Twilight Sparkle was assigned to study the magic of friendship, and she's been doing an excellent job of in-depth qualitative study with a small group. But proper research into social sciences demands some quantitative analysis, too, and to get the numbers she needs, Twilight is following her royal mentor's instructions: heading out into unfamiliar territory in Ponyville to make more friends.
What will happen when one of the most socially awkward mares in all of Equestria starts deliberately approaching ponies she's completely ignored for months, despite living alongside them? Why does Spike have to do it too, and can a baby dragon's instincts mesh with equine nature? And why doesn't anypony seem to know who painted all of those murals they keep spotting?
Not a literal crossover, but expect lots of references, shout-outs, expies from non-Pony media, and mythology gags.
That is a perfect explanation for how Spike keeps everything organized.
She never says her middle name is To, though. We don't talk about why.
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Not after what happened to the wallabies, no.
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Yes, I think the biggest clue was in the pilot: even Pinkie Pie can find where things are located in the library using a logical search method. Really, it's almost always Spike who locates a book that Twi is looking for.
I like how the narration seems to shift in tone to match whichever pony it's currently focusing on. It creates an interesting effect where I can't quite tell if we're hearing each character's actual train of thought, or if the story itself is adopting their individual ways of seeing things.
I wonder if Twilight is going to find out strange little secrets about each of the ponies she gets to know better. I had a feeling it was leading up to revealing that Caramel was somehow both of those ponies, but I'm not 100% certain which way the spell is going. He's physically female and the spell makes him look male most of the time? And I'm curious if we're going to find out who else is visiting Twilight for mysterious purposes.
By the way, this is the first story for which I'm bothering to use the new thumbs up/down voting system. It deserves more attention than it's getting, even though it feels like it's really only just begun.
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Thank you for the insightful, detailed comment! It is replies like this that encourage me to keep writing. Chapter 2: We Want a Rock is in the works, though it might be a week or so before it is ready for prereaders. It's a Spike-centric chapter.
Yes, my intention was to establish Caramel as a colt-identified pony who was born female. Thanks for the rating!
Hm, wonder what the typo was?
Periphery there pointed me to this. I'm glad E did. This is quite good.
Have my thumb and a track. They are well-deserved.