The World Ends With Pony

by Whiteeyes

First Contact

Warning: Perception jumps galore in this chapter. Also CMC and Pinkie Sense. You have been warned.

"My hooves are itchy my hooves are itchy!" Pinkie Pie announced to the friends gathered in the Library for the 'Owlowicious is Employee of the Month for the Third Month in a Row Party' after-party.

The other party guests look over at the pink pony in worry. You simply did NOT mess with the Pinkie Sense. Spike, forgetting his bitterness at being outdone once again by an owl, asked the necessary question and, to his credit, managed to keep it from sounding hysterical. "What does THAT mean?"

Everypony was curious, they hadn't seen this particular sense before. "I don't kn-kn-kn-ooo-wwwww ooooh w-w-w-wo-ow-ww-w th-eee-rre go-oo-os m-m-m-my doo-ooo-zz-zzy s-sss-en-seee!" she announced, vibrating rapidly. She suddenly stopped. "And now they're itchy again. D-ooz-y! Itchy. Doo-oo-ooz-zz-zzy! Itchy!" she said, going back and forth between the two.

Twilight Sparkle looked on in a mix of profound confusion and a good deal of analytical interest. "It's almost like the Universe is arguing with itself. What the hay could be causing that?" the unicorn wondered out loud. Spike, her young dragon assistant that she had taught the ways of science, considered the situation and, utilizing all the training he's ever had, gave the very scientific answer of an 'I dunno' shrug.
*********
Meanwhile, on a hill on the outskirts of town...

"And I say we all go in together!" Shiki insisted again, stamping her hoof down. Shiki looked rather different as a pony. For one thing, she was clover green with a dark brown mane and tail. Other than her glasses, her bag, and Mr. Mew, she'd kept no clothing. The most interesting part was that she had a symbol on her flanks showing a needle and thread. They had been told they were called 'Cutie Marks', but not even Shiki was girly enough to really believe a society would evolve where they would be called such a cute name if everyone had them. The most shocking part however was that she had a unicorn horn. She was an honest to goodness unicorn.

"And I say I go in alone, scout the place out for any danger." Neku argued once more, his uncharacteristic worry for the well being of his friends triggering a 'doozy' unbeknownst to him. Neku was dark orange and light orange, his body now much darker than his hair...mane, tail, whatever. He however had kept his jacket, incredibly, and that included the case of pins in the inside pocket. He'd also kept his purple headphones, but nothing to plug them into. His Mark was a purple spray can and two 'sprayed on' purple musical notes. Unlike Shiki, he didn't have a horn, but looked like a normal pony.

"What danger? They're ponies!"

"Yes, and so are we! Except they're better at it!"

"Do you really think they'll attack us?"

"Ponies are territorial! They sure aren't going to bake us a cake!"

"That's in our world. Maybe being intelligent made them friendlier?"

"Like it did with humans?" Neku pointed out, stopping the conversation dead in its tracks with a very awkward pause. "I know I know, I need to stop being so judgmental, but it's hard. Especially since it's not our world so we don't know anything about how cautious we have to be."

"I believe I have the solution." Beat announced. "Just send in the top team of my and my sister and we'll take care of it. We scout out with a smaller group, and we've got people hanging back in case it gets dangerous and we need a rescue. Plus, if anything does happen, you'll have my top grade power to sort it out. Also, I don't think people would bug me too much, I don't exactly look friendly." he noted at the end. Beat did look a bit intimidating. He was large for one thing, with a bit of a barrel chest. His body was midnight black. His mane and tail where straw blond. Not that you could seem much of his mane under the black wool cap he worse, decorated with a (now horse) skull no less. He also still had his iron (horse) skull pendant and his metal stud bracer on his left 'arm', as well as his board which had a decal of a (horse) skull wreathed in blue and purple flame. His mark was a pair of bone white Reaper wings jammed together, the effect looking somewhat like a bat. The wings design may have had to do with the fact that he was a pegasus, or with the fact that he used to be a Reaper. Probably both.

All in all, Neku had to agree that he looked pretty daunting. "OK, I can see you getting in no problem, but are you sure about Rhyme? I get you don't want to leave her out of your sight after all that's happened, but she doesn't look as...tough."

It was a bit of an understatement. Rhyme may have had a cap similar to her brothers (though the skull was much smaller) and the same straw blond mane, the rest didn't inspire fear. Her body was peach colored. Her bell-pendant was gleaming brightly in its simple yet elegant design. While she was also a pegasus like her brother, her wings where much smaller and more downy in appearance. Then there was the fact that she was outright small, being notably shorter than even Shiki; the effect was only exaggerated when she stood next to her brother. Quite frankly she looked like a little kid. What was also interesting was that unlike the others, she had no marking on her flanks.

"I thought of that. I think the problem is it's own solution." she noted. "Beat's too scary to just walk up so someone and try and ask a lot of questions, but if it's a 'cute little kid' they might be more tolerant. And if not and it does cause trouble, he can bail me out cause I doubt anyone would want to mess with him."

"That...is actually well thought out. Nice to see that your planning skills are as sharp as ever Rhyme. I think this could work." Neku noted, feeling a lot better.

"Yeah! Operation: Mr. Ed is a go!" Shiki shouted.

"...Operation Mr. Ed?" Neku asked after the awkward silence that followed.

"Well we have to call it something." Shiki noted. "Unless you can think of something better. I mean, we are expected to file a report on this one, and I think we really need to sound professional."

After a few more minutes debate, it was decided that operation Mr. Ed would begin immediately...tomorrow morning cause boy where they tired.
*********
Meanwhile back at the party, Pinkie had stopped doozying and had stayed itching. This did however lead to some new problems. "Itchy itchy itch-an-itch!" she noted, rubbing her hooves back and forth across the ground repeatedly in an attempt to stop the itching. In fact, she rubbed them so fast it was less that she had four legs under her and more like she had an area of pink blur. Once she had started to wear an actual groove in the floor, Twilight had called the party to an end as she needed to escort the pink party pony to the infirmary despite Pinkie's insistence that the party can still go on without her.
*********
The next day, Pinkie walked through town, somewhat miserable. Her hooves had stopped itching after being slathered in ointment and stuck inside ice water for a while. She felt better afterwards and had insisted that she was fine, but Nurse Redheart had insisted on putting her hooves in casts so that they could heal from rubbing raw. And unlike Pinkie's request, these were boring regular casts, not neon-colored jet-casts that would let her fly around and shoot tractor beams to bring her cupcakes. Despite the nurse saying such a thing didn't exist, Pinkie felt that it was just being kept secret from her because Nurse Redheart didn't want to share the cupcakes. Still, casts or no casts she was still Pinkie Pie, and so she walked on with a quite literal spring in her step, or hops as it were; the large metal springs stuck into the bottoms of the casts literally letting her bounce around. Well, bounce more than usual.
*********
Scootaloo, Sweetie Belle, and Apple Bloom watched as their pink sometimes-mentor bounced on by with a confused look on their faces. Shrugging it off as it being just a case of Pinkie being Pinkie, Scootaloo flapped her wings and sent the Cutie Mark Crusader Scooter Wagon (they needed a cooler name) off at top speed to find….something! Really, at the moment, the Crusaders didn't have any idea what to try next, so they were going around town to see if anything gave them any ideas. That's when they noticed the class snobs, Diamond Tiara and Silver Spoon, walking toward the edge of town with a mean smirk on their faces. Scootaloo, deciding that anything that made those two happy was worth wrecking, made a rather sharp and unannounced change in course to follow them. She didn't notice that the sharp turn almost threw her friends out of the wagon in the back, she was too busy trying to see what her two arch-enemies were up to. She was however paying enough attention to notice that there was a new pegasus pony, a filly really, walking into town, and that she…uh-oh.
*********
Rhyme stopped at the edge of town. Oh good, curious kids, just a hair smaller than herself. She could probably get a lot out of these two without arousing suspicion. She didn't know how, or if, ponies waved, so she opted to stand there openly, smile, and say "Hi there." Oh, and make the voice 'happy' in tone. Rhyme still had some trouble when it came to emotions. Erasure can do that to you. Or so she assumed. As far as she knew, she was the only human being to ever come back from total oblivion. The two ponies stopped, smirked, and whispered to each other as they pointed at her. That…wasn't a good sign.

They grey one with a silver mane and tail walked over. She was wearing a pair of turquoise glasses and a similar necklace. Both looked…somewhat designer for lack of a better phrase. The mark on her rear was a spoon with a heart in it. Any hope that the heart represented any sort of kindness left as she glared down at Rhyme…well not physically but socially. "Well hi yourself. What's the matter, run away from home blank flank?" she said in a mocking tone, her friend snickering. She was pink in color, her purple mane having a white stripe through it, and her mark was a crown of some sort. Encouraged by her support, the grey one continued "What's a loser like you doing out here anyway? Did your family throw you away?

Rhyme was starting to think this might have been a mistake. If being a 'blank flank', a moniker she was sure applied to her own lack of a mark, was some sort of social stigmata, she might actually be the one to draw the most attention. Just as she was beginning to believe that they might need to rethink the plan, three ponies came up. One of them, an orange pegasus with a purple mane and no mark, was ridding a scooter. She was apparently serving as a sort of 'motor' for the other two who were riding in the wagon that was attached to the scooter. One of them was a unicron, white with a purple mane, and the other was a yellow regular pony with a red mane. She couldn't be sure because of the wagon sides, but it seemed the other two didn't have marks either. Maybe it wasn't that big of a problem…

"Hey Silver Spoon! Leave her alone." the pegasus demanded (wait her name was seriously Silver Spoon?) in an angry tone. "Can't you two be nice for once?"

"Whatever losers." the one with the crown mark said dismisivly. "Come on Silver Spoon, lets go get a pedicure." (It…it really is Silver Spoon….)

"Good idea Tiara." the other piped in happily as she trotted off.

Rhyme was left standing there, several questions going through her mind. What was a blank flank really? How common or major was it? And seriously, their names were Silver Spoon and Tiara?

"Hey are you OK?" the unicorn asked, climbing out of the wagon, and she indeed didn't have a mark. "Sorry about Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara, they're very rude." (Diamond Tiara?…I'm not sure if that's better or worse.) "Anyway, my names Sweetie Belle."

Her friend, the regular pony, came bounding out as well. "An 'ahm Apple Bloom. Pleased ta meet'cha." she drawled in a rather thick accent. Like her two companions, she was indeed without a mark.

"Yeah yeah, I'm Scootaloo, introductions all around. So what's your name." the pegasus practically demanded, a look of slight (boredom? annoyance?) whatever passing over her face as she leaned on her scooter and awaited an answer.

Rhyme had been about to answer with a name she thought would work. There was a pattern of 'descriptor object' in all the ponies' names…until the last one. Well every society had oddballs and her nickname didn't sound too off so…"My name is Rhyme." she said, and remembered to sound nice. It was easier to use her nickname so slipups would be less likely "Anyway, I'm new in town, and I was wondering if somebody could show me around town." she finished off her request with a rather large smile.

The three of them stood together for a second, looking at each other in silence for a few seconds. Rhyme was afraid that she'd blown it one the name when they all shouted at once "CUTIE MARK CRUSADER TOUR GUIDES! YEAY!" at the top of their lungs. At first Rhyme was stunned, then wondered if they were calling for someone, a tour guide service? Then she was thrown into the back of the wagon as a helmet was put on her head and they departed at high speed for the center of town. Oh, apparently these ARE the guides…yeay.
*********
Twilight was a bit concerned about her friend bouncing around in casts, literally, but after a while she stopped worrying as it didn't seem to be hurting anything or anypony. Satisfied, she had decided to return to her library in order to read up on a new theoretical work Ancient Time Travelers by a unicorn with the penname of The Question, which featured pieces of ancient art that all seem to contain a brown earth pony that all bear a striking resemblance to each other, right down to the hourglass cutie mark. It was another conspiracy book; one of Twilights guilty pleasures was seeing how some ponies needed to have an explanation for everything, and that there couldn't be coincidences. Heck, there was a pony in town that matched that description, and as far as she knew Doctor was just a bit of an eccentric clock maker. He'd probably even write a book about it himself with something about reincarnation if he found out, or wonder if he invents time travel later because she showed him the book so he'd invent time travel so she would show him the book so he'd invent time travel so she'd show him the book so he'd….maybe she should just show him the book. If her brain kept on going like that, she was nervous it would reach Pinkie levels of chaos.

Twilight briefly wondered if that's how her friend thought of things all the time when she heard a familiar sound. Turning, she saw the Crusaders puling up in their wagon, but this time they had a new filly with them. "Oh, hey girls. Who's your new friend?" she asked, smiling.

"Her names Rhyme, she's new in town." Scootaloo responded.

"We're showing her around as" Sweetie Belle began. Twilight, knowing what was going to happen, covered her ears before they shouted in unison "CUTIE MARK CRUSADER TOUR GUIDES!" She would figure out some day how they managed to do that so perfectly on the spot. "And we figured since we couldn't decide where to go first, we should go to the last place on all our lists first."

"The library was the last place on your list?" Twilight said, disappointed.

"Ah no, that was school. But we all figurd' she woun' wanna see that yet so we decided here was almos as borrin." Apple Bloom explained, beaming. She didn't seem to notice her new friend getting out of the wagon. "Anyway we gotta go bye!" she shouted as Scootaloo took off at high speed, not noticing the missing pony.

"Hey wait your forgot your mmmph." Twilights cry to the others were cut short by the new pony stuffing a hoof in her mouth. Twilight took a good look at her. She was a pegasus, and her downy wings meant she wasn't old enough to fly yet, though she was a bit bigger than the Crusaders. Maybe she just grew fast? Her coat was a pale pink, and she had a bright yellow mane and tail. Like her friends, she also didn't have a cutie mark yet. What was interesting though was the pendant she wore. Where had she seen it before?

The pegasus took her hoof out, looking slightly demure. Before she had looked…blank. "Sorry, but they were a little too excited for me to handle. They're nice, they made Silver Spoon and Diamond Tiara stop teasing me, but the ride was a bit too much." she said.

Twilight could understand that easily enough. "OK, no problem. So, Rhyme right? Want to come in for some tea while we wait for them to calm down and notice they forgot you?" she asked, opening the door for the kid.

The pegasus trotted in happily. "OK sure. Say, since this is a library, that means you got a lot of books right?" Rhyme asked in the manner of just about every kid that thought they were so clever when they asked the obvious. She then looked around the room. "Oh. Yeah, that's a lot of books. Can I read some? I like reading."

The older mare smiled in response. "Of course you can. That's what a library is for. The kids section is over here." she noted as she cantered over. Hmmm, her name is Rhyme. Well, seven times out of ten… "How about a book of poetry?" she asked, turning around. She was actually a bit surprised to find the filly with a book entitled The Basics of Pony Society, a book meant for high-school and older ponies that analyzed , well, the basics of pony society. "Um, are you sure you want to read that book?"

"I found it myself. I'm big enough to read stuff without pictures." she noted, sounding dull. She was already flipping through the book to another section.

Looking over her shoulder, Twilight noted it was the section on cutie marks and nodded. Made sense to her; at her age all ponies wondered a lot about them. There was a loud knock on the door. Wondering if it was the crusaders, Twilight opened the door only to be greeted by the largest, meanest looking pegasus she had ever seen.

Comments

[the one guy on the left]

OH SNAP! Beat wagon in da house!