Prologue-
Off in the city of Canterlot a crowd of ponies was gathering outside of the palace all mumbling with discontent. The mob had started forming only a few hours ago when the news had spread of a new kind creature appearing throughout Equestria. The princesses had known of the creatures for some time, but kept things quiet for these exact reasons.
“The crowd has doubled in the past hour,” an orange unicorn guard said while looking over the balcony.
“It appears that it has, Lighting.” Celestia said while looking towards the crowd as well. “This reminds me of that speech I gave after the wedding incident.”
“You mean the invasion, your highness?” Lighting asked.
“Yes, but calling it an invasion only incites more demand for a war when there is no reason for it. Their queen is in the dungeon so they have no leader,” Celestia reasoned.
“Unless they decide to try again.” He said under his breath before realizing exactly who he was talking to. “Wouldn’t it be a better idea to get rid of the problem now that their queen is gone?”
“How would going to war with an entire species benefit Equestria?” She asked with a raised an eyebrow. “A country would be a different story, but a species is something else entirely.”
“They are parasites ma’am, they would only serve to harm our home.” He shot back with relatively sound logic.
“That’s a debate for another time. Please excuse me.” She said which resulted in Lighting saluting her as she walked out onto the balcony to finally address the rather large crowd forming outside.
She looked across the crowd seeing many ponies with a multitude of expressions ranging from angry all the way to fearful. The crowd quieted down their talking as they saw the princess step out into the sunlight which seemed to radiate with her coat. Her mane flowed in the non-existent breeze like it always did due to the immense magical power she held. Clearing her throat she then spoke with the royal canterlot voice to address the crowd.
“My little ponies, it has come to my attention that a new creature has appeared in equestria and has created some minor problems where they have been spotted.” She said which got the crowd to start talking again, mostly in agreement. Celestia cleared her throat again which got the crowd to quiet down long enough for her to continue her speech.
“These problems have included certain animals disappearing as well as assorted items being stolen from our homes. I have created a plan to stop this problem before it becomes any worse than it currently is and hopefully, create peaceful relations with these new creatures.” The crowd started to mumble again though it wasn’t exactly happy with the last bit of that sentence.
“This is going to be a long day” Celestia thought before continuing to address the crowd in order to quell the riots that were sure to break out if this was not handled properly. It’s never easy taking care of a country of fearful ponies.
****Somewhere else****
In a rather rural area far away from any villages with ponies stood makeshift tents made of materials ranging from leaves to animal skins. Music could be heard coming from the center of the city of tents, but it wasn’t from any instrument that could be found in equestria. Various people were walking around doing various things essential to keeping the thing from falling apart.
“Hey Mark, what do you want me to do with these dead batteries?” A someone asked a rather pale man wearing a T-shirt that was ripped and muddy with jeans that were equally deteriorated.
“You’re sure they’re dead? We only have so many left for the radio.” Mark replied while taking out an old gameboy.
“I’m pretty sure. Radio stopped working and swapping their places didn’t help.” The other guy said while handing them over. Mark grabbed the batteries and put them into the old handheld before flipping the switch to see if anything would come on. The light flickered red before going dark again.
“Alright, they’re dead. Go grab some from Alex and make sure you kill the radio in an hour.” He said while taking back out the dead batteries and putting them in his back pocket to be used later for something. He really didn’t know what uses for them were other than just keeping them out of the water.
“But Alex is scary!” The other guy complained to Mark who just nodded,
“He is, but he’s not dangerous. Just ignore the tattoos and don’t mention his quirks and you’ll be fine.” Tony said while putting on a smile for him.
“Alright. OH, Brian wanted to talk to you about leaving. You know, trying to make it out there on his own?”
“I know, I was going to go talk to him in a minute.” Mark replied before the other guy walked off to go find Alex. He passed by many tents all of which had something unique about them. These differences ranged from discarded junk hanging from the entrance to flowers planted outside of them. One even had some poison joke hanging just above the entrance; that guy didn’t like people.
Eventually the guy reached a tent that was covered in mud to leave the insides cooler than any of the other tents.There was a lot more junk piled around this tent with bits and pieces of old electronics taken apart.
The battery guy swallowed his fear before walking into the darkened tent. Even more junk was scattered around with a tall shirtless man was taking apart a radio with a screw driver. He had various tattoos across his body with a multitude of different designs. One that stood out though was three butterflies that were on the side of his neck.
“H-hey, Alex. C-can I-” Alex tossed batteries at the guy without looking up.
“I heard the radio die. Unless you were coming to get me to fix it, it needs batteries.” He said while continuing to tinker with the radio.When the guy didn’t leave Alex got a little confused. “What?”
“Nothing just-”
“I look freaky?” He asked. The battery guy just nodded with a melancholy expression. “I’m used to that. Just take your batteries and get going.”
The battery guy nodded and beat a hasty retreat from the scary looking individual and his random technododads.
Alex just sat in silence for a few more minutes after that guy had just left. He wasn’t exactly happy that everyone looked at him like he was going to hurt them. Sure he had a lot of tattoos, but that was from his teenage years before realizing how far he took it and only got one more tattoo afterwards.
“*Sigh* Aren’t we supposed to look past appearances?” Alex asked himself as he put down the radio and looked towards his screwdriver. “At least you won’t judge me screwy.” The screwdriver did not respond, but Alex cracked a grin at it. “Screwy, you’re crazy man!” He said happily.
“Hey, Alex. The hand crank broke again.” Another guy said as he walked into Alex’s tent.
“Why am I the only one that can fix anything?” Alex thought as he put screwy back into his right boot and followed his new acquaintance out of his tent to go fix the messed up hand crank. When Alex left his tent a chill ran down his spine,
“I wish I had a shirt when I got sucked into this.” He said to himself which go this friends attention.
“I thought you just didn’t like wearing a shirt.”
“Nah, these tattoos scare off everyone so I tried to keep them covered back home.”
“Any special ones?” Alex thought for a moment about that question. Sure, plenty of them have stories but none really were any better than the rest. Finally he thought of one, Flexing his arm he showed off a particularly interesting tattoo of a chinese dragon.
“This one I got after winning a bet. This tattoo cost over a thousand bucks but it was free for me.” He said with a smug smile on his face. “It costs so much because of the style and artist which I suppose don’t matter much now.”
“I suppose not. What about that one?” The other guy asked while pointing towards a samurai tattoo on Alex’s chest.
“That one? Oh, that story isn’t really interesting…”
Far away from Alex and his tattoo conversation Mark was talking to someone who had an aggravated expression on his face.
“So what, we just stay here and waste away? I want to go home damn it!” The guy yelled while throwing his hands up in the air. Mark just put a hand to his head and shook it slowly,
“Brian, we can’t afford to just leave. We need each other man.” Mark reasoned while putting a hand on Brian’s back. He however, smacked Mark’s hand and jerked away.
“We’re falling apart Mark! How long do you think they’re going to listen to you if we don’t even try getting home?” Brian asked while motioning to the sub par living conditions they were in. “No one should have to live like this! How long before one of us get’s killed by a timber wolf, or one of those manticores? I can’t keep everyone from wandering off like I’ve been especially when more keep coming in!”
“You have to, they respect you Brian and if you leave, they leave.” Mark responded.
“That might be best for them! Why live like this when there are ponies that are willing to help?”
“And what if it becomes a Zecora situation? I’d rather not have them go out without any idea on what the situation would be.”
“And if it’s not like that? You’re putting them at risk on a maybe!”
“That’s what you’re doing too, Brain!” Mark borderline yelled before taking a deep breath. “At least they have some place to come back to if they fail out there Brian. If we just give up on this then what happens if I’m right?”
“I don’t know, but anything is better than living like this.”
“This conversation is over Brian. Leave if you want, but know you’re fucking over everyone that follows you out!” Mark finally snapped before storming away from Brian who huffed in frustration.
“Jackass is going to get us all killed.” Brian thought to himself as he picked up his makeshift machete that was lodged in the ground beside him. He started to walk in the opposite direction of Mark so he wouldn’t have to talk to the moronic jackass anymore. Mark was the one who came up with whole stupid idea to begin with and hadn’t pushed to try and get home.
“Doesn’t the bastard realize some of us have families we miss.” Brian said to himself while letting out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. He walked past tent after tent as he made his way towards the edge of the tent city that he had a hand in creating. When he reached the edge he stopped and kept his eyes toward the horizon. It would be so simple for him to just keep going without anyone stopping him, but was that really the best option? What if Mark was right?
Looking back towards the tents and random junk that littered the place that he had stayed for the last 3 months. The decision was easy enough as he took another step away from the people that served only to hold him back.