• Published 11th Apr 2012
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PonyFall: Onward Valiant Crusaders - Fullmetal Pony



A man finds 3 familiar girls one day

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Something nudged against my cast. My eyes flopped open. My chest felt like it was weighing down my lungs and my back felt like it was glued to the seat. Images of Jim Carrey and shutting my computer came to mind as the last things I remembered. The scratches on the back of my laptop indicated that I’d used my cast to close it. With droopy eyes, I looked over to what was nudging my cast.

“John,” Apple Bloom half-mumbled, “I gotta go use the outhouse.”

That fully woke me up. My arms flailed around my waist to unbuckle my seatbelt and I managed to get it off and stand up. The rapid shift from sitting to standing sent the blood straight to my head and I had to grasp at the armrest to avoid falling flat on my face. Apple Bloom let out a giggle at my expense. “Ugh, come on, lets get you to the bathroom.”

I led Apple Bloom from our row out to the aisle. The entire cabin was darkened, but the light strips on the ground guided us ahead. As we walked, Apple Bloom turned her head up at me. “How exactly am I gonna go if we’re still in the air? Actually, I should probably ask Scootaloo about that... what with pegasi flying all the time.”

And that is a conversation I am staying far away from. We reached our destination and, to my shock, there wasn’t a line to the bathroom, but it was currently occupied. I sighed and stationed Apple Bloom in line and waited behind her. The door opened and the previous user shuffled out.

Apple Bloom inched forward and looked into the bathroom. Her eyes went over the small sink and the equally small toilet and then back to me. “How the hay did they get an outhouse on a plane?”

“Science,” I muttered and gave her a friendly push into the tiny room. I stuck my head and hand inside and gestured to the door lock. “Slide this to lock the door... everything else should be like a regular bathroom, okay?”

Apple Bloom nodded and I went back into the small alcove the surrounded the restroom. While I waited, I took the chance to do one of my favorite pastimes on a long distance flight: staring out the emergency hatch window. It was the only window on the plane that didn’t have a blind on it no matter the time and no one by it to get annoyed at you for peeking through it. When books, music, games, and movies failed, the hatch window was as good a distraction as anything else. Plus, it gave me an idea of if we were near our destination or not.

Outside, half of the world was changing from an amorphous blackness to light pink and blue dotted with ripples and clouds. At the head of the plane, ocean and sky still met at some indeterminate point, each so black that we might as well have been in space. The view from the tail of the plane was a different story: a shimmering orb of light encased in a pink glow with rosy fingers emanated from that direction. Now is that morning or dusk I’m seeing?

Before I could further ponder the sun’s position, I was startled back to the inside of the plane by a commotion coming from the bathroom. I rushed over just as the door swung open and a befuddled Apple Bloom stubbled out. She rushed over to me and grasped hard at my leg. “It tried to eat me! It tried to eat me!”

“Whoa whoa! Slow down.” I bent down on a knee and got to Apple Bloom’s level. “What happened?”

“W-well...” Apple Bloom’s face turned a slight red. “I was just finishing up, but when I pulled the flush thing that... that thing tried to eat me in one gulp!”

“Oh...” A look of comprehension sparked across my face. “It just does that to make sure there isn’t anything sloshing around. Think about when we took off, you wouldn’t want to have a full bathroom during that, right?”

The red on Apple Bloom’s face turned into a sickly green. “Just forget it. I don’t wanna talk about this anymore.”

“Sounds good. But ya still gotta wash your hands.” I pushed myself off the ground and held open the door for Apple Bloom. She darted in, slammed her hands against the faucets to get it to turn on, jabbed her hands under the water, and sped back out of the bathroom and to her seat. I chuckled before closing the door to use the bathroom as well.

Apple Bloom was on the floor by my seat when I got back. My backpack was at her knees and my 3DS was in her hands. Her hands flicked the on switch but she only got a red light on the power light for her efforts. She heard my footsteps and frowned at me. “It’s not working.

I bent over and grasped the 3DS away from her. “It’ll need to charge.”

“Phooey.” Apple Bloom got back on her feet and shuffled back into her seat. “I just got the boss key. I was finally gonna get out of that horrible place.”

My seat greeted me as well, but just as I had clipped on my seatbelt, I sensed something to my left. I twisted around and was met with a flight attendant staring me straight in the face. The man had contorted his body to stretch over Sweetie and Scootaloo while he managed to carry a large platter of what looked like orange juice in small cups. Everything about the guy seemed a little too smooth: his beardless cheeks, the shimmer in his skin, and his stepford smile all greatly unnerved me. After a moment of him just leering at me and Apple Bloom, words with a thick Indian accent slipped out of his mouth. “Would you like some juuiiiccceeeee?”

“N-no thanks,” I stuttered, unsure how to respond to such a bizarrely voiced request. It sent a shiver down my spine. For a second, I thought I might have still been dreaming.

Apple Bloom and I both sighed in relief when the strange flight attendant backed away and went on to terrorize some other poor soul. When he was out of hearing range, she turned to me. “So... what do we do now?”

“Well...” I scratched my chin and considered my options. “If your DS is dead then the others probably aren’t in much better shape either.” My good hand rapped against the top of my laptop. “I want to keep a little bit of a charge on my computer in case we need it for something. Oh! Would you like to look through the flight magazine? It can tell you all about Australia.”

“Okay,” Apple Bloom smiled. I reached out and grabbed the fat magazine from the seat pocket and flipped it open to the contents page. A large picture of the man in scuba gear next to a massive mound of colorful coral formed the background of the contents page and the back of the cover page. Apple Bloom’s eyes went as wide as dinner plates. “Whoa, what is that?”

“A thing called the Great Barrier Reef,” I explained. “Think of it like an undersea forest.”

“That’s amazing! I’ve never seen anything like it!” Apple Bloom paused for a moment and narrowed her eyes at the picture. “Wait... this whole place ain’t underwater, right?”

That got a hearty laugh out of me. “No, it’s not underwater. It—”

A loud slam interrupted me. To my left, a piece of luggage had fallen from the overhead compartment and clunked against the ground. Two flight attendants instantly rushed over and leaned over to the passengers that were awoken and bewildered by the crash. Amidst the disarray, Sweetie nuzzled her head against her seat. “Muh... all stacked.”

My body tensed up a little as the scene unfolded. It wasn’t like anyone would associate the luggage with Sweetie, but enough “accidents” and the plane would have to land who-knows-where. With that thought on my mind, I reached out and gave Sweetie a light shake. “Hey, time to get up.”

Sweetie’s arm brushed against my and she curled up into her seat. “Five more minutes, Rarity.” I gave her another shake and one of her eyes flicked open. She raised up a hand and rubbed the sleep from her face. “Huh? John? Are we there?”

“No,” I replied, “but you were making stuff move while you were dreaming.”

“Oh.” Sweetie brought her hands to her lap and looked down at them. “Sorry. I was dreaming I’d finally helped Rarity clean up her store just the way she likes it.”

“It’s no problem.” I lifted the magazine out of my lap and showed it to Sweetie. Her eyes went as wide as Apple Bloom’s when she saw the Reef. “I was just showing Apple Bloom some of the famous areas of Australia.”

Sweetie’s hand brushed against a vibrant part of coral on the page. “It’s so pretty.”

“Yeah,” I replied. “Anyway, how about we go through the magazine and find out about Australia?”

“Okay,” said both Sweetie and Apple Bloom.

Sweetie’s eyes drifted to her right. She was so entranced by the Reef that she failed to notice she was leaning over Scootaloo. Scootaloo, in turn, was still lost in her dreams. “Um, what about Scootaloo?”

“Eh, let her sleep. She needs rest after the past few days.” I extended out my arms to allow both Sweetie and Apple Bloom to see the magazine. “Anyway, the Reef is actually made of thousands of tiny creatures called...”

~~~

“... vegemite. I can’t believe they actually advertise it.” We’d managed to make it to page ten. Said page featured a huge ad for vegemite with a giant can of the stuff and kids playing around it like it was a jungle gym. Clearly, the kids had issues.

Before I could explain more, a trolley with multiple trays on it was pushed to our aisle by a stewardess. “Breakfast?”

All of us nodded, save for Scootaloo, who was still asleep. I let the girls get their trays first before taking my own. Once the trays were set down, I raised up my hand and gave Scootaloo a light shake. “Hey Scootaloo, we got breakf—”

Scootaloo’s eyes opened in a flash and she nailed me on the chin with her head. “Who are you?” she yelled.

“Ow!” I rubbed my chin as numbness set in. All around us, people were staring in our direction, wondering what the commotion was.

Scootaloo spun her head around like a dog that had just caught scent of something before regaining her senses. When she saw me clutching my chin, she wilted into her seat. “S-sorry, I had a weird dream.”

“I think that’s an understatement,” Apple Bloom commented. “Ya nearly knocked John out.”

“It’s fine.” The ice from my drink went into a paper napkin and onto my chin. “What spooked ya anyway?”

“I wasn’t scared.” Scootaloo crossed her arms and pouted. “It was that person again! She was in a field with lots of tall grass.”

“You probably dreamt that because we were playing with our pokemon for so long,” Sweetie conjectured.

Scootaloo shook her head back and forth. “I’m telling you, she had the same voice and everything. It’s really weird. I was just about to catch her when I woke up.”

“Hmm.” The pain was slowly fading from my chin but my hand was getting soaked in the process by the melting ice. I reached up and pressed the service button. Last night’s discussion came back to my head. “You’ve never had a dream like this before?”

“No,” Scootaloo replied.

“Odd.” Well, for now, lets just enjoy our breakfast.” I tore off the lid on my tray and got a good view of what I was eating.

“Um... John?” Apple Bloom stuck out a finger and timidly poked a yellow sponge-like square in the corner of the tray. “What is this?”

Instead of my finger I used a fork to poke at my own sponge-thing and cut off a piece of it. I stared at it hesitantly for a second before I took a bite. The bland flavor mixed with the flimmy texture to coat my mouth in an unremarkable yet horrifying taste. “That’s what they’re gonna call eggs.”

Apple Bloom glared down at the “eggs.” “That’s a crime against chickens.”

~~~

When the trays were cleared away, they were replaced with a few sheets of paper. I knew the sheets well; there were spaces for our names, people in our party, home addresses, passport information, and about a dozen other things I’d have to clear with customs. I balanced the plastic ice bag a stewardess had given me between my cast and chin and put a pencil to the paper.

Scootaloo peared over at me and and was quickly joined by the other Crusaders. “That’s not a quiz, is it?”

“No, no,” I chuckled. “This is just a thing you need to fill out whenever you need to go to another country. Think of it like a contract.”

“Wait.” Sweetie placed a hand on one of the sheets. “Why would they let you on the plane if you need to sign a contract? What happens if you don’t?”

“Then you’re stuck in a horrible dark place until the end of time!” I said in an overly dramatic voice. “It’s called customs.”

All three of the girls looked at me with scrunched up looks and then back at each other.

“I don’t get humans at all,” Apple Bloom sighed.

~~~

The plane zoomed into the runway and quickly came to a much slower pace. I put the flight magazine back in the seat pocket and leaned back. My throat was dry once again from narrating the pages of the magazine and the rest my body felt a little tired and sore as well. The Crusaders, on the other hand, were absolutely ecstatic. If it weren’t for their seatbelts, they probably would have jumped out and around the plane.

“I can’t wait to see Pinkie and Fluttershy again!” Sweetie sang.

“Me neither!” said Apple Bloom.

“Hey, maybe we can go see that giant rock and climb it!” Scootaloo suggested.

“I’ll pass on the giant rock,” Sweetie replied. “Rarity would probably get mad at me after last time.”

~~~

I sighed and stood shoulder-to-shoulder next to a bunch of other anxious travelers. All our eyes looped around and around the carrousel that potentially held our luggage. My eyes were searching for the bags with a large B made of duct tape on them. Dad may have had some odd paranoid tendencies, but that was one that was highly beneficial.

“There’s one!” Apple Bloom jerked her arm out and up at one piece of our luggage that had just descended onto the carrousel. When it came close to us, I lunged out and yanked it up.

“Good eyes, Apple Bloom,” I smiled.

“No problem,” she said with a similar grin. “This is easy compared to when we have to rassle cows or pigs. I still can’t tell a few pigs from one another. Oh! There’s another one!”

Our bags were collected in a short order, thanks greatly to Apple Bloom’s quick reaction. It was onto the customs. My heart got slightly caught in my throat when I remembered I’d had to show the agents the false passports again. When the line finally got me to the front, I marched forward and mentally prayed.

The agent glanced at our bags and then at us. “Nothing to declare?”

“Nope,” I hastily replied.

The agent scanned over us and our bags again. He sighed and waved us through. “Move along.”

Like that, we had officially made it onto Australian soil. I felt about a hundred pounds lighter now that we were in the clear. I quickly led the girls through the terminal with a quick stop to the currency exchange counter and out to the curb. “Alright! We made it.”

“Sweet!” Scootaloo exclaimed. “So where do we meet Pinkie and Fluttershy?

“Well, we’ll...” The weight came back in an instant. My eyes darted down to my pocket and then to my backpack. Crap! My phone! No, don’t panic. You can just email Doug or something.

Apple Bloom tugged at arm. “John, is something wrong?”

“No,” I half lied. “I just need to get back inside so I can email Doug.” And hope his phone gets email... maybe they have payphones inside too. I turned around but just as about to take another step, but a highly ecstatic voice stopped me in my tracks.

“Hey you!” the bubbly voice screamed. Out of the gaggle of various people and cars, a young woman darted at us from across the road. “I hope you’re Apple Bloom because Auntie Pinkie’s coming in for a hug attack!”

My mouth dropped when I saw she was completely oblivious to the cars that were coming straight at her. Luckily, they just honked and stopped due to the lower speed limits. My mouth still hung low for another reason: the woman had neon pink hair that was as puffy as cotton candy.

“Pinkie!” all three of the Crusaders called out. They were all in Pinkie’s arms in an instant. Words spilled out of all four’s mouths and mixed to form an incoherent babble of noise. The noise was of a jovial sort though and that gave me enough confidence to stand back and let all of them reconnect with each other.

“Excuse me,” came a deep voice from to my left. “Are you John?” The man who the voice belonged to had a great shaggy mane of a beard. Above it were a pair of deep set eyes that probably didn’t look much better than my own. He stood at least a good foot over me and looked like he could swat me like a bug.

It took me a moment to realize I’d been so intimidated by his height that I hadn’t answered his question. “Oh uh, hi... you must be Doug, right?”

The man nodded, but my eyes had already drifted over to the two stragglers behind him. One was a small boy with white shorts, white shirt, and white hair. He kinda looked like Near from Death Note. His eyes pricked up the hair on my neck though, they were just black voids.

My eyes moved away from the abyss that was the boy’s pupils and over to the other straggler. Her smooth pink hair fell down her back and onto her long yellow dress. Aquamarine filled her pupils. She looked about the same age as Pinkie, but it was hard to tell since she quickly slid behind Doug.

My silence at observing the two of them hadn’t gone unnoticed. Doug’s right hand went out and he beckoned the boy forward. “John, this here is Angel.”

“Hhhh...hi!” Angel rasped. The bunny-turned-human sounded like he had a severe case of strep, but his voice was at least identifiable to the sound I’d heard on the phone call that felt like ages ago.

“Uh, hey there... little guy?” I replied with slight trepidation. All I got was the black eyes once more. I slackened my shoulders when Angel stepped back and allowed space for the girl to step forward, yet she remained behind Doug.

“And this here is Fluttershy,” Doug said. His coaxing managed to get Fluttershy to bend her head to the side and let me get a better look at her face.

Her features were very soft. She had a small nose that matched well with her fair lips. Above all that were her eyes which were like clear lagoons. I mentally slapped myself away from what she looked like since I wasn’t responding quickly enough. Damn trip is making me slow. “Nice... nice to meet you.”

Er, why had I stuttered like that? That sounded terrible. Nice first impression J— Something slammed into my foot hard. I pulled my foot up and clenched it as the pain from the attack spread like wildfire. “Son of a—”

That stupid bunny was glaring right at me with those damn eyes. He even had the gall to cross his arms. If he didn’t look like he was ten, I had the immense disposition to introduce him to the business end of my cast.

“John?” Scootaloo’s voice called out, breaking me away from the little bastard. She’d gotten out of Pinkie’s hug and was coming over to me. “Are you okay? I heard a... whoah!” She stopped in her tracks and gazed up at Doug. I couldn’t blame her, he was tall from my perspective, he must have been a giant to the Scootaloo.

“Hello Scootaloo,” Doug said with a smile. Scootaloo didn’t say anything and just kept staring at him.

“Hey Scootaloo, are you talking to Fluttershy?” asked Sweetie as she too left Pinkie’s grasp. “I can’t wait to... oh!” Like Scootaloo, her eyes went up to Doug and widened.

“Hey, what’re y’all running off without me for?” Apple Bloom called out. Pinkie followed behind her with an incredibly wide grin on her face. “I wanna see Fluttershy too.” Just like the other two Crusaders, her eyes went up to Doug and she blinked.

“Hello,” Doug repeated. His tone was more reserved now and held a bit more hesitation in it.

Apple Bloom broke her focus away from Doug and gave my shirt a tug. “Hey, you never told us y’all had talking bears on Earth!”

So that’s what this is about. I slumped my shoulders and explained, “He’s not a bear, girls. Just a little tall.”

Apple Bloom crossed her arms and gave her head a shake. “Uh huh, so how do ya explain all that hair then?” She gestured up to Doug’s beard and turned her attention to him. “Hey mister, are ya a bear or aint ya?”

“Apple Bloom! Don’t be rude,” Sweetie berated. In a show of both young bravery and absolute innocence, she walked over to Doug and held up her hand. “Hi, I’m Sweetie Belle.”

The giggling in the background killed the moment. I glanced away from Doug and Sweetie to see that Pinkie was giggling like she’d just gotten a full dose of laughing gas. Her laughter was interspersed with her whispering, “Captain Man-Bear.”

“You’re Fluttershy!” Sweetie squeaked, bringing me back to her, Doug, and Fluttershy. She looked Fluttershy up and down with wide eyes. “Wow, you look so pretty as a human! Rarity would love that dress!”

Fluttershy stepped back at the compliment like it was a physical force. She corrected herself in an instant and, like Pinkie before her, scooped up all the girls in a large hug.

“Oh, I’ve missed you all so much!” It wasn’t hard to see the tears streaking down her face. I would have been concerned had I not noticed the quivering smile on her lips. “I’m so happy you’re all safe. It must have been just terrible to wake up and not know where you were.”

“Yeah,” Apple Bloom gasped in the midst of the hug. “We were really scared.”

I backed away from the former ponies. After so long apart from each other, they deserved some personal time together. Tears dotted Sweetie’s face and there were even a few droplets in Apple Bloom and Scootaloo’s eyes as well.

The scene was so heartwarming that the loud “Hey!” from an unfamiliar voice shocked me into remembering that we were at an airport. There was now a man about my height but pudgier than me holding up a fist to Doug.

Doug looked as confused as I did and just stared down at the floating hoof.

“Brohoof, right?” the man asked. “You guys going to a meetup or something? I didn’t even know there were any planned for out here.”

The revelation dawned on me in the same instant it took Doug to return the brohoof. Eh, Bronies are everywhere. A fit a giggles arose in my chest at the situation. Here was a Brony randomly finding six of the show’s stars. It took all my strength to keep my laughter in check and return the man’s brohoof.

“So... you are?” Doug asked.

“Oh just call me Southern Cross, that’s what I go by online,” the man enthusiastically answered. “Same name on all the MLP sites. EQD, art, fanfiction...”

Doug bent over to “Cross” and looked him straight in the eye. “Did you find anypony?”

What the hell is he doing? I nearly screamed. “ Uh Doug, I think we should get going...” Before someone says something stupid.

Before Doug could respond, “Cross” let out a chilling cackle that sounded like something a villain would bellow upon his plan’s fruition. “What is that, some sort of inside joke? Seriously, did you find anypony? Sure, yeah. I have three in my backyard!” He then reached over to Doug and gave him a playful slap on the back. “So anyway, I need to get going. I just saw you all cosplaying and had to introduce myself. Look me up online sometime!”

Without another word “Cross” sped off into the crowd and vanished. What the hell was that?

I broke away from the spot “Cross” had disappeared into and back to Slorg. His expression of confusion probably matched my own. That interaction had been enough of the airport for me. “I... can we just get something to eat? I think we’re all a little sick of airplane food and that didn’t help.”

“Yeah, let’s get going,” Doug replied. “Having all of us out here in public together might draw unwanted attention, as we just saw.”

Together, Doug and I shepherded the ponies and Angel over to the car. They’d been spared “Cross’s” bizarre interaction since they were all still sharing tales and hugging it out with each other.

We stopped at a small car packed to the brim with camping gear. Including the driver’s seat, there were five seats total. “So uh.. how are we all going to fit into that?

Author's Note:

Yes, the "Juice Man" is based off an actual experience I had back in '07. I still wonder if it was a dream or not.