Hey, this isn't Minecraft...

by Twisted Light

First Shenanigans

Oh, what fun is there in making sense?

The dream was strange, to say the least. He was going... somewhere. There were endless fields as far as the eye could see in three directions, the fourth had a rather vast city, and he was walking upon a road leading to it. A feeling of assurance and confidence lie within the heart as he approached, with a sun setting behind him. When did it become... dream. It's a dream.

As he walked along a main road through the buildings, the lights winked out as he marched by. He stopped, and looked about; the blackout seemed to be centered on him. With a frown, he continued through the city, the lights winking out, in pace with him, but quickly picked up. Doubt crept in where confidence once resided, and he started to race to keep up with the lights, and with a glance to the left and right, the windows began closing their shutters of their own accord, as if to confirm the insecurity. The world snapped to blackness as the last lights went out.

After but a few moments of darkness, a familiar pale disk illuminated the sky; he looked up towards it. That familiar, disembodied voice seemed to note him again. "Thou art out of place."

------

With a sharp gasp, Nameless awoke in that shack. It was still night by the look of things; he shivered in the cold and climbed off the rather uncomfortable makeshift bed. After blindly rummaging for that pack, he withdrew an apple for breakfast, grabbed the axe, and tried the door; it opened without a fuss. Odd.

Instead of the inky blackness that he had grown familiar to, Nameless beheld a night untarnished by lights from below. He gawked at the pre-dawn beauty a moment before a growling stomach reminded him to eat. Survival rules; gotta eat to not die. Apples should do the trick for a while, but I've got to find something more suitable... With the apple mostly devoured, he eyed the seeds a moment before shrugging and set to chopping a small patch of dirt out of place. He then buried the bared core before stepping back into the shack.

Nameless put the axe in with the apples, then hefted the pack over his shoulder. He stepped outside, and shut the door to the shack. Nothing really worth stealing aside from these. This isn't my game; the texture pack is all wrong, and I am waking up and dreaming here. There might actually be someone in that town. It wasn't even ten meters before he heard another familiar voice clear its throat behind him.

"Heading off before I could even tell you the second challenge," the being identified as Discord called out in a rather disappointed tone. The being, however, wasn't there when Nameless turned about. "Over here," the voice called from another direction, but the being was still absent from sight. "You are terrible at this game!" Laughter echoed from several directions.

Giving up on facing the creature, Nameless turned back toward the town. "And just what is this second 'challenge,'" he demanded as he took several steps toward the town.

"Quite simple, really," Discord responded, the voice sounding like it was never more than a meter away. "It's actually ongoing, too. All you have to do, is complete the next challenge without anypony seeing you."

Nameless stopped and looked about. "Pony? I can't be seen by any pony," he asked incredulously. The chimeric being popped into existence before him, whistling nonchalantly and tapping two fingers together. Just what is he babbling about?

"You heard me," Discord stated suddenly and matter-of-factly. "Last a few days without catching attention, and the next challenge you complete counts as two."

"And if I don't want to play your game," Nameless growled out, annoyed that this... Discord was already trying to make his life difficult, even before the break of dawn.

"Then," Discord began his response while walking away. His body snaked over backwards, stretching to keep at an even distance while the legs wandered off, "I'd guess you don't want to go home."

His eye twitched; Discord winked. "Toodles," the chaotic being waved and winked out of existence as Nameless lunged at him. He looked back toward the shack, then to the village...

------

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk. The back of the axe substituted well for a hammer when the shaped planks needed to be forced into fitting together. Nameless looked at the creation before him; a rather rickety bed frame with more legs than a spider. Well, I'm going to need cloth for the actual bedding; don't want to freeze again. The thought sent a shiver up Nameless' spine. No, I need to get something to keep warm... and I suspect where I can find that...

For the second time this day, Nameless struck out to find out more about that nearby settlement. With the sun on his side this time, he made off just as before, only without some annoying, chaotic creature dogging him and spewing riddles and challenges and generally making the morning unpleasant. With a glance upward at the position of the sun, the time was determined to be roughly noon-ish. Another apple was freed only to be feasted upon as a traveler's lunch. He said don't get spotted by any pony, not any body. I highly doubt there's going to be ponies everywhere in this. Minecraft has horses, yes, but those could be miles away... then again... Minecraft doesn't have a... whatever that thing is.

------

Ponies, he thought as he hugged the back of a nearby tree, glancing over his shoulder at the brightly colored beings walking to and fro in the town. Ponies everywhere. He gulped and silently prayed that none of the beings had seen him approach. Okay, I just need to get out of here without being seen. Simple enough, right? I just need a... his thoughts trailed back to the bag. ...distraction.

Nameless slung the bag down some to get a new apple. He eyed the perfect place to throw it, how high to throw it, and the physics of it played out in his head. The distraction would be too confusing to ignore! It was perfect, seamless. "Bo-ring!" called out a rather obnoxious, unfamiliar voice. Nameless flung his arms into the air and whirled toward the new voice, and failed to note that he threw the apple straight upward. What he beheld made his heart sink; a wild-maned, blue-eyed pink pony grinning ear-to-ear at him. He only faintly registered another voice shouting down at him, "Hey, watch it!"

Everything suddenly went blue with white text. "An error has occured..."

------

"Uh, Pinkie?"

"Yeah?"

"Is... it going to be okay?"

"Oh, he'll be fine! Isn't that right!?"

"I don't think shouting's going to do much good."

"He just needs to stop blue-screening, then he'll be okay!"

"...wha?"

His vision cleared, and Nameless saw two rather colorful equines chatting in front of him, waving hooves in his general direction; one pink and the other blue with a multi-colored mane... and feathered wings? Things suddenly became very noisy from a whole lot of shouting; Nameless shouted in fear, the blue one shouted in surprise, and the pink one seemed to be shouting in... joy?

Then there was the attention gained from the shouting, as many of the inhabitants of this little town turned their gaze to the trio. "Monster," one shouted. "The horror! The horror," another screamed as the multicolored town scattered in a disorderly mob. They ran indoors, Nameless bounded back toward the forest, the pink one hopped along behind him, and the winged rainbow seemed to be trying to stop the former. Not good, not good, not good!

"Why's what not good," the pink's voice called as Nameless whirled about to see that his pursuers had vanished.

I hate this game... "Okay, that's just freaky," he shouted while shaking a fist.

"No, I'm Pinkie," the eponymous pony declared as she seemed to spring out of the ground, along with a burst of confetti. "That's Rainbow Dash," she continued, pointing up at the sky. He looked upwards to see the named winged pony hovering above them, and most definitely giving him a 'Do-Anything-And-Regret-It' glare. "And youuuuu," Pinkie pointed at Nameless and squinted before rubbing her chin with the other hoof; she most definitely rivaled Discord in the 'Barely makes sense' department. "You... don't have a name? Hey, what's with that?"

Nameless blin-

"He's not nameless, everypony has a name," Pinkie shouted at the sky abruptly.

The as-yet-unnamed-stran-

"Two chapters in and you haven't properly introduced him yet," Pinkie sat down and looked to the sky, shaking her head sadly. "I've seen better."

"Now hold on a minute," Steve protested in bewilderment, "What are you doing?"

"That's better," Pinkie nodded, then gave the formerly-nameless-but-henceforth-known-as-Steve a big grin. "Oh, just talking with the author."

There was a long, silent pause as the three stared at each other with differing looks. "You're crazy," Steve finally replied flatly.

"I can prove it, just let me reach right down here and then you'll see"

Pinkie, let go of the pa-

------

Pinkie Pie rattled off the story before allowing the reality wrinkle to sort itself out from the ordeal of reading the tale. Steve watched in mild horror as the past day and a half were just summarized for him, and Rainbow Dash started laughing in a nearby cloud from the reactions he gave. "And by talking to us, you just blew... your... challenge," she finished, starting in a cheery tone and wound down to an apologetic one. "Woopsie..."

"Woopsie, indeed," Discord called out from a different cloud. He streaked down from the bottom of the fluff like a bolt of lightning, landing beside Pinkie and Steve before putting an arm around each of them. "Oh, well, I guess that just means you get to play around here a while longer."

Steve and Pinkie glared at Discord, both wiggling out of the draconequus' talon and paw. "You set this up," an indignant Dash called out from above, zipping down to hover at eye level with the chaotic being.

"What? Mua," the chaos spirit released his 'captives' and made a show of innocence, complete with halo, which only drew glares from the two ponies and human. After a pause, the halo broke into a set of tiny red horns. "Fine, fine, you've caught me red-pawed," he said with plenty dramatic flare, the lion's paw fading to a dark red hue. "Our guest here is part of a harmless little game, where he simply has to take up brief residence and complete a few trivial tasks, then off he goes back home, as if nothing had happened." The halo reformed as the being gave what was supposed to be an award-winning smile.

The ponies looked to each other, then back to Discord, then to Steve, then back to themselves before nodding. "Alright," Dash said in response, "But I've got my eyes on you." She pointed a hoof at Discord, then swung it toward Steve, "And you too, Loudmouth."

"By all means, enjoy the show," Discord said before he spiraled in on himself and vanished; his voice lingered in the air a moment longer, however. "Since you went and got noticed, by the way, feel free to get acquainted with everypony; there's one in particular that I'm just itching to watch you bump into." His laughter faded out into nothing.

Rainbow Dash looked back to Ponyville a moment before she bolted off, leaving Steve with Pinkie. He gave a nervous smile as she gave an overly friendly one in reply. How does that phrase go, again? 'Shenanigans ensue?' "See you tomorrow Stevie," she nearly shouted before hopping back toward town. Okay, that was... random; and wasn't the sun higher a moment ago?

With the evening hours swiftly approaching, Steve sighed and headed back toward his little shack by the forest. Tomorrow, he'd try again, with a little more freedom than this day. Tonight would just be a test run of the bed frame.

Comments

[Butterkeet]

I am really liking this so far, can't wait to see where it goes

[IZshadowGirl]

Pinkie Pie is soooooooooooooo random
Oh, and what did Steve/Nameless do to make Rainbow not trust him?

[jlbfanfic2000]

What the fuck pinkie I said no more 4th wall breaking