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// It was a peaceful day in Canterlot. 
// Story: My Little Pony: Blue Version 
// by FaelaArts 
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It was a bright and sunny day in Canterlot, as was the usual. The Pegasi were filing some paperwork to schedule a multitude of storms over the next week for Ponyville as ponies below went about their business. If one were to look toward the palace, they would see the princess sitting upon her throne, filling out paperwork, from one of the decorated windows.

The windows showed a multitude of scenes of a purple unicorn, one depicting her with wings. Various armoured ponies stood at ready, evenly spaced throughout the room, a line of people waiting to see the princess. Her body pure white, and a mane of many hues, wearing a crown made of gold. On her hooves and neck were matching accessories.

“Princess Celestia, is our schedule for the storm in order?” The Pegasus dared to speak up, breaking the statue out of her stone. The princess looked down at the Pegasus, and quickly signed the papers and handed them over.

“My apologies, I was lost in thought.” Celestia’s voice was soft, but firm, a dismissal. Her smile radiated at the ponies in line, and they smiled in return, in awe of their princess. The Pegasus quickly excused himself, and flew away to file the paperwork and send word to Ponyville.

With practiced ease, Celestia filed the paperwork as it was stacked beside her, signing some papers for the ponies that needed it today before sending it off. While she would love to ask Luna, she couldn’t task her sister with the work that was done when she would normally sleep. While she had been slowly working on making  ponies more open to staying awake for an hour or so at night, it was still a long and tiring process.

However, she knew Luna was working on something special for the night to help increase interest now she had returned. Celestia gave her all the support(and funding) she needed. A small smile settled onto her lips, any expense for her sister.

Of course, all thoughts of her sister were momentarily pushed aside as something caught her attention. Above the center of the room a bright flash of light caught her attention. All eyes raised their heads to look as it slowly grew, and formed into a white swirling vortex. Celestia put down her papers, and stood up.

The first thing to come through were two hands, waving up and down for some reason. It was pulled back in a moment later, and then something fell through and landed on the hard and fashionable white floor of the room. Shortly after, three more forms followed, landing expertly on top of the first one.

A muffled voice spoke, and the three forms slowly untangled, allowing the fourth to stand up. Taking them in, three were tall strange creatures, and one looked almost like a unicorn, except for the fact it was the same size as Celestia. She might have been able to make out features, however all were covered by brown cloaks, the cowl hiding their faces from view. As the guards moved in to surround them, she noticed one, who may or may not have been used as a landing cushion, pull off his hood. The creature looked around the room curiously.

“I was hoping we’d appear somewhere familiar, Lyra this is your fault.” The creature was simian in appearance, but strangely hairless except for a small part on the top of his head. As he took off the cloak, folding it and putting it in his bag, Celestia was able to get a good look at the blue jacket and purple pants on the strange creature. Taking in the brown hair and eyes, along with the casual smirk she was able to say this being was radiating a cocky confidence.

“Why is it always my fault? I’m not the one that pushed you in, that was Red.” Turning to look to the unicorn as it took off it’s cloak as well, Celestia realised the unicorn was female. Her mint coat and light blue mane with white stripes looked vaguely familiar to Celestia, despite the fact her mane seemed almost wild, falling down both her sides with the top hanging down her ears. Celestia couldn’t place where she knew the unicorn, for she had met very few that met her in stature.

“Well it’s not like I can blame him, he doesn’t respond when you do.” The blue simian pointed to a third one, who was slowly stowing his hood as well. Taking in the bright red eyes and black hair, she noticed him slowly reach up and straighten the red cap on his head. His clothes consisted of a black T-shirt and matching pants with a red short sleeve jacket to complete the look. Looking into his eyes, she felt herself almost rising to the challenge, but composed herself just before her wings flared up to answer it.

“Are you two done bickering? I’d appreciate it if these—ponies right?—If these ponies weren’t pointing sharp spears at us.” The final simian took off her coat, and Celestia could appreciate the simple, plain design. Wearing a short white shirt, the brown haired female, for it had longer hair and a higher voice, was also wearing a red skirt, making the design look very slimming. Celestia made an internal note to get her designer to maybe add a little colour to her dresses in the same fashion. The blue simian turned to face Celestia, and glanced to the guards.

“Lyra, where exactly are we?” The blue simian turned it’s eyes on the tall unicorn, who glanced out the window and frowned. Celestia waited patiently for them to finish their internal bickering, however even she had her limits.

“Well, I believe we are in the royal throne room of the princesses in Canterlot surrounded by a bunch of armed guards.” As the pony turned to look at Celestia, a faint memory stirred Celestia's mind as she recalled seeing someone similar once in Ponyville. Logging the information away for a later date, Celestia waited to see what other information she could get from the strange group.

“I thought you said the ponies were friendly.” The female simian spoke, shuffling closer to the red simian and farther away from the guards. This didn’t go unnoticed by the unicorn, who walked between them and looked at the female simian.

“They—we, are. Just not when we’re pointing spears at people.” Celestia watched the mare give a shaky smile to the unconvinced simian, and decided it was time to step forward and get her questions answered. However, the blue simian beat her to the punch, turning to smile at her.

“I’m surprised, I didn’t think this Celestia character would look as legendary as she did back then, it was four years ago after all.” The blue simian smiled, and glanced to the others, before giving a mocking bow.

“Your majesty, I am Blue, a human from the planet omicron persy-eye-oof!” Celestia could only blink as the unicorn and female simian knocked the person named Blue in the back of the head. Regarding them, she assumed the others were this strange breed. Human, she hadn’t heard of that species before. This time, the unicorn stepped forward to explain.

“Uhm, Hi Princess Celestia,” she paused, and glanced to the ‘humans’ before glancing back and taking a deep breath.

“These three are creatures called humans, and they reside in a world completely different from our own. Due to some…problems, we have had to come back in time to try and stop something bad from happening. We mean no harm for the most part, however I do advise you to watch out for the human named Blue, as he wishes to put you through the process of ‘being captured’ sometime in the future.” Bowing slightly before raising her head, Lyra showed off a respect that Celestia only saw from one specific group of ponies.

“So you are Equestrian then. Please understand that I cannot trust you on your words alone.” Celestia flared her wings, and motioned to one of the guards standing back in case one of them tried to breach the defences.

“Go and grab one of the professors from the university, preferably one with a knowledge of truth spells.” The guard saluted Celestia, and dashed off in a hurry. Doing some quick math in her head, she estimated a good half hour before he would return. Looking to the sun, they had barely an hour till sunset.

“While we wait, I should get your names, and might I also ask how you are aware of mine?” Celestia made her way back to her throne, picking up the stacks of papers again. She might as well fill out more forms while they shared a chat. With the guard watching their every move, she doubted they would be able to hit her when she least expected it.

“Well, your highness, I am Lyra. I came originally from the town of Ponyville. You’ve already met Blue. The silent one is Red, and the female human is Green.” Lyra motioned to each of them in turn, noticing with slight satisfaction that Green seemed annoyed that she was labelled the ‘female human.’

“I see, then it is only fair I welcome you three humans to Equestria, and welcome you back.” Celestia gave them all a small smile, before returning to the paperwork. As she skimmed the declaration of saw, a demand for a re-enactment of the creation of the first sawmill, she began to ask questions.

“So how does your world differ from ours?” Celestia paused to glance in their direction, before returning to the papers. A request for a cider fountain, and it wasn’t the first one. She had had to deal with three just this morning, and one request for the word cider to be changed to booze.

“Well, in their world there is no real ‘leader’ so much as a group of towns run by the strongest in the area. All animals there are called Pokémon, and they can learn magic through various techniques, some by simply growing up a bit. People in that world take these creatures, and form a symbiotic relationship to grow and learn together.” Lyra glanced to Blue, wondering if she had forgotten anything.

“I see, I would like to learn more about this world sometime. However, I would like to move onto the main issue, what do you mean by ‘problem’?” Celestia put down her stack of paperwork, handing it to the unicorn secretary nearby to be filed. At the very worst, one town would miss out on being able to make tacos for another day if she left the remaining reports until tomorrow. Looking to the ragtag group, she watched as the unicorn, Lyra she reminded herself, looked to the human named Blue.

“Ok fine, I’ll do the explaining.” Blue raised his arms into the air in an imitation of the symbol for surrender. Rubbing his face, he turned to the legendary and sighed, thinking how to explain while making himself appear in the best light.

“Okay, so there’s this boss guy named Giovanni. He run’s this criminal organisation that likes to advertise their plans to the world. Anyways, after running him out of town, I got his job as the gym leader, which was his cover up. I have direct access to the Pokémon centre, a place to heal Pokémon in case you were wondering, as a precaution.” Blue paused, and brushed the hair out of his face and sighed.

“Let’s just say I forgot to make the safe that contained these small badges Pokémon-proof. Anyone with a single badge, anyone can control Pokémon up to level 30,  and most of the ponies around here are about level 5. Essentially this guy could come in and enslave your world, mostly. And to make matters worse, he ruined my floor so I will have to redo all the traps and mats that send you off in a direction…” Tailing off, Blue noticed the impatient glare of Lyra beside him.

“So basically, we discovered where he had been hiding out, and the disembowelled remains of a time capsule, set to take him back in time to a certain point, but allow him free movement to go wherever he wanted in that timeframe. After some preparation, we’ve come back in time to find him.” Finished his explanation, Blue gave a yawn and looked out the window.

“How do you know he came to this dimension, and how did you get here?” Celestia watched the humans expose a small wristband on their arms, with a circular device attached to it. Looking closely, she could make out various features such as withdraw, deposit, and ‘dimensional hop.’ 

“This device is called a Pass, my grandfather makes them with the help of a tech expert by the name of Bill. Basically he made four special versions for each of us, which would allow us to travel here whenever we pleased. However, one of the devices was stolen one night, and when we followed the trail we found Giovanni.” Blue glanced to the door as two ponies galloped in. Pausing at the princess, they both bowed. The guard returned to his post, and the scholar began charging a spell. Casting it, a dome of gray magic enveloped them.

“I have cast a small field over the prisoners. If they lie it will turn red, if they tell the truth it will turn blue.” Hearing this, Blue turned his head and smirked at Red.

“Ha, see? Blue is better than Red. It’s more truthful, making it better.” To Blue’s dismay, the field of magic turned a bright red, before fading back to gray. Behind him, Green hid a smile behind her hand.

“Now that that is taken care of, I can ask you. Do you mean to do us harm? Is there any chance what you do will harm Equestria?” Celestia stood, wings flaring as she approached them. Despite the fact she stood eye level, all three humans stood a little straighter suddenly, as if sensing the threat.

“We don’t mean you any harm, and it isn’t our action that will cause harm, but the work of another, whom we aim to stop, that will cause you harm.” Blue watched the dome turn the same colour as him, and glanced to Red to see if there had been any change. To his dismay, Red didn't look even slightly blue under the dome.

Celestia dismissed the scholar and looked out the window, thinking deeply to herself. While she had their word, and the word of a trusted scholar’s truth spell, she still felt slight doubts about freeing them. To further increase her worries, a letter arrived from Twilight asking for her to come to Ponyville immediately.

“Let me guess, that’s the purple one asking you to come to-Ponyville was it?” Blue looked to Lyra, who gave a nod. Turning back, Blue saw the suspicion on the legendary’s eyes. Giving a smile, he knew exactly how this was all going to turn out.

Celestia looked to the group, and then to the letter in her hand. Sending a reply that she would arrive by sunset, she scribed a quick message to be given to Luna as soon as she awoke, explaining the situation. While she still did not trust the humans, they seemed relatively harmless. Looking to the one named Red, she noticed the knowing look in his eyes.

“I will return soon. You will remain with a group of four guards-ponies at all times.” Finished giving her orders, she gave one of the guards the message with strict instructions of when to give it to Luna. Walking out the door, her horn began to glow as she prepared a teleportation spell. It would require a few jumps to get there, but she would arrive roughly at sunset.