Alistair comfortably strolled down the hallway towards the front doors. It was the end of a great day and he couldn’t wait to get home and enjoy it even more. Maybe read a book, maybe screw with something in the basement, maybe take a nap (yes, a nap sounded appealing).
And of course Twilight would want to know every pin prick of a detail that had gone on today, no doubt. He would be happy to pour out all his positive feelings of what laid ahead of him this summer. But the first thing he’d want to tell Twilight about was his pottery teacher, Ms. Press.
Her loonie-ness was something straight out of a children’s novel and the fact that it was happening in real life made the entire situation feel unreal. It was perfect. Smiling, he continued to walk to the front doors until a bother crossed his mind.
He swore he was forgetting something, something important. Looking through his cloak pockets, he rummaged around to see if he had forgotten something back in the classroom. Nope. All he felt was lint. He kept on brushing against the bottom with his fingertips, trying to remember what exactly he was missing. A few seconds into this he felt something peculiar on his hands, something slimy.
Looking down at his front pockets, he flinched in horror and let out a low yelp. Light smears of gray had somehow been slapped across clothes were his hands had been. Squinting his eyes he realized what exactly the gray was…clay. He had forgotten to wash his hands after class!
Acting fast, he sprinted further down the hallway and found a stallion’s washroom he had passed earlier. Pushing the door open with his rump, he briskly walked over to a faucet. Rolling up his cloak sleeves, he put some soap on his hands from the dispenser and flipped on the water.
He scrubbed his hands in silence, the soggy sticky lumps of gray dropping off his hands as the hot water rinsed it away against his palms. He kept on scrubbing until all but the least of residue was gone completely. Content, he happily hummed a tune as the last bits of clay receded down into the drain.
Grinning, he looked at himself in the mirror. Attempting his best military mare impersonation, he gravely spoke in the gruffest voice possible. “It’s time to hit the power and go a million miles an hour!”
Making the best super sonic whoosh that he could, Alistair took of sprinting. Bumping his shoulder against the washroom door, he threw it open in a blast and continued dashing towards the front doors.
For a few seconds the bathroom was still, no pony seeming to be inside. Seeing that it was safe, a blue pony slowly poked his head out of one of the stalls and looked around to see if anypony was still there. “What in the Hades was that?” it said to itself.
-------------------------------------------------------
Later that day, somewhere else in Ponyville, two ponies sat seriously at a kitchen table. They were of adolescent age, clearly friends, and clearly discussing something important. A can of soda sat on each side of where the ponies were, but both were untouched by their owners. Gray and white light flittered through the windows as a level of overcast hung over the late afternoon sky. A large hanging lamp was set just over the table, flipped on to allow some cheeriness to be allowed into the room.
“So yeah” said one of the ponies, a colt earth pony with unnecessarily shaggy blue fur. “I was just getting out of the stall and wham! There he was, standing right there, talking to himself.”
“Talking to himself?” Repeated his companion, a colt as well but notably shorter, red furred, and with a straighter mane. “Do you think he saw you?”
“No. I mean I hope not!” Shrugged the blue pony as he rubbed the back of his neck. “If he did he probably would have done something weird, maybe squawked or started talking to me.”
The shorter pony chuckled “Yeah, more than likely.”
The taller pony nodded and finally took a sip of his drink. “Celestia!” He loudly cursed.
“What’s the matter!?” His friend asked, mildly startled and nearly spilling his drink.
The blue pony blushed and pushed his hoof through his mane, further shagifiying it. “It’s nothing. I just…I don’t…I really…”
“Dude, what is the matter?” His friend repeated sternly.
The blue pony bashfully tapped his hooves on the table. “I…I just don’t know how to feel about this, Jam. Like this doesn’t feel real, at all. It feels weird. Really, really, really weird.”
The red pony looked at him with agitation “Well what are you expecting, Commodore? You randomly saw a human in the bathroom. Of course it feels weird, it is weird.”
“Like, I know I didn’t almost die or anything” Continued the blue pony as if he didn’t hear anything. “But I think I’m actually in shock over this. Which sounds really stupid when you think about, but still. It feels like it didn’t happen.”
The shorter pony smiled. “Maybe it didn’t happen and the human cast a spell on your brain to make you think it happened when it actually did happen but it makes you want to question whether it did or didn’t happen.”
“No really!” continued the blue pony, not letting the subject matter go easily. “This has never happened before. Something this random occurring to me. It feels wrong, out of place…weird.”
The red pony raised his eyebrows in disapproval. “Commodore, a human walking around isn’t that out of this world. Just forty years ago there was that one in Canterlot who--”
“I’m talking about right now, Jam!” Shouted the taller pony. “Something right now, in the present, happening! This human has been in Ponyville, for what, three weeks since Mayor Mare made the announcement?! I don’t think anypony has really “gotten used to it”. So excuse me for getting a bit flustered!”
The shorter pony paused a second and looked away, a bit unsure about what to say. “Why do you care anyway? Why’s this bothering you so much? It doesn’t seem all that important to you, or me.”
“I don’t know!” admitted the taller pony, “I really don’t know. It just seems significant some how.”
His friend wouldn’t let him go that easily. “But why? Why the sudden interest in bi-pedals?”
The blue pony slammed his hoof down onto the table. “Fine! You want to know why? I’ll tell you why!” The blue pony leaned across the table to get closer to his friend. He began to speak in a loud whisper, as if somepony else was listening but he still wanted them to hear.
“There’s something big hanging in the air, right in front of everypony’s face. It’s a mystery that no pony else seems to be all that concerned with. Everybody’s passing it off as “normal” and “run of the mill”. I see it as something different, something important and deserving of attention. There’s a mystery ahoof Jam, and we’re just the ponies to solve it!”
The blue pony looked upwards at the ceiling as if staring into a sea of twinkling stars. “Just think about it, Jam. We’ll be the ponies that discovered everything about a human that no pony saw was worth the time. Doesn’t that just sound amazing?”
The shorter pony stirred uncomfortably in his chair and smiled the best he could. His friend’s behavior was clearly out of character. “But Commodore…come on. Is there really that much to “discover” about this human? There’s movies, and books, and theatrical productions. Who’s to say one isn’t made about him? What use would we be?”
The blue pony bit his lip to hold back a scream. “Jam, you sound just like what I bet every other pony in Ponyville is thinking right now. There is a million things we don’t know about this human and I intend to find out more before some stupid…thing comes out and tells everypony before we can!”
“What about Twilight Sparkle?” The red pony continued. “The human lives in her house, doesn’t he? She probably knows everything about him. Why not ask her?”
Shaking his head, the shaggy pony would not budge. “I want to find this stuff out first hoof, get my facts directly from him. This is my adventure and I want to lead it. I don’t want it to be ruined by just asking a librarian for the answers.”
His companion sighed and face hoofed. “You’re calling it an adventure now?”
“Yes”
The red earth-pony was slightly taken back by this. Opening his mouth, he was about to say something but stopped himself. A level of submission went through him. “Alright then, Commodore. Let’s go on this adventure of yours.” He waved his hooves in the air to emphasize the word ‘adventure’. “Seems like a gosh-darn waste of time if you ask me.”
The blue pony laughed. “Like going on a magical adventure of self-discovery and friendship while uncovering the mysteries of the past and carving new light into the world while constructing a better future to save the world of pony-kind is a waste of time? You crack me up, Jam.”
“I’m serious dude; I think you’re wasting your time.”