Truthseeker

by RB_

Screaming and Hybrids

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA,”

“I probably should have seen this coming,” spoke the third mouth of the pink mockery of nature.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA,”

“But nothing’s ever broken my glamour before,” Continued the seventh mouth of the vile spawn of nightmares.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA,”

“So I honestly didn’t even consider it!”

A wincing Octavia, ears folded down and hooves clamped over them, shouted, “Would you please be so kind as to— ngh— quiet her!”

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA—” A pair of leathery pink ‘hooves’ pushed the green mare’s jaw closed. “MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM—”*smack!*

“Thanks, Octy!”

Lyra blinked, eyes returning to normal size. She rubbed her cheek where the grey mare had slapped her. “That hurt.”

“Not nearly as much as your screaming did.”

“Okay. So,” Lyra said, pointedly looking away from the pink mass of flesh until she could gather her wits. “First of all… What are you?”

“One-half eldrony, on my mom’s side.” Anticipating her next question, Pinkie continued. “Hybrid child of an earth pony and an eldritch abomination. Which is like a big, super-smart, super-powerful, super-funny-looking, usually tentacle-y monster that drives you crazy if you look at it long enough.”

“If it drives you crazy, then how…?”

-----

The rest of the villagers either ran off in fear or fell to the ground in gibbering, frothing madness. Chalcedony Quartz, however, took a determined step forwards. The Choosing Stone had revealed this creature to be his soulmate, and by the Stone he was going to make. It. Work.

-----

“Tradition and stubbornness. It worked out well in the end.”

“Are you safe to look at?”

“Yep! The whole making-no-sense-in-Euclidean-geometry thing didn’t get passed down beyond my mama!”

Bracing herself, Lyra looked towards Pinkie.

She was vaguely equine-shaped: four legs, one head, two ears, a mane and tail, but that was as far as the comparison could go. Her ‘mane’ was made not of hairs but of long and slightly moving tendrils, as was her tail. The eyes were in the right place, but they were small and far too many, arranged like a splash of seafoam across her face. A line of eight gaping (and grinning) mouths ringed with small feelers began at the creature’s muzzle and worked their way down her neck. Smooth, pink, leathery skin covered her in place of a soft coat of fur. A pair of small, vestigial looking bat- no, thestral wings sprouted from her back, and her hooves were cloven into three parts, the front ends spread apart like claws.

At least the familiar three-balloon mark on her flank confirmed that this was still Pinkie Pie.

Lyra forced down her base instincts. “That’s… going to take some getting used to.”

“Is it really so bad?” Octavia asked, curious.

“Yeah. It… yeah. It is.” Lyra winced. “No offense! I mean—”

“None taken, I understand.”

Relieved, Lyra turned to the grey mare. “So I’m guessing that question means you can’t see, uh… this.”

“Indeed. All I see is a perfectly normal looking earth pony.”

“Then why-“

“That’s what we want to find out!” the pink pony— and Lyra had to remind herself that Pinkie was still a pony, despite her appearance— declared. “You were able to pierce an eldritch glamour, and see through the disguise of a member of one of the most convincing shapeshifting races on Equis! And you did it without even meaning to!

“Now, there aren’t many things it could be.” Pinkie continued. “For one thing, those two are like, complete opposites of each other, magic-wise, so it must be something with reaaaaaaally broad effects. Which kind of narrows it down to either chaos magic or a conceptual blessing. Have you had any run-ins with either Discord or a propeller beanie-wearing pink and purple earth pony in the past twenty-four hours?”

“Not that I know of.”

“Then it’s probably a blessing. Had any weird dreams recently? Particularly ones revolving around some abstract concept like Trust or Justice?”

Lyra thought back to that morning. “…Something about truth, I think?”

“Capital ‘T’. But yeah, that would do it. Congratulations, Lyra! You’re officially an agent of a middle-tier deity now!”

Confetti rained from the ceiling.

“…What?”

-----

Lyra sipped at a strawberry milkshake. It was a few hours later, and she was sitting on her favorite park bench, half-watching the denizens of Ponyville as her mind went over what had transpired earlier in the day.

Following the revelation that she was apparently now the champion of a god, Pinkie had given her a few ideas of what to expect.

“A conceptual blessing does exactly what it says on the tin: it gives you an ability based around the relevant deity’s relevant concept. Seeing as you were most likely blessed by a deity of Truth, with a capital ‘T’, I’m guessing you can ‘see’ through deception!” she had said with a giggle.

Deities liked wordplay, apparently. Oh, and she should be expecting to meet the aforementioned deity in her dreams sometime within the next week. That was something worth remembering.

Returning home had been taxing, too. Not only had she been gone for way longer than she was supposed to, she had also forgotten to get the milk.

This wasn’t an issue, however; someone had apparently left a fresh carton in their mailbox. No, Bon Bon had been concerned about her briefcase. Which was apparently enchanted with a military-grade perception filter which, according to the candymare, should have made it unnoticeable.

“I’ve been getting a lot of that today.” had been Lyra’s response.

She wasn’t sure how she was going to tell her marefriend about this, but she did know that she was going to. Soon. She just needed to come up with some way to explain it without bringing up Pinkie Pie, who had made her Pinkie Swear not to reveal her true nature, or Sea Swirl, who Lyra had decided to give the benefit of the doubt.

Actually, I should probably apologize to Sea Swirl for earlier. And let her know that I know her secret.

Which would require a second set of explanations.

Grahhhhhhh…

Lyra was shaken out of her internal frustration by the approach of a group of schoolfillies. More specifically, by the blue unicorn filly with the white mane and the stripes.

Lyra had never met a zony before; zebras themselves weren’t very common in Equestria, and their hybrid offspring with ponies were an even greater rarity. And Lyra’s experience with zebras was pretty much limited to Zecora, so her sample size was, admittedly, very small.

But those didn’t look like zebra stripes to her.

Zecora’s stripes ringed her legs, and came down fairly straight from her back. This filly’s markings wrapped around her like snakes or vines, weaving over and under each other in a complex pattern. Emanating from a point on the filly’s back, the lines spread out across the entirety of her coat before converging into a spiral pattern which wreathed her cutiemark, a ringing hoofbell. Other lines led into the filly’s eyes, and more spiraled down her legs.

It kind of reminded Lyra of some of the tattoos she had seen on that one visit to Manehatten.

Lyra held her eyes shut for a moment, then opened them. Sure enough, the markings were initially invisible, fading into view a split second later.

Huh.

Lyra took another slurp of her milkshake, deciding to ignore it; she'd had enough weirdness for one day. Besides, whatever the deal was with those stripes, it probably wasn’t worth having to explain how she could see them.

Author's Note:

The ability of the pony races to mate and produce offspring with an astoundingly wide variety of species is a well-documented and studied phenomena. Most scholars agree that this is most likely a result of the inherent Harmony magic all ponies are born with, but some argue that it may be purely biological. Whatever the reason, this diversity in biological compatibility has led to the creation of numerous hybrid species, such as the dracony, the zony, the hippogriff, and the hippocampus.

-Excerpted from Basics of Equestrian Biology, Third Edition, by Rigorous Taxonomy.

Comments

[Kooliana]

I love this.

[Camolot the Creator]

I must admit my growing affection for this fic.

The rest of the villagers either ran off in fear or fell to the ground in gibbering, frothing madness. Chalcedony Quartz, however, took a determined step forwards. The Choosing Stone had revealed this creature to be his soulmate, and by the Stone he was going to make. It. Work.

Also, this? This is hilarious.
Keep it up.

[Deynarth]

The "How I met your mother" story from Pinkie's parents would be an excellent story of it's own.
This guy must have had balls of steel and a will of iron.

[Naturefang]

“One-half eldrony, on my mom’s side.” Anticipating her next question, Pinkie continued. “Hybrid child of an earth pony and an eldritch abomination. Which is like a big, super-smart, super-powerful, super-funny-looking, usually tentacle-y monster that drives you crazy if you look at it long enough.”

Wow. I actually get to say this.

CALLED IT!

[SIGAWESOME]

She was vaguely equine-shaped: four legs, one head, two ears, a mane and tail, but that was as far as the comparison could go.
<...>
At least the familiar three-balloon mark on her flank confirmed that this was still Pinkie Pie.

So something like what Zdzisław Beksiński painted?
beksinski.dmochowskigallery.net/gfx/db/bigger/003368.jpg

Chalcedony Quartz, however, took a determined step forwards. The Choosing Stone had revealed this creature to be his soulmate, and by the Stone he was going to make. It. Work.

Before Shining came along, how many stallions could say they have romanced a bona fide goddess?

[Soda Pop]

I am now a fan...boi wat magic u using?

[Maxes Altho]

8657868
I dunno, I like to imagine any number of mortals romancing Sunbutt, Moonbutt, and Discord at some point in the past.

[Striving for Harmony]

Hippocampus.
Pffffft. +1 internet.