Double Residency

by marmalado

Back in Town

The note had been laid out on the countertop, right next to the register. It told of a friendship mission Pinkie had been called on to a faraway land where she might not return for a few days...or even a few weeks, if worse came to worse. Any inquiries they had could be redirected to Gummy, who would be holding down the fort in his owner's absence.

As Pinkie closed her suitcase and began tucking it into her mane, she looked at the portal, then out the window. The sky only had a few kisses of sunlight within it. Celestia was raising the sun. Ponies would be getting up soon.

She bit her lip. Maybe I should've told the Cakes I was leaving for a few months, not a few days...

Nah. If I did that, they would've gotten suspicious.

As much as she wanted to tell her friends, she didn't want to make them suspicious too. The whole point of exploring this new world, after all, was not to draw suspicion from anyone, whether it was from the ponies of Ponyville or from "Odd Squad".

Rushing to the door to make sure it was sealed tight, she let out a sigh. It was supposed to sound relieved, but came out more anxiety-ridden instead. She wouldn't be lying if she said she wasn't scared at what she was planning on doing. One wrong move, and the cat would be out of the bag. She couldn't, wouldn't, risk that.

That, naturally, included leaving Gummy behind. Her becoming a human in another world largely unfamiliar to her was bad enough. She didn't want to know what Gummy would turn into if he went through the portal.

"I'll...see you soon, Gummy. Real soon."

With a deep breath, she took careful hoofsteps into the portal and closed her eyes.

---

TO-DO LIST FOR TORONTO:

• Look at my new human form. Learn what I look like and remember it!
• Apply to that "Odd Squad Academy" Ms. O mentioned
• Learn all I can about "Odd Squad" -- are they dangerous? Or are they nice? Ms. O, Olive and Otto were nice, so does that mean "Odd Squad" is nice? Must investigate
• Make some friends
• Spread smiles!
• Oh yeah, and try the candy here. And the food. Oh, and the pastries! I bet they're all super delicious!

In a nearby clothing store, Pinkie stared at the mirror that hung in the changing room. Her new human form seemed rather...what was that word Rarity used once? "Sloh-vein-lie"? No...it was "sloh-vehn-lee". Slovenly. Yes, she looked slovenly.

She donned a roomy gray sweatshirt with some sort of a weird emblem on it, one of those images that just kept going and going. Now that she looked at it, the emblem was on her navy pants and her purple shoes, too. She tenderly touched the purple glasses that sat on her face, blinking as she realized that she still had perfect vision with them on when she wasn't visually impaired in any way before. Usually, when she wore glasses with lens, the world got really blurry and she could barely see anything. It felt weird, but the glasses were a nice touch on her, so she decided to keep them.

Her auburn-red hair was nice too. Tied back in a large down ponytail and secured by a purple tie...

Wow, what's with all the purple? Maybe I should be called Purplie Pie! Or Violetie Pie!

She giggled, toying with her hair for a few moments before she gave an affirmative nod. She had a name. She had a physical appearance that would help others recognize her...well, aside from the tan skin. It seemed like quite a few humans here had skin like that. Either way, she was ready to go to her next destination. Getting directions from a few store clerks, Pinkie began making her way to what would become her new school.

And while the journey there was long and arduous -- seriously, what was Torontonian public transportation? -- the school itself was an incredible sight.

Boasting six buildings of varying colors and shapes, the Odd Squad Academy looked more akin to that one bakers' school for rich ponies Pinkie had tried to get into in her teenage years, in that it was more of a college campus than anything else. Hopefully it wasn't as classist as that bakers' school. She still remembered the harsh rejection letter along with the "INSUFFICIENT INCOME FOR ADMITTANCE" wording stamped across it.

She looked around at the many students that passed her, hoping to spot a few friendly faces. At some point she began to run towards what had to be the front doors, wanting to get admitted to the school as soon as possible so she could start making friends and spreading smiles.

When she spotted a front desk, she bounced up to it. "Hi! I want to attend school here, please!"

The agent in charge, donning a similar suit as Olive but with a red tie and red shoes, eyed her with confusion, glancing at her shirt and then making eye contact with her. "Um...are you sure you aren't already attending?"

"Positive!" Pinkie grinned. "My name's Olympia! Do you have an Olympia here?"

The agent began typing on her computer. Pinkie watched curiously as she squinted, then widened her eyes.

"Well I'll be. We don't have an Olympia in our student body." The agent glanced at her. "May I ask why you're wearing an Academy uniform if you aren't attending the Academy?"

"I, uh, I-I-shadow! I was, um, I shadowed here...once...and they gave me a uniform and everything! See, I just moved to Toronto and I need to pick a school and I figured since my name started with an O like Ms. O and Olive and Otto I could come to the Academy and learn all about Odd Squad here so here I am! And also, also, the uniform's really cool!"

While Pinkie hoped her cobbled excuse was good enough, it surprised her that the agent's eyes went slightly half-lidded as though she had heard motor mouths before. "You've met the modern greats already? How long have you been living in Canada?"

"Allmylife!"

The agent stared at Pinkie, then sighed. "Lived in Canada all your life, just moved to Toronto, terrified about attending the Odd Squad Academy. One more and it might outclass the dancing shark I saw last week." She went back to typing on the computer. "Anyway, Olympia, was it? I'll need your DOB."

"Born on a Tuesday! October 20th! I'm eleven!" Jeezaloo, am I possessed or something? That's not even my real birthday!

"Mhm, got it. Your name starts with an O, so there's no need for a name-change..."

And on and on it went. Pinkie was forced to give a fake address, a fake emergency contact, and a fake record of her current vaccinations. As unsurprising as it was, the ponytail she donned was thick enough to serve as good hammerspace for her to reach in and pull out all kinds of items -- an act that apparently wasn't deemed odd enough for the ones dressed in business suits to sentence her to execution for.

It felt like forever before she heard those magic words: "All right. You're in. I'll have your schedule printed by tomorrow."

"I'm in?!"

"Yes. You're in." The agent stood up and stuck out her hand. "Welcome to the Odd Squad Academy, Olympia."

"Yes!" Pinkie did a fist-pump, grabbing the agent's hand and shaking it with enough force to send said agent shaking along with it. "Thank you thank you thank you! Oh, I'm so happy!"

"A-a-any...ohh..." The agent began feeling around her general bubble, beginning to stumble away as Pinkie's grip loosened on her.

And then she keeled over.

"I'm gonna...ohhhh no..."

---

Okay, making someone throw up was not how you became their friend.

Pinkie knew this. She just got a little overexcited, that's all. Surely she could apologize and try again. It was an honest mistake. She had done the same thing tons of other times to ponies, and most of them always managed to forgive her. Why would a human in this world be any different?

...Yeah, okay, no. The stink eye shot at her by the agent the next time their eyes locked answered that question.

Still, that was where one of the other agents stepped in. Explaining that Ortega was prone to getting sick easily and was very much jaded from working at "Odd Squad"- whoops, Odd Squad for so many years, he offered Pinkie a tour of the school so she could prepare for tomorrow, which she happily accepted. She got to see every single building from top to bottom, peek inside a few classrooms, and even meet a few students who quickly befriended her.

Once the tour was over, she decided to head back into town to check out the bakeries as a way to fill up the rest of her day. She was quite hungry anyway, and needed something to fill her up. It would, at the very least, knock something else off of her to-do list.

The bell above the door to the bakery that was quite literally called Town Bakery tinkled a friendly tune. Pinkie moved to the side to allow a couple to walk out with a cake in a box, then made her way inside and began ogling the pastries. They didn't look as divine as Sugarcube Corner's...in fact, she could argue they looked decent. But as Rarity often told her, looks can be deceiving.

"Hi there!" a woman's voice called. "I'll be right with you!"

"Sure thing, just take your time!"

While she waited, Pinkie reached into her hair and pulled out the booklet the guide had given her. She had obtained all sorts of information about the school from him, but as this was the place where she was going to start her smile-spreading journey, she wanted anything and everything she could get her hands on.

"Sorry about the wait." The woman, wearing a traditional baker's outfit, stumbled out of the back room. "Oh, Odd Squad! Er...I think?"

"I'm a new student at the Odd Squad Academy!" Pinkie chirped. "My name's Olympia!"

"Ah, that explains it. Sorry about that. I'm really not used to seeing any more than agents in business suits." The baker laughed. "Anyway, what can I get for you?"

Pinkie tapped her chin. There were so many good options...but maybe humans having large appetites wasn't so common in this world, so "everything on your menu" was off the list. "Can I get...um...oh, oh, I know! A chocolate cake!"

"A whole chocolate cake?"

"Yeah!" Pinkie blinked. "Wait, no, uh...not a whole cake. Two chocolate cake slices, please!" Two...that's not so uncommon, right?

"Sure!" The baker tapped on some kind of ele- a computer. Yes, that was a computer. More specifically, a tablet. Pinkie's time in the other human world had served her well when it came to technological knowledge.

Finally, when it came time to hear the price: "Your total will be $4 exactly."

Pinkie reached into her pocket.

Stopped.

Realized two things.

I don't have any money in my pocket, do I? And...do stores here even take bits?

Beginning to panic, she furiously reached in her hair and dug around for any semblance of a dollar bill or a coin. While it was an easy money generator back in Equestria -- not that she would tell anyone; it was a get-rich-quick secret -- she didn't know if that translated to this world.

"I-If you can't pay it, don't worry about i-"

"No, no! Please, I-I can pay it! Just...gimme a minute..."

After another minute or two, Pinkie finally pulled out a bill. It didn't quite look like the money she had seen in the other human world, though. It looked similar, but this bill had a picture of a jackalope on it.

"Ohh, a $10 Jackalope Dollar bill?" The baker smiled. "It's your lucky day, huh?"

Pinkie stared at her, surprised that her nabbing free money didn't raise any suspicions -- if not in the "she can pull stuff out of her hair?" sense, then in the "where did she get that money from?" sense. Either way, she was confident that the bill was not four bits like she had wanted to grab. But at the same time...it seemed to be accepted currency here, at least far more so than bits.

"Yeah...I guess it is." she responded hesitantly, placing the bill on the table. "Here."

The baker took the money, opened the register, and took out a $5 Jackalope Dollar bill followed by a $1 one. "Here you are!"

Pinkie took the money and put it back in her hair, more on instinct than anything else. Upon checking, she found out that the booklet she had been holding earlier was also back in her hair. But that wasn't what worried her.

No, what worried her was her hair suddenly shifting to meet this world's currency needs. It was like it knew it was in another world. She was confident she had no Jackalope Dollar bills in it when she was in Equestria...but then, she hadn't really paused to look. She never thought "I'd like to have a Jackalope Dollar", reached into her hair, and gotten one.

Ah well. Something to look into, she supposed. But that was low on the priority list.

"All righty, two chocolate cake slices for you!"

Pinkie eyed the slices, the feeling of hunger beginning to gnaw at her more fiercely than before. After giving her thanks to the baker, she went towards an empty table, sat down, and immediately dug in.

Honestly, getting her hopes up over the slices tasting anything above "decent" was a dumb move.

The cake was...average. Sort of like what Rainbow made once. Pinkie had lied through her teeth, telling her it was amazing, but in reality it was just...average. Certainly nothing like the gorgeous confectioneries Sugarcube Corner made.

...Okay, maybe that was a little biased. But she knew good sweet treats when she tasted them, however much Twilight tried to insist she didn't taste most of the food she ate.

Still, she was hungry, and she had a ton of other bakeries to hit up in town, so she gobbled down the slices and began heading off towards the next stop.

---

By the time she checked into a hotel around sunset, Pinkie was sure she had made lots of friends. At the very least, nearly everyone she met was friendly enough to ask for her name and give her a smile.

But she knew friendship. And simply asking for someone's name and giving them a smile didn't mean you were their friend. She would have to get to know the people she met on a deeper level if she wanted to really become their friend.

Sitting on her bed, she reached into her mane and began taking out to-go box after to-go box. Really, when she wasn't befriending people, she was trying all sorts of delicious food and paying up accordingly, pushing the limits of just how much money her mane stored. To no surprise, it was a lot. A lot that would probably convert to bits when she stepped through the portal.

At some point in her unloading, she pulled out the booklet she had been handed by the agent who had showed her around. She had been so busy touring Toronto that she never took the time to stop and read it.

Well...there was no time like the present. After all, tomorrow was her first day at the Academy.

Opening a to-go box and taking out a cookie, she flipped to the first page.

Welcome to the Odd Squad Academy -- "E Weirdipus Bizarreum, Strangeus Non Normalur"

What is Odd Squad?

Odd Squad is an organization run by kids. We investigate anything strange, weird, and especially odd. Our job is to put it right again.

(It's a lot more complicated than that, but chances are your Professor Os have probably already told you.)

A frown formed on Pinkie's face as she read through the motto at the top again. She knew for a fact it wasn't Ponish...maybe pony Latin? Some kind of Latin. Though translating it was out of her realm of knowledge. She recognized bits and pieces like "weird" and "bizarre", "strange and "normal", but outside of that it just looked like gibberish. She made a mental note to ask Twilight for a few language books sometime.

Flipping through the rest of the pages showed a list of rules for the school, as well as a map of where each building and each classroom was and a list of staff as well as their odd-looking numbers (which were the result of adding up letters in names). Pinkie absorbed every bit of information, knowing it would take her several steps closer to finding out whether Odd Squad was a friend or a foe.

One glance out the window when she was three-fourths of the way done showed that the moon had risen already. Another glance at the clock on her wall showed it was 10PM.

Which turned into 10:30 by the time she went about eating dessert, putting her food away, bathing, brushing her teeth, and climbing into bed. Lucky that her hotel room came with a free mini-fridge. The perks of free money.

Laying in bed and staring at the ceiling, she felt her heart race with nervousness and excitement. Nervouscitedness, as it were. Tomorrow was her first day of school at the Odd Squad Academy. It was pure deja vu from when she had first attended school in Ponyville as a filly. How excited she was to meet her new classmates and make new friends, even if a lot of them turned out to be friendship rejectors who got their kicks from mocking and teasing her.

She only hoped she would have a better experience at the Academy, with more human students.

Eventually, fatigue overtook her. Her dreams became filled with all of the fun times she would have at the Academy -- throwing parties, making new friends, and of course, spreading smiles to everyone she came across.

Comments

[Alxsofthenight]

Restaurants to be a surprise to see my childhood try to be imagined into my second favorite series my little pony and yes I'm going to keep a close eye on this.

Ps you need to bring the scientist into the story she fits perfectly as twilight-ish.