacked her head on the counter, not for the first time by the looks of it. "Oh...Hey Marc...I was just making muffins, but...I can’t find your one, I know it's here somewhere..." Marc sighed and picked the muffin up off of Ditzy's back. "Here it is… Hey, you've lost your stutter!" He exclaimed. "Oh, I-I h-have?" Ditzy said, looking self-conscious. Marc smiled at her. "Nope, there it is again." She went a shade pinker than usual and giggled into her hoof. "Um...yeah, I st-stutter when I'm n-nervous." Marc didn't comment further, but instead led the endearing Pegasus out into the east wing where the others were busy eating their breakfast. "You know, Ditzy, when I woke up and saw nearly the entire hall filled with smoke and new ponies, I couldn't help feeling a little concerned." Ditzy sniffed at that. "Yeah, everypony worries about me.’Oh, that Derpy, shes going to blow the whole place up one day!' Well, I won’t, because I love this place, and everypony who stays here. These are some wayponies here for the night by the way. I...did burn the muffins, though." She looked up at Marc, who inspected his absolutely pristine meal. "Well, there's nothing wrong with mine, see?" Ditzy, bit a hoof and said sidelong. "I meant the first batch...yeah, I put those in the fireplace over there." Marc looked over at fireplace. He thought it had been loaded with charcoal. He ignored this with some difficulty and continued with the conversation. “Um…right. I saw the other ponies just now. It’s…actually kind of weird how they don’t seem to mind me…?” Ditzy suddenly looked a little jumpy and began stuttering profusely, but explained all the same, “U-uh, yes…When I-I w-woke up t-they were all st-staring at you, so…I t-told them about you. T-told them you weren’t d-dangerous” Her darting eyes betrayed her, though, and Marc wondered what exactly she had actually done. He looked himself over wondering what could possibly make the mare so embarrassed. After a few minutes, and not the least amount of pleading, Marc gave up , and simply enjoyed the breakfast he had been given. Afterwards, the three travelers left for the town with a cheery thanks and some coins for Ditzy's trouble (And medical bills). The three still unnamed ponies, two earth ponies and the unicorn, trotted out the door. The unicorn paused beside Marc, giving him an appraising glance before saying, “Ditzy told us about you. Well done on fitting in around here, Alien. Still, isn’t it a bit early to be sharing a bed with her-?” The unicorn was suddenly bodily knocked through the doorway and out onto the path. "Yay! Bits!" Ditzy shouted from her new position, the place previously occupied by the traveler. "Now we can go buy some more muffins!" Marc tried to process this new information, but wasn’t given the chance. He was literally dragged out by the hem of his by now ragged shirt by the anxious Pegasus. Marc walked along in the shade of the flittering Ditzy as she tumbled along towards the town. The annoying thing about a friend having wings, Marc found out, was that they could simply fly away if you tried to talk about something they didn't like. They came upon Fluttershy by the stream that ran alongside the path, trying to coax out a nervous bank-vole with soft cooing noises, but meeting with only limited success, which was further hampered when Ditzy called out, "Hi Flutteshy!" The pale Pegasus let out a subdued cry and shot up a tree, where she clung, trembling, before remembering she had wings. She released her hold and landed just in front of Marc. "Oh...hi." Thus ensued a rather awkward silence, all parties waiting for the next to speak. Eventually, Marc said to the embarrassed Fluttershy. "You know you can talk to me whenever you want, I'm always in town or at Rosewood, and I'd love to talk to you, you must have the most amazing stories about your animals.” Marc glanced back towards the den. Fluttershy whispered nothings to herself and looked as well, in time to see the vole give Marc a terrified glance before diving back down her hole. Realizing that nothing could be done here, Ditzy pulled on Marc’s shoulder and led him towards town. Marc waved goodbye, chuckling at the quiet mare. Marc and Ditzy were chatting about the various types of treats available in their respective worlds as they walked past the large tree in the town. Suddenly, a door at its base burst open and Twilight leapt out at them adopting a ready stance in front of Marc, with a growling scowl on her face. “Ditzy, step back! Marc, get inside. You have some explaining to do.” Marc retreated under the glare he found himself receiving. He glanced at Ditzy, who seemed as confused as he felt. When she didn’t fall back, Twilight huffed and, lowering her horn, sent a sizzling bolt of magic between the pair. With her warning shot fired, Twilight leveled her horn at Marc and with the slightest tremor in her voice, spat out, “Get inside, NOW.” Marc had no choice. The tree house/library was amazing itself, lined with countless tomes of knowledge. In the centre of the room stood four easily recognizable ponies, all wearing golden necklaces set with jewels. Marc felt a tremor of fear run through him, remembering Twilight’s description of the Elements, the most powerful weapons in the Equestrian arsenal. Seeing it leveled in his direction was distressing. He turned back to the door, his nerve giving, but the doorway was blocked by Twilight, levitating her tiara into place as she shut the door. As it shut, Marc saw Ditzy’s worried face in the jam before it snapped shut. Twilight never once lifted her gaze, glaring at Marc as if he were a poisonous snake. “Once Spike finds Fluttershy, then you won’t be able to escape. We know what you are, Marc, Princess Celestia sent me a letter informing me of your species’ terrible acts! We won’t stand to see you hurting our town.” Marc backed away from the glowering unicorn, only to find himself surrounded on all sides by the rest of the group. He looked from face to face, noticing looks of anger, fear and confusion, but undoubtedly in all of them, determination. Marc shook his head in a daze, unsure of how this could have happened. “I...don’t understand…” Twilight levitated a thick pile of pages, the seal freshly broken into Marc’s shaking hands. Even despite his barely elementary understanding of written Equestrian from Twilight’s lessons in the early days, Marc was shocked by the information he found within. He might as well be doomed. ***** Princess Celestia reclined happily in her private chambers, feeling content with the day. All she had planned gone off with a hitch. Her talks with the almost always impossible dignitaries that filled her court had blown over calmly, she and Luna had managed to spend some good quality time together, and her letter to Twilight had no doubt met with the expected results. Celestia was pleased with how she had dealt with the news from Ponyville. Her information had been carefully garnered with much difficult research into human culture, involving many sessions of scrying the human plane with the help of Discord, all tailored in such a way as to come to the only pleasing solution. Discord had proved invaluable in this regard. His experience in such matters had been key to finding only the relevant information that Twilight should need to see. In fact, Discord had appeared ever so apologetic about his actions, begging to help fix the mess he had made. Celestia had been unsure at first, and Luna still disapproved, but Discord’s repentance had seemed so sincere, and his plan to deal with the human had been perfect. Celestia had even granted Discord the honour of sending the letter off for his part in its creation. Celestia twisted her majestic form to look out of the long gallery of windows at the rising of the moon on the distant horizon, filled with a calm serenity borne of years of meditation. Luna’s Lights glowed through the night sky, their twinkling forms lulling the Princess of the day into a gentle doze. Suddenly, a bright green light flashed through the room, jolting Celestia from her reverie. She pulled herself up onto her legal hooves and snatched up the letter hovering briefly in the air. Curious, she untied the ribbon and read through it’s contents: Dear Pricess Celestia; The information you shared with me was...enlightening. I will try to follow your suggestions. At the moment he is contained in the library Basement, far from where he can hurt anypony. I will personally attempt all in my power to come to the bottom of this matter. I am so sorry for failing you in this, Princess. You faithful student: Twilight Sparkle Celestia shook her head in confusion. Why had Twilight reacted in such a way to a few insights into human sociology? Perhaps some of that race’s customs appeared confrontational, but that was no reason to detain Marc, was it? Celestia only thought to improve Marc’s easing into Ponyville society by clearing up some cultural discrepancies that might arise. As such, she had detailed a letter of human cultural norms to aid in understanding the human. Celestia clucked her tongue in displeasure, but muttered to herself, “I do not think you have dealt with Marc’s introduction in the best way, my little ponies, but…I must trust Twilight to know the correct course.” Just outside of Celestia’s quarters, a serpentine figure hovered. Upon hearing her words, it flitted away down the corridors of Canterlot Castle, and Discord could be heard whistling a merry tune.