Divergence

by grimchi3f

Help Found

Part 1: Ponyville - Chapter 3: Help Found

Twilight and Spike turned around to see who was calling for them, or more accurately, calling for Twilight. It turned out to be a lavender pegasus with a honey-blonde mane. She slowly glided down form her current height before landing gracefully on the ground in front of them.

"Are you Twilight Sparkle?" the pegasus repeated, hints of a Manehattan accent coloring her voice.

"Yes, I'm Twilight Sparkle," Twilight answered, trying to keep the annoyance out of her voice. They hadn't even gone more than ten meters from Bon-Bon's candy shop! What was with this town and its constant interruptions?

"I'm Cloudkicker," the pegasus replied. "My buddy, Derpy, sent me. She said you might need help with something."

Twilight frowned. "Well, what exactly did she say I needed help with?"

"She said that Princess Celestia told you to oversee the preparations for the Summer Sun Celebration and that that's what you might need help with," Cloudkicker explained.

"Well, she was right about that," Twilight said, surprised Derpy remembered all that. "But I don't really need any help. I think I've got it under control."

"Are you sure?" asked Cloudkicker, raising an eyebrow. She held out her hoof. "Here, let me see what you have to do."

Twilight shook her head. "I don't think that'll be necessary." But it was too late as Spike had already handed Cloudkicker the overseer's checklist.

Her eyes quickly scanned the parchment. "I don't know. That's a lot to get done in one day. You'd be running all over town!" She rolled it up and gave it back to Spike. "Why don't you let me take this off your hooves?"

Twilight was about to object again when something clicked in her brain: this would give her a boatload of free time to look for proof of Nightmare Moon's return! "Uh, yeah, alright! Go ahead!"

"I don't know, Twilight," said Spike, frowning at Twilight. "Didn't you say you wanted to do your 'royal duty' or something?"

"Yes, well, this gives us time to do something so much more important," Twilight replied. Then, turning to Cloudkicker, she said, "Thank you. You have no idea how much this means to me!"

However, Cloudkicker wasn't paying attention to her. She was actually staring at Spike with a mixture of awe and amusement.

"Wow, a baby dragon. I've never seen a baby dragon before," the pegasus muttered. "I bet Fluttershy would love you."

"Who's Fluttershy?" asked Spike, using the wooden hand to scratch his head.

"Oh, just Ponyville's resident animal enthusiast. I'll probably be able to tell her about you later since she was on that checklist," answered Cloudkicker. She looked at Twilight. "So, you're alright with me helping you out with this?"

"Yes, of course," said Twilight, nodding. "Thank you so much."

"Aw, don't mention it," Cloudkicker replied, extending her wings. "It always pays to be kind to others. You know, what goes around comes around and all that." With that, she took off and soared into the sky. "And don't worry! I'll tell you all about the preparations later!"

As Cloudkicker flew off towards Sweet Apple Acres, Twilight sighed in relief. "Let's get to the library, Spike. We finally have time to find proof of Nightmare Moon's return." She clopped both her front hooves together. "How wonderful!"

"Uh, I hate to burst your bubble, Twilight, but we don't even know where the library is," Spike pointed out.

Twilight's suddenly lightened mood dropped like a rock. "Aw, ponyfeathers."

-------

Determined not to start up anymore conversations with the ponies in this town, Twilight avoided asking anyone for directions. As a result, her and Spike spent the next couple hours fruitlessly searching for the library. They looked all over town, but they just couldn't find it. During their search, another infuriating thing about this town reared its ugly head: the layout of this town made no sense! It seemed like houses and streets were just randomly placed with no organization or thought whatsoever. This was the complete opposite of Canterlot, where every building, street, and landmark was organized and thoughtfully placed. Why couldn't Ponyville be like that? To top it all off, Ponyville didn't even have street signs! What was up with that?

Exhausted, Twilight plopped herself onto the ground in front of a giant tree-building. "This town is so stupid! At least it was easy to find the public library in Canterlot! Ugh!"

"Well, we haven't looked in there," said Spike, pointing at the tree-building.

"Oh, come on Spike," Twilight retorted, rolling her eyes. "It's not going to be in there. It's probably some sort of plant store or something. I mean, who in their right mind builds a library inside a tree?"

"Hey guys!" shouted a familiar obnoxious voice. "I just finished the mail deliveries!"

"It's Derpy!" Spike exclaimed, smiling and pointing.

"Oh joy," muttered Twilight sarcastically, turning to face the source of the voice. Sure enough, it was the muffin-baking, mail-delivering, wall-eyed, dropping-mailbags-on-ponies'-heads gray pegasus.

Gracefully, or at least more gracefully than one would normally expect of her, Derpy Hooves landed in front of the duo. "It's nice to see you guys again. Did Cloudkicker find you all right?"

"Yes she did," answered Spike. "In fact, she offered to do all of the overseeing for us!"

"Well, that's awfully nice of her," said Derpy. "I ran into her while I was still delivering mail and I mentioned you guys and that you might need help with your stuff." The grey pegasus blinked. "So, um, can I ask you two why you guys are just sitting in front of the library?"

"Wait," said Twilight, picking in her ears with her hooves to make sure there wasn't any earwax impeding her ability to hear properly, "are you saying that this tree-building-thing is the library?"

"Yep!" Derpy replied cheerfully, pointing to a sign in front of the tree. "That sign says so."

"WHAT!?" Twilight shouted, staring at the sign with a book on it that she'd somehow missed. "How did I miss that!? And for that matter, who builds a library inside a tree!?"

In contrast to Twilight's astonished anger, Spike couldn't seem to stop laughing; he started laughing so hard that the wooden hand he'd been holding dropped from his claw. " I t-t-told you s-s-s-so! Hahaha!"

"This...town..." Twilight growled, her right eye twitching.

"Yeah, this town is pretty awesome, isn't it?" asked Derpy obliviously, smiling.

At that, Spike, who had just been in the process of picking up his wooden hand, began laughing even harder, causing him to fall over. All Twilight did was contemplate bashing her own head into a nearby rock she'd just noticed.

"So," Derpy started, her eyes realigning like they had earlier, "are we gonna go in there or what?"

"We might as well," Twilight sighed, resigning herself to the fact that this town was going to drive her insane.

With that, the three of them walked up to the door (after Spike had picked up the wooden hand, of course), opened it, and walked inside. After closing the door, everything was pitch black inside the library. It was so dark, in fact, that they could see absolutely nothing, not even their own silhouettes.

"Why are the lights off?" asked Derpy.

"How am I supposed to know?" Twilight responded. "I've never been here before!"

"Oh yeah..."

"Maybe it's because no one's been in here for awhile," Spike offered.

"Maybe," muttered Twilight.

Suddenly, all the lights turned on, revealing party decorations all over the inside of the library and a multitude of exciting looking ponies surrounding the three of them.

"Surprise!" they all screamed.

Twilight's ears drooped. "Oh no!"

Comments

[NSFW]

yay, surprise time >:)