What happens when you suddenly have to help a pony that no one can know about?
To our knowledge, Earth is a pretty ordinary planet. Despite the craziness that goes on in our world, gravity keeps us on the ground, air lets us breathe, and food and water keep us going. On this ordinary planet, on an ordinary night in an ordinary house lives an ordinary person. On that night, that person makes a hypothetical choice before bed. That ordinary person just so happens to be you; and that choice might not be as hypothetical as you might think.
(Just your typical second person story starring a person named Anonymous. Rated T for language and jokes about dangly bits. Thanks to my friend for the cover art.)
Life can be pretty monotonous. Shifts at work get completed, days end and new ones begin, and events from the previous day repeat themselves without any acknowledgement of the fact that for the past few years, those events are the only things that have been happening. This is what your life is like. However, that’s not really a bad thing.
You know what to expect, which is always nice. Fun things still happen, and life has yet to lose its luster for you like it has for other members of the population. But enough reflection on your self imposed life of monotony, there are many unexplored pages of the internet that have yet to be taken in by your tired eyes!
Yes, though your day was average, you can’t seem to keep your eyes open while you sit at your computer and partake in your nightly ritual of internet browsing. The current site that you are looking at is one that some people wouldn’t normally go near for a long list of reasons; even less people that regularly visit this website would visit the section of it that you do for even more reasons.
The website in question? A group of image boards, each one dedicated to a certain topic. The one that you are currently on is dedicated to a cartoon about colorful talking horses learning about friendship. Yup, that show. My Little Pony. As emasculating as it felt at first, the show is a nice way to pass the time, as is participating in the faggotry of this board. Though your brain begs you to curl up in your bed right now, you want to at least check out a little bit of what’s going on here before you do.
Yawning, you begin lazily scrolling through the vast array of threads. There isn’t much new content tonight. All there is is the usual shitposting, complaints that the show is bad now, and threads that have been posted at least fifty times before. One however, sticks out to you.
It has no style.
It has no grace...
Actually, it looks kinda shitty now that you think about it.
You decide to investigate it anyway. Torturing yourself by staying awake longer than you really want to is one of the defining aspects of your character. After clicking on the thread, you begin to read what the opening post says. You go on to read what is printed on the screen once the page has loaded in.
"You have 2 choices.
Option one: You are sent to equestria. You are the only one of your kind and are easily accepted. You become friends with all the ponies you ever wanted and live an easy life. The catch is sex does not exist. You will still have your junk but they won't have anything. You can't convince them to or do anything sexual to them. You will be sent back to earth. You will only ever be friends with ponies
Option 2: Your favorite pony is sent to you on earth. Scared and tired. She will be confused and irrational for a while but in time she will grow on you. No one but you can know that she exists in this world. If even one other person finds out, she will be taken away and it will be the last you ever see of her and you will never know what happened to her. Sex exists and she will fall for you in a short time and soon thereafter will fall in love with you. She won't know that the reason she can't see her friends anymore is because you made a choice. You can choose to tell her one day, but that is your decision.
What is your choice?"
Neither of these seem to be too appealing. You start to ponder the two choices given by the anonymous person. They never said you could choose not to choose, but what if you were forced to decide between those two options with no way out?
Well, you’ve built up quite a nice life here, and if you were to have to start over again in a new world, that’d be quite the pain in the ass. Sure, Equestria is a land of opportunity, but you already have friends, family, and LODS OF EMONE from your job. Okay, maybe not loads, but you’re living nicely, and you like it.
So, you’d either get torn away from everything you’ve worked for, and only have your hand as a way of release for the rest of your life, or you’ll have a new roommate that couldn’t buy their own food. They’d also be an alien that would have some pretty awkward feelings towards you later on, too. Well, if you wanted to get rid of them, you could just show them to someone. Where would they disappear to, though? The post didn’t specify. It said “Never to be seen again”. Did it mean seen by you? Or any living thing ever?
Thinking a little more on it, this whole situation boils down to "Would you sacrifice your happiness, or someone else's?"
You are putting way too much thought into something so trivial, and at such a late time. Web browsing is supposed to rot your brain away, not make you think this hard! Really, you should just turn this dumb machine off and get some sleep for once.
...What’s the fun in that, though?
Taking the plunge, you type up a reply.
“Option two. All y’all bitches that chose option one are fucking betas that wouldn’t even need to use your cocks even if you were allowed to.”
You look over your masterpiece of a shitpost. Even at this level of sleep deprivation you can tell that the abomination you typed out sounded funnier in your head. Well, it's too late to worry about your attempt at humor, since you apparently already pressed the button to send your reply.
Okay, that's it for the night. You can't keep your eyes open much longer.
You turn off your monitor, walk to your bed, and flop down on it for the night. With the satisfaction of knowing that you’ll be getting a bit more sleep than usual, you quickly drift off into darkness. This already feels like it's going to be a nice rest.
Unfortunately for you, your sleep is cut short by the sudden sound of what sounds like shattering glass from the next room over. Your eyes shoot open, sleep still clouding your mind. As the dark clouds of sleep begin to clear, realization strikes. You live alone, there’s no one else in the house that could make that noise.
Oh shit.
Shit, shit, shit.
You knew this day would come. You knew and yet you still aren’t prepared. Quickly, you slide out of bed, avoiding roughly stomping onto the floor like you usually do. First thing’s first, a decent weapon. You dig through your nightstand drawer until you find what you’re looking for. A revolver, one that your grandfather once owned before passing it on to you. Much like dear old gramps, the firearm is old, worn out, and weak. Luckily, also much like gramps, the thing could still mortally injure someone if used properly.
Now if only you could find the ammo for the damn thing. Looking at your open bedroom door, your heart starts being even faster as you realize there isn’t much time. You’ll just have to hope they’ll run away when they see you have a gun. You grab a flashlight and quietly sneak your way out, attempting to remain as stealthy as possible. The source of the noise came from but a single room away, the living room. Despite the close proximity of your destination, the anticipation of what may happen makes the short trip feel much longer than it really is. You slowly peer around the entrance to the dark room, ready to either shoot, run, or a mixture of the two depending on what you see.
The sight of the room distracts you from trying to find the possible intruder. Or rather, the sight of the room’s wall. Once, a large glass window resided in the center of the western wall. Now, even in the dark you can see there is only a square hole and some menacing looking pieces of sharp glass protruding from the sides. Below it, at the foot of the window surrounded by even more dangerously sharp shards sits a square object. You quickly shine your light on it and see that it is a crate.
Not just some small delivery box you'd get from amazon. A goddamned wooden shipping crate. No wonder your window is in the state it's in. The whole situation is enough to make you not notice that you have been slowly creeping into the room. It isn't until you trip over your own feet that you realize that you've made your way towards the object that has destroyed your window and let the piercing cold air in.
You swiftly fall forward, instinctively using your arms to cushion your fall. Your fall right into the FUCKING GLASS SHARDS.
Dear lord, your arms feel like they are on fucking fire! At least they’ve taken the brunt of the damage, not your torso. Careful as to not agitate your now injuries, you climb to your feet, gun in hand. At least that thing didn't go off when it hit the ground. There's nothing better than adding a gunshot wound to gashes on your wrists. A cold breeze blows through the now broken window, reminding you what a pain it’s going to be to deal with the temperature until it's fixed. Speaking of entry points, you have to get your priorities in order and check the rest of the house for signs of an intruder.
Cursing yourself for your stupidity, you check your flank. Whoever did this could have killed you at least five times while you were making a snow angel in the remains of your broken window.
For the next twenty or so minutes, you scout out your property, checking every place that someone could hide. No matter where you check, you see don’t see anything suspicious. Returning to the site of the supposed break in, you stare again at the crate. Well, before you call the cops, you’d might as well check what’s inside.
Maybe someone just wanted to hide a body and pin it on you. In which case, you probably shouldn’t be handling the evidence. You really should be wearing gloves if you’re gonna do something like this. You’ve just been thinking about how satisfied you are with your life, no need to toss that away just because your curiosity got the best of you. It doesn't take much for you throw that train of thought out of your newly broken window though, as you hear something, something that sounds like movement.
Not movement from within your house though; the movement comes from within the crate in front of you.
What little caution you have left is thrown to the wind as you fling open the lid of the crate, which was apparently never sealed. The sight inside is enough to make you throw the lid back down.
Now THAT is something you weren’t expecting. No, there wasn’t a cut up mess of body parts in it, thank god. The contents aren’t even human; and surprisingly, not mentally scarring. Slowly opening the lid once more, you take in the sight of what lies within. Using your flashlight, you can easily make out its appearance.
Four legs. Pale yellow fur. Butterflies on the ass. A tail made of light pink hair, and a long mane to match. It’s a… pony. A pony that you know from a certain TV show. You let the reality of the situation sink in. No, you aren’t dreaming. The glass digging into your arms is still raising enough hell in your pain receptors to let you know that. You are currently face to face with Fluttershy.
She looks just like she does in the cartoon. Exactly like the cartoon. Outline, hardly any texture, everything that breaks the laws of reality. You start looking around in the cold night air, hoping that the universe isn’t starting to crumble apart. Well, you aren’t flying up towards your ceiling, and there’s no bright white light emerging from cracks in the fabric of reality, so you suppose that everything is holding together for right now.
Steeling yourself, you look back over to examine the pegasus once more. Her eyes are closed. Is she dead? It’s hard to hear if she’s breathing or not. Well, only one way to find out. Slowly you extend your hand, somewhat nervous about actually touching the pony. You immediately feel warmth when your hand finally makes contact with her side. Before long you also feel the sensation of her chest rising and falling with her breathing.
Good sign. You won’t have to bury any bodies tomorrow, then. Another cold breeze reminds you that you are completely exposed to the outside weather. Seriously, spring is almost here, why does it still look and feel like winter? Whatever, you’ve got a box to lug back to your room. Sure, you may not exactly be pleased with the whole turn of events, but you aren’t going to just leave a living thing out to be exposed to the elements.
Okay, so you don’t take in every homeless person you pass on the street, but that’s different. They aren't cute colorful talking animals. Crouching down, you slide your hands under the crate, careful to not touch any glass that may lie beneath it. It isn’t all that difficult to lift it up, and before too long, you arrive back in your room. Despite checking the house, and obvious signs hinting that this wasn’t any ordinary break in, you can’t help but feel nervous.
Questions run through your mind, the most obvious being “how?”, and “why?”. You watch a TV show, and somehow one of the main characters appears in the same place as you. This was either one hell of a coincidence, or you entered and won the horsefucker lottery without even wanting to. You yawn. This thing is going to be something to investigate in the morning. In the meantime, you notice the unconscious equine next to you begin to quiver. Without thinking, you extend your arm towards the pegasus and start rubbing her back.
Within seconds, the shaking subsides. You find yourself letting out a small chuckle at the sight. For what feels like the first time today, you let out a breath and speak.
You know how there’s always that one guy who takes a joke too far? Well, you never knew that REALITY of all things is that guy. Sure, you've wondered what it would be like to meet fictional characters in real life before, but you weren't chomping at the bit hoping for one to slam into your life (and window) out of nowhere. You'd need just a little preparation for something like that.
Sitting on the edge of your bed, you sigh and rest your head in your hands. The past few minutes were enough to wake you back up at first, though now that the adrenaline has worn off, you are not so awake anymore. Your nightstand clock shows the time to be 2:54 AM. You went to sleep around midnight, so this means you’ve gotten maybe two and a half hours of sleep.
This kind of thing would be a dream come true for some people, but the situation you find yourself in right now isn’t so pleasant. First contact is gonna be a bitch, that’s for sure. From Fluttershy’s perspective, she’s going to wake up in an unfamiliar place with some strange monster looming over her. In addition to that, you get the pleasure of having to introduce yourself to the most shy and skittish pony that you know from the show.
Sighing again, you let your arms fall back down to your lap and look over to the crate resting at your feet. The mare inside remains curled up, chest gently expanding with each breath she takes. Despite the size of the crate, it's only so big. Enough so that the already small horse needs to curl up a bit to fit inside completely.
“That doesn’t look too comfortable. Maybe I should get you out of there…”
You kind of hope that the sound of your voice would be enough to spark some form of awareness in her, but just as you expected, Fluttershy remains knocked out.
...She's not going to get out of there herself, is she?
Maybe if you yelled, she'd wake up and find a more comfortable place to be unconscious. No, that would probably be just as rude as touching her while she sleeps. You'd really rather not touch her again, that one moment of placing your hand on her earlier would normally already be enough to get you sent to court for multiple things.
Now that you think of it, the only other comfortable spot in here is your own bed. So the question is this: what would be worse, her waking up in a wooden box in your house, or her waking up in your bed?
There is no winning here. You're going to feel bad no matter what you do, so you might as well just choose something and do it. You’d might as well just get her out of that crate while she’s still unaware. Wasting no more time mulling things over, you squat down and slide your hands under the small equine and cradle her in your arms.
Please, for the love of god don't let her wake up now. You won't ever be able to live this shit down.
Lifting her is not all that hard, she probably weighs about as much as a small to medium sized dog. Luckily for you, she doesn’t wake up as you gently place her on your unmade bed and drape the covers over her up to just under her head. With that out of the way, you resume pondering your current predicament. What kind of preparations should you make for the first encounter? Food might be a good start. You’re sure you have something decently vegetarian around here somewhere.
Stepping out of the door and back into the rest of the house, you make your way to the kitchen. Compared to the heat of your bedroom, the cold air of the rest of the house chills you to the bone. You’ll have to be fast in raiding your fridge, lest you become a human ice sculpture. There really isn’t much in here in terms of fruits or vegetables, but that shouldn’t be hard to work around. After a few minutes of scouting around, you settle on just getting some peanut butter, some bread, and a banana to make a sandwich.
You finish the meal making process by filling a glass with water and bringing it all back to your bedroom. Finding some open space on your computer desk, you set down the plate and glass and turn to Fluttershy. What else should you do? You can’t really think of anything right now, and you still feel like you could fall asleep standing up. Obviously you can’t share a bed together this early in your relationship. Normally you’d sleep on the couch if your FUCKING WINDOW WASN’T BROKEN. Oh well, might as well just browse the web again.
Gotta do something, right?
Perhaps you’ll check back on that thread from earlier. Now that you think about it with a somewhat clearer mind, you realize just how big a coincidence this all is. Not only did you end up getting a surprise visit from a cartoon character, but it happened only hours after partaking in a discussion about this exact thing happening. You fall back onto your desk chair and wake your computer back up. Perhaps this is just the start on an equine invasion and there are others in the world having their houses damaged by cartoon horses. Speaking of, you’ll have to check with your insurance to see if alien invasions are covered in your plan. Can you even sue otherworldly beings for property damage?
Eh, there’d be no use, even though you’re in modern times and you probably could. The government would just take the ponies away for "diplomatic reasons", and you wouldn't get a cent. Actually, you'd probably just get killed to tie up loose ends.
Hardly any time passes before you begin to dose off at your desk. The most you are able to do before drifting back off to sleep is open up your web browser and go to the website where you had found the thread before. An unknown amount of time passes before your trance is broken by the sound of murmurs and the rustling of covers from behind you. Groggily lifting your head up from your desk, you turn your seat around and notice the pile of sheets and blankets on your bed gently rustling.
This very well may be it, better make a good impression for humanity, Anon.
Fluttershy’s head lifts up, looking like it takes a great effort. Her bleary eyes take in her unfamiliar surroundings. You say nothing, electing to wait for her to get her bearings straight. Her large eyes slowly begin to focus, pupils changing to the correct size for the current level of light. For a time, the mare just looks around, trying to figure out what’s going on. It isn’t until you raise your arm to scratch the back of your head that she seems to notice you.
The two of you lock gazes.
This is the first time you've seen her with her eyes open, and only now do you realize it’s just a little uncanny having something with such big peepers looking at you. You’ve never been one to back down from a staring contest, though.
Silence fills the room while the two of you just gaze into each other’s eyes.
Nobody blinks.
Your gut rumbles a bit, causing a bubble to rise up into your chest. Fluttershy tilts her head slightly, trying to make sense of the situation. The gas travels up to your throat, the tense situation not slowing it down in the slightest. Without thinking, you push it out through your mouth. Much harder than you need to.
The sound that comes out can only be described as the roar of a lion that had just drank a two liter bottle of pop. With that, you now also know that ponies might be the only living creatures currently on this planet with the ability to break the sound barrier without the use of a machine. In what seems like the blink of an eye, the mare bolts out from under the covers in response to your mighty display of gaseous power and runs for the closed door. A loud thump echoes through your room as she decides to run straight into it rather than try to get it open. You can’t even remember how much wing power they say that Fluttershy had in that one episode, but holy shit was she able to move.
Well, that certainly could have gone better. But hey, at least you won the staring contest, right? You stare at her for a few seconds as she nurses the bump on her forehead. Deciding to get the show on the road, you decide to try to get her attention.
“Uhh...” you calmly began to speak.
Fluttershy takes notice, turning towards you and scooting up against the door.
”S-stay away..!” she commands in a shaky voice, pointing one of her pale yellow hooves at you. You should have known that this wouldn’t be easy. You would back up, but your desk takes up the rest of the space behind you.
“Okay, okay… Relax, I’m not going to hurt you.” you assure her, making sure to keep your body language as calm as possible. “Hey, I’m uh… I’m sorry about that. I just had a bad burp, that’s a-“ but before you can finish, you are interrupted by a low pitched growl. You jump to your feet when the sound hits your ears. What the hell was that? Shit… Is she transforming? Was this all a clever ruse? Are you going to get eaten and not even have a corpse to leave behind? These thoughts run through your head in the span of a second, just before they are interrupted by a yellow blur colliding into your torso.
You try to scream, but can’t. It’s too late now, the grip on your body is too tight. You squint your eyes, waiting for the inevitable feeling of teeth sinking into your flesh; that feeling never comes though. Another growl, and the grip tightens. The beast holding onto your body begins to shake and emit what could be mistaken as a whimper. Breathing is difficult, and life is slowly turning into suffering. You open your eyes, ready to face your demise. When you look down, you don’t see the flesh devouring monster you were expecting; instead, you see the familiar form of a quivering pony, holding onto you for dear life.
Relief washes over you as you come to the realization that your short, uneventful life is not about to come to a painful bloody, end. The growl from earlier sounds out again, and this time you are able to tell what it is. It’s the sound of hunger, and you are pretty sure that it’s not a hunger for delicious human flesh.
At least, you hope not.
“H-hey… don’t be af… afraid. It’s just your… stomach.” you attempt to choke out through your compressed rib cage. Some seconds pass before this registers to her, and she slowly loosens her grip. Then quickly backs up to the middle of the room when she sees just what she was burying her face into. You get to your knees, deciding that standing would probably cause some intimidation with your height. An idea strikes, and you twist to your desk to grab the food you made earlier.
You walk back into your room with a plate which holds a hastily made sandwich. It doesn't have anything more than some peanut butter and some jam between the two bread slices, but it was the best you could do under the circumstances. Without a word. you set the plate in front of her.
Fluttershy eyes the sandwich cautiously, still looking like she might run away at your slightest movement. You shuffle awkwardly, unable to think of what you should say to defuse the situation further.
“I uh, didn’t know what you’d like to eat, so I just made this in a hurry. You don’t have to eat it if you aren’t hungry. Don’t worry, it’s not poison, I swear.”
Shit, that’s exactly what someone who would have poisoned someone else's food would say. The mare switches from eyeing the plate of food suspiciously to giving you a similar look. Neither of you know what to do, but you’re pretty sure that she is forming an escape plan much faster than you can explain yourself, so you need to think on your feet here.
“Look, I think we got off to a bad start, let’s start over, okay? My name is Anonymous, and this is my house. I don’t want to hurt you, and I have no idea how you got here. Right now, I just want to help, so here, let me do this.”
You get to your feet, causing your visitor to take a more defensive stance. Focusing your gaze on the door to your room, you begin to walk towards it. Fluttershy quickly shuffles over out of your way as you begin to walk towards her. Keeping your eyes off of the pegasus, you reach the exit and quietly open the path to freedom. Yeah, you want to find out what's going on, and yeah, you want to help her if she needs it; but you need to make it clear that she is still free.
“If you want to leave, go through here and enter the first room to the left. The front door is unlocked right now. I won’t stop you. I probably have a map around here if you need it.”
The mare is still quick to avoid you as you make your way to your desk to and sit down. You really don't know what you're doing. Opening one of the drawers, you lazily search for your rarely used map of the area you live in. This way, you can assist her in some way at least. From the corner of your eye, you can see your pony guest scrutinizing the doorway.
Fluttershy looks at you, then the door. You, then the door. You, door. Finally to your astonishment, she speaks.
"Thanks..."
As expected, her voice is soft, almost inaudibly so. You cease rummaging through your desk and turn to face the yellow mare. You almost don't know how to reply.
"It's no problem, really. Hey, I just realized I never got your name."
You are obviously lying. She hesitates for a brief moment before answering. Averting her gaze, Fluttershy speaks a little louder than the last time.
"I'm Fluttershy..."
“It’s nice to meet you, Fluttershy. Are you feeling okay?” you ask.
“I’m… fine…” she responds, still refusing to fully let her guard down.
At least you’re getting somewhere. You turn towards her and make eye contact again, causing her to shrink back a little. Right now, this pony is probably scared, tired, and confused beyond belief. Perhaps she needs time to think.
“Good, I’m glad to hear it. Do you need some time to clear your head? I’ll give you some space if you need it.”
Her only response is a small murmur that you cannot decipher, so you decide to make the decision for her. Getting up from your seat, you walk to your bed and sit down before letting her know what you plan to do.
“Well, I’ll just be right here for the time being. If you need anything, please let me know, it’s no issue at all. We’re in my house, so I can do most anything you might need, within reason of course.”
With that, you lay down in your bed. So… First contact didn’t go as well as you had hoped. Can’t say that wasn’t expected, though. Maybe if you weren’t such a goddamn sperg when you offered her food, it would have went better. Hey, look at the bright side! She introduced herself and isn’t trying to run right now, so maybe this will go better than you expected. Now then, what were you doing before the yellow cannonball woke up?
Oh right, the thread. You may not have access to your PC right now, but that's what smartphones are for. You reach over onto your nightstand and turn the portable device on. Alright, you’re focused this time around. Fluttershy may be awake now and you are still somewhat unsure of what she’ll do next, but you’ve managed to get your brain back in the game. Before you know it, you’re back at the page that may or may not have started all of this. Hopefully there’s something in here that will shed some light on the events that have unfolded. Starting from the top, you scroll through the posts that are shown, paying closer attention for any underlying hints.
Sadly, by the time you reach the end of the thread, you are left with a lack of answers. With a sigh, you sit up and scratch at the underside of your forearms. In an instant, pain shoots through your body.
“Gah..! Damn, what the hell?” you grunt out through your teeth.
Turning to the nearest light source, you examine at your arms and remember exactly why you are suddenly suffering such sharp sensations. You cannot believe that you forgot you fell onto broken glass earlier. Small trickles of blood stream down your arms, telling you that these wounds aren’t just a few small scratches. They must’ve reopened when you scratched them just now.
“Wow, these are pretty bad.” you say to yourself.
An attempt at pulling one of the shards out ends in you just agitating the laceration further and causing more bleeding. Not to mention it hurts like a bitch, only more so now that you’ve irritated it. Why do injuries only start to hurt when you notice them? Speaking of not noticing stuff, a certain yellow pony startles you when her voice emanates from right next to your seat.
“Excuse me, are you okay..?” she asks softly.
You turn to the source of the voice just now. Fluttershy is standing a few steps away from you, trying to get a decent view of what might have caused you this pain. She shrinks back slightly, her courage wavering at the eye contact.
“It’s nothing too bad, I’ve had worse. I’m just having a bit of trouble getting this glass out.” you say, forcing a smile.
As you speak, you turn one of your arms towards her; her eyes widen as blood quickly runs down your arm to your hand. Well, you certainly did a number on that one.
”Oh no! How did this happen?” the normally timid mare asks, concern evident on her face.
You feel bursts of what feels like wind hit you as the pegasus takes to the air, inspecting your arm closer.
”Oh my… These are in deep…” muses, actually taking your arm in a hoof.
The sting of the cut is too prominent for you to wonder how she's using her hooves to move your arm around. Though she seems to want to help, your pride takes over and you attempt to take the situation back into your own hands. Swiftly, you grab a less deep looking shard and pull.
“It’s really no big deal, I just gotta… gah..!”
You pull your hand away and notice a small cut on your index finger. Yet again, your male pride has screwed you. Perhaps you should use something other than your hand to pull these out.
”No, you can’t take them out like that..! Here…” Fluttershy says as she grabs your arm again. She pauses for a moment. ”L-let me help… Is that okay..?”
For a moment, you consider just waiting to go to a doctor in the morning, or trying to pluck these out yourself. However, this would offer a good chance to allow the both of you to communicate a bit more closely. A trust exercise of sorts? Plus, it beats killing yourself accidentally from blood loss. For all you know, one of these things is lodged in your vein and the only thing keeping you from bleeding out is the glass itself.
“Uh, sure. Anything we should have around?” You ask.
Fluttershy stutters out a list of items that you luckily have around the house. Minutes later you have the supplies laid out neatly on your desk, and a pony working on your wounds. You watch in a mix of amazement and horror as the shy pony uses a pair of tweezers with her mouth to extract one of the bigger pieces. Surprisingly enough, the pain isn’t as bad as you’d expect it to be.
This process goes on for several minutes, and after a bit of effort from the both of you, your arms are devoid of glass.
“Hey, you’re pretty good at this, you know?” you tell her.
No vocal response, but you do get a blush and a bashful smile as she begins to bandage up your arms. An awkward silence ensues. Time to change the subject. Just now, you realize that this pony probably doesn’t know what you are, or that you know what she is or where she’s from.
“So Fluttershy, what exactly are you? You kind of look like a horse, but you’re still different.” you inquire. She stops to think for a moment before giving her response.
“Well… I’m a pony, a pegasus pony. You kind of look like a gorilla, but are different, too. What are you..?” she asks timidly.
It’s unusual to have to think about how to describe what a human is to someone. Once you finally have your words together, you tell her.
“Well, I’m a human. We’re kind of like monkeys, or apes, but with a higher level of intelligence. I’m guessing that you don’t have any of us where you come from. I’ve never seen anything like you here before, so we must both live pretty far from each other.”
The mare looks thoughtful for a moment before speaking again.
”I’m from Equestria. From the looks of it, I don’t think I’m still there…”
You nod.
“Probably not. I've never heard of that place being mentioned as a location here.” you state flatly.
Fluttershy’s eyes widen at the knowledge that her home doesn’t exist here.
With her bandaging done, the pegasus softly lowers herself to the ground, shakily getting her footing once she lands. You are still curious about how she got here of all places, but aren’t quite sure if now is an appropriate time to ask now that she is aware that she is in a place where everything she has known her entire life does not exist. Well, it might help her if she tries to remember, so the possible grain of info that you could use should outweigh the minor social taboo.
“Do you remember what happened before you woke up here?”
She shakes her head, her messy pink mane waving along with the movements.
”I… just went to bed, and when I woke up, I was here.”
Should have figured that this wouldn’t be easy. You relax in your seat, noticing just how roughed up your visitor looks.
“And the ride here must’ve been pretty rough. You’ve got some pretty nasty cuts yourself. Here, let me return the favor.”
You get out of your chair and motion for her to sit down. Predictably, she looks unsure of your offer.
“Don’t worry, I hurt myself all the time. I know how to treat a few cuts.” you say with a smile. It takes her a little while, but Fluttershy finally responds.
”If you say so…” the pegasus answers, taking to the air once more before descending onto your chair. Now that you think about it, you have no clue why the usually cautious pony would actually let you do this. You have even more trouble believing it since you appeared to not know how to even take care of your own wounds earlier. As you tend to her wounds in a way that closely matches her technique, you mull over Fluttershy’s willingness to let you operate on her.
Maybe she’s starting to trust you already? Or is she just too afraid to say no? Either way, you are almost done treating the cuts on her body. She sure took the disinfectant a lot better than you did, that’s for damn sure. While you would swear like a sailor every time she so much as touched you with it, she’d just wince and let out a small whine.
“And there… we… go. That all ought to hold for now. Everything feel alright?” you ask while packing up the leftover medical supplies. The mare lightly tests her bandages and nods her head, once again causing her mane to bounce with her motions.
”They’re fine-” she says in her usual shy demeanor, “And thank you.”
“Not a problem.” you reply, heading out the door to return the medical supplies to their home. Arriving at your bathroom, you place each item in a spot that’s easy to remember. You never have to use these often, luckily. Upon returning to your bedroom, you find your chair rotated around so that the back is to you and the front is facing your computer screen. The carpet muffles your steps as you make your approach to your destination.
Something tells you that this visitor is a bit curious about the big shiny rectangle on your desk, and you aren’t about to pass up the opportunity to observe this phenomenon. Your inner nature documentary cameraman takes over as you quietly watch her figure out what your monitor is.
“And here, we have a magical cartoon horse in her no-so-natural habitat. Oh, she seems to have found something that has piqued her interest! Let’s see what happens…” You say in your head. Jokes aside, this is a good time to introduce her to technology. Plus, your mischievous side is going get a kick out of her reaction when she finds out you’ve been here all this time.
Soon, you’re standing right behind the seat, waiting to see what she does. Turns out, not much, as all she does is look around the various parts of your desktop wallpaper and various icons. Eventually, the pony raises a hoof towards the display. However, seeing as no one has given the computer any actual input in over ten minutes, the screen goes black just as her hoof makes contact.
Best. Timing. Ever.
A wave of panic seems to overtake her as she frantically falls back and looks around your desk for a solution for the problem. She tries tapping the screen with her hoof again to no avail, letting out a squeak of nervousness in response as she falls back into the chair once more. You stifle your childish giggles, having more fun than you should watching an alien horse struggle with technology.
That wasn’t enough to hide them from her, though. Fluttershy spins around, meeting your gaze with her big panicked eyes. A dumb smile spreads over your face and you let your even dumber giggles go free.
“Having fun?” you ask, having gotten the giggles out of your system
In a flurry of yellow feathers, the pegasus jumps from your seat and begins to profusely apologize as tears well in her eyes.
”I’m sorry! I… I b-b-broke…” she says, quivering almost as bad as she did when she first met you.
Okay, you may have let this get a bit too far already. Best to end this now before any further damage is done to her weary mind. You lean over and wiggle the mouse, making the display pop back to life.
“It does that if you don’t do anything to it for a long time. It conserves energy that way.”
A smile already on your face and you kneel down to match Fluttershy’s height.
“Do you have computers where you came from?” you ask.
You’re fairly certain they don’t, but you obviously can’t let her know you know that. Not yet at least. The pony shakes her head, wiping away the tears from earlier.
“Well, hop back up here and I’ll show you what this can do.”
”Really?” she asks in surprise. You roll your eyes.
“No, I’m going to keep you locked up in here away from your friends and family. C’mon, the seat’s all yours.” You assure her, patting the seat once more.
That… actually may not be too far from the truth if this is going by the same rules as the thread. Which brings to your attention the fact that you’ll have to tell her eventually what’s going on if it’s true. Hell, you should probably tell her eventually regardless. Getting back to your feet, you wait for her to get back up where she was so you can commence the show and tell. Before beginning the grand tour, you completely close your internet browser so that no evidence of your previous pony adventures on the web are seen.
You start by showing her the basics. The mouse, keyboard are the first up.
Fluttershy is somewhat entertained by the mouse and how moving it around also moves the cursor on the screen. You couldn’t tell if she was relieved or disappointed when you explained that the word “mouse” was just a name for the device and that it wasn’t an actual live mouse. The keyboard is easy to explain as well, you open up a text editor and type up a few short sentences.
“Wow,” she exclaims, “typing goes so much faster this way! We have typewriters back home, but they’re not used for too much.”
You smile at her awe, it’s actually kind of cute. Getting back on topic, you kneel down and look next to your desk at the lit up box that makes it all possible.
“And this down here is the computer itself.” Fluttershy looks back up at the monitor, confused.
”What about this?” she asks.
“Well, that just takes what this is doing and displays it in a readable form.” you answer. You are about to lean over her and start opening a few programs, but get a better idea. “Go on, grab the mouse and try clicking on a few things.”
Looking unsure, she speaks.
”Are you sure? I don’t want to break anything…” the pegasus says, voicing her concern.
With a smile and a roll of your eyes, you reassure her that nothing is going to break. Although, the hard drive HAS been getting slower and making more noise lately… Eh, it’ll hold for a few more months. The mouse design is difficult for her to use with her hoof, but she manages as she begins to explore your PC. A look of amazement is plastered on the mare’s face as you guide her through the various functions of the PC.
After a few minutes in the paint program, she finds her way to your pictures folder. In it is a group of people in a grassy park; only a few people in it are posing for the camera, the rest are doing their best to do something dumb for when the picture is taken. It’s a memory that sticks out to you. This was the day of your graduation. You see yourself with your small group of friends. Everyone looks like they’re on top of the world. Fluttershy’s amazement breaks and she points a hoof where you are looking.
”I see you right there. Are those your friends with you?”
For just a bit longer you go over the picture before responding. It’s been a while, and the memories flood back.
“Yeah. I haven’t seen them for quite a few years now.” you say, reflecting on the times you all spent together. Maybe you should actually try to hang out with some of your co-workers sometime, make some new friends. That, or actually keep in contact with the ones you have. You have a life to focus on, though. Two now, if this doesn’t end up being some strange fever dream. Fluttershy’s face seems to convey sadness as she looks down at her hooves.
Fluttershy glumly averts her gaze from the screen. You honestly hadn’t thought of what might have become of her friends up until now. If she was brought here, the rest of the crew are definitely not immune to cross dimensional teleportation. The look on her face is enough to put a small crack in even your hardened heart. Something about the expressiveness of the mare’s brightly colored eyes causes your empathetic side to take over.
You’re flying by the seat of your pants here, but you need to at least try to reassure her that things will turn out okay. This is something that you aren’t even sure of, but you can’t just stand by while she worries herself to death.
Right now, you are the only living thing that can help her.
You rest your hand on her back, right above her wings. The warm softness of her fur provides a pleasant contrast to the somewhat cold temperature of your room.
“I’m sure they’re safe and sound at their homes. If they haven’t already, they’ll be ready to do everything they can to get you back safely once they find out you’re missing.” you say, hoping that stating the obvious will be enough to bring her out of this slump. She seems to be more worried about them than herself right now, but hopefully you can stop any feelings of abandonment before they begin with that extra bit at the end.
This really isn’t your field of expertise. Sure, you can help people through minor issues in their lives, but when it comes to serious shit, that’s when you usually run into a dead end. Much to your surprise however, this seems to pick her spirits up a little. A small smile returns to her face as your words sink in.
“I think you’re right,” she starts, hopefulness beginning to show in her voice. “Me and my friends have been in worse situations, and we always find a way to fix them. We’d never leave anypony behind, either.” At this point, Fluttershy’s smile is back to the way it was before reality hit her. The feeling seems to be contagious, as seeing her like this causes a smile of your own to permeate your face.
Silence overtakes the both of you soon after, and you notice that your hand is still resting on her back. You can’t detect any discomfort from her end, but you elect to retract your hand before any awkwardness happens.
“I hope it goes without saying, but I’ll do what I can to help out.” you chuckle somewhat bitterly. “I’ve got a beef with whoever or whatever did this, too. You know how big of a pain it’s gonna be to get my window replaced?”
Fluttershy looks up at you, gratefulness displayed on her expression.Obviously, you have no fucking clue where you’d begin trying to find out how a fictional character became real. A yawn escapes your mouth and you look over to your clock. It’s just about four AM. So much for getting some extra sleep tonight.
“Hey, I’m getting kind of tired, how about we continue this in the morning?” you say, looking back over to Fluttershy. The pony looks just a bit disappointed at having to stop almost right after you started getting into the interesting parts of using the computer, but agrees nonetheless. She gets out of the chair and looks at you somewhat expectantly.
Oh, right. Sleeping arrangements.
“You can sleep on this bed tonight. It might be a good idea to stay in here if you don’t like the cold.” Realization strikes you as you receive a questioning look from the pegasus below. By the time she woke up, you had already taken her out of the box. The sound of the window breaking probably evaded her as well.
”Um, what’s wrong with the other rooms, if I can ask?” she asks, tilting her head to the side.
With a sigh, you begin to tell her the tale of your dear, departed window. “Well, as I mentioned earlier, my window in the other room is broken. Well, it wasn’t broken by a brick, or another kind of small object. Somehow, they threw that entire crate right through the glass.”
Fluttershy’s eyes widen at the realization that she went through such an ordeal without being aware of it.
“Oh my,” she says at a volume you can just barely hear. “I’m sorry that happened, I don’t know why anyone would do something like that...”
Without any idea of what else to say, you simply shrug in response.
“Me either. Just another unexpected bump in the road of life, I guess. Anyways, let’s try to get some sleep. We should talk some more in the morning, if you’re up for it”
The pale yellow pegasus meekly nods her head and gives off a high pitched yawn before climbing into your bed. You, on the other hand, lower yourself into your chair.
“Could you get the light while you’re over there, too?” you lazily request, closing your eyes. Your bed creaks a bit and the sheets rustle.
”Is, um… Is that really where you are sleeping? I don’t want to take your bed away from you…” Fluttershy timidly inquires, concern apparent in her tone. Already drifting off, you answer.
“I fall asleep here four nights out of seven anyways. I’m good. Thanks though.” For once in your life, you aren’t lying to make someone feel better. You really need to work on actually using your bed. Another shuffle of sheets, a click, and the absence of light are the last things that register to your tired mind before your consciousness fades away.
Your sleep is restless and filled with breaks in its cycle. It’s nothing too unusual, this happens quite often when you fall asleep at your desk like this. You keep telling yourself to get up and stagger to your bed, but you’d be lying if you said you are too uncomfortable to move right now. After an undetermined amount of time however, you get enough clarity to force yourself out of your chair and onto your feet. It’s still dark out, so you haven’t been asleep all that long. A small chill runs up your body from the temperature of the room. Is your heater broken again?
Whatever, the blankets will solve that issue for the time being. Arriving at the head of your bed, you look to your clock. It’s a little after six in the morning. Not bad, you’ll have plenty of time to get some real sleep. Your hair stands up on end as an unexpected noise emanates from beside you. It sounds close to a whimper, but you can’t quite place… You turn around, and still to your surprise you can see the faint outline of a sleeping equine laying her head on your pillow. So that wasn’t a dream…
Through the darkness you can see that Fluttershy is completely uncovered, and is heavily shivering while letting out an occasional feeble whine. You can’t blame her, it IS pretty cold in here. Might as well plug in the space heater while you’re thinking about it. Quickly, you take the small heating implement from your closet and plug it in next to your bed. With sleep clouding your mind yet again, you sit next to the sleeping pony and begin to absentmindedly stroke her side.
After a bit, she stops shivering and subconsciously snuggles herself into your warm touch with a murmur of comfort. You smile tiredly. That’s it, you have to help her somehow. If you weren’t before, you are now. Removing your hand from the pony, you get up and tuck a blanket around her before going back to your chair. Sleep comes much easier than before.
Before you know it, you are awoken by the alarm of your watch on your desk. You really have no idea why you use this instead of the perfectly fine desk clock next to your bed, but whatever. The light that tries to poke through the window blinds is a dull grey, telling you that today is going to be filled with clouds once again. Groggily you get up from your chair, a nice soreness in your back greeting you. Looking over at your bed, you see that Fluttershy is still asleep and that this is indeed still not a dream.
It appears to be ten thirty on the dot from what your clock says. Good enough time to wake up, you suppose. You decide to let the bed’s occupant sleep a bit longer, seeing as she’s had a much rougher night than you. Yawning, you head for the door, wishing all the while that you had used something to insulate your room. By the time you open the door, you want to just say “fuck it” and beg the gods to smite you where you stand. Nobody deserves to go through something like this in the dead of winter. As soon as you walk into your living room, your mouth drops. Speaking of winter…
Snow. A huge pile of it, right under the base of your window. It’s also still coming in, most of the outside world beyond it being obstructed by the fog of what might as well be a blizzard. You knew there were going to be snow showers, but not THIS bad! For a while, you just stare. Fuck it, you’re making breakfast. It’s the floor’s issue now. You ponder on what to eat on your way to the kitchen. Whatever it is, you’ll have to make double what you normally do. It’s been a while since you’ve made breakfast for two.
You open your cabinet and notice the box of pancake mix. Yeah, the last time you had a woman over and made her breakfast… you can’t remember much, but when you came to, your wallet was missing, and your toaster was leaking a weird fluid. Maybe it was the pancakes. Maybe you said a few things that you shouldn’t have. Whatever happened, the sex was totally worth it, even if she left without a trace.
You grab the mix and settle on trying this again. If Fluttershy turns out to be a demon or something similar, it’ll be a win-win situation. If you die, you’ll go down fighting a monster like you’ve always wanted. If you don’t, you have something to sell to the government to make a pretty penny. And if none of THAT happens, well at least you’ll be making some interesting memories in the future. Setting out a bowl and some plates, you proceed to pour the powder into the bowl and mix it with some milk.
The counter is already a mess. Once the batter is well mixed, you set a skillet on the old gas stove, you ignite the burners and pour half of the contents of the bowl on two different parts. A while later, you have two very large golden brown pillows of… whatever this mix is made of. You slide one onto each plate. Before leaving, you get out some syrup and butter. Once back at your room, you quietly open the door and creep back to your bed. As Fluttershy lets out small, near inaudible snores, you see a single strand of her light pink mane blow out with every breath she exhales.
You sort of want to brush the hair back into its rightful place, but you’ve already been fucking creepy enough with how much you’ve been touching her. Instead, you softly begin to try getting her attention.
“Hey, time to wake up.” The mare stirs a bit. “It’s morning. You don’t want to sleep the rest of the day away, do you?”
Slowly she stirs, making small squeaking sounds before stretching and letting out a large yawn. Well, large for her at least. Her eyes open up partially, trying to comprehend the space around her now that it actually has daylight filling it. “Good morning, Fluttershy. Feeling better this morning, I hope?”
The pony sits up, rubbing her eye with a hoof. ”Mmmh… Good morning… I’m fine…” Turning around, you begin to head back to the room in which your holy bounty of breakfast awaits. “I’ve got food waiting in the kitchen if you’re hungry. It’s two rooms to the right as soon as you leave this room.”
You’ve walked out of the bedroom, deciding to give the occupant some time to wake up and get herself together. The kitchen smells of fresh cooking, something you have always enjoyed, an opposite you draw with some members of your family. They’d always insist on venting it out. You’d insisted that they were in need of a psychological evaluation. You arrive at the table shortly, and prepare for the meal ahead.
Opening up the butter, you scrape some off with the knife and smear some on your pancake. For yours, you pour some syrup over the top and begin digging in. It isn’t long until you hear the strange new sound of hooves clopping on your tiled floor. You hope like hell this isn’t going to leave scratches. Seeing this cartoon character walk through your kitchen is still one of the most surreal things you’ve experienced in your life. You smile at her.
“Didn’t have any trouble finding the place, I hope.”
Fluttershy shakes her head, wearing a soft smile of her own. ”Oh no, not at all.”
When she reaches the table, you scoot out a seat for her. What? These seats are big, heavy, AND hard to move across the floor, even for you. She’s smaller than them. You aren’t reaching maximum fedora tippidge just yet. After fluttering up to the chair, you move her in closer to the table.
“I wasn’t too sure what all you might like on yours. I might have some whipped cream in the fridge, or some strawberries I could still chop up. I’m kind of boring when it comes to food.” Well, at least in comparison to some of the stuff you’ve seen in the show. You’d like to at least consider yourself not bland in taste.
”Oh, that’s okay, I couldn’t ask for more than you’ve already given. Thank you for the food, it smells great!” Fluttershy says with a sweet smile.
You shrug. “It was nothing, really.”
No, really, it was nothing. Just add milk to the powder, mix, then cook. They probably don’t have the all in one mix in Equestria, though. After putting some butter of her own onto her serving, Fluttershy begins to reach towards the bottle of syrup, only to be stopped by the shortness of her own front arm. You kind of just let it happen, chewing on a bite of your food before you realize that she could probably use some help. Quickly, you lean over and pass the bottle to her.
She takes it with a sheepish grin. Once her flapjack is covered with syrup, her next action surprises you just a bit. She goes headfirst into the plate, then back up, emerging with a piece of the food in her mouth. Right. Ponies. Hooves. Surprisingly, her face isn’t dirtied in the slightest. Minutes pass as the only sound in the room is that of chewing, and the occasional clank of silverware from your side of the table. Silence has reigned as the ruler of this room for long enough that you decide now is as good a time as any to strike up a conversation.
“So… How’s about we get to know each other a little better?” you ask, wiping a crumb from your mouth.
An apprehensive look is cast your way, the food in her mouth swallowed like a large pill with no water. Looks like you’ll have to take the initiative here. “Here, I’ll start. My name is Anonymous. You can just call me Anon for short, though. I like to relax at home on quiet evenings after a long day of work, though I also enjoy the occasional outing with friends whenever we’re in the same place.” You also enjoy long walks on the beach on warm sunny evenings.
Oh wait, this isn’t your dating profile. You list off a few more of your interests, along with your job. “So, that’s about it for me. What about you?”
Hesitantly swallowing, the gathers her courage and answers. ”W-well… My name is Fluttershy. I like to interact and take care of… animals…” Her sentence trails off at the last word, but you can still hear it.
“Interesting. Do you have any pets?” you inquire, resting your head on a hand.
Fluttershy’s eyes brighten somewhat at the prospect of discussing something she’s interested in. ”Well, I have a bunny. His name is Angel.”
You faintly remember that white puffball. If you aren’t wrong, that rabbit’s name betrayed its personality.
“Any others?” you ask, hoping to keep her going. Almost as if composing a list in her head, she looks down at her plate, only a small bit of the once large pancake remaining. Then she lists off what animals she takes care of. They range all the way from tiny things like mice to bigger animals such as bears. In all your life, you’ve never heard one living being list off as many different creatures as she has just now.
”But I just take care of them, they’re not really pets. They’re my furry little friends! I feed them and help them when they’re sick or injured.” She’s much more opened up, now.
“That’s good to hear that you care for them like that.” you claim.
The pony nods and points at her rear end. ”In fact, that’s what my cutie mark symbolizes.”
Your eyes fall to the three butterflies on her flank. “Cutie mark, eh? Can’t say I’ve heard of those before. What’s that all about?”
She goes on to summarize how each pony earns one specific to them whenever they find their special talent. Honestly, you kind of zoned out seeing as you already know about all that. Then, she goes on to tell you how she got hers. Again, something you know about, but it’s still interesting to hear it be told to you first hand. You try not to laugh at the fact that she opened her story up the exact same way as she did in that one episode. This also leads to her telling you about the rest of her friends and how they got theirs, though these were much shorter summaries since they weren’t her own.
After the discussion, you take the empty plates from the table and over to the sink. Perhaps you and her can get along better than you initially assumed.
You walk back to the table, feeling a bit more relaxed now that you and Fluttershy have gotten to know one another a bit better. Despite your repeatedly interrupted sleep the previous night, you find that you have a bit of a spring to your step as you walk back over to the table where the diminutive horse sits. Now that the pleasantries are out of the way, you might as well begin brainstorming ideas as to how to fix this predicament.
“So…” you begin, not really knowing how to segue into this topic “You got any ideas how to get back home?”
Fluttershy looks thoughtful at your question, fiddling with one of the table mats. Half a minute passes and you join her in her contemplation. For what feels like a long time, silence reigns as the both of you mull over the situation. Finally, the lack of sound is broken by the already familiar gentle sound of Fluttershy’s voice.
“I really don’t know. It’s still all so much to take in..." she says, still trying to think of a solution.
That is most certainly not a lie. Right now, it’s hard to even think of where to begin finding answers. It’s not like you can just go to google and ask “What to do when a dimensional traveler shows up in your house” and get an easy solution. At least, you don’t think that there would be any answers there. You make a mental note to consult Google later.
...Perhaps modern technology is beginning to spoil you just a bit.
A sigh escapes your mouth, making your feelings on the matter evident. “Yeah, I’m at a loss, too. Right now, the only thing I can think of is to just wing it. You showing up here like you did is probably one of the biggest events that could change the way we think about the universe right now. Something tells me that something else is bound to happen.”
As you finish voicing your thoughts, you feel a small burst of air brush against your face. Turning your head in the direction that it came from, you see the source of the anomaly. Fluttershy is lightly lowering herself to the floor, beating her wings slowly as she does. She looks at you after landing, a slight look of uncertainty still plastered on her face.
“Maybe you’re right. I did just get here. We don’t really know what is happening right now, so I guess we could go with your plan for now.” The pegasus tentatively agrees.
You feel a slight pang of guilt over your “plan”. Even though you tried your best, it still feels like you are just taking the easy way out. It seems like there should be some way of finding a way to fix this.
Another sigh passes through your lips. Why couldn’t you have had Twilight crash through your window? At least she can control magic. This would probably be over in a few days. You shake your head and push the bitter thoughts out of your mind. Nothing will get done if you keep thinking like that.
Without much else to say, you lean on the windowsill and gaze out at the snow blanketing your yard. The scene outside along with the steadily dropping heat in the kitchen reminds you of the broken window in your other room. It might be a good idea to start mentally mapping out what you have to do today.
The window is an obvious priority. It’s also time to go grocery shopping again, which is already bothersome enough. Finally, you need to keep an eye out for any info about what’s happened today. Groceries should be quick and easy. You just hope that the window can be repaired quickly without much hassle. As for getting Fluttershy back home… You still don’t know.
Might as well get started. You already know what you want to buy at the store, but now you have two mouths to feed. The fact that one mouth only eats vegetables and hay doesn’t help much. You walk over to a nearby drawer and fish out a small notepad along with a pen and rip off the top page.
You return to Fluttershy, who is currently hovering in front of the window you were previously looking through. “Hey,” you say, grabbing her attention, “I need to buy some food today. I’m not entirely sure what your diet consists of, so I thought you could write down a few things you might like.” You finish by placing the pen and paper on the nearby table.
“Oh, okay…” she responds in her usual coy demeanor. “I really don’t need much though, I’m sure that what you get will be fine.” Fluttershy insists.
Shrugging your shoulders, you start towards your room. “Don’t worry about it. Just write down whatever you want, it won’t bother me. Besides, I have a feeling that you wouldn’t like a good portion of an omnivore’s diet. So I insist, go for it.”
You give her no time to protest as you promptly exit the kitchen and start the cold journey back to your room. How you failed to notice the drop in temperature, you’ll never know. The walk back feels like it takes forever, yet in reality lasts less than a minute.
For once in your life, you’re glad that you don’t live in a mansion.
Keeping up your quick, chill fueled movements, you pull out some clothes that will be appropriate for the day from your closet. Up to this point, you’ve only been in a T-shirt and a pair of underwear. Thinking back on it, this isn’t really the most appropriate attire to have worn while eating breakfast with a female that you have only just met.
Thank whatever higher power that may or may not exist for the species gap.
Once you are dressed, you grab your wallet and keys. While gathering those last few objects, a thought hits you. Like most living things, you’re pretty sure the temptation to go outside is going to hit Fluttershy at some point, and you don’t have a plan to tell her to stay out of the public eye. Sure, all the people that live near here are really nice and wouldn’t hold any ill will towards the unusual being, but if word gets out that there’s a talking horse in your house…
Whether it’s because of the thought or the cold, you shiver slightly. There are way too many possible outcomes to letting Fluttershy’s presence be known. What if that forum thread turns out to be the reason for all of this happening? She could just end up poofing away and end up back home safe and sound. On the other hand, the description was so vague; if she’s seen, it’s also possible that creepy-ass shadows will appear and drag her kicking and screaming into some hell dimension.
Okay, maybe Hollywood has tainted your brain a bit, but you never know. Thankfully the winter weather will most likely kill any desire to go outside for at least a few days, so maybe for right now, you’ll just try to explain your reasoning to the best of your ability. Honesty is the best policy, after all.
Passing through the living room this time, you get a better view of the damage, along with the massive pile of snow at it’s base. Guess you’ll have to take care of this before leaving…
It takes about fifteen or twenty minutes to clear out the mess from your house. At least it isn’t snowing anymore, that would have made things a lot harder to fix. You return to the kitchen, noticing that Fluttershy is no longer there. On the table, you spot the paper, now with a few scratches of writing on it. Taking the notepad, you rip off the top sheet before folding it up and sticking it in your pocket.
You look around, noticing that the yellow pegasus has disappeared from the kitchen.
Oh shit. You were way more focused on cleaning up the mess than you were with what she was doing. Your heartbeat picks up slightly as you start to think about where she could have gone. There are only two traditional ways in and out of the house, and they are both within view of where you were when cleaning up the snow.
Because of that, there’s not much of a chance of her having gone outside. That thought is enough to calm you down. Unless she opened a window somewhere, she’ll still be here. As it turns out, your worries were not necessary; as when you turn around to start searching, you spot Fluttershy standing in your small rec room. It doesn’t have a lot inside of it, Just a couch, a desk, and a television, which she is staring at curiously.
You breathe a sigh of relief, thankful that she hasn’t wondered out into the world. As tempted as you are to startle her out of her concentration, you decide against it and hope that the easily audible sound of your footsteps against the tiled kitchen floor is enough to alert her to your arrival. Just as you guessed, she turns her head slightly to regard you.
“That’s a television. We use it to watch all sorts of shows and such.”
She cocks her head back over to the dark screen positioned in the corner of the room. “Watch shows? Do you mean like movies?”
They have movies in Equestria? Thinking back on it, there was one during one of the songs, but who knows what’s actually going on when those are happening.
“Yeah, pretty much. Only the screen is solid and isn’t being projected onto a surface.”
You know, there might be an idea hatching here. Grabbing the remote from your desk, you press the power button and activate the device. After a bit, the screen pops in, the last channel you were on filling the screen.
“Here,” You crouch down and put the remote at her hooves. “Press this button right here to switch what you are watching. What you are seeing is based on the channel number you are on. The one pointing up increases the channel number, the one going down decreases it. If the pictures stop showing, go to a different channel number.”
Pointing at a set of similar buttons, you explain further. “These control the volume of the television. Up makes it louder, down makes it softer.”
Some time later, once you’re sure she has the hang of it, you decide to talk to her about one of your earlier worries. “Hey, Fluttershy? I thought I’d better talk about this before I go for a bit.”
The mare looks at you, a small bit of concern on her face.
“Oh, what is it Anon?”
For a moment, you pause. You can’t help but feel that you’re being overprotective. Truthfully, you don’t know what will happen if she is seen. She is an adult though, and can make her own decisions. All you want to do is help, so even if it makes you uncomfortable, the most you can do is share your point of view on the matter.
“I don’t really know how to put this without making it sound like I’m trying to scare you, but I want to warn you just in case. I don’t know how people will react to seeing you. There are plenty of us who would be just like me and want to help you, while at the same time, others won’t be as generous.”
The concern on Fluttershy’s face only grows as you continue.
“I don’t know what some of the less friendly people would do. If my government or any scientists found out about a new sapient species with their own world separate from ours, then I have no clue what could happen next. For all I know, things could go better than I’d expect. On the other hand…”
Unpleasant thoughts run through your mind. Images operating tables restraining ponies awaiting dissection and human soldiers and tanks flooding through a portal into Equestria surface into the forefront of your thoughts. Sure, they might be a bit ridiculous, but judging by the path society has taken in the past few years, ridiculous seems to be the norm.
The now uneasy mare remains quiet, so you bury the thoughts and finish your warning.
“Just… be careful if you decide to leave, okay? I’m sorry if I’ve scared you.”
After another uncomfortable moment of silence, Fluttershy responds, still obviously a bit more fearful of the world around her.
“It’s okay. I… think I understand. I’m actually kind of afraid to see what’s out there, anyway. It’s also really cold right now.”
You manage a small smile. “Yeah, I’m not a fan of weather like this.”
Having gotten that out of the way, you pick up the TV remote once more and change the channel on the TV. The screen starts displaying a group of elephants going about their business. It seems to be a nature documentary of some kind. Unsurprisingly, it catches Fluttershy’s attention almost immediately. Seeing her perk up and take interest in something that she likes serves to improve your mood after the difficult talk you just had.
You tell her that you’ll be going out to the store for a bit and head out to your car. The cold air stings your face as you walk into your garage and climb into the parked vehicle.You buckle up, slide the key into the ignition, and twist. The engine roars to life and you back out, the loud noise of the vehicle tearing through the structure.
One day, you really should get that muffler fixed...
Almost two hours have passed since you left your house to go shopping, that’s what the clock on your phone is telling you anyway. You’ve never had to deal with window replacement before, so your former estimate of “not too long” was just a tad inaccurate. At least they’ll be able to replace it today; that’s a miracle straight out of fiction. The crisp winter air caresses your face as you walk through the exit of the store and pocket your phone.
You open the door to your car and deposit the bags of groceries inside. As you remove the plastic bags of various sizes and weight from the shopping cart, you curiously observe the somewhat greenish bale of hay that sits in the back of your vehicle. Yeah, that’s something you never imagined you’d buy. You also never imagined just how cheap it would be. On this day full of surprises, that one was a pleasant one.
A yawn escapes your mouth as you climb into the driver’s seat. Maybe if you’re lucky, you’ll fall asleep while driving ba- okay no. You can’t die here, your vacation is almost over and you already used up all of your sick days. Not to mention the whole “cartoon pony in your house” thing.
Alright, maybe a nap when you get back might be a good idea. You don’t usually consider suicide unless it’s monday morning and you’re out of coffee. Luckily you’ve already forgotten about your morbid idea to escape doing work by the time you exit the parking lot. Before you know it, your house is within your range of sight, giving you a sense of relaxation and telling you that your chores for the day are almost over.
“So, you have carriages that are able to move on their own?”
You nod in affirmation, unpacking the last of your groceries for the week.
“I guess you could call them carriages. We call them cars, though. Funny enough, some parts of a car’s power is measured in ‘horsepower’, though.” you state, giving a small laugh at your own attempt at humor.
Fluttershy holds a blank expression for but a moment before letting out a small giggle of her own. Good, you were hoping that “horse” wasn’t some kind of racial slur in Equestria. Who knows, maybe it is and Fluttershy here has more of an offensive sense of humor than one might think.
“That seems like an odd measurement, honestly.”
You shrug.
“Well, we did and still do use horses to do a lot of our work, it’s probably some historical relic of a bygone era or something of the like.”
The slight look of amusement on the mare’s face fades as a look of contemplation replaces it.
“You said before that in your world horses are just animals. If you use them for work, is that what you were worried about happening to me if I were to go out?”
You’d rather not think of what would happen if word about her existence were to spread, but you do your best to assuage her worries without bringing up any of the possible morbid outcomes.
“I doubt that. Honestly, I bet most of the people around here would probably just like to talk to you, maybe give you some food, a scratch behind the ear, and tell you how cute you are.”
A smirk grows on your face when she blushes with a look of disbelief at your last few words.
“Relax,” you say with a chuckle. “I’m just messing around. People around here are nice. They’d respect your wishes and decisions. That’s an advantage to living in a neighborhood where the majority of the population is retired grandparents. I’m just paranoid, overprotective, and really have no idea what I’m doing. I guess it’s a good thing I’ve never had smaller siblings or a child…”
Now you just hope you didn’t insult her. Sure, you may not mind being compared to an ape, but most people probably don’t like being compared to a small, cute animal. On top of that, this is a small pony who could have their feelings hurt more easily than usual. Not to mention this is Fluttershy, yadda yadda yadda…
With a sigh, you add on to your last statement. “Sorry about that, I hope I didn’t hurt your feelings. I know you aren’t just some weak animal. I don’t mean to try to play the victim here, but this whole thing is pretty jarring for me. I’m just trying to keep a positive atmosphere around here while we figure things out. Cultural barriers are a real bitch, y’know?”
Fluttershy, blush already faded from her face, smiles warmly.
“It’s okay, I understand what you mean. I really don’t know a lot about you… or even this world.”
You relax a bit. Considering her nature, you don’t know if Fluttershy would truly let it be known if she was offended or not, but right now, she seems genuine.
“I guess we’ll just have to keep learning from each other, huh?” You ask, having mutually walked with her back to your recreational room with her in tow.
“I would enjoy that, I think. We got to talk to each other during breakfast, but there is only so much you can find out in one meal.”
Sitting down on one end of the couch, you respond.
“Yeah, you’re right. Hey, at least we skipped the dating and decided to live together, that makes everything move a lot faster!”
You can’t help but chuckling again when Fluttershy’s face heats up again and she freezes in place.
“Kidding, kidding! There, that’s one thing you can know about me; I enjoy being a nuisance.”
Yet again the mare recovers from your lack of tact and sits down on the other available armchair to the right of where you are sitting. This time, she manages to laugh it off as well. For once, you resist the urge to go even further and tell her that she is actually pretty cute when she’s flustered. You’ll just have to slowly ease her into the torture that is being around you.
You look at the clock, noting the time. It won’t be long before it’s time for your window to be repaired. Looking back at your housemate, you see that she’s just looking around the room, probably contemplating the current situation.
“Well,” you begin, “No time like the present. We’ve got about an hour before the window gets repaired, want to talk until then?”
Fluttershy shifts her focus off of one of your wall’s knick knacks and looks to you.
“Sure, I’m okay with that if you want to. Would you like me to start, or..?”
The pegasus trails off, waiting for your response. As much as you’d love to hear more about Equestria and mentally prove some really stupid headcanons wrong, it would probably be a lot easier for her if you opened up first.
“I can start if you’d like.” you offer.
Fluttershy seems to relax and nods.
“I’m okay with that.”
You scratch your neck in contemplation.
“Where to start… You know a bit about me, and I know a bit about you, maybe I can get you a bit more accustomed to my world. Let’s start with what country we’re in…”
The hour passes a lot quicker than you’d expect. Though you haven’t learned much new stuff about Equestria, Fluttershy has been deeply engrossed in your stories of Earth. You try to sugarcoat as much of the dark history that you can, but the talks of your culture and technological advancements have intrigued her deeply. If she’s this interested, you’d hate to think of what kind of situation you’d be in right now if it were Twilight you were telling all this to.
Fluttershy had taken a particular interest in how developed human settlements are compared to her world. Sure, they had larger modern looking cities such as manehattan, but that was just about it. She wasn’t too fond of the hustle and bustle of the big city herself, but it still managed to grab her attention nonetheless. When you told her how humans have had to make due with what the planet has provided them for medicine, she couldn’t imagine how hard it was to recover from various different things without magic, potions, or magical potions. You decided not to tell her about cancer and how tricky THAT is to get rid of.
In turn, she is now telling you about the many mystical elements of her world and the beings that inhabit it. You’ve feigned surprise throughout a lot of it, but she seems to believe your reactions so far.
“Man, we may not have magic, but your world sure sounds dangerous compared to ours! Dragons are fictional, but most of the time they’re not exactly the kind of thing you’d want to get near.”
You haven’t mentioned the overwhelming military force most nations have, but who knows just how humanity would be right now if it had giant fire breathing monsters that are also sapient roaming around the place.
This time, it’s Fluttershy’s time to smirk.
“You know, I actually faced off against a dragon once.”
You think you know what she’s talking about, but you humor her anyway.
“Really now? I’d like to have seen that.”
Her smirk slowly turns into a smug grin.
“I didn’t even have to lift a hoof to make him leave, either. All I had to do was stare straight into his eyes and give him a good scolding!”
You do your best not to crack up at how proud she is of her accomplishment. It’s just funny to see her so smug about triumphing over someone else. Though you can’t say that you’d have the guts to face something at least ten times your own size without a weapon of any kind.
“Well goddamn, that’s pretty good! Just remind me to stop teasing you in the future, okay? I don’t want to get on the bad side of a dragon slayer.”
The two of you share a good laugh. Despite it only being a little less than an hour, you can say that you feel much less awkward around her now. Hopefully she can say the same about you. Eventually the laughter dies down, and she speaks again.
“Dragons were one of my biggest fears. Really, they still are…”
Adjusting yourself in your seat, you lean in a bit.
“I’m not gonna lie when I say that it must have taken a lot of courage to do that. What happened that lead you to do it, anyway?”
You already know the answer.
“It was going to hurt my friends. When it happened, something came over me… I don’t really know what, but I just kind of acted without thinking. I had to save them. I didn’t want to see them hurt…”
Hearing her say that makes it seem so much more impactful than the show made it out to be. You hear about it all the time on the news, but it isn’t too often you get to hear it first hand from someone it happened to. It also isn’t often that you get to hear their side of the story after seeing it from a third person point of view.
“I’d say that’s a very… noble thing to do. I hope that I’d do the same thing to protect those that I care about if push ever came to shove.”
Fluttershy’s expression brightens a bit again after hearing what you have to say.
“I don’t like conflict though. I’d much rather just enjoy a nice day either by myself or with my close friends.”
Leaning back and sprawling out a bit, you throw your opinion in as well.
“Yeah, I’m not a big fan of loud commotion either. I’d much rather just take it easy and take life as it comes.”
The sudden ring of your doorbell cuts the conversation at a decent stopping point.
“Guess that’s the repairmen. Do you mind staying back here for a bit while I take care of things?”
Though a bit reluctantly, Fluttershy complies with your request.
“I understand. Do you think it will take too long?”
You seem to have gained at least some amount of trust from the shy pony, and despite being a bit of a loner, having someone to talk to in a strange place is probably preferable to bearing the weight alone. You haven’t wanted Fluttershy to feel alone since she got here, and especially not now that you’ve forged a bond, no matter how small.
You put your hands in your pockets and look down at the floor.
“Honestly I’m not sure. This has never happened to me before. I’ll be sure to come back in as soon as I can, though.”
Her mood seems to lift up a bit, and a small yet bright smile comes back to her face.
