The Little Curiosities

by Comma Typer

Reset And... [Them's Fightin' Herds]

Cartdiff is a lush and precious land of grass and forest. It isn’t much compared to most other nations in Foenicia, especially Long-Shan and Cariboue which many to this day call the Old World’s Manehattan, but it is home to the proud and tradition-loving Feltics of which the stereotype of sheep-flooded fields has much truth. Still, the grass is greener on the other side, so tons of youngsters take the opportunity to leave home for a change of scenery like Amareica.

But no one puts Turn into a unicorn in their itinerary.

Least of all, me.

I am a history undergraduate, interested in ancient-era texts and their insights as to how society was like back then. With an intent to collaborate with Amareican archaeologists and to contribute my knowledge of Cartdiff’s primeval pagan practices to the cause of discovering who we were so we can move forward all the wiser, I left my family and neighbors behind for better academic weather.

Things went well at first, taking jeeps to dig sites and consulting real historians in the flesh, but there was something amiss that Sunday. In Everton University, not too far away from the future ground zero that would be Canterlot, I was analyzing newly-found historical documents alleged to be written by the esteemed founder of Neo-Modern Amareican Faeianism, Lock Lee, when said documents glowed. When I saw these purportedly magic documents manifest what might’ve been actual magic, I cast them away from me.

With levitation.

I threw them in panic, but they floated gracefully above the table, as if unkempt and untouched. Had magic not been involved, they would’ve crumbled into dust, and I would’ve faced consequences far worse than a lecture on being careful with priceless artifacts. It was almost midnight, however, so I chalked it up to disorientation from lack of sleep.

How naive I was, for when Monday’s magic shenanigans began in earnest, I was among their first targets. A flash of white light, and in the next moment, I’d become a unicorn.

When it dawned on me that this wouldn’t go away, that we were all stuck as these creatures for the rest of our lives, I let it slide. I’ll finish my studies here, human or not. I did not endlessly whine about my situation unlike my moodier travelmates. No fingers? No problem! That Sunset Shimmer vlogger was quite helpful, though me being what others dubbed “a classical Cartdiffian unicorn” rather than an Equestrian pony did help, having cloven hooves to uncomplicate my grip on things (though how those Earth ponies hold things on their own, I’ll never know). And for a time, I was vindicated in my one-track persistence: I would not let a flurry of magic activity and my becoming a unicorn stop me from my work.

Then one day, I accidentally turned on my phone’s Internet. I usually kept it off (my laptop had the excuse of being my workstation; do not ask me how hooves and unicorn magic mesh well with a touchpad and keyboard) so I wouldn’t be distracted by funny EweTube videos and MyStable happenings. It was Sunday then, so I said, “Why not?” and indulged myself to see how those back home were taking it (I immediately messaged my parents about how they were since that Monday; I am not that cold-hearted). I did plan to send off some greetings of concern, and I admit, there’s some morbid fun in seeing everyone screaming virtually at this whole new world.

But at the top of my notifications lay a group chat I’d never thought would see the light of day again.

The Happy Hexad.

Forced alliteration, yes, but the group’s admin had been fond of wordplay for some time. The Hexad was a group of gaming nerds I’d joined to let off some steam and because my parents wanted me to spend some time with others my age; getting myself into studies and extended discussions on theories with “old dusty professors” wasn’t something they wanted me to partake in all the time. Truth be told, much study is weariness of the flesh, so I hung out with the Hexad some of the time. Always ended up in the admin’s house at the outskirts of town, playing several games in the space of six or so hours—everything from chess (which is one of the few games I am more than willing to pay attention to) through Ogres & Oubliettes and all the way to, yes, video games. Especially that one fighting game with cutesy, almost anime-esque, graphics.

Scrolled down to see the whole thing. In online text form (and the occasional picture, despite the difficulty of taking one without hands), there it was: the plight of my five acquaintances.

The admin kicked it off by asking if everyone was okay. Paprika was so caring that she waited for everyone else to say their piece before she talked about her now-alpaca self. She loved hugs and other public displays of affection (of the platonic kind, to be sure); it’s only fitting that she became a very huggable creature (their wool is not expensive without reason!) though she did struggle with tight spaces and small doors thanks to her super long neck.

Arizona and Pom had turned into a cow and a sheep, respectively. Literal livestock. Fortunately, much of the Foenician continent didn’t turn into predator creatures unlike Equestria with griffons, Diamond Dogs, and Abyssinians; these two didn’t need to worry about becoming somecreature’s well-done beef and mutton dinner. Nonetheless, it had been jarring and ironic for the grill-loving Arizona and the wool-clothes-collecting Pom. They’d coped the best they could, quadruped difficulties notwithstanding; seeing a video selfie of the two of them meeting for the first time post-transformation was heartwarming, actually. “I know that voice anywhere! Pom, is that you?”

Velvet became a reindeer. Vain woman-doe she was, Velvet became terrified that she’d “become such a ghastly specimen of vildlife!” That was until she stopped dramatizing on the phone and looked herself in the mirror. She then praised herself for becoming “zhe stunning pinnacle of reindeer beauty!” And just like a unicorn’s horn, her antlers were her magic conduits, giving her the power of levitation and ice magic. She made snow appear out of thin air along with making snowcones. And then she used her ice magic to prop up her homemade brand of ice cream and advertised that like crazy.

As for Tianhuo, I expected her to become a dragon, but a half-horse hybrid is a nifty second place, able to fly around with wings made of fire. How that works, I’ll say magic. Aside from partnering with Velvet to cook spicier dishes with her fire breath, she sometimes just flies around on her own, which is to be expected. For a literal hot head, she’d been the most calm and contemplative of the bunch. No wonder she gives me grief in chess, although I hope she doesn’t burn my personal wooden chess set on accident.

Of course, thanks to the nature of MyStable’s messaging application, everyone else saw that I just opened the whole chat. They then bombarded me with a gluttony of greetings, asking me how I am, what it’s like to be a unicorn (I updated my profile picture to fit my current appearance), and how things were going in Equestria especially near Canterlot where much of the magic had flourished.

I wanted to get away from it all. Turning into a unicorn and having the whole world change with me had done little to stop my historian’s pursuit, to uncover great things for the world’s benefit all on my own. Why should I let some dormers get in the way of that?

As I left to go to another tab on my browser, I caught a glimpse of a message Paprika sneaked in. I would’ve ignored it, but curse my curiosity! I clicked, and I saw, and I was conquered.

The face of a sad alpaca, frowning at me. Below the forlorn picture:

We miss you, Oleander. How’ve you been over there?

Why didn’t I just move away? Rationalized it away: it was the weekend, I was too bored and curious for my own good, the face was rather adorable and I had a soft spot for cute things like little flowers, others saw I’ve already seen the message and it’d be impolite if I did not respond.

A train hit me. In the heart.

I never asked much of them, never checked up on them much, yet they kept wondering about me. The right response was to be disappointed or angry in me. Judging from the times we’d had, they were good times: laughing over a silly Fool’s Mate in chess, angrily (but in jest) flipping my cards and the table over a game of Alakazam: the Assembly to much laughter, and trying to speed away from the cops in Motor Vehicle Theft 5 while armed with C4 and rocket launchers. They must’ve remembered that more than the times I’ve ghosted them.

And Paprika kept calling me friend. But it wasn’t just her, nor did I need them to throw friend around to know they saw me as one. Yet, I didn’t return the favor—or was it really a favor? Maybe they didn’t expect much from me, didn’t expect me to give much in return. Even outside the little games we played, they treated me well—Paprika was also a good cook, but it wasn’t just her, too. Arizona knew the ins and outs of barbecue and grill, and she rodeoed a few times in her life—had many such experiences to talk about, and of course, I engaged in the discussion since Cartdiff also had much of its roots in wrangling cattle.

Pom was into fashion though that didn’t mean she was snooty and uptight; she found beauty in the simple things and wasn’t afraid to show it off in what she humbly called peasant’s clothing—though making some of her own clothes merits her some well-deserved pride, even if she is too shy at times to show off her own work—nice of her when she showed me a dress she made just for me, little black dress it was.

Speaking of fabrics like cashmere and denim, Velvet, along with Tianhuo, were entrepreneurial folk, though I was surprised when they came to me one day and asked if I could provide some insight, some very informal consultancy. Apparently, a historian-in-training could help with seeing trends in past financial statements to see what the future may hold, and studies in history do hone skills of intentional and purposive analysis and reasoning.

The sad alpaca got to me again. That alpaca and that message of hers.

I cried in my sleep, having spilled out all my guts to these five acquaintances I’d sworn I’d forget the moment I move on from college. I missed them, missed their company—I had good travelmates as history-passionate as me, but the schedule was tight; how could I ever bond with them? And my own chase after extra-curricular stuff, looking after my own career—

To imagine myself as a lonely unicorn, sheltered away, giving all of myself to the world to show them their past, holed up in a library that may as well be a mountain monastery, talking and speculating with other ivory-towered airheads like me about some new discovery here or there.

A sigh later, I knew I could not be content with my future. Not if I did not make the best of my present.

From that day forward, I made an effort to talk to them every day even when I did not feel like it, even when it was simple small talk. How else could I respond to all those good times, these good people? And how I longed for their presence! No matter how many video calls we did, even while playing games online, there was nothing that would match their presence face to face.

So fast was the time, shock overtook me when I realized it was the last day of my studies in Amareica. To be sure, I did not neglect my studies in the slightest, but it seems that I’ve neglected something far more important than that for the longest time.

Every hour on the way back home, joy welled up in my heart, butterflies consuming my stomach from within. For one, I would see my home for the first time post-Change (as they’ve started to call it), and from what I’ve gathered, my family had also turned into unicorns as well as most of my hometown; I’d be remiss to ignore them. There was also that studious spirit of mine: considering the extraordinary circumstances, indulging one’s self in post-human sightseeing wouldn’t be a waste of time and money.

But the chief reason for coming here—it wasn’t just about a good semester break. That reason—as well as a taxi driven by an alpaca who clearly can’t fit his car thanks to his stupidly long neck so opened the window and drove with his head out of the vehicle—brought me here to the front door of Paprika’s house, the now-alpaca having moved from Surian to study in the same prestigious univeristy I was in.

One knock at the door, and the most adorable marshmallow I’d ever seen attacked me. Said attack turned out to be a hug, and when I opened my eyes, there sat Paprika’s ecstatic face. “I’m so glad you got here! And the sun just set—ooh! Sun’s moving fast! Lookie! Anyway, less talking, more doing things! Come inside! We’ve got something special for you, since, you know, you’re here again, but not really the old you but the new unicorn you—anyway, get inside!”

And after her wildly gesticulating and cooing self opened the door to let me in, into the living room we went.

Paprika shut the door behind me and zipped to the dining table. By the side was her huge TV where a game of Power of the Flock—that cutesy fighting game—was paused mid-fight. In the shelves lay tons of games she’d brought over from her place: video games, board games, tabletop games, war games... with this much on her plate, it’s a wonder how she didn’t drop out of college.

But sitting at the table were them. They were there to greet me, chomping happily on spiced salad and hay topped with fresh fruits—no meat which I’d gotten used to. Everycreature dropped their dinner to greet me, everyone from longma and deer to sheep and cow.

“Heya’!” yells Arizona as she jumps down the chair to meet me up close, and she hugs me close, holding me tight. “I’ve really shrunk, huh? Eh, doesn’t matter! Yer’ here, and that’s what matters! Y’all like family ‘sides my actual family!”

“Indeed,” I politely reply, and after a few seconds to break the ice, hoping she’d end the hug but also returning it with a pat on the head—“by the way, how’s your family ranch? Getting past the awkward stuff with your cattle?”

“They’re new buddies, and I ain’t complainin’! I even let Mesa try out potato chips for the first time. He loved the good ol’ chippies!”

“At least the host of this house wants all of us to be healthy,” Pom says by her salad bowl with her cute Trottish accent. What an adorable sheep she is in person! “It’s an admirable effort—“

“Ah yes,” goes snooty Velvet, slurping a blue smoothie quietly. “Zhe same host who’s given us soda, chips, and pizza over zhe past hour? Please. You might as vell be ordering diet soda to complement your deep-fried zhocolate bars!” That vain deer eyed me with all the power vanity had given her. “At least you have not grown fat!”

“I assure you, I’ve eaten well! Unlike you sipping around with your smoothie.”

“Vell, if Tina here vould stop her flames for just a moment!“ and she glared at longma Tianhuo still heating up her bowl to a fiery crisp with actual body heat.

“Hmph,” and Tianhuo turned her flames off. “Perhaps if the smoothie is not to your liking, I shall have it.”

“Hey! No takezies!”

“I am making forays in fertile country to supply myself with food.”

“Solar Shoo’s The Mastery of Warfare, Chapter Eleven, Paragraph Twenty-One!” I said in glee, jumped for joy. “It’s a delight to know you’ve caught up with ancient texts!”

Tianhuo slightly bowed to me. “But it was you who recommended them to me,” she said with a wink not really directed at me. Made me turn around, seeing the paused game on the screen. “Speaking of warfare—“

“Eeeee!”

And the alpaca raises me up to the air, crushing me with a super-fluffy-wool hug, all while I flailed my hooves around in a tint of fear.

“And we now all talked to you just like that! Oh, I so missed having a full house here since you were gone, but... oh, this will be a special night! I’ve got so many things prepared! I’ve got Monopony, Ninja-XX, Pioneers of Canter, even that new Werehitpony Mafia card game!”

“But Mafia lasts days if you wanted the optimal playing experience!” I cried.

That’s when Paprika winked at me. “Class isn’t starting again until a month and a half from now, so...”

And with that, I could get everything back. The time I should’ve spent with them, all the years I’d known these wonderful creatures over: now, I could have the best times of my life with my friends. And not just through games. I think we’d gotten way past being that small little gaming group to let off steam; now, we could go out, eat at cafés, talk about the craziness of turning into magic creatures and living in a magic world, and just get on with life together.

And that’s how I’m here, a unicorn using her magic to wrangle a controller to make some hairdo’d muscle army guy fight against a sheep’s wandering ninja, getting cheered on by a cow (carrying a stupidly heavy stack of board games on her back) and an alpaca (using her own wool as thread to fix up a shirt that no longer fits her) while a deer sips melted smoothie with disdain and a longma coaches me from behind about what tactics to employ against the aforementioned ninja, and we’re all screaming and laughing at each other. And a drink gets spilled and we all laugh at Velvet screaming at her stained floof like it’s the end of the world.

I won’t have it any other way.

Author's Note:

Thanks to StatiZkyZ for pre-reading.

Comments

[Matthais Unidostres]

What about the pirate goat character?

[Comma Typer]

10700968
I wanted to rely on the Book of Lore for the characters here. Since Shanty does not have any info beyond some vague info in her showcase stream many months ago, I'd rather stick to just the six.

[FanOfMostEverything]

Especially that one fighting game with cutesy, almost anime-esque, graphics.

i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/750/722/f12

angrily (but in jest) flipping my cards and the table over a game of Alakazam: the Assembly to much laughter

Oh, I've been there, in jest and out of it.

I feel a little bad for Fred collecting dust in some forgotten archive, but this a lovely way to do the crossover.

[Comma Typer]

10708713
It could be TFH but it could also be Skullgirls. Or it could be... well, those are the only two cute anime-esque fighting games I know of, heh-heh!

As for Fred, I think I learned my lesson about not having Earth and Equestria (or Foenum in this case) become carbon copies of each other (especially if you remember the problem with Principal Cadance back in A Magic Turn of Events). Maybe it's an overcorrection, but I'm content to think that Fred doesn't exist on Earth at all.

And thanks for it! First time trying a crossover, and I'd have to say again that it can't be done without the help of StatiZkyZ whose characterizations of the TFH cast in his own crossover story may or may not have nudged me this way or that.

[Captain Absolution]

10718272
Alright, good idea have Earth and Equestria not be carbon copies of each other.
But have Fred not as an old magic book, but a ‘normal' unicorn. I.E, change things here and there.
Other then, loving the story.~