On Light Hooves I Tread
a Fanfic by Adam J Nelon
Chapter 9: How to Say Goodbye in Equestrian
As the chariot nestled itself to a hill just on the outskirts of Ponyville. and as my eyes again beheld the majestic skyline of the work of so many Earth Ponies from so long ago, those feelings of dread reared their ugly heads to me.
I had been dreading having to do this, but for the sake of leaving, I had to get my dearest friends together to say my goodbyes.
Within a few moments, I disembarked the golden chariot which the two Pegasi had manned to carry me here, turning to them for a moment.
"Wait here for now. I pray that this won't be long." I sighed, my head hanging slow as I walked into the morning quiet of the town...
While it was not as quiet as when I rode to Canterlot, the streets were only sparsely populated with ponies. Thankfully, the first to appear was none other than Twilight Sparkle, who was eager to offer me a smile and greet me with good cheer.
"Hey, Morning Haze! I heard you got to see Princess Celestia! How was it?" She asked, waving.
I smiled a bit and raised my head. "It was great, Twilight. Although both she and Luna were letting off some strong magical energy..." I chuckled, blushing.
"You tend to get used to it after a little while. I certainly did." Twilight giggled back.
"But you've been around the Princess since you were just a filly." I joked, which both caused us to burst into laughter, which soon faded into quiet before my face grew solemn.
"Listen, I was hoping to find you, because I need to get the girls together for something important, and knowing you're the organized sort, you'd probably be able to help me."
Twilight's face grew solemn as well after those words.
"Well, of course I can help, Haze..but what is this about?" She asked, her cheerful expression now turned to a face of concern.
"I'd rather not talk about it until we're all together. It's kind of big news." I moaned back before I stretched my wings.
"Alright. I'll go see Rarity. I guess you're off to see Rainbow?"
I nodded, before taking off into the skies to Cloudsdale, Twilight cantering along to the Carousel Boutique in search of Rarity.
As I passed through the cloud lining into Cloudsdale, I saw Rainbow Dash hard at work in training her body for what I could only assume was the Best Young Fliers' Competition. This is going to be a bit tougher than I had expected, I thought to myself, pressing onward into the fray to rendezvous with the living rainbow face to face for a confrontation. Her business was making it so I would have to engage in an aerial dance to get within speaking distance. Of course, all things considered, it was worth it to compete with Dash until she was at arm's length.
"HEY, RAINBOW!" I shouted, hooves cupped about my mouth to help amplify the sound of my voice.
"WHAT?!" Dash asked as we began to nosedive through the clouds.
"CAN WE TALK?"
"WHAT?!"
"CAN WE TALK?!"
"LATER! I'M PRACTICING RIGHT NOW!"
"OKAY! MEET ME AT TWILIGHT'S, THEN?!"
"YEAH, SURE!"
With that, I barely escaped the nosedive to make headway for Fluttershy's cot.
Twilight trotted into the Carousel Boutique to find Rarity and her younger sibling, Sweetie Belle enjoying breakfast.
"Ah, Twilight! It is a pleasure to see you! Come to join us for breakfast, have you?" Rarity chirped, starry-eyed as she often was.
"Actually..." Twilight drew, before punctuating her drawl with a heavy, "...no."
"Oh?" Rarity quipped, a look of concern on her face. "Well, what does bring you here, then?"
This was when Twilight's solemn expression returned more. "Morning Haze wants us to gather to the library. He wouldn't tell me much, other than the fact that he had something important to say, and it was best for us all to be there for him to say it."
Rarity mulled over the situation being placed before her, but after a moment, she nodded. "I'll be there. If it is of the utmost concern, then I must be in attendance." She hummed, using her magic to properly adjust her bed-worn mane.
"Thank you, Rarity. I just hope whatever he has to say isn't too bad. I'll go see Applejack. Enjoy your breakfast." Twilight said, bowing her head before rushing into full gallop to Sweet Apple Acres.
Within a few short moments, I had managed to successfully land onto the hills near Fluttershy's cottage without spraining, slipping, pulling, or breaking anything. Thank goodness for that.
The animals were out and about with their patron pony busy at work feeding the animals on the outside, before spotting me from the corner of her eye and bringing a smile to her meek face.
"Oh! Morning Haze! Hello! I didn't notice you! What brings you here?" She hummed in a ginger tone before approaching me.
"Well...I have something important that I need to say. Come to Twilight's house and I'll explain everything." I sighed in a slight tone of melancholy.
"Oh...well...okay. I guess I can be there." She squeaked, blushing before she revealed her face from behind her pink bangs again.
"I'm glad to hear you say that, Fluttershy...I've just got a lot I need to get off my chest..." I murmured, hanging my head a bit.
"It's okay. I'm sure when we're all together, you'll be able to let it all out. Keeping secrets isn't easy."
Oh, the irony of that statement. With this, I nodded, before flapping my wings once again to prepare for my next flight.
"See you later, Fluttershy." I moaned before taking off, Fluttershy waving me goodbye.
Twilight, in her short sprint, had arrived at Sweet Apple Acres where, lo and behold, the clan Apple was at work tilling the farmland as usual, with Big Macintosh at the plow, and Applejack at work bucking apples.
"Hey, AJ! Got a minute?"
Applejack turned to Twilight after delivering a swift buck to a nearby tree.
"Howdy, Twi! Oh...you look tense...somethin' up?" She asked, cocking her head.
"Yes. Morning Haze came to me this morning, saying that he had something important to say. He wanted to make sure everypony was together for him to say it. Think you can meet me at the Library?"
"Ah guess ah can. Just gimme a few to finish bucking these trees before ah join ya."
"Good to hear that, AJ. I hope this is important..."
"Ah hope so, too."
With this exchange, Twilight made a dash back to the library.
My final stop on my assembly journey was to the candy-coated confectionery creation station known as Sugar Cube Corner. As soon as I opened the door, Pinkie Pie was right in my face.
"Hi, Morning Haze! What's up? You look tense!"
I looked to the Pink Pony with a straight face.
"We need to talk."
"Talking?!" Pinkie Pie squealed, her ears perked in excitement. "I love talking? What are we talking about? Parties? Are you planning to throw a party, and you want my hel-"
"Pinkie Pie. This is something serious. Meet me at Twilight's library in a little bit. I've got something I have to get off my chest."
"Something on your chest? Is it a flea?"
I dug my face into my hoof before snapping back to the perplexing perky pink pony in a peeved position.
"Just...be there, okay?!" I pleaded, storming away as I heard Pinkie Pie's signature phrase come from her lips:
"Okie-Doki-Loki!"
As the band of fillies had been gathered, I stood in the den of the library, pensively stroking my left foreleg with my right one as one-by-one, the mane six began to join me.
"Why, Morning Haze! You look absolutely dreadful! What could possibly be wrong?" Rarity asked, that same face of concern as when we first met on his face.
"Yeah, sugar-cube. you look a mite down. Somethin' buggin' ya?" Applejack joined in, an honest face full of worry in her face.
"I know," Fluttershy chirped, a bit more profound in her tone than she was before. "It's not like you to be this serious."
"Yeah. What 's got you in a bad mood, kid?" Rainbow Dash added, sharing the similar expression marked on the rest of the procession of ponies.
"Nopony should have to be this sad!" Pinkie Pie giggled, making her the only pony in the group to not bear a face of despair or sadness.
"Girls," Twilight interrupted, helping to part the herd to allow me some breathing room, "I think we should let Morning Haze explain now. That's why he called us all here."
The rest of the group fell silent then. She then turned back to me.
"Go ahead, Haze. We're all listening now." Twilight told me before she took the last position in a ring around me.
With this, I took a few deep breaths to calm my nerves.
"Okay...so..You all remember how I said I couldn't remember anything from that crash, and that my name was Morning Haze?"
"Yeah?" Twilight asked.
"Well...both of those were actually lies I told you. But I had a few good reasons to lie. First, My name isn't actually Morning Haze. It's Adam. Second, I actually know plenty about Equestria, aside from how my body works. And third, I'm not truly a pony?"
"Whaddaya mean, "you're not a pony"? You look a lot like a Pegasus to me!" Rainbow Dash shouted, threatening to get up to my face, before Applejack restrained her with her teeth by the tail. "Are you a spy?!"
"Hold on a minute, sugar-cube! Let the fella speak, now!" She shouted through gritted teeth before the Cyan pony dropped to the floor in a cross-legged expression and a humph.
"Thank you, Applejack," I noted, before clearing my throat. "Actually, I'm a Human. Princess Celestia brought me here to see if such a member of my kind could exist in and adapt to life in Equestria. So, she chose me, and by Fisher's Law of dimensional travel, the natural laws of this dimension turned me into a pony. I took up the "I have no memory" excuse and the name Morning Haze partly out of the fact that a pony named Adam would seem kind of weird, and if I just went out into a town in which no one knew me and shouted "Hey, everypony! I'm a human!", there would be a lot of ponies either thinking I was crazy, or they would chase me out of town with torches and pitchforks, claiming I was some kind of evil fiend."
"That's crazy!" Twilight said, wide-eyed. "Why in the wide world of Equestria would you think people would try to chase you out of town!? We're so much nicer than that!"
"And just what the hay made ya think ya had to lie to get us to be yer friends?!" Added Applejack, the living embodiment of honesty.
I shrunk for a moment. "Well, I thought that you wouldn't believe me if I told you outright..."
"Don't be silly, Adam! My middle name is Diane! Nopony here thinks that's weird at all!" Pinkie Pie chimed, bouncing.
"Pinkie," Rarity groaned, leaned over to her Pink companion, "I think he's referring to the fact that he is a...Human...in Pony shape?"
"Ooooh." Pinkie Pie said, nodding in understanding.
"I'm sorry, everyone...That I had to lie to get this far. That this whole business of friendship had to be built off a slowly-maddening lie. I really shouldn't have done that...it just wasn't right of me...which is why..." I began, on the verge of tears as I gulped a sorrowful knot into my throat. "...I'm going back where I belong today..."
"WHAT?!"
A tear drooped from my eye as I said those words.
"But why? I thought this was your home!" Twilight asked, stopping me as I neared the door.
I hung my head a moment.
"You're right," I sobbed, another tear falling. "It was my home. But my real home isn't here. It's back where all the other humans live. I don't belong here...especially now that I've put my deceit into the open..."
"Adam..."
Fluttershy ended a hoof, placing it on the Violet unicorn's shoulder.
"Let him leave, Twilight. He's obviously pretty homesick...not to mention ashamed. For his sake, we have to let him get home..." She said, a somber tone to her voice, especially considering that these were the first words the Pegasus had even said since this conversation began.
"I..." Twilight started, before stepping back and hanging her head in defeat.
"I guess it can't be helped..."
With that, I left from the library before breaking off into a sorrowful gallop, tears trailing me as I bolted. I hadn't even bothered to wave or even say goodbye, I was so ashamed. Why could I have been so deceitful? Was this how friendship was meant to be forged? Lies and trickery? How could I have been so foolish?!
I neared the hill at which I had instructed the two Royal Guard Pegasi to wait for me until I returned. My tears had begun to dry as the sounds of other ponies faded from my mournful ears.
"Hey, kid..." Steel Sabre said, turning up her head. "Ready to...Oh...you don't look too good. Something up?"
"N-No..." I sniffled, obviously lying. I already admitted one lie, so why the heck not replace it with another?!
"Ready to get back to the Castle and go home?" She asked, to which I simply nodded, taking up the rear.
"Well, if you're really rea-"
Silver's concerned agreement was cut off by a loud, deafening, and most certainly bestial roar.
"Oh, dear sweet Mother of Sol, what in Equestria is that?!" Iron Sides shouted.
I was snapped completely out of my puddle of pity at the very sound of roaring. I began to look back and forth between the royal chariot and the town of Ponyville. Part of me wanted to just take the chariot and bolt out of there before whatever that roar came from decided to try and eat me for lunch.
No.
No. I couldn't just do that! It was bad enough that I betrayed my dearest friends, but leaving them for dead?! That was a crime I simply couldn't bear to commit. My head snapped back to the overlook of Ponyville, the tears in my eyes dried as fiery determination flared into them.
"You two! Get to the Princess and warn her about this! I've got to go down and help them!"
"Are you insane?!" Steel Sabre screeched. "You're going to get yourself killed! Plus, you don't even know what that thing could be!"
"I DON'T CARE!" I shouted back. "JUST GO!"
"Yes, sir!"
With that, the two guards took flight, darting for Canterlot to warn the Princess of the impending doom that was approaching as I darted into the hamlet of Ponyville with absolute disregard for my own safety. If I was going to atone for the sins I had committed, then this, I thought, was the best course of action.
"Hold on, girls!" I panted. the town square slowly in view. "I'm coming!"