Mornings. Patrick's eternal nemesis.
The PI groaned as he sat up on his bed, his head throbbing. "Must've been some party last night... How much did I drink?" He continued to mutter as he got out of bed, his hooves connecting with the floor...
Wait.
He didn't have a bed, he slept on his sofa.
He had sworn off alcohol a year ago. His headache couldn't be a hangover.
And he definitely never had hooves.
Patrick panicked, practically prancing in place from his excess energy, before he remembered his breathing exercises. 'All right, in, out, calm down... first step to solving any problem: examine the situation from all angles.'
The PI looked around the room. It bore an uncanny resemblance to his office. The desk, bookshelves, window, sofa, doors - heck, even the desk lamp and stacks of paperwork on his desk were in exactly the same position as the ones in his own office. yet, despite the similarities, there were still a few differences, more than enough to be noticeable. First, of course, was the bed, a small one tucked into a cranny that used to house his television. The colors of pretty much everything were almost painfully vibrant, especially the once-dull sofa and desk. Both of them, along with a few other things like the door, seemed to be remade for a completely different... species...
Patrick facepalm... err, facehooved. 'Achievements in forgetfulness: you're a different species, stupid!' Sighing, he walked over to the bathroom door, not even thinking about how he was currently walking on all fours. At that point, he just wanted to see what he even looked like. He opened the door and entered... his office.
The shock snapped him out of his groggy daze, and the memories rushed back to him. "...Either I'm dead, or I'm still dreaming."
"It is not your time quite yet, hero of Earth." A familiar voice said.
Patrick turned to his left to see Princess Luna relaxing on the sofa. He quickly regained any composure he might have lost and responded, "Could you please just call me Patrick? I don't really like titles."
"If you wish, Patrick. You had some questions for me, I believe?"
Patrick did. There were so many. Jayce's joking 'are you single?' line came to mind briefly, before it was utterly annihilated. Somewhere outside, something exploded. Patrick ignored it. "Can I have a mirror?"
Luna giggled. "It is your dream, not mine."
Patrick facehooved again, his tail starting to swish behind him in annoyance. How could he be so dense? He quickly willed a mirror to appear, and he saw... himself. No hooves, no extra appendage that he just noticed and was trying not to freak out over, just a perfectly normal human in a badass longcoat. "Um... I think this mirror is defective."
"Are you so sure of that?" Luna asked. "You do not even know what your current form looks like. How would you be able to see it in a mirror inside your own subconscious? You will have to wait until you awake."
"Yeah... I suppose..." Patrick mumbled as the mirror faded. Then it hit him. "Wait, when I wake up?! You mean, I'm actually...!"
Luna chuckled again. "I did warn you there would be changes."
Patrick looked for a retort, but found none. "Okay... could you at least tell me what I am, then? And, erm... if you don't mind me asking, what you are?"
"You are a pony." Luna stated as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, which it probably was. "An Earth pony to be specific."
Patrick shook his head, somewhat frustrated. "And 'Earth pony' means... what, exactly?"
Luna sighed. "I keep forgetting that you are not used to our kind... very well, a brief explanations of different types of ponies seems to be in order. If you could summon something for me to write on?"
Patrick willed a whiteboard into existence, along with a few markers of different colors and a rag to erase with. A look of confusion briefly passed Luna's face - had she not seen the things before? - but it quickly passed.
In a few minutes, Patrick doubled over with laughter. Luna really didn't know anything about these things. The marker she had been attempting to draw with had still had its lid firmly attached. The look on Luna's face when she realized her mistake was priceless, and even she couldn't help but giggle a little.
After that, Luna launched into a short-but-informative lecture on the different types of ponies. Patrick wished he could take notes. without them, he could only memorize the basics. 'Unicorns: magic. Pegusi: flight, weather manipulation, quick healing. Earth ponies: boring but practical.'
The lecture diverged into 'cutie marks'. Patrick nearly spewed dream vomit at the name. Apparently, they showed what a pony's special talent was. Curious, he had managed to catch a glimpse of his. A magnifying glass. Typical.
Patrick rubbed his forehead with a hoof as the lecture finished. "Ugh... dream headache..."
Luna seemed to stifle a giggle. "Apologies. it seems our sister's student has rubbed off on us..."
That piqued his interest. "Your... sister?"
Luna nodded. "Yes, as I am the princess of the moon, my sister, Celestia, is the princess of the sun."
"What's she like?" Patrick did a mental facehoof at his rash instincts, sending the sound of it throughout the dreamscape. "I-if you don't mind me asking."
Luna seemed to be having more and more difficulty restraining her laughter. "Not at all. My sister is kind and gentle, too much so at times. She is strict when it comes down to it, but her love for her subjects can sometimes be too blinding for her."
"Sounds a lot like my brother." Patrick relaxed as a faint image appeared near the desk. "He was always too afraid that whatever he was doing might hurt me or someone else." He sighed. "...He was always such a worrywart.
"So, anyway!" He smiled, wanting to avoid that area of discussion. "You and your sister..." Great, what was there to talk about?! "is the pattern of 'Princesses of celestial bodies' ceremonial, or do you have some sort of connection to them?"
"It's quite simple, really," Luna explained. "I raise the moon, and my sister raises the sun."
Patrick's mind imploded, as did the office. "So basically, I'm having a peaceful chat with Mrs. Pony Dream Goddess." He deadpanned as the bookshelves fell over, their contents flying across the room. "Joy."
Luna cringed slightly as The Art of War landed on her face. "We - and by that I mean all living alicorns - do not appreciate being called goddesses. We are far from perfect."
The princess looked as if something else was bothering her, but before Patrick could ask what it was, the room began to literally tear itself apart. "It seems that our time is up for now. Good morning... my little pony."
^^^^^
Mornings. Patrick's eternal nemesis.
The PI groaned as he sat up on his bed, his head throbbing. "Must've been some party last night..." He continued to mutter as he got out of bed, his hooves connecting with the floor...
Wait.
This again.
This time he didn't panic. He knew what he was, and something about the land he found himself in. He did his breathing exercises and inspected his surroundings.
The room was unfamiliar to him this time. Kinda comforting; he knew it wasn't as likely to be a dream if he didn't know where he was.
The room looked quite generic, to be honest. A bed, a nightstand, a dresser, all that jazz. Of course, each piece was proportioned to a pony body and were lined with some kind of crystal.
Before he could continue his examination, the door opened to show a white unicorn mare clad in golden armor, with an axe of a worrying size attached to her belt. Patrick realized that she was likely a member of the royal guard. "Patrick Matthews?" She asked in a surprising tenor.
Patrick nodded without delay. He got the feeling that pissing her off was an extremely bad idea. If her glare was any indication, he already had.
"Princess Celestia wants to see you. Follow me." The guard turned and exited the room and Patrick followed her cautiously, paranoid of angering her.
The sight of some of the rooms they passed through would probably make a human architect giddy. Patrick made a mental note to gawk at it later. Right now, he was busy avoiding his escort's wrath and going over formalities in his head. He knew he was inevitably going to put his fo- his hoof in his mouth at some point during the upcoming meeting, but he wanted to delay that as long as he could. Same applied to earning further ire from the mare in front of him.
After some walking, the guard stopped in front of a pair of ornate double doors. "Princess Celestia is inside. Behave yourself."
Patrick nodded. "I plan to."
The guard didn't respond, she simply left. 'Yep, She is massively ticked off. The second pony I ever meet hates my guts. Joy.'
Patrick took a deep breath and nudged the doors open.
The room was... actually quite simple. It had a few windows on each side and a throne on top of some raised platforms, by far the most ornate things in the room. Sitting on the throne was...
...Oh dear lord she was beautiful. Was it wrong to think that? 'Gah, focus!'
After a few minutes of waiting for her to speak, Patrick decided to take the initiative. "Princess Celestia?"
She nodded in kind. "Patrick Matthews, it is a pleasure. I bid you a warm welcome to Equestria." Her voice was calm and serene, like a mother to her child. "I imagine you have many questions for me."
"Um..." Patrick tried to think of an appropriate question, but, Luna had answered all of his questions when she brought him here...
Wait. "Why would you bring me here? I do appreciate it, Luna could not have come at a better time, but... why?"
Celestia sighed. A nerve had obviously been struck, and Patrick was struggling against his instincts telling him to keep attacking that nerve. "That, I'm afraid, is a tale full of tragedy I would rather not recount at this time. Long story short, we have some... enemies in your world that will stop at nothing to get to us. For the first time in centuries, we will have to take the offensive.
"And that" Celestia turned to Patrick, "is where you come in. In order to combat this foe, we will need to send our warriors into your world in order to combat them. However, we have encountered a few... problems with such situations in the past."
Patrick tilted his head. "What do you mean by problems, exactly?"
"Unfortunately, I am not the best suited to explain those kind of problems." Yep, there it was, the subtle sign showing that Patrick's hoof had irreversibly entered his mouth. "My student was going to be here to give you an explanation, but she seems to be a tad late..."
As if on cue, a wisp of green smoke flew into the throne room. Patrick braced himself for, well, ANYTHING, but instead of something akin to a terrorist attack, a scroll appeared from the smoke. Celestia smiled. "This should be from her. Just a minute..."
However, as Princess Celestia read the scroll, her expression turned from one of joy to one of concern and shock. She quickly replaced it with a more calm facade and walked out of the room. Patrick followed her and the guard from before joined as soon as they cleared the doorway. "I'm afraid our conversation must wait for later, Patrick. There has been an incident in Ponyville concerning my student's protege, and nopony knows what happened."
Patrick tried to keep silent, but his curiosity and altruism won out. "May I be of assistance?"
Celestia smirked. "I was hoping you might ask."
A slight string of laughter escaped Patrick's throat at that, much to the guard's annoyance. 'Oh, well played Celestia. Get me to volunteer for the task.' "I normally don't work for free... but I suppose I'll make an exception here."
"Excellent. Hoof Axe?"
The guard startled at first, but quickly recovered. "Yes, your majesty?"
"I want you and Sixth Sense to accompany Patrick, as well as assist him in creating a more appropriate pony name. The less ponies know about his origins, the better. Understood?"
"B-but Princess-"
Whatever Hoof Axe was going to say, she was interrupted by a quick glare from the solar diarch. "UNDERSTOOD?"
Hoof axe was shaking in her armor, producing an almost humorous clanking sound. "Y-yes Princess..."
The princess nodded as a pair of guards ran up to her. "Good, I will leave you to that. For now, I must return to my subjects. Good luck, you two."
And with that, Celestia turned down a different hallway, the pair of guards flanking her. This of course left Patrick alone with the axe-wielding mare who had once again defaulted to incomprehensible animosity toward the PI. "Come along, 'Patty Cake'," She spat, catching Patrick off guard, "let's find Sixth Sense and get this over with."
It took only a few nanoseconds for Patrick to recover. "'Patty Cake'?" He held back a chuckle at the sheer ridiculousness of the name. "Yeah, I'm not going to be using that name anytime soon."