Kevin was startled. He had never seen a pony like this in the series. It seemed whenever the producer created a new character out of thin air, that character was a bad guy. The look on this new pony’s face (along with the scar on his muzzle) confirmed in Kevin’s mind that he was here for some off intentions. “How could a pony so young even have a scar like that?” he thought.
The impressions floated amongst all the other’s in the young mind of the colt until a purple hoof trailed around the edge of the cloud door and pulled it the rest of the way open.
“Twilight?” Kevin asked.
The alicorn nodded.
“Who’s he?”
“That’s not important right now. I need to speak with you.”
“Well… what?! I think I have some sort of a privilege to know who that is.” Before Kevin could continue, the stallion stepped forward and introduced himself.
“My name is Blizzard Blast,” his slightly deep tone crawled in through Kevin’s ears and tickled his acoustic nerve.
“What are you doing here?” Kevin asked not giving him a chance to explain.
“That’s what I was going to explain,” continued Twilight, “I was going to tell you. We’re here to get you home.”
“Why?!” Kevin asked, reflecting over the matter that he was here to help a mare that he had gotten to know through interaction with a TV screen nonetheless, but someone very significant to him. He was here helping her through her hardest time and now he was just going to throw that away?
“There’s a paradox, we…”
“I can’t though, the finals…” The interruption got interrupted.
“You’ll be killed!” yelled the mare. Kevin stepped back professionally so that they could talk a little more intimately(look up what this word means if you are giggling right now. For my purposes use definition one).
The news hit Kevin like a bag of used toasters. He couldn’t die there.
“You’ll be killed as the only thing that doesn’t belong here. You’re a paradox in this reality. I’ll lose you, and then I’ll lose Fluttershy in the future!” Twilight explained.
Kevin put his face between his hooves and looked upon all he did so far.
He had taken the hurt out of all of Fluttershy’s encounter bullies. Taken their names. Taken their insults, their carnage, their destruction. He was there tonight when Fluttershy was hurt beyond belief. Yet none of it hurt. He didn’t feel any pain, because he’d look into her eyes and she’d know that he was her friend. That he loved her. Everything would be okay. They both had a friend that cared more about the other than him/herself.
“I’m staying,” said Kevin, a bit muffled.
“Staying?” Twilight repeated, confused.
“I’m staying.” Kevin took his hooves away from his face and stood tall to make his voice clear as if he were confident in his decision (he wasn’t).
Twilight took a step back. “Why?” She said on the verge of tears.
“You don’t like me anymore?” Twilight whimpered to Kevin.
Blizzard Blast’s eyes turned colors from green to a milky white. Judging by that alone, it was likely he didn’t like what he was seeing.
Kevin hurriedly stepped forward and raised the mare’s head. “It’s not that,” Kevin said, “You need Fluttershy more than you need me. I’ll stay. I’ll stay. I’ll do whatever I can to get her back.” Kevin meant what he said, but he didn’t say all of it. The truth was he was also doing this for Fluttershy. He’d grown to love her. He’d grown to love her too much and Twilight was the wrong mare to say that in front of.
“I’m sorry.”
Twilight and Blast turned and left him alone at Fluttershy’s door.
“Twilight?” Kevin called after her in a now weeping voice.
Twilight turned only her head.
“Is he-?” Kevin gestured to the stallion to her left.
“My colt friend,” Twilight concluded his statement.
“Just what I thought,” Kevin thought barely aloud as he turned and walked.
Twilight put her arm over her greatest friend of all and continued to walk.
Twilight had someone else.
Morning was the flight test. Kevin would pass. That was a given.
He got out of bed with his mane in a mat. His face looked as if it had been held over an opened flame and melted like wax. His eyes were bloodshot. He was depressed. He might not ever be able to muster the strength that Fluttershy needed today, but he would have to. He would always have to.
Kevin climbed to the bathroom and took a shower that would outlast a bath before going to the door and walking the halls. His coat was still wet. His mane was slightly moist, but he could care less. Let the world mock him as if he still felt their words.
Kevin trudged onward until he reached Fluttershy’s room and knocked on the door, faking a smile as he did so.
Fluttershy opened the door and saw Kevin. Today was no day for a test. Fluttershy was still embarrassed from last night. She couldn’t face any crowds today, but Kevin had come here for her. There was one stallion that she couldn’t let down, here. The one word trailed Fluttershy’s mind. She had one stallion here. Her father undoubtedly wouldn’t show up after she got her cutie mark in taking care of animals.
Fluttershy sniffled and walked out of her room with the stallion’s hoof in hers. Each of them walked the halls.
Kevin saw the mare’s eyes as they walked: bloodshot. More than his. She hadn’t slept all night.
Kevin would hug her forever if it wouldn’t embarrass her. He thought of kissing her on her adorable forehead. It might seem weird to do that anywhere, even if they had kissed before.
He wisped away the thought as each of them approached the testing facility. Kevin took a deep breath in. This is where he would die. He would finish his test and then die here as a nameless, joyless, colt. Kevin walked her to the side of the arena and waited for the command to start. The track had already been set up. He would wait with the one he would later die with.
Twilight approached the portal with the one that she held most dear. It felt terrible to break Kevin’s heart and even worse to let him stay and die to help her friend. She wouldn’t let another pony die from this. It was Fluttershy or Kevin and Kevin had the choice. Everypony has choices.
Both Blizzard and Twilight were reluctant to return to the portal without what they came here for. Still, they had to go. The town would miss them if they didn’t. Twilight held Blast’s hoof as they began to pass dimensions. Blast knew the spell. He cast it and transcended his current world with his love. A white stallion forced his way past the couple and into the confused world of the past. Twilight looked to identify the figure as he darted quickly into the old world.
“Kevin?” Twilight squinted at the mysterious pegasus.
“Get down!” Blast shouted turning and thrusting Twilight’s head towards the ground: moving her head out of the way of a bullet.
The stallion moved his body the rest of the way through the portal and summoned two glimmering swords from his horn. He threw one of them at the human before him: cutting the destructive weapon in half.
The ground turned white with snow, but black with hatred as the warrior’s eyes flushed white with rage.
Colt after colt after mare after mare, Kevin waited his turn. It was useless to be sitting here waiting for his turn. What time did he have to fly if he was to be pronounced dead in no more than a few moments? Kevin shut his eyes as he sat in woe. His life reflected in his pupils. Only a small portion of it was spent knowing anything about My Little Pony™. Only two months was spent with them, but in that short time, Kevin had accomplished so much and saved so many lives. His was ending.
“Alright! I think it’s Kevin that’s up next!” shot the instructor with the hard voice.
Kevin passed himself up to front of the starting line as the instructor mumbled to himself.
“What’s a Kevin?” He muttered trying to hide what he was saying although failing.
“It means kind and gentle in Irish,” Kevin told the pegasus, annoyed at the matter that he had such a weird name in this reality.
“Fair enough,” said the stallion obviously again confused at the name of the language that Kevin had said.
With that, Kevin pushed off the edge of the cloud and flew the obstacle in a mild fashion, passing everything smoothly, but slow enough to be a humble flight to encourage Fluttershy.
Kevin turned the entire loop and found himself at the starting line again. His heartbeat fell out of time and he breathed hard.
“Passed!” Shouted the harsh voice as Kevin fell backward from dizziness.
The world around him spun and turned. Ripples turned from his very insides. He turned a spasm on the ground as he felt his stomach burn and his flesh felt as if it were being torn away and burnt.
And then it all vanished.
Fluttershy’s face entered his vision. Everything would be alright while she was here.
A single tear fell from the end of her nose. Kevin felt his own tear being brought forth.
He wanted to tell her it was all okay. That she would be alright. It was his decision, but the words choked in his throat. He blinked just for a minute and felt the shocking pain in his chest.
Kevin lay on the side of the test track: dead.
A mysterious figure entered very timely to the scene. He was a white pegasus with blue hair. That approached the body: now rippling into nothing and finally disappearing. The figure approached the mare: now shaking a third and final time.
Twilight scanned her library. After the encounter with the man with the gun, she ran through the portal and immediately passed anypony that wanted to carry out a conversation with her. A stallion had passed her that looked too much like Kevin for it to be real.
“WHO WAS HE?!” She screamed in her mind.
She looked over everything in her library in a rush.
“Spike!” She finally turned to her #1 assistant to get her book for her.
A stallion opened the door and marched in: seeing tears at his mare’s eyes.
It broke his heart that she would act this way.
“Twilight?” he asked awkwardly.
“There you are!” she shouted, “You know, don’t you?”
“Yes,”
“Who was that?” She responded in question.
“Kevin.”
“I knew it!” she calmed and then thought back, “How?”
“He is a paradox. A person cannot be a little kid in two worlds.”
“How’d you know?”
“I recalled his description from one of Fluttershy’s stories. I thought it was just a coincidence until I saw him.”
“So… the paradoxes? They’ll mark themselves out?”
“Yes, Twilight. They will. you can’t be a paradox that causes paradoxes. That just doesn’t make sense.”
“But why was that Kevin?”
Blast smiled at the mare as his horn lit up.
“I know what happens. I can’t tell you, though. It’d cause a paradox.”
“So what, now, then?”
“We wait.”