Strangers in a strange land

by Snowy Flanks

Order to Chaos

The next morning Bright Baker and Bright Light awoke to the sounds of birds singing. Baker looked around and shook his head a little. Looking down at his zebra nephew nuzzled next to his unicorn body he stretched a little.

OK so that wasn’t a particularly vivid lucid dream.

Gently getting up and moving to the bathroom he left the door wide open and turned on the faucet and tried to wash his face and mane. Grabbing a cloth from the basket beside the sink he tried his best to give himself a wash down. As he was finishing there was a loud knock on the door and saw a red unicorn standing at the door.

“Princess Celestia requests your presence at breakfast in the next ten minutes”

Nudging Light awake and rubbing the little guys head, the two followed the red unicorn to the royal dining room to find Princess Celestia sitting at the table with a stack of papers beside her. In front of her is the largest assortment of fruits, grains, and other breakfast items Baker had ever seen. To drink there was jugs of water, juice and milk along with a steaming kettle of tea. Two guards stood motionless at the door. The rest of the seats at the table were empty so Baker pushed a high chair next to Celestia and placed Light in it, he then took the seat next to it and sat down. Baker took an apple of the table, crushed it and handed it to Light.

“Hello Bright Baker how did you sleep?” said Celestia with a smile and a sip of her tea.

“I slept fine Celestia, and you can call me Baker if you want. How did the paperwork go?” said Baker reaching for an orange.

“Everything is in order and ready for you to sign, but first let’s finish breakfast” said Celestia with a smile.

Baker handed a piece of toast to Light and took a few waffles for himself. He put strawberry sauce on the first one, maple syrup on the second one and hay seeds on the third one. He tried to pick up the fork and knife but was not quiet able to do it so he just bit into the stack. Light just pulled the toast apart and ate the pieces with a big smile. Celestia was the picture of poise as she levitated each perfectly cut into her mouth but you could clearly she the smile on her face from how her guests were eating.

“Interesting eating habits you have there Baker, I haven’t seen somepony eat like that in centuries” laughed Celestia.

“I really don’t have that many options, and I am really hungry” said Baker with a shrug and a lick around the lips.

“I would never stand in front of a hungry pony and a platter of food. The cooks always insist on making far too much food options for me. At the very least they could just give me a menu and I could order what I wanted for the day, but they never want me to wait”

“So what do you do with all the uneaten food?”

“It is donated to the local food kitchens”

“Well at least it does not go to waste” said Baker with a shrug.

By now Baker had finished his waffles and took a fragrant banana. Not bothering to peel it he just bit a piece off and chewed. The rind was rubbery but edible. Soon both Celestia finished her tea and Baker swallowed the last bits of his banana. As the servants took away to food Baker grabbed a pear and gave it to Light to eat. With the food gone Celestia levitated the stack of papers and placed them in front of Baker, meanwhile Baker wiped Light’s face with a cloth.

“It was not easy but I was able to find all the necessary documents for you to sign for you to gain citizenship. One of these has not been used in over seven hundred years. The fact that we can’t write down your former address made it complex” said Celestia spreading the papers and a quill in front of Baker.

Baker didn’t even try to pick the quill up with his hooves, instead he tried to sign his name with his mouth but all he got was something that barely even counted as scribbles.

“Why don’t you use horn and just levitate the quill? It is much easier then mouthwriting” said Celestia.

“I tired to use my horn yesterday, I couldn’t even get it to glow, let alone lift something” said Baker spit out the quill and looking at it in shame.

“It takes time for magic to stabilize in a unicorn body; your magic should be usable now. Just try to lift the quill” said Celestia.

Baker shrugged and focused on the quill, after a few seconds it began to glow and quiver but didn’t lift of the table.

“Try again you are putting to much effort trying to force the quill to float, instead focus on your intent and desire of floating the quill” encouraged Celestia with a smile.

Baker steeled his gaze and tried again, the quill glowed then slowly and shakily lifted up floating a few centimeters of the table. Baker reached over and hugged Celestia “I did it! I can make thinks float! This is so cooool! Thank you so much Tia!” Then he sat down and blushed a little “Sorry I was overcome with joy”

Celestia smiled “Ok now see the quill writing the words that you want on the parchment”

Baker looked over the first document which seemed to be his personal information. He filled in his name and age but then came on a problem. “Umm what should I put in for address? I don’t have a home”

“I sent a message to Twilight last night; you’ll be stay with her for the time being”

“OK” said Baker filling in the address with the Books and Branches library. After filling in the rest of the document, including listing Light as his dependent, Baker moved on the next document. It was Equestria’s charter of laws and an agreement to abide by the laws of Equestria. He continued to read and sign document after document agreeing to defend Equestria, keep it secrets and obey the rulings of the Princesses. He gave guards the right to question him and agreed to live under watch until he was deemed safe. Slowly his signature and writing got better and better as he kept writing and writing. By the time he was done he had a head ache and lot of documents scattered around him. He focused on them and managed to get them into a mostly tidy stack.

“Is that all the documents I need to sign?” said Baker looking up at Celestia.

“Yes Baker you are now an official member of Equestria. Are you ready to go back to Ponyville?”

“Yah your majesty not that I mind because really she is so adorkable, but if you don’t mind me asking why do you want me to live with Twilight?” asked Baker

“Several reasons, as long as you stay with her she can keep you under watch and you can send me messages if the need arises. She is very smart and will be willing and able to help you if you get in any trouble. And since she raised Spike she will be able to help you with Bright Light”

“That makes sense, but I hope you told her that she doesn’t need to watch my every move and teach me everything she knows. I’ve seen how Twilight acts when she gets an important job. While it can be funny to watch, I doubt it will be fun to experience.” said Baker with a sound of fear.

Celestia laughed. “Don’t worry Baker, I’ve talked to Twilight about that and I made it clear that she only need to watch you passively. If she gets to rowdy just send a message to me and I will sort her out”

“Thanks Celestia” said Baker with a smile

After Light had finished his breakfast and had his face wiped again, Baker went back to his room grabbed the carrying bag and went to the courtyard to get his chariot back to Ponyville.

---

Once they arrived in Ponyville the chariot was dropped right in front of the library. Stepping off of the chariot and thanking the pegasi before they flew away, Baker checked on Light snuggled in his carrying case and knocked hardly on the door.

The door opened to reveal Spike rubbing his eyes “Who is it?” he ask slightly grumpily.

Baker walked right by Spike and said “Hi Spike, Hi Twilight, Princess Celestia told me to stay here for the foreseeable future”

“I know I found the princesses message this morning” Said Twilight from the breakfast table. She was eating plain corn pancakes and a daisy sandwich.

“Great so my name is Baker and this is Bright Light” said Baker pulling Light out of his bag and putting him on the ground. “I just became a citizen and I needed a place to stay. Celestia in her divine kindness and wisdom said I could stay here”

Twilight finished her meal and got up from the table. “Princess Celestia told me to watch you carefully” she said staring at him.

“Celestia told me that she expressly told you to not spy on me, only report anything strange that I might do. Anyway where should I put my stuff? I don’t have much but I would rather not have to carry it all day”

“I’m afraid we don’t have much room right now” said Twilight looking around.

“I’m not surprised with the way this library has been organized” said Baker with an internal smile.

“WHAT!?” shouted Twilight staring right in Baker’s eyes.

“I mean seriously, who was the fool that chose to organize the library this way. Look at these books organized by title with no thought whatsoever to the content of the books. It would have been just as effective to leave them in a pile in the middle of the room. The previous librarian clearly didn’t know what they were doing” said Baker with a slight sigh. Inside he was laughing at how easy it was to rile up Twilight.

“Princess Celestia herself chose me to live and run this library and I will have you know I have awesome organizing skills! I plan my day down to the last second”

“Being obsessive compulsive about your time does not mean you can understand how to properly organize a library. By the looks of it this library is organized alphabetically by book title. That is the kind of organization a child would use and only works if you know exactly what you are looking for. And don’t get me started on the need to separate adults and children, seeing a library like this actually makes me want to cry” said Baker looking at Twilight.

“Well if you are so smart then you organize it yourself Mr. Organizer!” and with that Twilight pulled all the books of the shelves and stormed out of the library, slamming the door behind her.

“Restore a library to the way it should be? I would love to. Spike do you think you can help me?” said Baker with a smirk on his face.

Spike stood in the middle of the room still in shock from what had happened. Twilight had just made a bigger mess then she usually did, she had just had a big fight with the new pony and left the library in a huff. “What happened?”

“I challenged Twilight’s skill until she got angry enough to dare me to improve it. I would like your help” answered Baker lifting Light above the books and putting him in a safer area.

“But she wasn’t being serious!”

“I know but she still said I could. And anyway she is going to make you clean it up when she gets back. This way you can clean it up right and it will go faster.”

Spike stared around. It was true that he would have to clean up, and this way Baker would help him “OK”

Baker smiled and walked over to an owl sitting on a perch “You too Owl boy” he said poking the perch

“Whoo”

“None of that from you Owl; just help me and Spike fix this library” said Baker turning around and walking back to Spike; the Owlowiscious landing on his back.

“OK Spike here is the first step we need to sort all of these books into piles. All the non fiction books, that is all the books that teach things, should be sorted into ten piles in this order:

000 – Information and general works

100 – Philosophy and psychology

200 – Religion

300 – Social sciences

400 – Language

500 – Science

600 – Technology and applied science

700 – Arts and recreation

800 – Literature

900 – History and geography

The fiction books or the books that are stories should be sorted into two categories: Adult’s fiction and Foal’s fiction” Said Baker writing down the sections on a sheet of parchment.

“But why don’t we just put them back on the shelves” whined Spike

“Because then they would not be in the right spots, now come on if we work together it shouldn’t take too long” Answered Baker picking up a book and examining it.

It took an hour to do, but all of the books were soon in a series of smaller piles, most of the sorting was done by Spike and Owlowiscious did most of the work since they knew what books were in the library, but Baker managed to get a few, some piles were very large while others only had a few books.

“Ok now the difficult part” started Baker

‘That parts was easy?” asked Spike

“Sure it was just a little moving them around. Now we have to create an organization system. Spike you’re the smartest one here when I comes to that, and you have the best writing so that will be your job. You already know the main sections, but we need to create categories. Each section should have a general category but the rest of the categories depend on the specific section. For instance, Section 000 is general knowledge, thus categories should be: biographies, encyclopaedias, serials, newspapers, and rare books. I can give you suggestions but you know what will work well” said Baker slipping into teaching mode

“This seems like a lot of work” said spike beginning to write down the organization system.

“Right now it is, but it will make it easier later” said Baker checking on Light who was staring at Owlowiscious.

“What about the rest of the sections?” asked Spike looking up

“Hmm” said Baker rubbing his chin “Philosophy should be sorted into different kinds of philosophy like ethics, logic, psychology, psychology, and that sort. How many religions are there in Equestria?”

“Umm there are 4 popular ones and a few others” said spike looking confused

“The religion section should be sorted so that each popular religion should have a category the rest of the religions should be sorted by geographic location. As well there should be an area for general religion” said Baker clinically. “Do you know what the social sciences are?”

“Yah” said spike with a nod.

“The sort them evenly among ten categories, try to keep similar social sciences together, either way I trust you” said Baker with smile. “You got all of that?”

“Yep, are you sure this will work?” said Spike with a nod

“Of course I am. Sort language and literature with a general section at the start then eight categories by region” started Baker.

“Region?”

“A large area of land, In Literature, Equestria would be one, the griffin lands would be one, the zebras, the dragons and the mules, each one would get an area. Language is similar if you don’t have enough room for all the languages you sort by the common connections of languages” explained Baker.

“Equestria only has 7 spoken languages” confirmed Spike.

“Then leave have the general section, the seven languages, and finally other languages” stated Baker. “How are you with the sciences?”

“I’m fine with it. What do I put in for technology?”

‘Hmm I don’t know much about technology, but why don’t you have the general section, then medicine, engineering, farming, buildings, manufacturing, chemistry, management and home economics” said Baker, he hadn’t seen much technology and he hoped with would work.

“Home economics are a science? Whatever. What about arts?” asked Spike.

“Let’s see: general, landscaping, architecture, sculpture, drawing and decorative arts, painting, printing, photography, music and performance should work, unless you disagree?”

“What about designing dresses?” asked Spike, not willing to let his Rarity get forgotten.

“That would fall under textile arts, which would be a kind of decorative art”

OK that’s all but the last one, “What should that be like?”

“Geography and history? That depends on what world looks like, do you have a map?

Spike showed Baker a map of the world there where six large land masses.

“OK start with general like usual, then genealogy, ancient history, and a category for each of the land masses” said Baker

Spike finished the list and looked at it “Now what”

Now we need a lot of little labels and your brilliance” said Baker while Spike ran to get Twilight collections of labels. “I need you to sort these categories into smaller subcategories; if you have any questions make sure to ask me, it will be much easier then having to redo everything later. Then you still a label on each book and write the number down.

“What does that mean?”

Well if you look at the list each section has a number and each of the categories in the sections have a number too; so take this book called “Perplexing Pony Plagues”, it would be in science, then medicine, then maybe a subcategory for illness and you would end with I don’t know maybe 618 depending on what number illnesses would be. Do you understand?”

“Yah, I’m sure I can figure it out. What are you going to do?”

“I will check each book to make sure it was done right then put them on the shelf, Owlowiscious can help put books on the higher shelves and watch over the little guy” said Baker confidently

‘What about the story books?” ask Spike

“We will do those later, first the non-fiction books” said Baker

While Spike began to pick up each book and carefully label it, filling in subcategories as he went. Baker used some parchment and tried to label the shelves properly. He guessed how much he would need based on the size of the piles but didn’t secure the parchment encase he need to change them. Once the shelves were labeled he started to levitate the books one by one on to there proper places. Once he got a good system going he started to sing.

“Book by book, stacking them together
Non-fiction, filling out the shelves piece by piece
Making sure they stand up nice and straight
So that the patrons can browse them
Always gotta keeping in mind my pacing
Making sure the spines are correctly facing
I’m sorting the Books and Branches.

Stack by stack, fussing on the details
Decimal system, don’t you know a label on spine saves time?
Make her something perfect so she’ll squeak
Even though she does not like my cheek
Gotta mind those intricate bookends
Even though she's more concerned with friends
It’s Twilight’s new library.

Organizing is easy, for newspapers section 70
Mathematics is 530
Everything has its spot
Do you think this is nerdy?

Something brash, perhaps a poster
Line and stack, wait until you see the plaque!
Making sure they ready for the road
Don’t forget some magic in code
Even if they leave it on a table
You can put right back in it’s stable
Were building a library system

Book by book, then pamphlet
Ephemera, manuscript
Serial by serial, cleaned and pressed
Films and slides, no more stress
And that’s means no more big mess!”

By some magic in the music, by the time the songs was done, almost the entire non-fiction section had been sorted. There had been a few times when Spike had made an honest mistake in coding, and Baker had needed to change the shelf labels once but things had gone well, Spike had done a pretty good job at making subcategories that worked. Within ten minutes the last books were on the shelf, all of them were labeled and numbered properly.

“OK! The fiction section is going to be a lot easier. Move them to the second floor, Children’s books on the left, adult books on the right, sorted by author’s last name, then book title. Labels go: FIC for fiction, author’s last name first three letters, and children’s book have a J on the top.

Sorting the fiction sections was a lot easier then the non-fiction section, they were just on the T’s when the door downstairs open

“What the hay happened here?” came a slightly shrill voice up the stairs.

“Miss. Twilight there is no need for such language in a library; I’m just doing what you told me do. I’m sorting this library properly.” Said Baker coming down the stairs, Spike looked up then returned to filing the books.

“Well change it back! That system was designed by Princess Celestia.”

“Celestia might be a phenomenal world leader and loving to no end, but if this is her system then it was flawed”

“What? I demand you fix this!” shouted Twilight her horn glowing

“Calm down Miss. Twilight, just give the system a chance, if it is really so bad you can always change it back. In fact why don’t you send a message to Celestia explaining exactly what I have done? You can even include the sorting system I designed. I am confident she will at the very least tell you to give it a try”

“Are you trying to tell me that you invented an entirely new library system in less than five hours? How exactly did you do that?

“Before I came here, I worked as a librarian, this was the system that was designed and polished over a hundred years. It worked great and I am sure the princess will love it. I myself always loved sorting books in the system, made me popular since all the other librarians never wanted to do it.

There was a bright glow and Baker felt a tingling sensation on his back he turned around and saw his flank was glowing. When the glow stopped instead of his normal teal coat, there was a bookshelf on his flank.

‘Well look at that, even magic says I know what I am doing” said Baker with a slight smug in his voice.

Twilight just pouted and marched upstairs, but at least she didn’t throw all the books on the floor again.

Baker took Light and slipped out of the library; closing the door slowly enough hear “SPIKE TAKE A MESSAGE!” come down the stairs. He smiled again and walked away

Comments

[Snowy Flanks]

1329733
She is just that angry, poor Twily

[ManlyDerp]

...Okay, I'll admit it... I sang that song out loud

[Hereward]

I love this chapter. I work in a library myself and it's so much easier using the Dewey Decimal System.

[Galaxy of Equestria]

when i was middle school i work at liberty. it was fun for few years.

[HB_DS2013]

I'm surprised Equestria doesn't have an actual organization system for books, and I KNOW how eh, passionate Twilight can be about organization, especially about books. In other fanfics, Twilight rearranges the books so often that no one can remember which books they want. Plus, I haven't seen ponies other than the Mane Six actually go to the library, save for Cheerilee, who prolly occasionally visits for help with her lesson plans.

[Luckyfanisaac]

“Try again you are putting to much effort trying to force the quill to float, instead focus on your intent and desire of floating the quill” encouraged Celestia with a smile.

0:03

Loved the rewrite of “art of the dress!!“

[KvAT]

Classic, Dewey Decimal System.
Old fics really have a lot of these.