The multiverse is vast. More so than even the gods of creation in our universe can comprehend. Strange and wondrous things happen in places both tiny and big.
You may ask, then, "Then what happens there?" The answer is simple. Everything happens. Now and forever... Let me show you.
A collection of tiny stories/scenes that I come up with and can't fit into any of my other stories. Hope you enjoy!
There were many terrifying things in Equestria. There were monsters and gods, horror stories given life, and even sentient globs of unidentifiable material. Of all the monsters that were in Equestria, Twilight and her friends had already dealt with the biggest of them all. Nightmare Moon had been purged of evil, leaving behind only a small filly. The god of chaos and disharmony had been borderline domesticated by the most timid pegasus ever to have lived. To think that one who could turn the laws of the world around with a snap of his claws had been reformed using only the promise of a friendship severed if he refused to think of anypony other than himself. The changelings had been cast off to the other side of the horizon by overeating. Even they couldn't consume a city-wide shield's worth of love.
But even then, Twilight could not think of any horror; any monster or terrifying event she had experienced that came even close to what she was experiencing right now. She had gone through so much and now, sitting here in front of her friends, she found herself at a loss for words. She opened her mouth again and again in an attempt to coax any words out. Any at all. Nothing happened.
She looked around her, eyes pausing briefly at each of her friends.What would they think? Would they run away? Would they laugh? She didn't know. She was scared to find out.
"So, Twi, what was it you called us here to tell us?" Applejack asked, motioning at the library they were in. "Reckon it's something mite big for you to look like Apple Bloom with her hoof in the cookie jar."
She sighed. There was no way out of it. She'd have to tell them. She'd have to tell them about what attacked her last month, why she had barely even sent them letters and spent most of her time in Canterlot. They deserved to know.
Drawing in a deep breath, she opened her mouth and started to speak. "L-Last week... I was attacked." She raised a hoof to her neck which still had a bandage around it. "I was attacked and I was bitten, but I survived. I managed to get away with a panicked teleport which landed me in Luna's bedroom. It... That isn't even the worst part. I... I'm a." She stopped and shook her head. "It would be easier to show you."
Closing her eyes and drawing in a deep breath, she called forth a part of herself that she had only recently stopped fearing... Or rather, something she still feared but not so much as she used to.
The canines in her upper jaw started to grow, getting longer and sharper until they were nearly an inch long each. She opened her eyes and where they had previously been a deep purple, they were now a blood red with her irises like Spike's.
"I.. I'm a vampire," she said, boring her head in shame and fear.
There was no reaction from her friends. At least none that she could hear. Looking up she found all five of them staring at her with wide eyes, though Fluttershy looked more scared than surprised. It was to be expected given her timid nature.
"I was bitten a month ago when I was on my way to Zecora. I got away and Luna found me in her bedroom... she helped me. Without her I would've succumbed to this, this beast inside of me."
"So... You're in contol, then?" Rarity asked hesitantly, her eyes never leaving the fangs. "As in, you are Twilight Sparkle, and not some monster?"
A look of her washed over Twilight's face. Monster. It was what she'd been calling herself the first two weeks. It was what she'd been convinced that she had become. "Yes.. I'm Twilight Sparkle. I'm not a bloodthirsty pony out for other pony's blood. And I promise you, on my life, that I will never do anything to hurt you. Never."
Rarity nodded, so did the others. The promise, only words as it was, was actually enough to bring out a less frightened look from Fluttershy. She was still visibly shaken and had no idea what to do, but she was far more at ease now.
"I bet you all have a ton of questions so... Fire away," Twilight said, waving a hoof as if to say 'go on'.
Pinkie raised her hoof. "I have one!"
"Yes, Pinkie?"
The earth pony looked around at the assembled ponies, their stares mirroring each others'. All seemed equally confused. Could it possibly be that Pinkie Pie had a serious question for once?
"So, Twilight, now that you're a vampire... Do you spark-"
She never got to say anything more before a purple blur shot across the floor, impacted with Pinkie and forced her down on the ground. Twilight stood above her, hoof in her mouth, and glared down at her.
"I swear to Faust above, Pinkie, finish that question and I will deliberate forget your birthday next year!"
Pinkie's eyes widened to the point where it should have been impossible. Death threats, threats of violence; they wouldn't have worked on the party pony, not to mention that Twilight would never make such a threat. But the risk of having one of her friends forget her birthday was... horrifying, to Pinkie. She mutely nodded and Twilight removed her hoof, stepping back to sit down.
"What?" She asked, having caught Rainbow's open-mouthed stare. "Sorry. My... change, have caused me to become a little more aggressive.
"T-That's not it," Rainbow croaked, looking at the spot where Twilight had been sitting before and where she was now, beside Pinkie. "How the hay did you move that fast?! I barely even saw you! I'm Rainbow Dash, for buck's sake, and I could barely see you move!"
"Oh..." Twilight reached behind her head, scratching herself with a hoof. "Well, becoming a vampire kinda, sorta, made me much faster and quicker than any other pony in the world... I'm, uh, actually just a tiny bit slower than the princesses."
It had been eons since Equestria had first been created. Eons since the universe had been born at the whim of an entity of such magnitude that not even the gods of Equestria could fathom its power.
The name of this entity? Faust.
She had been lonely and had chosen to create Equestria, both for the occasional companionship when she longed for it, and just to create.
"What good is to be when there is nothing?" She had reasoned as she drifted across the vastness that was the Void before creation.
She'd lost count of how long she'd been watching Equestria and the ponies she had created. It had been a long time; several thousand years if one used the ponies' way of measuring time. Over these years she had grown fond of her creations. So fond, in fact, that she chose to take on the form of them. While she had only been a creature of consciousness and cosmic powers before, she know had the body of a white alicorn with a rust-red mane and tail. Why she'd taken the form of the other two alicorns she had put onto the world to rule she didn't know.
She watched over Equestria all the time and listened to the wishes and pleas of ponies. Every once in a while she would grant a wish. Other times she would punish a pony whom she felt deserved it. And quite often, she just had her fun with the world.
One such day was as any other. A tiny wisp of her consciousness floated around in a park with only a few ponies present. Such two were a mint-green unicorn and a beige earth pony.
She watched them with interest, invisible to their eyes, and simply observed. They were having a picnic, just two lovers sharing a day together.
It was then that everything seemed to go wrong for the two mares. The beige one started spluttering and coughing after having taken a bite of her sandwich. The mint-green one spat out the lemonade they had brought and did her best to scrape the horrible taste off of her tongue.
"Ugh... The lemonade tastes like someone put a ton of salt in rather than sugar!" The green one exclaimed.
"And this this sandwich is so crunchy I would expect someone to have put sand in it!" She lifted one of the two pieces of bead and nodded. "Someone put salt in it."
Faust blinked, or blinked as much as a wisp of her consciousness could, and moved closer still to observe. She'd pranked more than a few ponies, but this wasn't one of the times. This could be interesting.
"Where'd you get that lemonade?" The beige one asked.
"I bought it from Pinkie. She said she had some spare from yesterday night... Where'd you get your sandwiches?"
"...Pinkie. I didn't have any bread left this morning, so I went to her and The Cake's bakery to buy some more. She just gave me these sandwiches, saying she did the entire thing just to make me smile." She looked at the other mare, her expression a perfect example of just how fun she thought the current situation. "She pranked us." She simply stated.
The mint one nodded gravely. "She did."
A few moments passed in silence before the unicorn smiled and looked up at the sky. "Well, look at the bright side of things! At least it can't get any worse."
Bingo! Faust thought, her wisp grinning as widely as a wisp could. Turning her will to the skies above, she gathered the clouds tighter above the small town they were in and called down the rain, quickly soaking the two mares.
"You just had to go and say that... didn't you?"
"Okay..." the green one muttered. "Maybe I shouldn't have said that, but you have to agree with me here, now it can't get any worse."
Faust shook her head and once again directed her will towards the skies. A low rumble was the only warning before a bright light split the sky above them, followed immediately by a loud explosion.
"Okay, but now-"
"No!" The beige one exclaimed. "Lyra Heartstrings, you just shut up now and stop challenging the universe!"
Faust had to agree with her there. It was never a good idea to challenge the universe. It never went well and was never a fun experience. Well... unless you are the universe.
Celestia stood watching the large tear in the sky with bated breath. She'd never seen anything like it and couldn't help but feel the icy tendrils of fear creep forth and grab at her.
What scared her wasn't actually the tear, or rift, itself, but what lay beyond. As if looking through a pair of strange glasses, she could see a titanic sphere of blue, green, brown and white. She didn't even have to ask the man beside her what it was. He'd already told her, and even then she knew well enough what it was.
Earth.
Home for the bipedals that called themselves Humans. They had torn a rift in space and sent a single man through. That one man was the one standing beside her on her balcony.
She looked down at him, his short-cropped, brown mane was the only fur on his entire body. That is, if his clothes didn't conceal what other there might be. It didn't manner, though. What mattered to her was that this alien species had sought out the ponies with promises of peace and trade. But even those promises did nothing to assuage her fear. She'd sensed enough from this creature's mind that they were a violent kind, that they fought and killed. She could not put her ponies in that kind of danger.
"Mr. Smith-"
"Please, just John, Your Majesty."
"Very well, John, I have heard your promises of your kind wanting nothing but peace and trade, yet I sense from you mind that you are a violent species, much like the manticores and timberwolves of our world. Why is that?"
The human, John Smith, looked up at Celestia and cocked an eyebrow. "We humans have a saying that we're the only species on our planet intelligent enough, to be stupid enough to destroy ourselves. We've had countless wars amongst ourselves, killed billions of our own kind for petty reasons such as oil or territory. Luckily, those days are behind us. It may also be that we are hunters by nature. It's how we've always survived."
Celestia nodded, her professional mask not broken by the tendrils of fear that continued to sneak up on her. She wouldn't let them, couldn't let them get the better of her. She mustn't show that she was afraid of this creature.
"I am sorry, Mr. Smith, but I cannot allow my ponies to come in such danger. You promise peace, but your past is something I cannot look past. I am afraid that relations between our peoples is impossible."
John Smith hung his head and sighed. He'd somehow expected it to go like this. "Are you sure, Princess Celestia? We could help revolutionize your country, your world. We could teach your how to gather water in places you'd never be able to, even with magic. We could teach you how to travel faster than any pegasus can fly. And yes, even faster than your Element of Loyalty, was it? We have ways of travelling faster than the speed of sound almost effortlessly." He smiled, a small spark of hope igniting in his chest. "There are so many things we could teach you, and that you could teach us."
"I suppose..." She shook her head and mumbled, almost inaudibly, that she could always blitz their planet with the sun.
"I would advise against that," John said darkly.
Celestia looked startled. "What do you mean?"
"Princess Celestia, let me tell you something about us humans. First of all, we don't only live on Earth, we live in peace with other species on other planets as well, so if you were to destroy our home planet know that our species would rally up and strike back. We are peaceful now and haven't had reason to pick up arms, for any reasons, in the past four hundred years. But should we be attacked, then do not think we still stand back and just watch."
Celestia's eyebrows creased in a frown, but she said nothing.
"Our existence is owed entirely to persistence, endurance, and determination. We drink one of the most potent solvents on our planet, breath a naturally corrosive gas. Our bites are so infectious that we can kill each other just by biting through their skin. Back when we were still primitive, our preferred method of hunting was persistence hunting. We chased our prey and didn't stop until its body gave up and died. We can survive for extended periods of time without nutrition since our bodies will begin to eat itself to keep us alive."
"Even if we were to be attacked, we can take extreme amounts of damage, lose half of our blood and still live. Not even losing a limb is enough to kill us. We will keep on fighting, keep on surviving. We have only one natural predator on our planet, dogs, and we domesticated them and made them our faithful companions. Of all the creatures on our planet, even the one that was our superior ended up becoming a pet and companion for us. Inside our bodies are microscopical bacteria that will kill even us if they were in any other place but where they are. To any other species they'd be just as fatal."
"As mentioned before, we humans are persistent. Our physical strength and speed aren't anything spectacular, but we don't get tired. Our bodies will supply us with enough energy to keep on fighting for over a day without slowing down. Not even pain will stop us there."
"But that is not the worst, Princess Celestia. The worst is that what I just explained is just how we normally are, when we are still bound by our limits. When we are pushed far enough, when we are confronted with death, we break our limits. Our strength is multiplied tenfold, our endurance never-ending. We won't feel pain, we won't slow down, and we won't stop fighting. This is what we call Hysterical Strength, and it is why we can stand up and fight against a bear with nothing but our fists."
"Princess Celestia. We humans are a truly terrifying species should we be provoked. We are peaceful now and do not seek to fight against anyone, but do not think of docile."
Celestia's legendary mask had been shattered, the proverbial pieces littering the ground around her hooves. She couldn't believe what she had just heard. That a creature so small had so much power in them. If she hadn't been able to sense his mind and known what he said to be truth then she wouldn't have believed him... but she knew, without a doubt, that what he was saying was nothing but the truth.
She gulped and nodded. "My apologies, John Smith, I let my fear get the better of me. I swear on my immortal life that I will not strike against your kind without due reason."
"I appreciate that," he replied and smiled up at her. "As do I promise that we will not attack you unless provoked."
Even she could not keep back the sigh of relief that escaped her lips. From what this John Smith had said, their kind was not one she wanted to get on the bad side of. "Thank you. Regardless, I feel that I must decline your offer. I don't think the ponies of this world are ready for cooperation with beings from another world."
John smiled, though it was easy to see the disappointment in his eyes. "Very well. I will return to my home and close the rift. You will see no more of our kind, at least for now." He nodded to her and raised his left arm, right hand hovering over the watch attached to it. "Goodbye, Princess Celestia, it was nice meeting you. And good luck, I wish you and your sister luck with leading your ponies." He chuckled. "Too bad she's been asleep this whole time." His smile widened ever so slightly, and then he pressed a button on the watch. His body seemed to divide itself into billions of tiny sparks which then shot towards the rift at speeds unimaginable.
Not two minutes passed before the rift was closed, not a trace of it left.
Luna watched with a smile on her face as ponies bowed or gave respectful nods as she walked past them on her way through the Canterlot market square, enjoying the rustle and bustle, the bartering, the hollering shouts of ponies trying to sell their goods and make it clear just how much better their products were than that other guy twenty metres away.
While she wouldn't fully admit to it, she still found herself a little perturbed by the lack of bowing. Sure, there were some ponies that still did it - for which she was thankful - but it was difficult to just throw away the old ways and embrace how things were now, a thousand years after her banishment. She did her best to not let it grate her, but every now and then she found herself needing a bit of time without any pony around her just to make sure that she wouldn't unintentionally scare some mare, stallion or filly by asking them why they weren't bowing for "Your Princess of the Night". She didn't always make it to a secluded area, however.
So while she was trying her best to embrace the world of 'today' and not the one of yesterday, or rather, the day of millennia past, she did sometimes find herself having a minor relapse.
She returned a nod to a stallion working a market stall filled with mangos, papaya, and an assortment of other exotic fruit, and then stumped over something.
She just barely managed to catch herself and not fall over like a ragdoll, and then looked down to find a small cream coloured filly pegasus.
"My apologies, Little One, I did not see where I was going," Luna said, giving her the warmest smile she could. She still couldn't do it as well as Celestia, but then again that's what lessons are for.
The filly shook her head and blinked, looking up at her with an innocent yet apologetic look on her face. "No... I'm sorry, I just wanted to ask you a question... I-If that's alright?"
It was a surprise, to be sure, that somepony came up to her for the sole purpose of asking her a question, and a filly no less. Usually all she got was the grovelling of greedy nobles. With the smile on her lips widening ever so slightly, she waved a hoof, indicating that the filly could ask. "Speak forth, Child."
The filly blushed madly at this, apparently not having expected to be allowed to ask a question of Princess Luna so easily. "Well... My big brother told me something and I wanted to make sure it was true, so..." she paused, pawing awkwardly at the ground.
"Do not hesitate, you can ask me anything."
"Alright... He... My big brother said that..." her blush somehow deeped and she frantically blurted out the question in her hurry to get it over with. "Isittruethatyouaremadeoutofcheese?!"
