The Earth Ponies

by RomanCandle

Chapter 21 - For Real This Time

Half Note stood in a forest. Around her, birds chirped, leaves rustled, and other forest creatures made their forest creature noises.

A pretty little bird fluttered down in front of her, and began to peck at the grass. She smiled and said hello, but the bird ignored her.

She frowned, and another, larger bird fluttered down. It began to fluff and caw at the smaller one, beating it about the head with it's wings. The smaller bird squacked and cowered and dodged, but didn't fully fly away.

Half Note exclaimed her displeasure, and tried to separate the two birds, but they didn't notice her hooves as they came between them, and continued to squabble.

Frowning, she walked away, and found a squirrel trying to pry open a nut. She offered to crush it with her hooves. But the squirrel didn't seem to notice.

Frustrated, she tried to grab the nut, but her hoof went through it. She tried again, with the same result.

She ran through the forest, passing by all kinds of creatures. None of them so much as looked at her, or moved out of her way.

She ran and ran and ran, but the forest never seemed to end. She stopped and turned around, but saw no hoofprints; no indication of where she had come from or where she was going. There was no sign that she had been here, and no sign that she was here.

As far as the forest was concerned, she did not exist.

---

Half Note awoke to a rush of warm air and a cold sweat. She was still on the train, which was still chugging along. She pulled herself out of the pile that was Firelock and Tornado Bolt and looked at the windows - all of them were closed. Blinking, she looked out the window and saw all the colors of the rainbow sparkling through the sky and fading off into the distance.

Something moved behind her, and she turned to find a pair of green eyes and a grin the size of Canterlot.

"Would you look at that!" The stallion jumped, his goofy grin never leaving his face as he clambered over the seats and smushed his face against the window. "I can't remember the last time I saw something so magical!"

Half Note swore she could hear the glass squeak as he smiled. As her friends stirred, she rubbed her eyes and let her brain catch up with waking up - and the memories from the previous days pulled to the front of her mind. She looked to the side, and saw Sun Shower waking up slowly. She turned back to the stallion.

"...Cheese?"

He pulled his face off the glass and beamed at her "In the flesh! Thanks for helping me on the train earlier. I wouldn't have got to see that -" he gestured to the window, where the rainbow sparkles were still faintly visible. "- if I was still lying on the floor of the train station! Your name is Half Note, right?" She nodded. "You know your mark has quarter notes on it, right?"

She turned and looked at her rump before shaking her head. "Weren't you just...drained of all your magic or something?"

Cheese shrugged. "Well, I got better. Probably because of the rainbow thing." He pointed at his own behind, now adorned with what looked to be a sandwich accordion. She looked back up at Cheese, who patted his head and frowned. "I miss my hat, though."

Firelock was running her hooves through her mane, trying to straighten it out - Tornado had drooled and it was stuck at a weird angle. She stopped and turned to Cheese. "So...you have your magic back?" Cheese nodded emphatically. "Can you tell us what it was like without it?"

The stallion frowned and looked away. "I...don't really want to. It was like being tired, but you can never get enough sleep. I didn't want to do anything. Even breathing felt like too much work." He shuffled uncomfortably. "It's not something I want to think about that much."

Firelock sighed. "That's fair enough. What's important is that you're better." She looked out the window - the sky only faintly sparkled, the rainbow having long since faded, but snow had begun to fall, and looking ahead you could see the beginning of the Northern Tundra. "How close are we to the Empire, do you think?"

Tornado Bolt pushed the Unicorn's head out of the way and peered. "Can't be more than an hour, I think - those clouds aren't Pegasus made...but I can't see the Aurora yet, so I dunno."

Firelock rubbed her head and glared at the Pegasus. "Thanks, very helpful." Tornado turned and grinned. Sun Shower got up on shaky legs and looked at Cheese, and sighed with relief.

"Oh thank goodness, it's over. Oh, goodness." She swayed and brought a hoof to her head. "I think...I think I should stay laying down. Did...did Tirek get the train?"

Tornado Bolt snorted. "No, you just fainted." Firelock dug an elbow into her gut. "Ow! Well, you did."

The Unicorn rolled her eyes. "You're probably still experiencing shock. Laying down is probably a good idea. I think I'll go make sure the conductor knows what happened, and see how close we are to the Empire. I figure the Ponies who left earlier are going to want to get back, so the station will probably be pretty busy when we get there. We'll probably be the only ones getting off." She tried to smooth her mane out once again before frowning and opening up the door. A gust of cold air rushed in behind her, and everypony shivered until she closed the door behind her.

Cheese Sandwhich rubbed his chin with a serious look on his face. "This definitely merits a party, but should I throw it at the Empire, or wait till we get back to Equestria proper? The Empire is closer, but Tirek didn't make it all the way up there. Or, I could throw it right now on the train - but no, then only the Ponies on the train would get to party, and that's not fair. A lot of the Ponies will be at the Empire, but most of them will want to go home before they want to celebrate..." he continued muttering under his breath. Half Note looked at Tornado and Sun Shower - the former relaxed but unkempt, mane tousled from sleeping in a pile, while the latter was still visibly shaken, taking deep breaths with her eyes closed. The Earth Pony sighed and closed her eyes, listening to her own heartbeat.

A few minutes passed before Firelock returned, face flushed.

"Ah, uh, the conductor was very happy to hear that the rainbow fixed everypony's magic. He ah, he said that we should be at the Empire in about 45 minutes, and we can take more Ponies on to take them back to their homes." She rubbed the back of her neck. "We can, uh, we can get off there, though it'll probably be crowded."

Tornado Bolt raised an eyebrow. "You all right? You seem kind of flustered. You upset that I was right about how far we were?"

Firelock blushed. "No, um...The conductor was so relieved, he um...he kissed me when I told him what happened."

Tornado blinked, then burst out laughing. "Darn it, Firelock! You're really taking that Gift of Virility seriously, aren't you?"

"Sh-Shut up!"

Author's Note:

NOBODY SAW ANYTHING

On a completely unrelated note, did you know the Edit and Publish buttons are right next to each other? Yeah, you could totally make a big mistake and publish a chapter while you were still working on it. Wouldn't that be awkward.

It's a good thing there's an unpublish chapter button too. Just in case. Not like I'd ever make a mistake like that. Nope.

Comments

[Lord Of Dorkness]

...

O~K?

[AuDragon]

Er, uh, yeah. That's a full chapter. Totally.

[Thought Prism]

Funny in both the normal and meta aspects. Well done.

[DualKitsune]

XD Of course you wouldn't! Now, more please!

[Aquarian_Sage]

Yes, finally! A fic that gives earth ponies the love they deserve. Thank you for writing about my favorite race!

[AyanamiRei]

So many awesome chapters....so little time! <3 <3

[Emperor]

Well, now that the whole Tirek problem is solved, who wants to bet they'll run into somepony in the Crystal Empire who'll recognise them, even in their adult forms? 99.9% odds right there.