Rest
Rainbow Dash took a deep breath. Oh, this was feeling good. The sky was half-full of clouds, the sun was coming up, and Rainbow Dash was up here with them. She turned around to look at the weather team, which were ready for her orders. “Okay!” she said, planting her hoofs on her hips. “We have a forecast of mostly sunny today. However, we can’t just go busting because we have a cloudy tomorrow and a rainy the day after that, we need to keep the clouds around, unless you all want to get up early tomorrow to get forming.”
The chorus of ‘no’ was exactly what Rainbow Dash wanted to hear. “Well, then, I suppse we’re spending today doing sky-highs!” There were cheers, every pegasus happy with that news.
As one, they got to work gathering together the clouds, forming them into large balls. As they worked, a white earth pony with a red mane in a white hat looked on in confusion. She had seen the pegasi push clouds around before, but never in this way. She usually didn’t watch the morning weather, but this time there was obviously something interesting going on. They were arranging the cloud balls in a line, but Liz couldn’t figure out why.
There was a gasp behind her, and Liz turned to see Twilight looking up at the clouds as well. “They’re doing sky-highs?” she asked, a big grin on her face, “These are always such fun! It’s one of the more interesting weathershaping methods, that was first devised during a particularly bad drought. A particularly bad cyclone meant that everyone was poor on clouds, so one pegasus thought of a way to keep clouds around for future needs, and has been a way of conserving cloud matter ever since!”
Liz blinked at Twilight. “Uh… let’s start with the basics. What are ‘sky-highs’?”
Twilight looked at Liz again. “You’re not familiar with weather control, are you?”
“Some Pokemon can do it a little,” Liz admitted, “And a few legendries can do it a lot, but it’s not an everyday thing with procedures and a team and all. Now, I can understand pushing clouds around, and I can understand breaking the clouds to get them out of the way, but what are ‘sky-highs’?”
“Here,” Twilight said, turning away, “Follow me.” Liz did so, following Twilight out of town. “Now, I’m not sure how weather works where you come from, but the further away a cloud is, the smaller it seems, right?”
“Right,” Liz said with a nod. “That’s basic logic.”
“So, if you don’t want a lot of clouds around, but you don’t want to get rid of them, you put them out-of-the-way, someplace where ponies won’t notice them, right?”
“…up in the sky?” Liz guessed. “That’s about as out-of-the-way as you can get.”
“Exactly!” Twilight said, “And from there, they can be retrieved when needed.”
Liz thought for a moment. “So they just gather the clouds up in big balls and push them into the sky?”
Twilight let loose a slight giggle. “It’s a bit more complex than that.” She led Liz over a hill, where they could see a pegasus on the other side. He was different from the others: Large, bulky, and with tiny wings. No, that was an understatement: he was huge. His muscles rippled under his skin, almost threatening to burst right off his body. He had a lantern jaw, a short, flat-top haircut, and a look of focus on his face as he went through what Liz recognized as a warm-up routine.
Rainbow Dash flew down next to the hulking pegasus, smiling at the way everything was going. “Are you ready, Bulk Bicpes?” She asked, a bit of challenge in her voice.
Bulk flung up his forehooves, flexing his muscles. They bulged, veins popping out of them. He took a deep breath, and released a loud, “YEAH!”
Rainbow Dash laughed and nodded. “Okay! First cloud, coming straight down!” She then zipped up to the first cloud ball, which the other pegasi were in formation around. They maneuvered it over the top of Bulk Bicpeps, who took up a sturdy stance on his two back hooves, his little wings beating to keep him upright. At Rainbow Dash’s signal, the flying pegasi drove the cloud down on top of Bulk’s head, who met it with a perfectly-timed surge upward. The cloud hit the ground and the bottom flattened, spreading along the ground. There was a tense pause, and the cloud rocket upward, blowing the pegasi around it out of the way and continuing into the sky until it was little more than a little, white poof in the distance. The pegasi laughed as they regained their orientation and examined their handiwork, Bulk Biceps standing triumphantly on the ground, a silly but proud grin on his face.
“Looks good, everypony,” Rainbow dash said as she examined the far-off puff, “But maybe a bit higher than it should be. Let’s move to the next spot, everyone!”
The Pegasi moved on, and Liz’s mouth hung open as she watched them go. Twilight smiled and nodded. “It’s a really clever usage of the elasticity of clouds and natural pegasus magic. It’s not easy to do, but thankfully we have a really good weather team. Other towns often need four or five pegasi working together on the ground, and they can’t do it as reliably.”
“Wow,” Liz said quietly. “I’m not sure what to make of that. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
“You said that Pokemon can weather control a little, right? Do humans have machines to manage the weather, then?” Twilight asked.
Liz shook her head. “Not really. We just let the weather form naturally and deal with it. We try to forecast the weather, but we can’t really control it.”
Twilight frowned. “Like the Everfree? Weather patterns just… form?”
“Yeah, I guess,” Liz said with a nod, and then immediately regretted it as she was regaled with meteorological questions. “Twilight! I’m not a scientist! I don’t know! Winds are caused by the Coriolis Effect or maybe the sun heating the earth, clouds are made by the water cycle, tornadoes are made when warm equatorial winds move under colder polar winds, and hurricanes in a similar way but form differently because of the moisture coming up off of the ocean.”
Twilight raised an eyebrow. “You sound like you know something about it.”
Liz sighed. “I went to school. I passed science classes. Barely. I don’t know any details, just the bare minimum.”
Twilight smiled and rested a hoof on Liz’s shoulder. “That’s more than I know. Come on, let’s work on that report for Celestia.” Twilight then led Liz back toward the Library, over the large hill again. When Liz got to the top of the hill, she stopped, and looked over Ponyville as it basked in the morning sun.
Twilight turned to look at Liz after she noticed that Liz had stopped. Liz had an odd look on her face… something like confusion. “Is something wrong?” She asked.
Liz didn’t respond for a moment. “I don’t know, it just feels weird, I guess,” Liz said. “It’s like… How do I explain this? Twilight, where did you grow up?”
“Canterlot,” Twilight replied, “My parents are fairly well off; they’re not nobles but I’ll admit they’re a lot wealthier than most ponies. I was accepted into Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, and that’s where I did all my schooling. I’ve really only lived in Ponyville for a few years.”
Liz nodded. “Right. Now, when you first saw Ponyville, what did it feel like? Kind of… unreal?”
Twilight shook her head. “Can’t say it did, but I was distracted at the time. I’m not quite sure what you’re going for here…”
Liz shook her head. “It’s just… you hear about places, right? And you watch movies about them, and see pictures, but it’s different than-wait. Twilight, have you ever seen the ocean?”
Twilight’s eyes widened. “Yeah. It was several years ago, but I remember it. The water went out all the way to the horizon, it was breathtaking! It started to feel normal fairly fast, but I’ll never forget the first time I saw it.”
“It’s kind of like that,” Liz said, gesturing for Twilight to come up next to her. “It’s the difference between reading about someplace and actually going there. Looking at Ponyville from here, it’s just a bit hard to believe that it’s real. It looks like an idyllic small town, taken right out of a storybook. It’s hard to think that a place like this is real, much less that I’m living here for now.” Liz sat down, a frown forming on her face.
Twilight walked up next to her. “Liz?”
“This is just too weird,” Liz said to herself. “It’s just… what happened? I mean, I know what happened, but it doesn’t make any sense. I’m a pony, and my team is nowhere to be seen, I guess we’ve found two of them, but… what even happened?”
Twilight didn’t say anything. Liz’s expression slipped from bewilderment into confusion and began to edge on panic. What was going on? Twilight’s mind raced to find an explanation. It seemed like she was having a reaction to the realization that Ponyville was a real place, but she hadn’t had a panic reaction before. Even while they were in the everfree, Liz got scared but she never seemed to panic. Perhaps… adrenaline and enough distraction could keep the full impact of a given situation from hitting someone, and up until now Liz must have had a solid enough goal in mind to keep herself from realizing the gravity of the situation. That’s what was really going on here. It would be like what would have happened if Twilight had been stuck in the Equestria High world after the portal had closed. Maybe even worse?
Twilight guessed that Liz’s mental state was somewhat fragile right now. Improper wording or a poor consolation would only make the situation worse. The correct answer contained truth, compassion, and the assurance that she would not have to go through whatever happened alone. A more secondary aspect of the answer was distraction, as if permitted to run rampart in her own mind Liz would become more upset.
Twilight moved forward, and wrapped Liz in a hug. A firm hug, but not a tight one. A friendly hug, but one that could not be denied. Having spent a few years with Pinkie Pie and Fluttershy, Twilight learned more about hugs than she thought there was to know about hugs. They were very complex.
After a bit, Liz pulled away from the hug. She was smiling again, a bit sheepishly but smiling all the same. “Thanks, Twilight. I needed that.”
Twilight nodded. “Come on,” she said, “Let’s go and see Ohm and Cica. They likely miss familiarity as much as you do.”
Cica-Ninjask liked the pony-things. One pony-thing was fast, was very good at flying, and had many colors. The many colors part wasn’t too important, but it was kind of nice. But the being fast and very good at flying made Awesome-Colors-Pony-Thing a challenge. Cica-Ninjask was hoping Awesome-Colors-Pony-Thing would get better and they could race more.
The Nice-Yellow-Pony-Thing was very nice. Nice-Yellow-Pony-Thing told Cica-Ninjask what plants were good, and which were poison. Nice-Yellow-Pony-Thing let Cica-Ninjask stay with Nice-Yellow-Pony-Thing and help Nice-Yellow-Pony-Thing sometimes as long as Cica-Ninjask stayed quiet and was nice.
Cica-Ninjask had lots of practice being quiet and nice. Cica-Ninjask was quiet and nice a lot back when Cica-Ninjask was Cica-Nincada, or Hides-Shiney-Objects-In-Small-Holes-Nincada, before it met Liz-Human-Trainer. It was harder when it became Cica-Ninjask, but Liz-Human-Trainer worked hard to keep Cica-Ninjask quiet and nice.
Cica-Ninjask also liked White-Fancy-Pony. White-Fancy-Pony made clothes. Nice clothes. Little hat. Little tie. White-Fancy-Pony made Cica-Ninjask feel fancy. Cica-Ninjask liked feeling fancy!
Cica-Ninjask did not know much about other ponies. Orange-Pony was seen very little, and Bouncy-Pink-Pony gave sweets during the party. Bouncy-Pink-Pony seemed odd to Cica-Ninjask. There was also Purple-Pony, who Nice-Yellow-Pony said Liz-Pony-Trainer was staying with.
It was odd for Liz-Human-Trainer to be Liz-Pony-Trainer. Very confusing. But Cica-Ninjask was Cica-Nincada before, so Liz-Human-Trainer could turn into Liz-Pony-Trainer. Cica-Ninjask was sorry Cica-Ninjask screeched at Liz-Pony-Trainer. Liz-Human-Trainer was not upset when Cica-Nincada became Cica-Ninjask. Liz-Human-Trainer was happy.
Cica-Ninjask was happy that Ohm-Magneton was back. Ohm-Magneton said Ohm-Magneton was happy to see Cica-Ninjask, too. Cica-Ninjask hoped that soon Cica-Ninjask would see more Pokemon! Maybe Cica-Ninjask would see Cica-Shedinja?
No, Cica-Ninjask would not see Cica-Shedinja. Cica-Ninjask only saw Cica-Shedinja at Liz-Human-Trainer-Parents-House. That made Cica-Ninjask a little happy, but only a little. Cica-Shedinja was Cica-Ninjask’s shed-twin, but Cica-Ninjask found Cica-Shedinja creepy. Cica-Ninjask still liked Cica-shedinja, Cica-Shedinja was smart and knew many things about people and Pokemon.
Cica-Ninjask wondered if all Ninjasks found their shed-twins creepy, or if that was just Cica-Ninjask.
Cica-Ninjask went to Ohm-Magneton. Cica-Ninjask asked Ohm-Magneton what Ohm-Magneton wanted to do today. Ohm-Magneton said that it needed to conserve energy, so today it would wait. Cica-Ninjask did not understand that. But Cica-Ninjask knew that Ohm-Magneton was very good at waiting.
“Cica! Ohm!”
Joy! Cica-Ninjask rushed to Liz-Pony-Trainer as fast as Cica-Ninjask could.
Twilight looked on as Cica, followed by Ohm, came out of the woods near Fluttershy’s cottage. Liz went to work, getting a wet cloth and cleaning Ohm, Cica helping after finding his own cloth. Ohm cooperated, moving some of his metal parts around to let Liz get at the places underneath. Soon enough, Ohm was shining like new.
Notes. Twilight summoned a notepad and pen from her library, and began writing. Her original idea of working with Liz all day to make that report had fallen by the wayside, but this might be even more interesting. Trainers tending to their Pokemon, much like how ponies tend to their pets. Liz began to talk, more to herself than to her Pokemon, about what she should be doing in the future that she’s in Ponyville. Good, Twilight thought to herself, she’s getting her mind back onto future goals.
Liz then went and found a simple wash basin and filled it with water. “Your turn, Cica!” The giant bug responded by disappearing. Liz rolled her eyes and stayed put, waiting patiently. After a few minutes, Cica flew out of the woods and, with a buzz that sounded a lot like a sigh, landed on the edge of the basin.
It was a clear display of pack behavior, Twilight noticed. While normally ponies used herding behavior, individual behavior in a group for safety, pack behavior is more based on each member of the pack working together to support the whole. Of course, both kinds of behavior are harder to identify and categorize among sapient beings, but the signs were there. It was like what Liz said about catching Pokemon: they saw her as in charge, and she knew how to manage them.
Twilight pondered the cultural ramifications of this for a moment. Would this result in more individuals with leadership skills? Or more individuals without leadership skills in what amount to positions of leadership? What was the amount of Pokemon trainers in comparison to the rest of the populace? What about ones as strong as Liz? Stronger?
“They’re so happy together!”
Twilight almost jumped. She looked over at Fluttershy, who was smiling at the trainer and her two Pokemon. Twilight looked back at the trio. Liz was gingerly polishing the golden mask-like markings on Cica’s face, making them clearer and more beautiful. Cica certainly didn’t seem to mind, and Twilight had no idea what Ohm was thinking, but Liz was happy. “Come on, stop squirming!” she teased Cica, “I know how much you like being clean. In order to be clean, you need to get washed.”
Liz finished up cleaning Cica and let him take off. Cica disappeared and then reappeared almost immediately, landing on Twilight’s back. It felt kind of odd, Twilight had no idea how it could possibly stay upright, and the Pokemon was surprisingly light for its size. Twilight smiled slightly at the giant bug. She didn’t know quite what it wanted, of course, but made a quick guess. “You look very nice,” She told him. The Ninjask buzzed at Twilight, and then looked up suddenly. Twilight followed his gaze, to see a small black could speeding toward the cabin. After a bit she noticed a rainbow trail coming out of its back, and knew just what was going on.
Rainbow Dash zipped in, pushing the small thundercloud. “Hey, anypony order some spare lightning? I said I would deliver, and I did.” Ohm quickly moved into the cloud, and there were a few rumbles of thunder as Ohm sucked electricity out of the small cloud. Cica, not wasting any time himself, moved over to Rainbow Dash and buzzed around her excitedly. Rainbow dash was mainly confused by this. “Woah, slow down there! It’s, uh, nice to see you, too?”
“He wants another race,” Fluttershy said, “I’m sorry, Cica, but Rainbow Dash needs to recover some more.”
Cica buzzed at the pair of ponies. Rainbow Dash shrugged. “Yeah, taking it easy for today. If I don’t, I’ll wind up in the hospital again right away, and no one wants that. Anyway, I’d love to stay and chat, but I promised the mayor I’d help with cleaning city hall.”
As Rainbow Dash zipped off, Liz hmmed. “Being able to fly would make things like that much easier. You know, at first I was wondering why the library has such tall shelves, but there are both ponies that can fly and use telekinesis, so height is really not much of a problem for a lot of ponies.”
Twilight nodded. “The different pony tribes do have very different building styles; it’s an interesting line of study, especially historically.”
Liz nodded, and then remembered. “That’s right; we were going to spend today sharing information, weren’t we? So that you could write a presentation on my world. I completely forgot about that.”
Twilight nodded. “I’ll go get my stuff. Oh, Fluttershy, you don’t mind that we do it here, do you? I think that it might be a good idea to have Cica and Ohm nearby while writing about their home world.
Fluttershy shook her head. “No, no, that’s okay. I’m curious myself. I want to know more about Pokemon, too.”
Celestia sighed deeply as she threw another plan into the fire. Stupid changelings. You can’t assume the worst, you can’t assume the best, and you can’t tell anypony. In theory, anypony could be a changeling. In actuality, most of the ponies that commonly worked in the castle were cleared; no changelings were found in the guard, the management staff, janitorial staff, or even the nobles that frequent the castle. That ruled out all the ponies that could do a lot of damage, but it also ruled out all the ponies that could be casually checked in the name of improved security procedures. There was still no way to surreptitiously check the general populace. Openly checking the populace was guaranteed to cause a panic, but not doing anything would arguably be worse, as it permitted the changelings to continue to do whatever they wanted.
There was a knock on the door, and Celestia straightened up. “Enter,” she commanded, and proceeded to relax as Luna entered the room. “Luna, what are you doing up?” Celestia chided, “You should get some sleep.”
“You have duties to perform, sister,” Luna retorted, “Duties that, if skipped, will make the ponies nervous.”
Celestia resisted the urge to grit her teeth. “I don’t want to listen to the nobles whine. I have bigger things to do! Two different bigger things to do.” Even if Liz’s problem was not as pressing as changeling one, it was still better than the daily drivel of the day court.
Luna shook her head. “No, sister. You have had to raise the sun and the moon by yourself for too long.”
Celestia shook her head back. “Go to bed, Luna. That was a non-sequitor.”
“Quite the contrary,” Luna said, “It is exceedingly important. For a thousand years you ruled alone, all of Equestria on your shoulders. You have forgotten what it is like to have other princesses around you that you can delegate tasks to.”
“Not so, for a while I had Candace,” Celestia countered.
“Sister, I have spoken with Candace. You taught her well, but she was scarcely given more than any noble who you trust. You prefer to do things on your own when you can, and that is admirable, but in this case, you can’t.”
Celestia sighed. “Then what shall I do, Luna?”
Luna placed a hoof on her sister’s shoulder, grabbing her attention “Go be the sun for the ponies to look up to. Let the moon shine upon the hidden places and ponies who tell lies. Let magic sort out the unusual visitors to our land.”
Celestia was quiet a minute, and then sighed. “You’re right. Luna, I trust you to deal with the possible changeling threat. I will take steps to put Twilight firmly in charge of the Pokemon issue when I can. Hopefully these two issues will not collide more than they already have. Now will you go to bed?”
Luna, smiling slightly, shook her head. “I will when I can, sister, but I believe that for now I have to see what we know about the changeling problem. Be a dear and send us some coffee?”
Celestia let herself smile back. “I’ll let the kitchens know.” She turned away, leaving Luna in the office.
Luna looked at the papers, and silently mused to herself that the chances of these issues not colliding were non-existent. However, this did not strike her as a bad thing. If what Celestia had told her was true, then she found it likely that if the issues did collide, they would quickly only have one problem. Celestia was a great long-term planner, bless her soul, but she was never terribly skilled at the more underhanded parts of life.
“Luna!”
Luna turned around, looking at her sister who had appeared at the door to the room again. Luna was about to make a snide remark when a newspaper was pushed into her face. Surprised, Luna read the headline aloud.
“’Professor of marine biology discovers new species.’ This is not a big deal, sister. I understand that new species are found in the ocean every time they look.” Luna then looked at the picture provided. She stopped. “Is that-”
“It matches the description that Liz gave me. Distract the court, Luna; I’m going to send this to Twilight.”
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neat a new pokemon the team grows
Water type this time it seems. Wonder which one it could be.
Cica's POV is very entertaining.
I cant remember if Liz mentioned anywhere if she had any of the classic starter powerhouses. Or even a Gyrados, or Lapras.
Gyrados would be nice. Thunder, Flamethrower, Draco Meteor, Surf?
Bulk Biceps punching a cloud into the stratosphere. YEAAAH.
Oh! Her water type! I hope its a Squirtle, or an Oshowatt if we're doing gen 5. those two are my favorite
Personally I hope it's a Lanturn.