> The Three Strange Ponies
>  by Kama and Hallie
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

> Chapter 1: The Three Strangers
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The sun was shining and it was going to be a regular day in Ponyville, for now anyway. Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash were casually hovering around the edges of Ponyville chatting and having a good time after working the whole day, not having a care in the world. 

"Yeah! They're thinking I could be captain one day, that would be so cool! So, you know how Twilight's doing with her princess duties?" Dash asked.

"Oh, I haven't heard too much. But other than a few usual stressful moments, I heard she's doing just fine-" Fluttershy said before Rainbow interrupted her.

"Hey, who are those guys?" Rainbow pointed towards then Everfree Forest, where Fluttershy could see three forms crawling out of there.

Fluttershy and Dash decided to see what was going on and flew in the direction of the three forms walking out of the forest, as they got closer they could hear the forms speaking.

"YES! Finally! Civilization!" the smallest one shouted.

One of the forms pointed towards the two pegasi.

"Hey, do you guys see that? I think those things are coming towards us."

As Dash and Fluttershy got closer, they could see the forms more clearly. They were three ponies, specifically three foals...no, two foals and a young stallion, one of them a filly and the other a colt. The foals didn't seem that old, they looked between the ages of the Cutie Mark Crusaders and the six students at the School of Friendship. As for the stallion, he seemed to be around the age if not a few years younger than the two mares and their friends. The two pegasus mares landed in front of the three strangers and finally got a good look at the three of them, and the three ponies suddenly stared in shock and took a step back as if seeing something completely alien which they both found odd. These ponies seemed fairly ordinary, but at the same time, there was something off about them that neither mares could put their hooves on.

The young stallion was an earth pony just like the other two and the tallest of the three, he looked like he might've been a head taller than even the two mares, but he wasn't big or strong. He was really scrawny with legs that were as thin as matchsticks, the mares thought it was a result of being in the Everfree but after careful observation and seeing the foals, it seemed his skinniness was more of a result from an unhealthy lifestyle than starvation. His coat was white contrasting to his light brown baggy eyes and messy mane, and his mane had three strands of hair sticking up which they didn't think was possible, extending from his mane was an unshaven stubble that was just as uncared for as his mane with strands of beards growing longer in a few parts of his muzzle with remnants of a mustache on the end of his snout. But perhaps the strangest thing about this stallion was the fact that he had no cutie mark! Neither Dash nor Fluttershy have ever seen anything like it, most ponies would get their cutie marks at an early age, usually younger than even the two foals by his side, which made him especially curious. They could only wonder what could have caused this.

The filly was pink with a straight orange mane and greenish-brown eyes which made her stick out like a sore thumb from her two companions, she seemed to be the same age as the colt though built a few inches taller than him and a bit chubbier than both her companions, though not to the point of looking like Mrs. Cake. The filly seemed like the more normal one out of the three of them, she also has a very cheerful aura to her that was represented well in her cutie mark which was the shape of a smiley face. Actually, the fact that the two foals had cutie marks made the stallion's case even odder. Looks like she could get along well with Pinkie, which is funny since they're both pink... Dash thought.

Perhaps the strangest of the three was the little colt, he had a white coat similar to that of the stallion but with dark brown eyes and mane and his mane was wavy but unkempt, unlike the stallion's just plain messy mane. Contrary to the pink filly, the colt had a very sour and unpleasant aura, nothing sinister but it was enough to let some pony know they wouldn't have a pleasant time with this colt. The thing that caught the mares' attention was the colt's clothing, it was a messy mash of colors and styles that would have made Rarity have a panic attack and faint. The colt was wearing a purple turban with a red gemstone and feather, which raised questions on its own but that was just the beginning. He was also wearing a black t-shirt topped with a dark blue Hawaiian shirt used as a coat, and there was something on the shirts that really caught the mares' eyes and confused them more than before. The t-shirt had a large picture on it, which was of a large hat or saucer-shaped metallic object floating on top of a forest, and underneath were big white letters that formed the sentence "I WANT TO BELIEVE". Believe in what? And what does a flying metal plate have to do with believing?  Dash thought in utter confusion at staring at the colt's t-shirt. His Hawaiian shirt consisted of a pattern of the same saucer-shaped objects on the t-shirt, his clothing seemed to connect to his cutie mark which was a green question mark and was nearly covered by green short pants patterned with the same marks.

After a few seconds of observation, the mares realized that the three strangers were still staring at them with wide eyes in complete fear and confusion while hugging each other, never taking their eyes off them.

"What the hell are those things?!" the young stallion yelled while shivering intensely, which only added to the mares' confusion even more.

"Did the gay pride flag grow wings and flew off with a terrible anime girl OC before turning into horses?!" the colt asked with a scared but also mocking tone, neither Dash nor Fluttershy understood what he was trying to say.

"Guys," the pink filly spoke up, her tone significantly calmer than the other two. "I think they're supposed to be what we are right now." Dash and Fluttershy just stared at each other trying to decipher what was going on and what they were trying to say.

"Wait, really? Oh yeeaahh." the colt said while observing his own body as if it was something he had never seen before.

Finally, one of the mares spoke up.

"Um...goodness, are you three alright?" Fluttershy said with a calm and comforting voice.

"Alright? Well, let's see...we were just walking out in the woods trying to take photographic evidence of UFOs, then those weird mushrooms that I ate of the ground must've been hallucinogenic because after that I started seeing a glowing empty archway which made me reenact that scene from '2001: A Space Odyssey' when I walked through it and then I couldn't feel my fingers anymore and my friends look like weird coloured horses and we had to walk through this jungle filled with creatures that came out of an 8-year-old fantasy fan's wet dream and now we're being confronted by even WEIRDER coloured horses with wings and..." the little white colt stopped himself from continuing and redirected his attention toward the two pegasi. The colt took a few steps toward the two mares which made Fluttershy take a step back and carefully observed their wings.

"Holy shit, you two are actually winged horses...like the Pegasus!" the colt said with eyes full of amazement.

"Language!" Fluttershy shouted in shock while Rainbow just snickered, the fact the colt just swore distracted them from the fact that he didn't know what a pegasus was.

"But how? Who are you? Where are we? Why are we like this?" the pink filly momentarily panicked.

This time the mares looked worried, the filly if not all three of these ponies are suffering some form of memory loss.

"Woah, woah. Calm down there, kid. Look, we'll answer all your questions later, but you all look pretty tired and hungry, you should probably come with us to get something to eat first." Rainbow Dash said in order to try and calm the little filly.

"Rainbow Dash is right, maybe you can come with us to Sugarcube Corner. It should give you some strength back, we'll lead you there. Oh, I almost forgot to introduce ourselves! My name is Fluttershy..."

"And I'm the Awesome Rainbow Dash!" the cyan pegasus cut in striking a heroic pose.

"Who?" the colt asked in a deadpan manner.

"Rainbow Dash. The Element of Loyalty, performed the Sonic Rainboom, saved Equestria multiple times?" Rainbow answered in a slightly annoyed tone.

"Never heard of you." the colt still said in a deadpan and uncaring tone. Rainbow grumbled at that statement.

"Um, well...uh, what are your names?" Fluttershy attempted to redirect the conversation back to the original point. The pink filly was the first to answer.

"Ah, my name is Hal..."

"AHEM!" the shorter colt fake coughed stopping the pink filly from going any further before he took over the conversation.

"Um...what were your names again?" 

"Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. Why?" the yellow pegasus answered a little confused.

The colt took in the information he just heard for a moment and then focused on a spot behind the mares, and they both became embarrassed when they realized what the colt was staring at, Fluttershy in particular beginning to blush. Is that colt staring at our flanks?! Rainbow thought. After that, the colt shifted his attention to his own flank and his friends, and the mares could almost see the gears in his mind working. After a few moments, the colt finally spoke.

"Ah, well. My name is Question Mark..." the colt moved next to the pink filly "...this annoying hyperactive idiot is Smiley Face..."the filly looked at him with an irritated face, then the colt moved next to scrawny stallion still sitting on the ground "...and this braindead moron is called Doofus Dweeb!" The colt introduced both his friends with a voice full of smugness and disliking.

"HEY! How come I...OW!!!" the stallion yelled with a very angry tone before the colt kicked him hard on his foreleg and shot him a glare. The two mares just stared in shock and disbelief and winced seeing the little white colt's treatment of his friends.

"Hey, you shouldn't treat your friends like that." the yellow mare said in a quiet but stern voice.

"Yeah! That's not cool, dude." Rainbow chimed in also displeased with what she just saw. "These two stuck by your side in the Everfree Forest, you should treat them with more respect. Especially the adult. Who is he anyway? Your brother?"

"Brother?! HA! The day I'll be related to that waste of space is the day the apocalypse comes and the Great Old Ones swallow reality. There's no reason I should treat these losers with any respect, they're too stupid to live! They act like they're always by my side and help me solve my problems, but I'm the one who does all the work while they stand there like cardboard cutouts and I'm the one who has to save their asses every time!" the colt ranted with an annoyed smile.

"But even if that's true, these friends still remained by your side and didn't abandon you. Try being nicer to them." Fluttershy explained with a warm smile.

"Well, I don't really care about this kid too much. I mean, he just makes my life more miserabl...OW! WHAT THE HELL?!" the skinny stallion called Doofus Dweeb tried to explain before he was kicked on his foreleg again by the pink filly this time.

"I mean...Yeah! I'm the oldest and I'm the one who's taking care of you two! You should at least show me a little bit of respect and not treat me like an embarrassment all the time!" Doofus tried to explain to Question Mark.

"You don't want to be an embarrassment? Why don't you stop sitting in that position you're sitting where your dick is exposed enough for these two girls in front of you?" Question Mark answered with a bored and frustrated tone while pointing to the area between his friend's hind legs.

"Wait, what? OH SHI...!!!" It took the stallion a second to process what the colt just said before looking down before panicking and crossed his legs as fast as he could while trying to stand up at the same time which just resulted in him slipping and falling back to the ground.

"Hehe...God, what an idiot." Question Mark mocked in a low voice. 

Fluttershy was a bit flustered after what happened but felt bad for the poor stallion, but Rainbow couldn't help. but giggle a bit at his antics.

"Why do you have to be so embarrassed? It's not like none of us have ever seen one before. " Fluttershy attempted to comfort the stallion while helping him back to his hooves.

"Ugh, you don't need to tell us about your sex life." Question Mark said in disgust while holding a hoof in front of his face.

"Who said anything about sex?" Rainbow asked with an annoyed expression. Fluttershy was shocked to hear such a young colt talk about an inappropriate subject like that, but Rainbow has heard other foals his age talk about such things when no adults were around so it didn't surprise her as much as it did Fluttershy.

"Wait, wait. So you're telling me that you guys never wear clothes?" Doofus said with a nervous tone.

"Well, unless it's a special occasion, work-related or you just feel like wearing them I don't think there's too much of a reason to wear them." Fluttershy explained.

"Yeah, unless you're Rarity. Although I do have this jacket I like to wear a lot." Dash added.

"And you all just casually walk around in public naked with other naked ponies?" Doofus asked again, this time a little panicked. 

Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy didn't say anything, but the confusion on their face seemed to tell the scared-looking stallion all that he needed to know.

"Oh, god. This can't be happening. Don't look at me!" Doofus this time actually panicked and took a few steps back then jerked his head around desperately trying to find a place to hide from the sight of the two females.

"Oh for Christ's sake, you dweeb! They just explained being naked is normal around here." Question Mark exclaimed, clearly getting tired of the antics of the stallion.

"Yeah, Ma...I mean, Doofus." Smiley Face chimed in, the pink filly clearly didn't like addressing her young adult friend by that name. "If what they said is true, then they would've been used to seeing guys like you not wearing clothes. So you being...er, exposed wouldn't bat any eyes." she assured her friend.

"But...they..."

"But nothing! You're gonna be fine."

Question Mark cut into the conversation. "Look on the bright side, nobody's gonna laugh at how small it is anymore!"

"You know what? You're right..."

"Now people can just laugh at you for being a pathetic loser like they usually do!"

"Oh, shut up."

The two mares became extremely worried about the young stallion's condition. They've never seen a pony this uncomfortable and panicked about the fact that they weren't wearing any clothing, they could only wonder what these three especially the stallion have gone through. Jeez, what happened to this guy? Rainbow couldn't help but wonder. 

"Uh...tell you what! Why don't you come with us to town and get something to eat, then you can tell us all about you and we'll help you adjust around here. How's that sound?" Rainbow asked attempting to hide her worry behind a reassuring smile.

"Hmm...you know what? Yeah, I'm starving." the colt answered first.

"I bet there'll be lots of candy there!" the filly exclaimed.

"Eh, why not." the stallion answered plainly.

"You know, I would tell you not to take all the food to yourself. But you would probably already finish all of it by the time I reach your face from behind your ass. AHAHA...OW! GODDAMMIT!" Question Mark mocked his filly friend before she hit him on his withers. 

Normally Fluttershy would speak up and tell her not to hit another pony especially a colt, but she kept quiet. This colt was clearly treating his friends very badly, and she couldn't blame how his friends were reacting to his behavior, although that didn't mean he deserved violence. Fluttershy decided it would be best to help these ponies with their problems and help them become better.

"Alright then! Follow us, we'll lead you there." Fluttershy said before the two mares walked back to the direction of the town with the three strangers following close behind. They could see the stallion blushing and attempting to look in another direction, clearly trying not to stare at their flanks.

"Hey, uh...what's the town called anyway?" Question Mark asked from behind them, him and the filly looking a little awkward from being behind them but still being completely fine compared to their tall skinny friend.

"Oh, it's called Ponyville." Fluttershy answered.

"Ponyville? Oh my goodness, why am I getting a bad feeling about this?"

And the five of them continued to walk towards the town.
> Chapter 2: Ordering
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The two pegasi and the three earth ponies continue walking towards the town as it starts to appear is sight. The three strangers still continue to bicker amongst themselves behind the two mares. Rainbow Dash could've sworn she heard the stallion quietly yell at the colt about his own name and the colt saying that the name suits him, which caused Rainbow to wonder if the names that the colt told her and Fluttershy were their actual names, was the colt lying to them about their names? If so, why is he lying about their names? What is he trying to cover up? Rainbow decided to leave this question for later to not pressure these possibly hungry and tired youngsters.

Finally, they arrived at Ponyville where the streets were bustling with ponies of all shapes, sizes, and especially colour. The markets were full and crowded, buying their supplies for the day and the pegasi were in the sky managing the weather. The three strangers behind the two mares seemed shocked seeing these many ponies in one place and seemed downright scared seeing other ponies, walking so close to each other they almost tripped a few times. The three of them tried to take in the world around them, the colt who seemed the least afraid among them was studying every inch of what he was seeing. Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy's suspicions increased even more, these ponies weren't just scared of them, they were scared of other ponies in general! What was going on with these three?

The five of them finally arrived at Sugarcube Corner, the sunlight reflecting off its frosting-covered roof and gingerbread coloured walls. The three strangers gazed at the bakery with awe.

"Is the roof actually covered real frosting?" Question Mark asked being weirded out.

"Honestly, I never thought of that." Rainbow Dash answered anticlimactically.

"I hope it is!" Smiley Face the pink filly said then licked her lips hungrily staring at the roof.

"Gross, who knows how long that's been up there." the white colt said disgustedly.

They entered the building and walked up to the counter where Pinkie Pie and the Cakes were preparing a new stash, the pink pony was the first to notice them.

"Hi, Dashie! Hey, Fluttershy!" Pinkie waved excitedly so quick her hoof turned into a blur.

"Hey, Pinks. You won't believe what we just found." Dash prepared to explain.

Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy moved out of the way to bring the three strangers into Pinkie's sight like presenters at a show. Pinkie stared at them with wide eyes for a few seconds, clearly making the newcomers feel awkward and uncomfortable. Suddenly the pink pony leaped up in the air gasping, surprising all five of them and then fled from the scene in a blink of an eye. All the five could do was stand there dumbfounded, trying to figure out what happened.

"What's up with her?" Doofus Dweeb asked breaking the silence.

"She probably got the right idea after noticing your presence." Question Mark snickered at his own insult.

"Oh, shut up." the scrawny stallion grumbled, his tone suggesting this isn't the first time his foal friend has mocked him like this.

"I'm so sorry about that, I don't know what came over her." Mrs. Cake went over to the spot Pinkie stood a few seconds ago.

"Hello there, Fluttershy! Hello there, Rainbow Dash! Nice to see you today...Who are these two lovely youngsters and stallion behind you?" the plump blue mare tried to look behind the two pegasi from behind the counter.

"You won't believe what happened, Mrs. Cake! We found these three coming out of the Everfree Forest and they don't look like they're from around here..." Rainbow explained.

"The Everfree Forest?! What on earth would they be doing in there?" Mrs. Cake looked worriedly at the newcomers.

The three of them didn't seem to be paying any attention to the conversation happening right in front of them as they were busy curiously observing the plump earth pony mare right in front of them.

"Well, Smiley. Looks like we finally found someone even fatter than you." Question Mark muttered to his slightly taller filly friend, which granted him a scowl from the pink filly and a shocked look from Mrs. Cake.

"Question Mark! That is no way to speak to other ponies! And we do not insult other ponies because they are overweight." Fluttershy lectured the white colt.

"What insult?! I'm just stating the facts! That lady is fat as hell. If I wanted to insult her, I would say something like...You're so fat, that if you were lying in an empty bathtub and someone decided to lay on top of you they would never realise that the bathtub was empty!'" the colt attempted to defend himself but instead offended the baker even more and gained more shocked looks.

"Actually now that I think about it, her flesh would be a perfect substitute for dough." the colt continued to pour more bags of salt on the wound and digging his own grave.

"Ka...Question Mark! Stop talking....!" Smiley Face whispered loudly to the colt.

"Why? I mean even if I was trying to insult her, it's not like that big tub of lard is gonna do anything." Question Mark sneered, that last part clearly trying to offend Mrs. Cake.

The blue mare seemed like she was about to lose it any second and beat some sense into the colt, but ultimately calmed down and looked down at herself sad. Mrs. Cake then walked out of the room looking embarrassed.

"Oh, no! Don't cry, your tears could send a shockwave that could encircle the Earth three times, the Tsar Bomba's record could be broken!" Question Mark mocked as the baker turned her back on the visitors.

"Question Mark, that wasn't very nice, young stallion!" Fluttershy scolded at the white earth pony colt.

"This is the shit I have to deal with everyday when this kid is around." Doofus said to himself hoping someone would be listening.

"Dude, what gives?" Rainbow said disapprovingly.

"I mean, you can't deny that that overgrown smurf was borderline morbidly obese. I mean did you see some of the flaps of fat she's packing under there...OW!" Question Mark says before his Smiley Face shut him up with a smack to the back of the head.

"What the hell?! Don't do that! Do you know how hard hooves are, you imbecile?!" he yells to the filly.

"Oh, sure. Disregard me." the scrawny stallion grumbles to himself.

Suddenly a yellow stallion almost as skinny as Doofus came out from the other room Mrs. Cake went through with a worried face, Mr. Cake trotted toward the counter.

"Did something happen? Cup Cake walked past me looking sad and she won't talk to me! Do you know what happened to her? Mr. Cake asks slightly panicked.

"We'll explain later, right now we need have to have a word with a certain colt." Fluttershy says staring intensely at Question Mark who looked completely unfazed, he has yet to see what Fluttershy was capable of.

"Oh, but you poor things must be hungry. What can we get you?" Fluttershy's mood changed quickly remembering why they brought the strangers here in the first place.

"I could really go for a cup of coffee with a jelly doughnut right now." Doofus Dweeb says.

"I'd like two jelly doughnuts, an Oreo cheesecake and a strawberry cheesecake, and maybe a milkshake?" Smiley Face suggests, sounding like she has a lot more ideas that what she's letting out of her mouth.

"I really want a chocolate doughnut covered in lemon-flavoured sprinkles, those are my favourite!" Question Mark says hungrily.

"Don't they only sell those at Dunkin' Donuts?" the pink orange-haired filly asked.

"Well if you're gonna order as much as an average American, surely my doughnut shouldn't be too much." the colt fired back at his friend. 

Then the five of them walked over to their table.
> Chapter 3: Lunchtime
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The five of them sat at a table near the window. Mr. Cake approached their table carrying in his a tray full of everything the newcomers ordered, and the three of them began to feast. Question Mark ate his doughnut painfully slowly, all while looking out of the window daydreaming and observing the town he is in. Smiley Face wolfed down her meal so quickly she could almost rival Pinkie Pie, and something told the two pegasi mares that she wasn't eating this way because she was hungry from being lost in the Everfree, rather that this was how the filly always ate her food. Doofus Dweeb ate at just the right speed, relaxing while sipping his coffee and enjoying his doughnut, though his table manners could use some improvement. Fluttershy sat and drank her tea quietly while Rainbow was munching down on her cupcake, both of the mares unsure of what to do with the strangers or who to tell about them at the moment, but an answer should present itself sooner or later.

Question Mark continued to look out the window observing the town and the customers inside the bakery, and he finally broke the two mares' train of thought.

"You know, I just noticed something...I've been seeing a lot of females but barely any males. Are they off somewhere?" the white colt asked.

"Of course not, why do you ask?" Fluttershy asked confused.

"Well, it's just that ever since I walked into town I've seen so many girls all over the place but I've only seen like five...seven...eight guys when I walked to this bakery." Question Mark elaborated. 

"Well, that's just how few stallions Ponyville always had. Other than Appleloosa, I don't really know any place with an equal amount of stallions to mares if I'm remembering correctly. Why, are there a lot of stallions where you three come from?" Fluttershy asked.

"A helluva lot more. In fact, I remember a lot more guys than girls in my town, although I don't really know the people of my town that much so it could just be me." the colt said.

"Woah, maybe I should try visiting there sometime. Could get a better chance to score than here." Rainbow said, finally joining the conversation after keeping to herself for a while.

"Wait, wait. You're telling me there are a LOT more girls than guys in this town?" Doofus Dweeb asked, he and Smiley Face both starting to get interested in the conversation.

"Um...yes?" Fluttershy answered visibly confused.

"Wow, maybe I could get along with people easier here." the pink filly pondered.

"Well, people say 'there's plenty of fish in the sea'. If that's true then this is probably the Great Barrier Reef for me." the scrawny stallion said with sudden confidence that he was lacking the entire time the two pegasi mares knew him.

"Good luck with that, all the fish here are protected species." the white colt shot at his stallion friend.

"Laugh all you want, but I have good hopes that once I go out there not only will I finally get a girl who's interested in me, but there might even be multiple other girls fighting over me and begging me to choose one of them leaving the others jealous." Doofus describes his imaginary scenario in perfect detail with his voice full of confidence.

"That's really unrealistic expectations even for you, the only fight going on is either the girls fighting to get away from you or you fighting to desperately get their attention." Question Mark mocked. Both Fluttershy and Smiley Face looked at the colt with a weird expression.

"Gee, sounds pretty brutal. Good thing we share our stallions, huh?" Rainbow said, intrigued by the young stallion's imagination.

"Wait, what?" the three strangers looked at Rainbow Dash surprised, making the two mares confused at their reaction to their species' mating ritual.

"Share our stallions...y'know, with other mares. Court a stallion and other mares, form a herd together...why do you guys look so confused? This is basic and everyday knowledge. Actually, it's not even basic knowledge, it's the way things are supposed to be." Dash answered looking just as confused as the guests, although about different things.

"Well, let's just say that things work...differently where we come from." Question Mark says while also looking at Smiley Face.

"You can have more than one girlfriend here?! That means I can have whoever I want and not have to choose!" Doofus said happily.

"Choose? Since when were YOU able to choose?" 

"Oh, shut up."

"Hmm...wait a minute. Oh yeeaahh, I forgot. Horses and equines are polygynous." Question Mark explains to his two friends.

"Polygynous?" the stallion asks.

"It means having a relationship with more than one female."

"I know what it means! I'm not that big of an idiot."

"Well then why did you need to ask if that wasn't the case?"

"Becau...uurrgghhh!" Doofus grew more irritated by the second.

"You don't have to speak to him like that." Fluttershy attempted to calm the situation.

"Yes, yes. Feelings hurt, none of my concern. So, um...quick question. Are you guys a matriarchal society?"

"What?" the two mares looked at each other before asking.

"Matriarchal! It's an adjective, it means a society that is ruled and run by females."

"I know, I know. It's just that...why are you asking us all of these questions?" Fluttershy asked bewildered.

"Yeah, why don't you know any of this? Where are you three from, anyway? You haven't told us." Rainbow asked in turn.

The three newcomers started to look panicked and the three of them looked at each other waiting for somepony to answer. After a few seconds of just stuttering and mumbling, one of them finally spoke.

"Um...well, we're...we actually come from..." the pink filly tried to explain before the white colt interrupted her in a hurry.

"We can't remember! We can't remember anything! We have zero memory of where we came from, all we can remember was waking up in the forest. I couldn't recall anything about myself except for my name and the ungodly low intelligence of these two who call themselves my friends."

"Don't look at me, I never liked you anyway." the older stallion grumbled to himself.

"Oh, dear. That might explain why they looked so frightened when they saw us, they probably went through something so horrible in that forest that they can't even remember what they're supposed to be anymore." Fluttershy whispered to her cyan blue friend beside her.

"Yeah, these guys seem to have gone through a lot. But I don't know, Flutters. Something about their story seems kinda off, especially that colt." Dash whispered back while staring at Question Mark full of suspicion.

"It does seem a bit strange, but they're obviously tired right now. We can ask questions about them later, right now let's just focus on helping them, alright?" Fluttershy replied trying to make sure the guests couldn't hear their conversation.

"Yeah, alright."  Then Rainbow and her yellow friend turned back to the three in front of them.

"Okay, so you guys can't remember anything about where you came from?" Dash asks the newcomers.

"Uh, yeah." Smiley Face answers a little hesitantly.

"And you also forgot how any basic stuff works?"

"Well, other than breathing, eating, drinking, and speaking, that is correct." Question Mark answers.

"Oh, Goddess. We might have to do a lot of explaining and teaching to do." the yellow pegasus gasps.

"Yes, please. We are completely clueless as to how your society works, I think things work differently here than how it was where we came from."

"Oh, so it's not just because of memory loss?"

"Well, we can't remember anything but I'm pretty sure that our town and society functioned a lot differently."

"Uh-huh." Rainbow said with her eyebrow raised.

"I noticed that you said Goddess instead of God, so returning to my original question: Is this supposed a matriarchal society?" Question Mark continues to ask his question.

"Why are you asking that?" Smiley Face whispers to her friend.

"Because horse herds are female-led. So if we take that into consideration, their society should be female-led too." Question Mark whispers back.

"Um...well, yes. Ponies have been led by mares for most of our history, all of our current rulers are mares, the mayor of this town is a mare. Though to not be rude, there have been some stallion leaders like Shining Armour and King Sombra. Oh, he was probably not a good example to use for stallion leader." Fluttershy explained but regretted her last example.

"Interesting. What about that 'Goddess' thing? Do you ponies believe that the creator of the universe is female too?"

"Um...no, I think that's supposed to refer to Princess Celestia for how she ruled and protected our land for a thousand years. Though I heard from my friend Twilight there are certain groups of ponies, mostly mares that believe there is a higher female power that created the world by giving birth out of her to it just like how a mare gives birth to a foal from her...oh, no. I probably shouldn't explain any further. I'm sorry, I shouldn't explain something like that to little foals, and I don't really know that much about those kinds of things, Twilight's usually the one who knows more about these things."

"Okay, okay. I'll try to only ask basic questions because it seems that's all your mind would be able to process."

"Wait, so where you come from ponies say 'God'? Sounds like where you come from is patriarchal."

"Patriarchal? That means a place run by stallions right? Why's that so surprising, Flutters? Appleloosa is run by guys and no one makes a big deal out of it." Rainbow Dash finally joined the conversation after being absent for a while.

"U-um...no, I mean that Appleloosa is just run by stallions, where these three comes from sound like it's very focused on stallions. Not that there's anything wrong with that, I don't wanna sound like I'm against stallions." Fluttershy answered a little timidly.

"Eh, you worry too much, Banana Strawberry Girl. And you're right about where we came from, though you shouldn't feel bad for offending the ones who live there." Question Mark reassured for once.

"So back to questions, you said that peo...er, ponies here form herds which are basically romantic and sexual relationships consisting of one or two males and several females, right?" the colt asked.

"Yes, we do. Though I don't know if I should talk about...S-E-X around a colt and a filly your age." Fluttershy said nervously.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever. And the mares are also the leaders or dominant ones in the relationship instead of the stallion?"

"Well, of course. The mares have always been the ones in charge in a herd relationship, though 'leader' and 'dominant' sound like very strange words to use."

"So mares are in charge of everything here?"

"Not everything, but we do take up the most important positions. Nowadays, stallions are now allowed to actually be in a highly powerful position. Though there are still very few, it's better than nothing. Back then stallions were forbidden from having so much power because it wasn't their place back then, but I'm glad we don't think that way anymore."

"So you're saying that not only are there a lot more girls than guys here, but girls are the ones in charge?! Wow, I never thought this day would come, when what I dreamed of would come true. You hear that, guys? I guess that means you two should start obeying ME from now on!" Smiley Face turns to her two friends with confident commanding authority.

"Don't try to be a smartass, Smiley. We're ponies, not fucking hyenas." the colt said in a deadpan tone, his language causing a gasp from Fluttershy and a minor surprised look from Rainbow Dash, but the yellow pegasus decided to address that later.

"Smiley, you shouldn't speak to colts or stallions like that, that's not nice. They're not your slaves."

"What?!" the pink filly gasped.

"Haha, you just got fucked over by your own cockiness." the white colt laughed at his filly friend.

"And that's another thing, we need to take care of that language and your rude behavior, young stallion!" Fluttershy pointed at Question Mark and spoke in a hushed but intense voice.

"Oh, come on!" now it was the pink filly's turn to laugh, while Doofus Dweeb just sat there unable to take any more of the two foals' shenanigans.

"Well, if we're talkin' about discipline here, I think I know the first place to go." Rainbow added once more.

"Alright then, we'll make sure to take them somewhere fitting for the afternoon, and later on we'll tell the rest of our friends about them. But first, I think we need to pay for all this food they ordered." Fluttershy looked at the table worriedly.

"I would pay for it, but I don't I've got any cash on me." Doofus Dweeb said to the yellow pegasus.

"Oh, please. Don't worry! Let us do it, you shouldn't have to be the one to pay. Wait right here, we'll be right back." and the yellow mare walked off towards the counter.

"Um...Rainbow? Do you have some extra bits I can borrow?"

"Uh, hang on. I think I got some spare change in my saddlebag."





The three strangers watched as the two inhabitants who guided them through the town walked off.

"Do you think they suspected anything?" the pink filly asked the white colt.

"Nah, just keep being yourselves and they'll just think you're weird." the white colt answered.

"Well, I don't think I wanna do that. I'm already considered a freak at home, I don't wanna be seen as one here." the tall scrawny stallion said.

"Well, they're gonna think that of you regardless if they find out about you or not."

"Oh, shut up. So how the hell are we gonna go home?"

"Why are you asking me that?"

"You're the one who knows how this kind of bullshit works, so of course I'm gonna ask you!"

"Jeez, calm your ass down. I hate this place too but we've only been in this place for less than a day, I can't look for an answer THAT fast."

"Well, hopefully we don't go home too quickly. I'm actually starting to like this place." the pink filly cut in.

"You think ANY place we go to is amazing." the white colt shot at the filly.

"I know, but I think if we give this place a chance we could at least enjoy it before going home. We could find a lot of cool stuff here and maybe make new amazing friends."

"Hmm...Yeah, in a place where girls are in charge and guys can have multiple girlfriends I could actually have a chance here!" the stallion contemplated.

"My God, you two are complete imbeciles! First one of you wants to go home, now you two want to waste time making idiot friends and getting into relationships that aren't even gonna last long because we're not even supposed to be here!" the colt yelled at his two companions.

"You're too pessimistic. Try looking around, maybe you'll find something worth taking from about this place." the filly explained.

The colt grumbled to himself and looked outside the window, before seeing something that caught his eye.

"Actually, I think there is. Look!" he pointed out the window so his two friends will see what he's seeing.

It was a unicorn mare carrying her luggage with her magic, and the strangers looked in awe. Then they notice a tree-shaped structure in the distance that seemed to be made by a crystal none of them have ever seen before.

The colt starts getting an idea in his head.

"From what I've gathered, it seems magic is a very common everyday thing around here. You were right, this place is getting a lot more interesting. We should learn more about what this place has. Who knows, maybe in the end we actually might have something to take from this place when we go home."
> Chapter 4: The Walk
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The two pegasi mares and the three strangers walk through the town of Ponyville, the mares leading the way while the newcomers look around to take in more of their surroundings. They all stared in awe at the citizens of the town, they seemed to be marveled at seeing other ponies. After a while of observing, they turn toward the two biggest and most eye-catching structures in the town in front of them.

"Hey, what's that huge crystal tree building thing over there?" Doofus asked.

"Oh, that was Twilight's old castle before she moved to Canterlot. Now it's mostly Starlight who lives there." Rainbow Dash answered for him.

"Wait, so this 'Twilight', is she like some sort of queen or princess? And you're friends with her? That's so cool!" Smiley Face said enthusiastically, leaping with joy during the last sentence.

"They didn't even answer your question yet." Question Mark mumbled mostly to himself.

"Yeah, she's the princess and the ruler of Equestria now, pretty cool. We don't really have queens that much, for some reason."

This visibly confused the young colt. "What? That doesn't make any sense. How do you have kings and princesses but not queens? Like, how does that work?"

"Well...honestly, I don't really know. I don't really look into that sort of stuff."

"And you're friends with the ruler of all the land?! Oh my god, that's awesome! Most of our interactions with our government are usually pretty bad and end up negatively." Smiley Face continued to admire.

"Yeah, individuals like you are the last ones I'd expect to have good relations with the government. Miss Skittle Hair over there looks like someone the government would arrest constantly for always causing a scene on the streets." Question Mark added, which only caused his friends to roll their eyes.

"Yeah, Twilight. Feels like only yesterday when she was just that dorky egghead I bumped into the mud while flying, now she's sitting on a throne in Canterlot running everything. She grew up so fast, though not as fast as I can fly, hehe." Rainbow momentarily reminisced. 

"Uh-huh, yeah. So uh, this Canterlot...is it supposed to be the capital? If so, where is it?" Question Mark asked showing absolutely no interest in what Rainbow was saying, contrasting his filly friend who was on the verge of tearing up.

"Oh, Canterlot's right on top of that mountain over there, see? And yeah, it is pretty much the center of all of Equestria." Rainbow Dash pointed toward the mountain in the distance in which the three strangers followed her gaze, seeing a silhouette of a huge city and castle on the side of the mountain peak. The sight of which made them stare in awe and amazement.

"Woah..." Doofus muttered.

"So awesome." Smiley said breathlessly with wide eyes.

"Ugh! Can you stop saying something is awesome every five fucking minutes?!" Question Mark yelled at the pink filly, it seemed whatever patience he was storing has reached its limit.

"Language, young stallion!" Fluttershy yelled. Not too aggressive, but a little loud for what Rainbow is used to.

"What?! Come on! This chick's the one pissing me off and I'm the one who gets the scolding?!" Question Mark attempted to defend himself and shift the blame to his dark pink friend.

"Behave yourself. Stop being a big meanie, or else you'll get...the Stare!" Fluttershy said with dramatic intensity at the last part, closing her face with the colt's and staring at him with one wide eye.

Question Mark did nothing but scoffed. "Pfffttt! What? The Stare? Why would I be threatened by a stare? What am I, six years old? If you're gonna threaten me, you should at least use something threatening."

Rainbow knew the colt had just made a big mistake, and Fluttershy was about to unleash all of Tartarus on him. Once the colt stopped talking, Fluttershy stared as intensely as she could. This made the colt jerk his head back in surprise and gave an uncomfortable look, which was exactly what the mares were expecting. Oddly enough, the colt's uncomfortableness didn't seem to come from the Stare, it was CAUSED by it but not for the reason Fluttershy might think. This was proven true as the colt's reaction as Fluttershy stared for seconds straight was:

"....what're you doing?"

Fluttershy continued to stare, a lot more intense this time.

"Are you trying to scare me with that, 'cause it's not working. My mom can make more terrifying disapproving stares than that." 

That was enough to make Fluttershy stop. "W-what? I don't understand, that usually works."

"Yeah, except for Discord." Rainbow added from behind her.

"Jee, the inhabitants here must be weak as hell if all it takes to make them submit themselves is a stare from a quiet yellow broad with hair that makes her look like a rape victim." Question Mark says mockingly.

Now this really pissed Rainbow off. The constant negative comments and rude behavior already annoyed her to her limits, but insulting one of her best friends like that was crossing the line, who did this colt think he was?!  

Rainbow Das stepped in front of Fluttershy and put herself between her friend and the colt in front of her. Rainbow stared him in the eyes with a face full of rage, while the colt just looked at her bored with a slight smirk.

"Listen up, buddy! You do NOT insult me or my friends like that! Because if you do, I'm gonna teach you a lesson!"

"Uh-huh. And what's the lesson?"

"Oh, I'll tell you! I'll...uh...I'm gonna...er...oh, no." Rainbow tried to threaten the colt but stopped herself when she realized what that would mean, she almost threatened to harm a foal, and a colt nonetheless. She should never stoop that low because a foal said some bad, but he did insult her friend, so...

But what Rainbow was thinking didn't stop the colt's mocking spree. "Wow, nothing? Yeah, kinda what I expected. Well, good thing you've got that prismatic mane so nobody notices the low density in your head, or would it be thick and high density? Is the inside of your skull solid or gas? Because either way there's no brain in there."

Dash couldn't take it anymore, this colt just insulted her and her friend, and he thought he was so high and mighty with the way he spoke down to her. Rainbow lost control that moment, and let her body and anger speak first before her mind. She wished she calmed down sooner because she struck the colt with her hoof to his face. She didn't hit too hard, but it did leave a mark on his face. Rainbow's eyes widened and she winced as she saw what she had done, in the form of a big bruise on the side of the colt's face, a slight cut on the cheek, a bleeding gum, and a fallen out tooth. She's lucky she had some restraint, because who knows what she could've done if she released her full force on him.

Question Mark looked back at her with either an enraged or merely irritated face trying to hide the pain. "OW! Okay, I'm sorry! Jeez, calm your tits."

"Oh my gosh! I'm so sorry, I don't know what came over me! I didn't mean it! Are you alright?! Are you hurt?" Rainbow said frantically checking the colt's face.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine. God, you're annoying." Question Mark tried pushing Rainbow's hooves away from his face.

Both Smiley Face and Doofus Dweeb had completely different reactions to what had just occurred. Smiley looked completely shocked and worried about her friend as well, while Doofus just smiled and was clearly trying to hold back laughter. When Fluttershy noticed the panicking Rainbow Dash, she immediately trotted over to her to try and calm her down, saying all the usual things anypony would say in a situation like this and don't need to be mentioned. After Rainbow was assured that she was just angry and it wasn't her fault, she turned back to Question Mark who was rubbing the side of his face where Dash hit him.

"Look, I'm really sorry. I wasn't thinking back there, and I shouldn't have done that especially to a foal. There's no excuse for what I just did..."

"Well, technically there was a pretty good excuse for doing that." Doofus interrupted to add his input, which was followed by Smiley Face and even Question Mark agreeing with what he just said.

"Yeah, well...the point is, that was really stupid for me to do and I understand if you're mad or hate me..."

"Nah, it's alright. I deserved that." Question Mark said while waving his hoof at Rainbow.

"Yeah, you kinda did." Smiley Face said from behind him.

Rainbow was honestly surprised at how the colt responded, she at the very least expected him to hold a huge grudge against her after doing something like that, but he just brushed it off like it was no big deal. "R-really? You forgive me?" 

"Uh...yeah, sure." Question Mark answered plainly.

"Ohmaigosh, thank you so much! I thought you'd just be mad at me." Rainbow said excitedly, feeling very moved by how the colt handled the situation, though Question Mark just responded by raising his eyebrow.

"Wow, Question Mark. I didn't expect you to be somepony who would be this calm after all I've seen from you." Fluttershy said just as surprised as everyone else.

"I mean, she's not the first per...one who's wanted to hit me in the face whenever I speak, she just happens to be the first one to do something about it." Question Mark shrugged.

"I'm one of them, by the way." Doofus Dweeb raised his hoof.

"Shut up, Dweeb! No one cares about your contribution!" the colt yelled to the stallion behind him.

"Well, let's just all agree to put this whole mess behind us and just continue our walk to the castle." Fluttershy cut between the colt and the stallion.

"Yeah, let's just do that." Smiley Face joined in what Fluttershy was doing and acted all 'fun counselor'-like towards her two friends.

When the mares started to continue the walk, Doofus said one more thing to the colt. "You know, I wish I could've done that to you."

"I wish I could do that to everyone I know and everyone in the world." Question Mark added his own idea After that they continued their walk.

Not even a minute after continuing their walk to the Castle of Friendship in silence, the colt spoke up again. "Hey, uh...Can we go back to the questions and answers thing?"

Rainbow Dash was still a little nervous about speaking to the colt after what she did to him, but considering the colt seemed to be putting the whole ordeal behind him she figured she would as well and answer whatever questions he may have. "Sure, go ahead, dude."

"Is there a story behind that crystal tree castle thing? I mean, it sticks out like an aristocrat in the slums amongst these cheap huts made of regular bricks and shitty haystack roofs." Fluttershy was about to scold Question Mark for swearing again, but Rainbow knew this would just annoy the colt again and cause another ruckus so she stopped her friend before she got to say anything.

"Well, that's actually a really cool story, if you ask me. A few years ago when Twilight was still getting used to her princess duties and stuff, this really huge evil centaur named Tirek escaped from Tartarus stealing Equestria's magic." Rainbow explained in a way that dramatized Tirek's evilness.

"Wait. Tartarus, centaurs and pegasuses? Isn't that like..." Smiley Face whispered to Question Mark yet again.

"Yeah, I'm thinking it too." Question Mark whispered back.

Gee, these kids really like whispering and keeping secrets, huh? Rainbow thought to herself.

"Uh, before we go on, I wanna ask a few questions real quick."

"Wow, you really like asking questions, huh?" Rainbow chuckled.

"Well I'm a curious individual, and I like to research stuff as much as possible to get to the bottom of things."

"Ha! Sounds like you could really get along well with Twilight."

"Eh, I don't know. It could go two ways: I could either finally find someone who's as intelligent as I am and I can level with after spending a while in these two dry coconut's town where everyone's IQ is Antarctica's temperature in Celsius," the colt said while pointing to his two friends by his side which added to their annoyance. "Or I'll just find someone who's just as annoying as I am and in the end, it's just a fight to the death with boredom as the weapon." After Question Mark finished, he looked at Rainbow Dash, who was looking back at him with wide and confused eyes trying to digest what the colt just said.

After realizing his long rant, Question Mark tried bringing the conversation back on track. "Actually, you know what? Let's just stop talking about me and you just answer my questions, otherwise we'll just lose track and get lost in the endless sea of conversation."

"Uh, yeah. Let's just do that."

"Okay, what was I gonna ask? Oh yeah, about Tartarus. Is it Cerberus, the three-headed dog who's guarding it?"

"Yeah, it is. You know a few years ago before Twilight was even a princess, Cerberus left his post and caused some ruckus in the town. Twilight told us this might've caused Tirek to escape."

"Uh-huh, and are there also hydras, chimeras, and minotaurs here as well?"

"Oh, yeah. They're in the Everfree Forest where we found you, that place is crawling with all sorts of monsters like cragadiles and rocs."

"Okay, we were right." Question Mark whispered to the pink filly beside him.

"Wait, you're telling me you went through the Everfree without encountering a single monster? Damn, you guys are lucky." Rainbow said before getting a glare from Fluttershy for doing the exact thing they were encouraging the colt not to do, which Dash replied with an innocent smile and a quiet 'sorry'.

"Anyway, sorry I interrupted your story about that T. Rex centaur guy. You may continue." Question Mark said to the cyan pegasus walking in front of him.

"Oh, right. Where was I? Oh yeah, the princesses sent our friend Discord to hunt Tirek down, but Tirek must've said some stuff to him which made him betray us and help Tirek grow more powerful." Rainbow Dash continued.

"Who's this Discord guy you keep mentioning?" Question Mark interrupted her yet again.

"Discord's the Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony, he was once a big...meanie who tried to take over Equestria but I helped him embrace friendship and now he's our friend and  he has helped us so many times." Fluttershy answered with enthusiasm.

"You're friends with a princess and a chaos spirit, is there anything you guys CAN'T do?" Smiley Face said amazed like always.

"Spirit of Chaos? Sounds like Nyarlathotep." Question Mark muttered to himself.

Rainbow on the other hoof was getting a little irritated. "Dude, you want me to finish the story or not?" she shot at the colt.

"Right, right, sorry. Do continue, I won't interrupt you anymore." Question Mark said waving his hoof.

"Well, after Tirek betrayed Discord and fought Twilight and stuff, Discord apologized and gave Tirek's necklace to her which activated her element which turned out to be the final key to opening a chest that appeared when we returned the elements to the Tree of Harmony..." 

"What?" Question Mark and his two friends said completely baffled at what they were hearing, clearly having a hard time following what Dash was saying.

"Eh, it's a long story." Rainbow tried to prevent herself from answering the strangers' questions. She was clearly exhausted answering them all and annoyed since everything they were asking were things everypony in Equestria should know by now. Like who doesn't know about the Elements of Harmony, Tirek's attack on Equestria, the way their society functions, and all that crap?! Those things are probably stuff they teach in schools by now or something. But since Rainbow knew that these three probably went through some weird and scary ordeals and can't remember anything, she decided to calm herself down and help them understand what they're dealing with. She's still not gonna answer every single one of their questions, though.

Rainbow continued. "So we unlocked the chest, got superpowers and defeated Tirek and returned the magic to Equestria preventing its destruction, and then the chest floated away in some rainbow to that exact spot, and this huge castle just sprouted out of the ground which is now the Castle of Friendship."

"Woah, cool. You guys must be like heroes to your entire land or something!" Smiley Face said awe-struck which irritated Question Mark.

"Heroines, actually. And yeah, we kinda are."

"That sounds like some DragonBall Z shit." Doofus said just as surprised at what he heard.

"Yeah, that sounds badass and all. But Castle of Friendship? That sounds stupid as hell." Question Mark said.

"I mean the name does sound kinda...frou-frou? Girly? I don't know. But it was quite a reward for all the things we did for those past years and thanks to the Map that appeared in the castle it made us help even more ponies and solve a lot more friendship problems than we thought we ever could. I mean, it even made Gilda and me friends again after hating each other for like, a couple years? But now we're cool, and she even started doing good stuff to other griffins in Griffinstone." Rainbow explained with memories flooding back in.

"Friendship problems? Are those like international relationship issues or petty bickering among two brats?" Question Mark asked.

"Well, it's pretty much any pony that's suffering some sort of personal problem like misunderstandings, fights, something that's harming their entire village or it can be really big dangerous problems like a supervillain trying to destroy the world!" Rainbow explained with her usual dramatization of stories.

Smiley Face gets more intrigued by Rainbow's stories every second. "So other than a radar that tells you where someone's having a problem, the map can also function as a supervillain tracker? Tha..."

"If you say 'that's so cool' one more time, I will rip your vocal cords out." Question Mark said to the slightly taller filly through tightly clenched teeth while holding out a folded hoof to her face.

"Sorry..." she replied with a quiet voice looking away from the colt.

"Yeah, that's what I used to call it when the Pony of Shadows got loose." Dash said pretending to not notice what the colt just said.

Fluttershy angrily gestured to Rainbow to do something about how the colt just threatened his friend, but Rainbow just gestured back that she would, but she doesn't want things to get ugly between the mares and the colt considering the colt has a hobby of pissing ponies off. It could result in them harming an already damaged and confused colt.

Thankfully Doofus was able to distract everypony from that. "Huh, so I guess you guys are like the..."

"Avengers."

"Justice League."

Question Mark's two friends looked at him weirdly, which caused him to look worried.

"I mean, I don't really like DC but you gotta admit they're pretty cool, too."

"Huh, Justice League. I like that name. Maybe we could use that." Rainbow thought.

"Yeah, just make sure none of us get sued." Question Mark mumbled to himself.

"What?"

"Nothing. About those 'friendship problems': I gotta say, it's kinda pathetic if you need the national hero...ines to solve your petty personal issues and bickering or whatever it is you go through, I don't know."

"Well, you'd be surprised how those 'petty personal problems' could cause a lotta huge problems. I mean, just ask Starlight later."

The five of them still haven't arrived at the castle, but they are getting close. They could start to see the school from where they were.

"Um, hey. Can I ask one more question? I'm not gonna ask anymore after this, for now anyway." Question Mark broke the silence one more time.

Man, this kid doesn't stop. Rainbow thought. But she decided to let the colt have his way this last time. "Alright, go ahead, kid."

"What's that fancy chateau-looking building beside the castle on the side of that mound surrounded by waterfalls and a pond?" Question Mark pointed toward the school.

"Oh, that's the School of Friendship. Twilight built that school to teach ponies and other creatures about 'respecting differences and communicating', basically teaching every creature about friendship values and whatnot. She used to be headmare there, but ever since she became Ruler of Equestria it's now run by Starlight." Rainbow explained.

Smiley Face seemed happy and proud to hear that, Question Mark as expected, had a completely different reaction.

"What?" the colt said flabbergasted like it was the most absurd thing he ever heard in his life.

"Why? Is something wrong with that?" Rainbow asked, genuinely confused why the colt reacted the way he did.

"I mean, I'm all for teaching respect and tolerance. But...a school of friendship? Seriously? And this is the princess who built that, so I'm guessing a lot of the country's finances are wasted on it. Shouldn't whatever that school is teaching be stuff we would've learned back in elementary school. I mean it's almost as stupid as building an entire museum just to teach people tolerance. Oh, wait, that exists? Why am I not surprised?!" Question Mark ranted mostly to himself.

"Well, I don't see anything wrong with that. I think it's great that they take friendship as their main priority. We need more of what you guys are doing, especially where we come from." Smiley Face assured her friend.

"Well I can definitely agree on that last part, but I disagree with the first. I think you ponies are way too obsessed with this whole friendship thing." 

"I wish I had real friends." Doofus Dweeb randomly added.

"I mean come on, Castle of Friendship? School of Friendship? Friendship problems? Friendship lessons? Am I missing anything here?" Question Mark ranted again.

"Well, Twilight is the Princess of Friendship, she formed the Council of Friendship consisting of her, Rainbow, me, and all our other friends, and our main belief is that friendship is magic." Fluttershy explained with a smile.

Question Mark pursed his lips irritatingly while extending a hoof to Fluttershy's direction as if to present what she just said to prove a point. "See? Right there! I mean, don't get me wrong, we are social creatures so socializing is an important part of our lives but you guys aren't just romanticizing it, you're straight-up worshipping it. You're probably one of those weirdos who believe all that 'power of friendship' bullcrap, aren't ya?"

"Hey, it's not bullcrap! It's real and it's helped us overcome so many obstacles over the years and even helped us saved Equestria's flank multiple times! Though I kinda agree that Twilight can get a little annoying with her friendship lectures, sometimes I wish I could tell her to shut up like Starlight did when we first met her. She constantly has to lecture somepony about sciency egghead stuff or morals every time somepony does something wrong." Rainbow Dash said.

"Wow, this Twilight chick sounds like a fucking loser." Question Mark chuckled hearing what Dash said.

The colt's comment caused Fluttershy to gasp and Rainbow Dash to be enraged a second time. "Hey! I told you not to talk about my friends like that, buddy!" Rainbow turned around and prodded her hoof to the colt's chest.

"Or what? We both know you can't harm me 'cause if you do I'll report child abuse on your ass, Skittles. It would be a shame if that happened considering you're a national icon." Question Mark said with a slight smirk on his face.

Rainbow hesitated, and eventually went back to walking. Behind the colt, his two friends looked at them with worried faces.

"I mean, she seems to have this unhealthy attraction to the concept of friendship. I'm betting that she was a shut-in with no physical contact with anybody in the outside world and mostly just views the world through some other media, wasn't she?" Question Mark speculated.

"Actually...yeah, she was. That was pretty accurate. She used to lock herself in her library and barely interact with anypony, but now she's a lot more social and hangs out with other ponies and trusts them a lot more than she used to." Rainbow said genuinely surprised.

Question Mark smirked, gesturing his hoof to Rainbow Dash's explanation. "See? What'd I tell you? The ones who spend most of their lives cooped up and ignorant of the outside world will start obsessing themselves over the things they missed out on to the point it starts to consume them."

"You're one to talk. You always coop yourself up in your tent researching magic, conspiracies, ufos, magic, and whatever weird stuff it is you find out about." Smiley Face shot at the colt.

"But at least I'm not ignorant of the outside world. If she believes in friendship as much as what I'm hearing, who's to say some random pony doesn't take advantage of her and make her life a living hell?" 

"Actually, that happened to our friend Rarity a few years ago when we went to Manehatten ago. Her dress style got stolen after sharing it with another pony and she became really sad when she got back to us." Fluttershy explained.

"Well, she must've learned her lesson not to trust anyone after that."

"No, she learned to always be generous no matter what."

"Wow, then she's just as stupid as the Twilight chick, then. If there's anything what I do has taught me is to trust no one, especially if you're involved with dangerous individuals like I am. They'll do anything to take back the files I stole from them."

"Hey! Rarity's not stupid, especially not Twilight." Fluttershy scolded. She was actually curious as to what the colt was talking about in the rest of his story but decided to take care of the other matter at hoof first.

"Yeah, Twilight's easily the smartest girl I know!" Rainbow backed Fluttershy up.

"Then I don't know if that says more about Twilight or you guys." Question Mark said. Fluttershy's face became sadder and Rainbow was trying her best not to do something about the colt's behavior.

"Plus, I'm not wrong about her obsession with friendship involving the school. I know she's royalty but just look at how fancy that building is! Like, how much money did she waste building a school like that? And her students are obviously no better since they probably threw away all their life savings going to a school about relationship issues, making that school the biggest money-wasting degree since gender studies." Question Mark explained.

Rainbow was about to give the colt a piece of her mind before Fluttershy stopped anything from going any further with her announcement. "Why look at that, we've arrived." the yellow pegasus gestured to the castle that's right in front them now.

The tree-shaped castle loomed over the five, with its crystal surface reflecting the sunlight. The sight filled the three strangers with amazement at the structure.

"Woah, it's so much bigger up close." Smiley gaped.

"Everything is bigger up close, Smiley." Question Mark said frustrated.

"Yeah, you're right. But you gotta admit it's huge."

"Of course. It's a castle, it's supposed to be huge. But yeah, this is a marvel of a structure."

"This should be fun, the fanciest place I've ever been to in my life's a mall." Doofus said looking at the castle in front of them.

"That and the fancy restaurants you keep wasting your money on for your failed first dates that dump you on the same night." Question Mark mocked the young stallion.

"Shu...Okay, you're not wrong."

"Have I ever been?" Question Mark answered.

The five of them went up the steps and went through the huge door into a hallway full of doors and crystal pillars, both Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash suddenly remembering the day Twilight was moving out to Canterlot when they all hugged in these halls. At the other end of the hall, they see a light purple form in a kite-patterned sleeping robe levitating a cup of tea. It was Starlight Glimmer, who strangely looked like she just woke up eventhough it was the middle of the afternoon, Rainbow thought it must be because she must've been 'busy' with her herd late last night but Rainbow didn't want to delve too deep into that thought.

"Oh! Hi there, Fluttershy. Hey there, Dash." Starlight greeted her two friends.

"Hey there, Starlight. Something happened today you might wanna hear about. By the way, are Trixie and Sunburst here?" Rainbow asked.

"Sure, we're just having brunch, I was just looking around." Starlight looked behind her two friends. "Who are they?" she pointed at the three strangers trying to act normal but instead made them look weirder.

Fluttershy trotted over their direction to introduce the newcomers. "Oh, they're the reason we wanted to come see you. We found these three outside the Everfree Forst. This is Smiley Face."
Fluttershy introduced the chubby pink filly.

"Hello, there." the filly greeted cheerfully.

"This is...Doofus Dweeb." Fluttershy introduced the tall scrawny stallion, although uncomfortable saying his name. Even Starlight raised an eyebrow at the young stallion's name.

"Hey, there." the scrawny stallion attempted to introduce himself smoothly.

"And this is Question Mark." Fluttershy introduced the white colt.

"Um...hi?" the colt awkwardly tried to introduce himself.

Suddenly Starlight noticed the bruise on the colt's face. "Oh, Goddess! What happened to your face?" Starlight touched the bruise on the colt's face.

Rainbow Dash almost panicked when that came up again, but considering she already apologized and talked things out with the colt, she knew Question Mark would explain everything to Starlight and clear up what happened.


...or at least that's what everypony thought he would do.



"IT WAS HER! That rainbow-haired girl hit me! We were just talking and she suddenly struck me across the face and knocked out my favorite tooth and caused my gum to bleed! Now I probably won't be able to eat properly anymore!" Question Mark cried hysterically while pointing at Rainbow's direction.

"WHAT?!?" Rainbow shouted. She looked in the direction of the colt's two friends, and they looked both surprised yet also expectant of this.

"What?! Rainbow, how could you?!" Starlight looked disappointingly and shocked at Rainbow.

"Come on, I didn't mean it!" Rainbow defended herself.

"Didn't mean it?! You struck a colt in the face!"

"I didn't know what I was thinking! I lost control for a moment. Flutters, you saw what happened! Tell her!" 

"W-w-well, the colt was saying bad things about me and her." Fluttershy attempted to explain what happened.

"Even if that's the case, you don't hit a foal just because they said mean things to you!" Starlight scolded. "Let's just go to the dining room, you can tell me all about these three. And Rainbow, you better have a better excuse for doing what you did because this could get you in trouble for this!" Starlight said pointing at Dash.

As the six of them walked toward the dining room, Rainbow looked completely defeated after what happened. She saw Question Mark walking off following the others with a grin completely abandoning his sad and scared expression.

Rainbow poked him in the back and the colt looked back at her. "What the heck, dude?! I thought we agreed about what happened!" Rainbow said in a hushed voice so nopony else would hear. 

"Well you didn't expect me to let you off the hook without at least a little payback, did you? Don't worry, I do this to everyone who fucks me over, not just you. Also, I've had this shattered tooth on the right side of my jaw for a few years now, so I always had to use my left side to chew food. But now you knocked out a tooth on my left side, so that last part about 'not eating properly for a while is a possibility." Question Mark explained then trotted off, leaving Rainbow Dash completely bummed out.

And the six of them continued to walk through the hallway.
> Chapter 5: The Castle
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Rainbow Dash moped to herself as she walked with the other five toward the castle's dining room, and she kept staring at the colt walking in front of her who told on her to one of her friends. She couldn't believe that colt would sell her out like that after acting like all is forgiven, he even talked about her like she was some malicious foal beater. If Question Mark's words get out to the rest of her friends before hers, it might cause a huge problem for her, especially if one of her friends decide to tell somepony else before she gets a chance to explain, though she shouldn't have a hard time figuring out which one it would be. Suddenly Smiley Face walks to Question Mark's side and started whispering to him, Rainbow leaned her head closer to listen to what they could possibly be talking about now.

"Hey, why did you do that?" Smiley Face asked quietly to the colt.

"Do what?"

"You know what I'm talking about!"

"Well the candy you bought was so good and I just couldn't help myself..."

"No, I'm talking about Rainbow Dash!"

"Yeah, I knew that. I was just messing with you." Question Mark snickered while Smiley just looked at him unamused.

"Alright, alright. I mean, that LGBT supporter just knocked a tooth from the left side of my mouth, now I have to chew with my right side that has a shattered tooth, do you know how much it hurts to chew with a shattered tooth?! Not very pleasant. And besides, did you really think I would forgive her for hitting me in the face that quickly? I'm not the type that just forgives someone *snap* just like that without getting at least a little revenge."

"But lying to her friend accusing her of child abuse, don't you think that's a little too far?"

"Eh, well. What ends up happening to her social life is none of my concern."

"Why are you such a jerk?" 

"I don't know. I just am." the colt answered plainly.

"You really need to stop it, because if it goes on my sister and my parents will forbid me from ever seeing you again."

"Well, they're not here right now, are they? Look, I really hope you stop getting on my case for these gullible idiots, they're none of our concern. All we should focus on is gathering the stuff necessary for research and evidence, find a way to get back home and not get too attached with this place. Ever read stories where characters got too used to being at someplace that they abandon their home?"

Everything the colt has said just confirms her doubts about him. Evidence? Gullible idiots? Now Rainbow was sure this colt was up to no good, and he clearly remembers his home more than he's admitting judging from how much he wants to leave. Dash first thought they might be changeling spies but then she remembered that that was a long time ago and that she just accidentally had an extremely xenophobic thought so she tossed that theory out the window. All of their known enemies are defeated, so if this colt is a threat then he's definitely a new one. First, she's gotta warn her friends that Question Mark and possibly his friends are not to be trusted. And luckily she doesn't have to worry about her friends calling her crazy because of their encounters with Cozy Glow, which is one thing she can be thankful about with that monster of a filly so they never underestimate where their enemies can come from.

They finally arrive in the dining room where sure enough, Sunburst and Trixie, who are now Starlight's herdmates were sitting there drinking and eating their afternoon breakfast. Sunburst looked particularly exhausted, and Rainbow couldn't tell if it was from studying all night or...something else. Or it's probably because Starlight woke him up early again, you never really know with these two. 

Sunburst looked up from his mug to the visitors and seemed pretty happy to see them, while Trixie just yawned pretending not to notice them. "Rainbow Dash, Fluttershy! Nice to see you again. How have you been?" Sunburst got up from his seat and trotted towards them. 

"Hey there, Sunburst. We're just...y'know, doing what we always do." Rainbow answered. She then looked to the pony behind Sunburst. "Hey, aren't you even gonna at least acknowledge us being here?" Rainbow said annoyed.

"Oh, sorry. Didn't see you there. I was a little busy thinking about one of my best performances to notice you" Trixie finally looked toward the two pegasi's direction, not even trying to hide her sarcastic tone, causing Dash to become even more annoyed.

"Yeah, sorry about that. Trixie can be a bit of a pain to be around, but she's a really nice mare once you really get to know her." Starlight said a little awkwardly, followed by a smile and nod from Sunburst as she said exactly what was on his mind.

"Trust me, I'm fully aware of the first part." Dash said through clenched teeth, Starlight's reassurance apparently failed to calm her.

"Who are these three? Do they need our help?" Sunburst said finally addressing the three strangers accompanying the two pegasi mares.

"Oh, yeah. Apparently Fluttershy and Rainbow here found them leaving the Everfree. This is Question Mark, Smiley Face and...was your name 'Doofus'?" Starlight pointed to each of the three newcomers before stopping on the scrawny young stallion.

"Well, uh..." the stallion looked around nervously while looking at Question Mark, who glared at him as if warning him. "Yes, it is." Doofus finally answered with his ears drooped really unhappy with his answer, while Question Mark let out a quiet sigh of relief.

"The Everfree?! What could they possibly be doing in there?" Sunburst said a little surprised by what he heard.

Then Question Mark stepped into the conversation to explain their situation. "We don't know as well. We suddenly woke up in the forest with absolutely no memory of where we came from...well actually, we do have some memories about who we are and where we come from and what things were like there, but we don't really remember where exactly we came from. I think things also worked differently where we came from because we have absolutely no idea how things work around here, but I'm not 100% certain. I think we're suffering from amnesia, but if that's the case why do we still remember our names and what our home was like? I don't know, I'm not a neuroscientist. Look, the point is: we don't remember how we got here and we're completely clueless as to how things work here."

"Wow, that's a lot of information coming from such a little colt." Trixie says, finally joining in.

"Yeah, if you didn't understand a thing I said, I don't blame you. I don't really think that much information would fit in such a small storage anyway." Question Mark replied.

"Prob...wait...HEY!" Trixie exclaimed, taking her a few seconds to understand what the colt was implying, getting a snicker out of Starlight.

Sunburst rolled his eyes and brought his focus back to Question Mark. "So you really have no memory of where you came from, except that it functions differently than here?"

"Pretty much the gist of it." the colt replied.

"Well, that's gonna be tough to narrow down since that's barely really a starting point."

"The colt said it doesn't work as it does here, so we just have to look for places that aren't Equestria!" Trixie thought out loud.

"Trixie, every place in Equestria functions differently than Ponyville, and even if you're right that still doesn't narrow it down." Sunburst said unimpressed by Trixie's conclusion.

"Eh, Trixie did what she could." she shrugged.

"Actually, Question Mark did give us a few hints as to where they came from was like." Fluttershy said.

"Really? What did he say?" Sunburst asked.

"Well, he didn't really say too much but a lot of his questions implied a lot about what his home was like. Apparently where they came from is a patriarchal, male dominated and very stallion-centric society." Fluttershy explained.

"A patriarchal and male-centric pony society? That's odd. I've heard of pony kingdoms with a lot of stallion leaders or having stallion historical figures, but they were never really stallion-centric." Sunburst said.

"I mean, I can't really say it's really patriarchal or guy-centric since we guys have to really give a lot of respect to the girls. Like, we have to give them presents, gifts, and especially attention." Doofus Dweeb explained.

"Yeah, but the girls still keep on fighting for equal rights to this very day and we still need more empowering, so it's probably still pretty patriarchal." Smiley Face explained as well.

"Yeah, but most of those people are just a bunch of whiny idiots trying to get their way instead of equality so I don't really think that's 100% true."  Question Mark said to the pink filly.

"Wait, mares fighting for equal rights?!" the five ponies of Ponyville exclaimed all at once, unable to comprehend what they just heard.

"That can't be true!" Rainbow said refusing to believe the words of the pink filly.

"Yeah, throughout history stallions were the ones oppressed by the ruling female class forced to do all the physical labor, treated like objects to be traded around when confronted with a 'better' stallion, and most of all only used for means of...er...reproduction and...bedroom toys." Sunburst explained, hesitating a bit at the end to explain in front of the mares and especially the foals.

"It's probably just a bunch of lazy mares who want to turn back time and make stallions do all the work for them, not that Trixie would mind too much, I could use more assistance." Trixie shrugged while her herdmates gave her frustrated and disapproving looks. "Though, Trixie can't really blame them too much. They're probably just tired of having to suck up to perverted and silver-tongued stallions all the time as society expects them to, Trixie is as well. Just like the time with my wagon and that Saddle Arabian stallion, remember, Starlight?!" Trixie says to her herd sister.

"What?! Are you seriously still holding that against me? That was a long time ago! I thought we've forgotten all about it by now!" Starlight said outraged.

"Yes it was, but what you did was an act of the betrayal of trust! And considering our current relationship status, Trixie's pretty sure that would count as infidelity!" Trixie yelled back at the purple unicorn.

"Now see here...!" Starlight shouted before being interrupted by a loud voice.

"ACTUALLY...!" Fluttershy said in a loud voice to prevent the argument between the two mares, Question Mark seemed relieved as well since he looked frustrated at the bickering going on over what Smiley Face said. "I've heard there are actually a few protests for equal rights by mares since they felt that mares are always expected to take care of stallions all the time that it spoils stallions and stallions start to take advantage of that norm. "But I don't really know too much about it and I've only seen them in places like Manehatten, so..." Fluttershy explained, becoming a little nervous at the end. 

"Manehatten? Seriously?" Question Mark whispered.

"See? What did Trixie tell you all?" Trixie pointed out Fluttershy's explanation.

"Trixie, be quiet." Starlight said.

"You don't tell the Great and Powerful Trixie to be quiet!" Trixie said with a dramatic tone.

"Oh, my god. I can't take another second of this..." Question Mark said visibly exhausted listening to the ponies in the room.

"OH! That's another thing! They also say 'God' instead of 'Goddess'!" Fluttershy pointed out.

"God damn it."

"Wow, their home sounds really male-dominated." Starlight says surprised.

"I've never heard any pony society having that expression. Maybe they came from a place inhabited by a patriarchal species, like the griffins. Wait, do the griffins even believe in a god or that kind of stuff?" Sunburst theorized, whispering to himself at the end.

"Yeah, can I sneak out of the room while none of you are looking? Because you guys are about as pleasant to listen to as a nail-filled barbed wire glove scratching a 20-meter blackboard. Unless someone out there actually enjoys the sound of scratching a blackboard, which I actually wouldn't be surprised at all." Question Mark said unenthusiastically.

"Ah, sorry about that. Must've gotten lost in the...Oh, Goddess! What happened to your face?!" Sunburst exclaimed after noticing the large bruise on the side of the colt's face.

Rainbow Dash hadn't noticed until now, but the colt was purposefully hiding his bruise from everypony's sight for whatever reason and only made it visible now.

"Oh yeah, almost forgot about that. Apparently, Rainbow Dash here struck this colt in the face!" Starlight glared.

"What?! Rainbow, how could you do something like that?!" Sunburst asked in disbelief.

"Oooh! Trixie has got to see this!" Trixie said excitedly getting up from her spot to where Sunburst and Dash were standing.

"Yeah, I'm just gonna stand over there where I can't get involved." Doofus said scampering away from the ruckus to a far corner of the room.

"I actually want to go somewhere you wanna go for once." Question Mark said following his scrawny young adult friend, not wanting to listen to anything else the other ponies in the room have to say.

"But, guys...shouldn't we help clear up this misunderstanding?" Smiley Face said meekly to her two friends walking away.

"No!" They both replied, which caused Smiley to instantly give up and join them, leaving Rainbow Dash alone with her friends.

Rainbow looked back at the three other ponies staring at her disapprovingly, except for Trixie who was clearly pretending to look disapproving but Dash could tell she was just watching this for her enjoyment.

"Well, Rainbow. What do you have to say for yourself?" Starlight asks aggressively.

"Come on, I didn't mean to actually hit him! Not that hard, and that colt already said it was o..." Rainbow tried to explain before being interrupted.

"What do you mean 'not that hard'?!" Starlight asked again. Dash tried to calm her down but accidentally ended up making the fire bigger than it already was.

"Wait! Sorry, that wasn't what I meant to say!"

"So you did mean to hit him!"

"No, I didn't want to hurt him. He was saying bad things about me and Fluttershy!" Rainbow attempted to defend herself.

"So you hit a little colt in the face because he said mean things about you. Oh, this is too good!" Trixie said, unable to hold back her smile and control her laughter. None of the others were amused by her enjoyment of the situation.

"Shut up, Trixie! None of you were there, he wasn't saying typical foal insults! He called Fluttershy a broad and a rape victim! Does that sound okay to you?! Flutters, you were there. Tell them what happened!" Rainbow pleaded to her yellow friend, being very close to losing her temper. Starlight and her herd seemed surprised at what the colt apparently said, but didn't lose their dissaproving looks.

"Er...well...I-It's true, he did say those things about me. I was also really shocked to hear him say it." Fluttershy muttered, unsure of how to answer.

"But he's just a colt, he probably doesn't even really understand what he's talking about! Foals his age do tend to be pretty, um...aggressive? Frustrated? Overly emotional? I mean, just ask Starlight's father." Sunburst tried to explain, the last bit causing Starlight to glare at him.

"Oh, I'm pretty sure he knew exactly what he was saying! Did you all forget about Cozy Glow? Oh! And speaking of Cozy Glow, there's something I need to talk to you about Question Mark. But, um...can we talk about in the hall?" Rainbow said quietly at the end.

"In the hall? Why? If you want to talk about Question Mark, isn't it better to talk with him as well?" Starlight asked, confused at how secretive Rainbow was being.

"Starlight is right, talking directly with the pony you're having a problem with will help finish the problem faster. We should know, we're guidance counselors." Trixie said.

"I WAS a guidance counselor, you're the guidance counselor now." Starlight smiled at her herd sister.

"Actually, no. I don't wanna let that colt hear us, because it's not actually that kind of problem. It's something else that I think you should hear." Rainbow explained.

Fluttershy and Starlight's herd looked at each other and eventually agreed. "Fine, this better be worth our time." Starlight said. With that, the five of them went out into the hall.





As the five ponies of Ponyville exited the dining room, the white colt stared at them with an annoyed face.

"Urgh, damn horses. I thought they'd never leave." the colt said as he turned back to his friends after the door shut.

"Man, we got them questioning us a lot, huh?" the pink filly said.

"Yeah, gotta be careful about that. I don't wanna be tested in Pony Area 51." the white colt replied.

"How do you know they even have those here?" the scrawny stallion asked.

"I don't, that's why I'm worried. We don't know how they might react." the colt answered.

"Also, I think that rainbow chick really hates you. Not that I'd blame her." the stallion pointed out.

"Yes, I'm aware. But as long as they think she's a child abuser, I'll be fine." the colt said.

"Yeah, I doubt that'll last very long from what I've seen." the pink filly said.

"Do you think she suspects us?" the stallion asked his two companions.

"Probably, but I don't think she'll actually find out. At least not now." the colt answered.

"By the way, did you hear that stuff about how their gender stuff is like backwards? That's pretty crazy." the stallion said.

"Yeah, like the girls are the oppressors and ruling ones and the boys are the oppressed ones treated like objects. It's like reversed gender roles." the pink filly added.

"Well, obviously. Equines are a naturally matriarchal species, where we came from was naturally patriarchal, so of course the circumstances would be different. Were you two not listening back at the bakery?  And also, I wouldn't say they're reversed, it's more of similar situations that differ because of the different factors." the colt explained.

"Yeah, but it's still pretty reversed." the filly said.

"Alright, fine. It's reversed." the colt said, knowing the information wouldn't get into the filly's head. 

"Good news for me, that means the girls won't hit me anymore because that would be considered oppression on the fairer sex!" the stallion said happily.

"Even if that was the case, they'd still hit you." the colt replied, causing the stallion to frown.

"So, uh...Are we still going with the 'collect evidence' and 'find a way home' plan?" the filly asked.

"Of course! You're not seriously thinking about living here, right?" the colt asked.

"N-No, of course not! It's just that...finding a way home might take a while, so maybe before we know how to get home, why don't we just take in this place and get to know it." the pink filly explained.

"Eeehh, I don't know." the cold said hesitantly.

"I mean, think about it! It would be a waste if we came to a place like this and not try to find out all about it." the filly continued.

"Oh yeeaah, you're right. You finally said something smart for once in your life." the colt said after thinking about it, his comment at first making the filly smile and then scowl a second later.

The white colt then continued. "But we also can't let them become too familiar with us or else who knows what might happen. So for now, let's just play along."
> Chapter 6: The Missing Property of Question Mark
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

"So, let me get this straight. You think that this colt is hatching some evil plot against us and could possibly be working for some dangerous villain trying to destroy us?" Starlight asked. As the five ponies stood in the crystal hallway right outside the door they exited.

"Yes! I don't know what he's planning, but I know it can't be good." Rainbow Dash exclaimed.

"Rainbow, that's ridiculous." Sunburst said.

"Ridiculous?! Are you forgetting that's what we thought of a certain other foal that ended up doing exactly what I just said?!" Rainbow yelled in disbelief.

"Well, no. But...just because it happened once doesn't mean it'll happen again." Sunburst replied.

"But it doesn't mean it won't happen again! Look, you have to believe me. That kid is up to something and I have no idea what it could be, so could you at least keep an eye on him." Rainbow said.

"Well, that's what we were about to do anyway. Rainbow, I think you're being a little too paranoid. We haven't really seen this colt do anything that incriminating other than him saying mean things and saying some conspicuous stuff that we don't know the meaning of yet, but if it makes you feel any better we'll try to make sure he doesn't try anything funny." Starlight said.

"Fine, we'll humor you. But personally, Trixie would have declined since the thought of you trotting around town yelling about an evil colt just sounds hilarious to Trixie." Trixie chuckled at the thought.

"Trixie..." Starlight growled.

"What? Trixie was just kidding, kind of." Trixie smiled.

"Alright, let's just all go back inside and decide what to do with those three." Starlight said calmly. After that, she directed all of them to go back into the room, but right when they entered they stopped dead in their tracks after hearing a loud noise.

"GODDAMMIT! WHERE IS IT?!" a loud voice yelled. It was Question Mark, who was trotting frantically around the room looking for something.

"K...Question Mark, calm down. You probably just left them back at the bakery or something." Smiley Face said attempting to get her friend to relax.

"Calm down?! You simpleton! You know how important those things were! They were priceless to me! Oh, what am I gonna do? If someone finds it before we do, they might sus..." Question Mark rambled before stopping himself when he looked behind him noticed the other ponies in the room. Then he hesitantly attempted to finish his sentence while trying not to maintain eye contact with them. "...steal our stuff. I mean, you obviously remember how much they cost, right?"

"Yes, you've reminded me a hundred times." Smiley Face replied with a tired tone.

"Oh, dear. Did you lose something? You seem pretty worried." Fluttershy asked.

"I did, something very precious and very important to me." Question Mark said.

"Really? What was it?" Fluttershy asked. Rainbow Dash leaned her head closer to listen to the colt's answer, hoping to hear something incriminating against him. And his answer was...

"My backpack." Question Mark answered. Rainbow drooped a little in disappointment.

"Your backpack? Well, what was in it?" Fluttershy asked a second time. Rainbow lifted her head up again to listen to his answer, recreating the same tension she had a few seconds ago. And this time, his answer was...

"Just my books, our, er...equipment, and some snacks." Question Mark answered a second time as well. 

Rainbow felt confused this time for some reason. "T-that's it? Just books and snacks? Nothing more?" Rainbow asked with a hint of disbelief in her voice.

"Very expensive and priceless books. A few of the books I brought are not easy to find and they cost quite a bit. I mean one of them cost around 45 and took two months for me to order the package when it should've only been less than a week! I mean, can you believe the incompetence? That's why I can't afford to lose them. Also, what's with your question? Were you expecting me to answer with something else?" Question Mark eyed the cyan pegasus.

"No, no. Just...curious." Rainbow Dash answered in a more quiet tone than usual.

"A backpack, huh? So I'm guessing you three were traveling or hiking, explains what you might've been doing in the Everfree." Sunburst thought out loud.

"Okay, look. I need to go back to the bakery or the forest to look for it, I can't lose it for even a second longer!" Question Mark said with panic forming in his voice.

"Woah there kid, calm down. We'll look for your backpack later, just rest for now. I mean, it's only books in that backpack, right?" Starlight reassured.

"Books that are extremely valuable to me! And I don't wanna waste too much time sitting on my ass boring myself when my only sources of entertainment and creativity are lost out there scared and alone!" Question Mark protested making the situation sound more urgent and tragic than it actually was.

"It's okay. Look, if you're worried about being bored, why don't you just read some of the books in the library, there's not as many as when Twilight was here but I'm sure you'll manage. Or why don't you try exploring the town, get to know your surroundings, maybe even introduce yourself and befriend some of the citizens here." Starlight suggested.

Question Mark's face shifted as if an idea struck. "Yeah, I guess I could do that. Although, non on the ami part. I really hate befriending people. Also, your idea of 'rest' is going around town talking to a bunch of weirdos you barely know?" Question Mark asked as if the idea was the most alien thing he's ever heard in his life.

"Haha, sorry. Kinda contradicted myself back there. So you really want to go out and look around town?" Starlight asked.

"Uh...yeah, I would very much like to see how things work in this pleasant little place. You know, just casually walk around, observing all the activities and landmarks, taking a relaxing stroll..." Question Mark said before he was interrupted.

"Oh, I'd like to come too! I'm really excited to get to know the people here!" Smiley Face jumped in enthusiastically.

"Oh, God." Question Mark muttered.

"I'd kinda like to see what everyone is like around here. Who knows, maybe someone around here will actually see how cool  I am? Or maybe I can actually manage to pick up a chick for once around here." Doofus Dweeb joined in.

"You dweeb, these ponies are a different...standard than you!" Question Mark scolded in a disgusted tone.

"Eh, I don't know. I'm just desperate for anything at this point." Doofus said with his head neck lowered as in a defeated pose.

"Yes, I'm sure the authorities would love to hear that." the colt replied.

Starlight was starting to become a little weirded out by their conversation, so she decided to put a stop to it and sent them on their way. "Alright, why don't you guys be on your way, Ponyville has a lot of fun stuff to offer. Oh, would you like one of us to accompany you? Show you around town?" the light purple unicorn asked.

Rainbow Dash wanted to volunteer, mostly to make sure Question Mark didn't try anything shady. But before she could say anything, the colt had already answered Starlight. "Oh, no no no need! I'm pretty sure we'll be just fine walking on our own, I'm a big boy after all! Except for this guy, he probably would need to be accompanied." Question Mark gestured towards Doofus, which gained him a scowl from the stallion.

"O-okay! Well then, have fun you three! Just don't go too far and too long, so we can make sure you're fine!" Starlight said as the three strangers were walking away towards the door.

Doofus looked back with an unhappy expression. "Hey, lady! I'm like, around your age! I don't think I need you to baby me, I didn't even need to call my mom for extra cash for six months! That's a new record for me! Haha...!" the young white stallion said confidently and triumphantly before he turned back to the direction he was facing earlier and got the door slammed in his face by Question Mark who was closing the door on his way out.

"OW!" Doofus shouted.

"Hahahaha!" they heard the colt laugh from the other side, pretty much confirming he meant for that to happen.

"You little shit! C'mere!" the stallion yelled as he ran out the door.

The rest of the ponies in the room could do nothing but stare blankly and weirdly at the door the three strangers exited from, after a while Starlight turned back to the others.

"Well, that was certainly...something. So shall we discuss the three of them and what to do with them?" Starlight asked.

"Yeah, let's." Sunburst answered.





The three strangers walked through the hallway of the castle and made it to the front door, when they opened it they could see all of Ponyville stretched before them, ready to be explored.

"Man, I can't wait to make new friends!" the pink filly said full of excitement.

"I can't wait to show girls my awesome gamer and bongo-playing skills!" the scrawny stallions said with confidence.

Meanwhile, the white colt just stared at the town and listened to his companion's painfully annoying enthusiastic comments, putting on a face that's a mix of anger, frustration, and exhaustion.

"The nightmare truly begins."
> Chapter 7: The Three Strange Fillies
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The three strangers walked through the town supposedly called Ponyville, looking around while also having some eyes on them by some of the ponies they passed. They all had different moods reacting to the strange new town around them, the scrawny young stallion was a little afraid of being in such a new place with unfamiliar faces, but hid it with a confident and snarky face. The pink filly put on a happy and excited face, one that she put on quite often, and trotted joyfully around. The white colt, however, put on a very sour face, not enjoying the company he has, only viewing the citizens around him as collectibles than actual citizens. Viewing the world around him like a book ready to be read, though unknown in a good way or bad.

"Jeez, look at how sunny this place is! Certainly beats our constantly cloudy and grey-skied town." the pink filly commented.

"Eh, where I come from is tropical, so it's nothing special." the white colt replied.

"Well, but at least here, it's not scorching hot. Just warm enough to enjoy the open air without getting sunburnt." the pink filly commented back.

"Yeah, sometimes I worry I was turning pale back in our town." the scrawny stallion added.

"Guess we'll never find out in our state." the white colt said pointing to his and the young stallion's coat.

"Eh, yeah, guess you're right." the stallion said.

"So where should we go to first? Ooh, we should've asked them which places are worth seeing. Hey, what's that big building in the middle of the town? I'm guessing that's the town hall. Oh! Maybe we should check out that school that you guys talked about earlier, I really wanna see what they teach in there!" the pink filly said enthusiastically.

"There's so many chicks around here in one place, maybe I should just lean against that lamppost and introduce myself, maybe that could work." the stallion thought to himself.

"Fine, you idiots can go ahead and just dawdle around, go ahead. I need to focus on the more important priority here: finding that damn backpack." the colt said.

"Um, don't you think it's better that backpack gets lost. That way no one will find it and no one will suspect us." the filly thought.

"True, but also shut up. Like I said multiple times, the stuff in that backpack is important to me. Not only to me but to you guys as well, you might need that stuff later especially when we go home, you don't wanna lose them forever, do you?" the colt asked.

"Yeah, guess not. So can you just get outta here so I can charm these ladies uninterrupted?" the scrawny stallion shooed the white colt away with his hoof.

"Alright, I'll make sure the first-aid kit's also in the backpack." the colt mocked deadpan at the stallion.

"Yeah, go ahead. But in case you weren't paying attention, these girls probably can't hit me!" this stallion said triumphantly.

"Dude, have you ever looked yourself in the mirror? I don't think even different gender roles are gonna save you from an angry female's left hook to your face." the colt shot at the stallion.

"Okay, you know what? Do you honestly enjoy seeing me fail and suffering alone or something?" the scrawny white stallion asked angrily.

"To be honest, I kinda do." the colt replied casually with a smirk.

"See?! I knew it! Y'know, my life was going perfectly fine until you came into my life." the stallion accused.

"Eh, I wouldn't really say that. That would be giving your life way too much credit, not even someone as big of an asshole as I am could ever cause someone to live a life as sad as yours."  the colt replied unfazed by the stallion's accusation. 

The stallion stammered for a while, looking for some reply to the colt's comment, but ultimately came up with nothing. "Yeah, honestly, you've got a point." the stallion said, admitting defeat.

"I know I do." the colt said casually.

The pink filly did nothing but just watch as her two friends had their daily fight with each other, sighing in exhaustion from watching them. Now she was not sure if she had the same enthusiasm as a moment ago.





In another part of the town, three fillies were riding through the streets, one on a scooter and the other two in a wagon being pulled by said scooter. The dark orange pegasus filly with a dark purple mane named Scootaloo drove the scooter pushing it with the propulsion of her tiny wings, and in the wagon was a white unicorn filly with a light purple mane named Sweetie Belle and beside her was a yellow earth pony with a red mane and big pink bow named Apple Bloom. As they cruised through the town, Scootaloo started picking up speed as they dodged a particularly crowded street on Ponyville, must've been a busy day. Scootaloo was starting to have a harder time avoiding the bystanders now, even coming close to hitting a few of them.

"Hey, Scoots! Watch where yer goin'!" Apple Bloom shouted from behind the pegasus filly.

"You try maneuvering through something like this!" Scootaloo yelled, turning her head to look at her yellow friend.

"WATCH OUT!" Sweetie Belle shouted as the three of them noticed they were riding right into three figures in front of them who just noticed them as well.

Then a loud crash happened right at that spot, as six ponies, as well as a scoOter and wagon, crashed into each other, causing quite the ruckus. After the dust cleared, a lot of ponies gathered to see what just happened and to see what became of the victims of the crash. One of the first to get up was a dark brown-maned teenage colt, desperately getting back up, and it was obvious he wasn't happy in the slightest and was ready to give whoever hit him a piece of his mind. Then the other five got back on their hooves, then the colt stomped aggressively toward the three fillies who run into him.

"HEY! What's the big idea?! Can't you imbeciles see where you're going?!" the colt yelled at the fillies.

"Ow...okay, jeez, we're sorry." Scootaloo said without seeing who was talking to her, still trying to recover from the crash.

"Damn right, you're sorry! My bones could've shattered from the impact and put me in the hospital or leave me crippled!" the colt continued to yell.

"Oh, Goddess..! I said I was sorry! What else do you want to say...!" Scootaloo shouted back before stopping herself to look at the ponies in front of her, her two friends also got up to see who they just hit.

In front of them was a white colt with a wavy but unkempt dark brown mane who stared at them angrily, the colt seemed to be only a few years older than them and a little taller. Behind him was a pink filly with a long, straight orange mane who appeared to be the same age as the colt, but a little taller than him and was slightly chubby. And the other was a white and skinny young stallion with a messy brown mane with three strands of hair sticking out, he was a lot taller than any of them and seemed to be around the age of the three fillies' sisters, or maybe a few years younger, it was hard to tell. The stallion was still sitting on his flank on the ground, hugging one of his hind legs, shouting indecipherably as he dramatically cried about his pain, which the colt in front of them rolled his eyes and ignored.

"Hey, who are you? I've never seen you around here before." Scootaloo asked.

"Yeah, and you're not gonna see anything around here after this if you pull some jackass stunt like that again!" the colt said threateningly.

"Yeesh, why do some colts always have to act so mean just to appear tough?" Sweetie Belle commented on the colt's behavior. 

"Well, if they're sharing an area code with hooligans like you, I'd kinda understand." the colt replied to Sweetie Belle's comment.

"Be quiet, Question. Sorry about him, uh...what were you asking again?" the pink filly pushed her white colt friend out of the way and stood in front of him to speak with the other fillies.

"We were askin' who y'all were." Apple Bloom said.

"Oh, my name is...Smiley Face." the teenage filly answered a little confused. "And these are my friends, Question Mark..." she gestured to the colt. "And, uh...Doofus Dweeb." the filly gestured to the skinny stallion, saying his name a little hesitantly.

"Doofus Dweeb?" Scootaloo asked, unable to comprehend the stallion's name.

"Why would you or your parents give you a name like 'Doofus Dweeb'?" Sweetie Belle asked, just as confused as Scootaloo.

"Yeah, seems kinda wrong and hurtful fer the foal." Apple Bloom commented.

"Yeah, terrible name. I know." the white stallion said sadly.

"I don't know, kinda suits you, if I'm being honest." the colt said to the stallion. Everypony could see the stallion named Doofus was glaring angrily at the colt, so the pink filly Smiley Face stepped in.

"Haha, okay. Sorry for all this, um...what about you? What are your names?" Smiley Face asked the fillies.

"Oh, Ah'm Apple Bloom. This here's Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo. And together we're..." Apple Bloom gestured to her friends, before gesturing them to get into position so they can all introduce themselves.

"THE CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS!" the three fillies shouted in unison.

"Cutie Mark Crusaders? Man, if that isn't the gayest shit I've ever heard then I don't know what is." the colt named Question Mark said.

"Crusaders? That can't be right. Where's your bucket helmets and red cross shields?" Doofus asked.

"They don't need them anymore because it's obvious they've already killed all the Muslims, otherwise the streets here would be almost empty because there wouldn't be any girls allowed to walk in public Bahahahaha...eh, actually it would end up that way regardless." Question Mark said after laughing at his own joke.

"What do you mean girls won't be able to go outside, and what are 'muss lims'?" Scootaloo asked.

"Er, not important. Okay, we know each other now. Can I please go now?" the colt asked impatiently.

Before anyone could say anything, Sweetie Belle was casually observing everything about these three strangers, until she noticed something strange about the skinny stallion's flanks that made her eyes widen. "Oh, my Goddess! Girls, look! Doofus doesn't have a cutie mark!"

"I don't have a what?" Doofus asked.

"What? No way." Scootaloo said, unable to believe her unicorn friend's claim.

The three fillies all run over to inspect the young stallion's flank to confirm if what they heard was true.

"Woah, it's true!" Scootaloo exclaimed.

"But...how is that possible?" Apple Bloom asked out loud.

"Um, guys? Why are these little girls staring at my ass? I'm not gonna go to jail for this, am I?" the stallion scaredly asked his two companions.

"Don't worry, from what I've seen back home, the fairer sex can get away with any sex-related crime no matter how cruel or disgusting it is. You should keep that in mind for the future, could help." Question Mak said deviously.

"Question, don't get him into any more trouble than you usually do." Smiley Face said to her friend.

"Man, you're no fun." the colt replied.

"Okay, okay! Please stay away from my rear or else I'll report harassment on you considering what I heard about the gender stuff here." the stallion threatened as he backed away from the fillies. 

"They're kids, doofus." Question Mark groaned at the stallion's antics.

"I mean, I know kids that already do stuff like that when they were these girls' age." Doofus replied.

"Well, a lot of animals get to know each other by inspecting their rear ends." Smiley said.

"I thought only dogs do that." Question Mark said.

"I actually don't know, you know more about animals than I do." Smiley replied.

"I do, but I don't research them that deeply. Though imagine if that's really how ponies greeted each other here, would be really bad for some of us." Question Mark said while smiling.

"Eeww, what are you talking about. Why would we sniff each other's butts?!" Sweetie Belle exclaimed in disgust.

"Yeah, that's gross!" Apple Bloom exclaimed as well.

"I don't know, I'm willing to bet that someone out there wouldn't mind if that was the case." Question Mark said while he gestured toward Doofus Dweeb in a not-so-subtle way.

"Hey, I'm not that desperate!" Doofus shouted in defense.

"We'll see about that." the colt whispered sinisterly.

"Alright, shut up. What were you three doing just now?" Doofus asked, still with a worried tone.

"We were jus' shocked that ya didn't have a cutie mark. How does a pony yer age not have one?" Apple Bloom asked.

"Cutie mark? What, is that like, your gang sign or something?" Question Mark asked back.

"Wha'...how do ya not know what a cutie mark is?" Apple Bloom asked, she and her two friends becoming more confused than before.

"Yeah, are you just playing dumb with us?" Scootaloo asked.

"Uh, yeah, long story. We're not from around here." Question Mark answered nervously.

"Yeah, I figured that out. But how do you not know what a cutie mark is? What planet are you from?" Scootaloo asked warily.

The three strangers suddenly went wide-eyed for a moment and looked at each other worriedly, adding to Scootaloo's nigh-suspicion.

"Well, we're actually suffering some form of amnesia. We found ourselves in the middle of the...whatwasitcalled...Everfree Forest, having no memory of where we came from or how basic things work. So something like a...ugh, cutie mark is completely new to us." Question Mark explained, saying 'cutie mark' with a disgusted tone.

"Oh, Goddess. Really? Poor you." Sweetie Belle said worriedly and with pity.

"Gosh, sorry, I didn't know." Scootaloo calmed down a bot after hearing the older colt's explanation.

"Sad, I know. And then we were found by this yellow pink-haired quiet chick and this rainbow-haired, skittles-looking, pride flag-looking bitch who never stopped glaring at me, who brought us to that crystal tree castle thing over there." Question Mark pointed to Twilight's former, now Starlight's castle.

"Wait, are ya talkin' about Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash?" Apple Bloom asked.

"Woah, you know those two broads? Wow, what a small world...hopefully not." Question Mark replied.

"Hey! Rainbow Dash is not a bitch! She's the coolest pony I know, practically a sister to me, and she's saved Equestria multiple times!" Scootaloo yelled at the slightly older white colt by poking a hoof into his chest and bringing her face to his.

"Well, too bad she couldn't save me from her unpleasant presence." Question Mark said with a smile.

"Listen here, buddy!" Scootaloo became angrier, wanting to call the colt something worse but decided to save it for later.

"Hey, break it up! Break it up!" Smiley Face came in between them and pushed them away from each other. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle helping by pulling Scootaloo away.

"Calm down, Scootaloo. He jus' doesn't know who Rainbow Dash is yet. Besides, we're supposed ta be nice ta colts, remember? We shouldn't hit them." Apple Bloom lectured her orange pegasus friend.

"Yeah, listen to your redneck friend. Surprised even she's got more brains than you." Question Mark said mockingly.

"Excuse me? Whut's that supposed ta mean?!" Apple Bloom asked the colt angrily, immediately forgetting what she just told Scootaloo, and her accent becoming a little thicker.

Suddenly, Smiley Face jumped in front of them before things could get ugly again. "J-just ignore him, he's always like that. Can we just go back to the original question?"

"Huh? Oh, right. We're talkin' about cutie marks." Apple Bloom said, calming down almost immediately.

"Yeah, that. What are cutie marks again?" Smiley Face asked.

"Uh..." the Crusaders looked at each other confused, feeling weird having to explain the concept of cutie marks to another pony of all creatures. 

"Well, a cutie mark is that symbol ya have on yer flank over there." Apple Bloom explained, pointing toward Smiley Face's flank, causing the pink filly to look at it. "It's supposed ta represent yer special talent and yer callin' in life." the yellow filly continued.

"Wait, so this is something everybody has? I thought those two chicks who found us just happened to have those things because they're one of those friends who are so weirdly intimate with each other that you'd expect them to be a couple yet they're somehow not. Hehe." Question Mark chuckled at his own statement while everypony else just stared at him blankly.

"Yeah, you usually get them when you finally find what your calling is and what you're good at or want to do. But everypony usually gets them when they're still foals, that's why I was shocked when I saw that Doofus is still a blank flank." Sweetie Belle continued the explanation.

"So, this butt tattoo is supposed to symbolize your special talent right?" Question Mark asked for reassurance.

"Yes, why?" Sweetie asked back.

"Well no wonder this dweeb doesn't have one, he has no talent!" the colt laughed hysterically.

"Hey! That's not true! I have some talents."  Doofus attempted to save himself.

"Oh, really? What?" Question Mark dared the stallion.

"I can play COD for 6 hours straight, um...I can, uh...I can play the kazoo pretty well, er...I've been on plenty of dates even though they all failed, and uh...yeah, I can't name anything special about me." Doofus finally gave up.

"Hehe, maybe that should be your special talent." Question Mark mocked.

"Jeez, you're mean." Sweetie Belle said.

"Yeah, I know. Okay, I've had enough of this, I should really go now." Question Mark said blankly as he turned away and started to walk away from everypony.

"Hey, where are you going in such a hurry?" Scootaloo asked to try and stop the colt from taking another step.

"I'm trying to look for my lost backpack, which was what I was trying to do before you three crashed into me." Question Mark looked back, clearly not in the mood to answer the fillies' questions. But the fillies, along with the colt's companions decided to follow behind him.

"Really? What's in it?" Apple Bloom asked.

"Stuff." Question Mark answered plainly.

"What kinda stuff?" Sweetie Belle asked as well.

"Super cool stuff ordinary individuals like you wouldn't understand." Question Mark said with his head turned back to face them, getting frustrated.

"Woah, that means we totally gotta look for it as well." Scootaloo said confidently, hoping to beat this colt in something in order to teach him a lesson.

"No!" the colt said.

"Why not?" Scootaloo asked, also getting frustrated.

"Because the stuff in my backpack is private, and you'll only mess my stuff up." Question Mark replied.

"Do you really think we're that clumsy?" the pegasus filly asked again.

"Yes. You've given me no reason to believe otherwise." the white colt replied again as well.

"Well, we'll show you, Question Mark! We can find it first and return it to you safely and the insides untouched!" Scootaloo challenged the teenage colt.

"This isn't a race, Scooby-Doo. I'm just trying to find something Iost." Question Mark dismissed Scootaloo's invitation.

"We can make it one, we'll both have to look for your backpack. If we lose then we'll be your servants for a week." Scootaloo set the first rule, which made her friends panic.

"Kinda extreme, but sounds good. And If you win?" Question Mark asked.

"You'll have to apologize to us, Rainbow Dash, Doofus, and not say any mean things anymore. Oh, and worship Rainbow Dash like a goddess." Scootaloo continued, which caused Question Mark to raise his eyebrows.

"Alright, let's do it." Question Mark said like nothing was wrong.

"You're on! We're starting...NOW! C'mon, girls!" Scootaloo gestured to her friends and immediately started running, with her two friends following, leaving the strangers behind.

"Are you sure this is a good idea, Scoots? What if we lose?" Sweetie Belle asked from behind the orange pegasus. 

"We won't, Sweets! Trust me! It'll be worth it, even if we have to go into the Everfree." Scootaloo reassured her unicorn friend. And they ran off to inspect the town and the forest.





As the three fillies ran off, leaving the strangers behind, the white colt stared blankly for a moment before snickering and turning away. "Hehe, idiots." 

"Whaddya mean? Aren't we participating?" the pink filly asked.

"Of course not, races are stupid. Plus, I've never been good at finding lost personal items so might as well let them do all the work." the colt replied.

"But, you're gonna lose. Do you really wanna lose?" the filly asked, not for motivation, but just out of genuine confusion.

"I won't. The deal is that whoever finds the backpack first will win, but since I'm not looking for it, I'm not participating, so I can't lose." the white colt explained. feeling smart.

"Oh." the pink filly gave up, but then she had an idea. "Y'know, you could've learned and gotten a lot of information from those girls if you didn't act so douchey the whole time." the filly said with a smirk, which got the colt's attention. 

"Whaddya mean?" the colt asked.

I mean, they were willing to teach us some useful information, but since you did nothing but joke around and insult them, which kinda threw that chance out the window. You could gain knowledge and learn a lot more if you just acted nicer to these ponies, then it would make your job a lot easier. You did say you wanted to learn all you can about this place." the filly explained.

"Eh, yeah, you're right. Look at me, I'm always going on about having to learn stuff yet I prevent exactly that with my asshole behavior." the colt realized.

"Exactly, so can you please at least try to be nice starting now?" the filly begged.

"Alright, I'll try to tone down my behavior, at least as much as I'm able to."
> Chapter 8: The Backpack
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The three fillies continued venturing towards the Everfree, passing Fluttershy's cottage which they could tell was empty. They arrived at the entrance of the forest, a little hesitant to enter at first, but decided to continue immediately. They ventured through the forest, unable to tell how long they've been doing it, but they knew they couldn't have been there too long, they needed to beat Question Mark anyway so they made sure it stayed that way. So far, they couldn't find anything, it was ridiculous to assume they could easily find an item like a backpack in a place like the Everfree, but they were determined to beat the white colt so they can teach him some manners, literally that is. Though it was a little odd how they saw no signs of the colt or his friends attempting to find the thing, they shrugged it off and focused on finding the backpack that Question Mark was looking for in the first place.

"Ugh, this is taking forever! How are we gonna find Question Mark's backpack here? It could be anywhere." Sweetie Belle complained.

"Sweetie's right, Scoots. How're we supposed ta find that thing? We could search fer days an' not turn up with anythin'." Applebloom backed up her friend's complaint.

"Ugh. Look, I know it's gonna be really hard looking for that backpack, I'm really not enjoying this too. But if finding that backpack's what it takes to make that colt stop being a jerk and find out more about him and his friends then it'll be worth it." Scootaloo reassured.

"Ah hope yer right, Scoots." Applebloom said with no enthusiasm.

After who knows how long of the three fillies just checking behind every bush, rock, tree, but still couldn't find anything. They were considering giving up and letting the colt win, but a miracle happened.

"Guys! Look! I found it!" Sweetie Belle shouted happily, poking out from behind a bush holding the backpack in her hooves.

"Really?!" Scootaloo exclaimed excitedly, then she and Applebloom quickly rushed over to where Sweetie Belle was.

"Are ya sure it's Question Mark's? What if it's somepony else's backpack that got dropped around 'ere?" Applebloom asked looking at the backpack as she and Scootaloo surrounded the backpack to take a closer look.

"Yes! Look, it says so right here!" Sweetie Belle pointed out while smiling, in front of the backpack there was a green question mark surrounded by drawings of weird objects that the fillies didn't recognize, and below them was a small written note also written in green marker on the backpack that says: "(Do not touch or imma fuckin' kill you)", which kind of made the fillies wince a little, but then again most teenagers liked to write something like that on their personal property so it wasn't a big deal.

"Boy, this bag is heavy. What's inside it, anyway?" Sweetie Belle said while trying to lift the bag up.

Scootaloo just stared at the bag for a few seconds, thinking carefully before the words came out of her mouth. "How 'bout we check out what's inside?"

"What? Scootaloo, it's rude ta look through a colt's property. Well, anypony, really, but especially colts." Applebloom decided against the orange filly's idea.

"Yeah, but don't you guys also think that that colt and his friends are kinda weird?" Scootaloo asked in defense.

"Well, they did say some things that don't make any sense. But just because somepony doesn't act like what we consider 'normal' doesn't automatically mean they're bad." Sweetie Belle reasoned.

"Ugh, Sweetie Belle, you know that's not what I mean!" Scootaloo said. "I mean, I can't be the only one who feels like there's something off about them."

"Yeah, they kinda are. They must be from outta town, 'cause Ah've never seen them before. Maybe when we see them again we can ask where they're from!" Applebloom suggested.

"We could, but what if they don't tell us anything? From what I've seen, Question Mark seems pretty secretive, so even if we do ask, there's a chance they're not gonna say anything anyway." Scootaloo decided against it.

"You're just looking for an excuse to look inside the backpack, aren't you." Sweetie Belle said with an unamused tone.

"Alright, fine! I confess, I just really wanna know what's in there." Scootaloo admitted frustratingly. 

"Do y'all really think it's worth it? What if he finds out?" Applebloom asked, still very hesitant.

"We'll just have to be really careful not to leave a trace. Simple." Scootaloo shrugged.

"But don'tcha think it's better ta let Question Mark ta tell us 'imself? That way we can actually hear tha full story straight from the horse's mouth and we don' end up bein' untrustworthy and they won't wanna be our friend? Is looking in the bag really worth that much?" Applebloom asked.

The three fillies looked at each other than at the backpack, as differing thoughts raced through their heads, deciding what to do next.





At an outdoor restaurant table in Ponyville, the three strangers were relaxing and enjoying the drinks they ordered while bathing in the sun. The white colt ordered a sweet iced tea, the pink filly ordered her third serving of milkshake (it seemed she wanted to try every flavor in the menu), and the scrawny stallion ordered a soda, although he barely touched it. The stallion seemed more interested in wooing any mare that was in his line of sight mostly to failure. The colt seemed to enjoy watching the events unfold.

"Hey, check it out. He's gonna say something really stupid." the colt gestured to the filly toward the stallion on the other side of the table.

The stallion spoke to a mare at the table next to them. "Hey, girl. Did you fall from Heaven?" he asked.

"Oh, haha, thanks." the mare giggled, liking the fact a stallion was complimenting her looks.

"'Cause your makeup is all messed up. Like jeez, you should get that fixed." the stallion pointed out, which did not make the mare happy. She grabbed her glass and threw it on the stallion's face, making his head all wet. Some of the mares who interacted with the stallion laughed, while most of the bar just gave disapproving glares and scolded the mare for acting that way toward a stallion who merely said something that was not even that mean.

A mare walked up to the scrawny white stallion. "Hey, are you okay? That glass didn't hurt you too much, did it?" the mare asked.

"Uh...no, I'm fine. It happens to me a lot." the stallion answered awkwardly, not knowing how to process this random mare's kindness to him.

"Oh, dear. Well, be careful, okay? There's a lot of dangerous mares out there that could hurt you if you're not careful with who you talk to." the mare warned with a soft voice.

"Boy, do a lot of people need that advice." the white colt said from behind the stallion.

"Uh, sure. Thanks for the heads up." the stallion smiled, the mare smiled back before walking away. The skinny stallion turned back to his two foal companions. "Did you guys see that?! That chick asked me if I was okay! I think I'm making progress here!" he announced excitedly.

"Nah, she just got lucky by cutting the interaction short. A second longer and she would've smashed a bottle on your head." the colt mocked, which gained him a smack on the shoulders by the pink filly.

"I guess this proves if I keep trying, I'll find the right one! Sure it'll be the millionth attempt, but I'm sure of it!" the stallion said confidently.

After some silence, the colt spoke this time. "Mmm, wow, this iced tea is good. I should steal this recipe and make it for my mom, she'll be so happy."

"You make iced tea for your mom, that's so sweet." the pink filly said.

"Eh, yeah, I guess.  But once I make this one for her, she'll be complimenting me and asking me for more for a week straight, which I'd consider a big accomplishment." the colt said. "Wait, did you bring any money?" the colt asked the stallion.

"No, I thought you had it." the stallion said nervously.

"Me? Of course I don't have any! Paying for stuff is your job!" the colt scolded.

"Oh, shit. I forgot to ask that purple unicorn chick for some money, I didn't wanna look bad." 

"You already did, asking for some extra cash wouldn't have made a difference!"

"God, and all our money is in your backpack."

"Even if we did have it, our money's useless here!"

"God, what are we gonna do? They're gonna chase us down! I don't wanna go to jail!" the white stallion panicked.

"Oh, wait! I have an idea! Hey, waitress! Can I borrow some pen and paper?!" the colt shouted at a waitress passing by, and she gave him what he needed. The colt tried writing on it but was having a hard time doing so. "For fuck's sake, how do you write?!" the colt growled under his breath, writing with his forehooves as best he could.

"I saw some ponies who wrote with their mouth, maybe you could try that." the filly suggested.

"Jesus, I look like a cripple now." the colt grumbled as he placed the pen between his teeth. It wasn't any easier, but he finally got the job done. He left the note on the table and got up, his two companions following his lead. "Let's get outta here!"

As the three strangers leave, the waitress went up to the now empty table to collect the payment. But when she got to the table, all she found was a piece of paper with a sloppily hoof and moth-written note that said: "The iced tea is so good, money is not even worth rewarding its deliciousness" with a heart and smiley face at the end. The waitress groaned. "Damn customers, that's the sixth time this week." 

The three strangers ran as far away from the restaurant as they could, ending up in the middle of a wide street. "Man, that was close." the filly said, a little out of breath.

"Hopefully they don't rely on tips to survive here too." the colt said.

"Hopefully they don't throw us in jail for this. I don't wanna get raped in prison." the stallion said with a paranoid voice.

"I'm sure you'll be fine." the colt said deadpan and frustrated.

The stallion breathed a sigh of relief. "Phew, thanks. Wait a minute..." the stallion just realized the implication of what the colt just said.

"Hey, those three kids are coming back! It looks like they've got the backpack with them!" the filly pointed to three little forms running toward them. "Quick! We gotta make ourselves exhausted!" the filly commanded.

"Why?" the colt asked.

"So it looks like we actually tried looking for the backpack too, dummy! Now let's duck behind this building." the filly ran behind a nearby structure and her two friends followed. Once they were hidden, she told them what to do. "Okay, now run in place! Make yourselves sweaty!" Then all three of them ran or actually attempted to run in place, though the other two weren't really enjoying themselves.

"Are you serious right now?" the colt asked grumpily.

"Yes! We should make sure they feel good about themselves for finding it and don't feel cheated!" the orange-haired filly answered between breaths.

"Hey, you know what? We should also make ourselves injured!" the colt exclaimed with a smile.

"What?" the tall stallion asked before a hoof from the colt struck him. "OW! What the hell?!"

"Bahahaha!" the colt laughed hysterically.

"Were you just looking for an excuse to hit me?!" the stallion asked furiously.

"I'm pretty sure that's a question that doesn't need to be asked." the colt answered, unfazed by the stallion's anger.

"You little shit!" the stallion smacked the colt in the head in return. 

"Did you jos fookin' hi' me, ma'e?!" the colt shouted, changing his accent for no understandable reason as he hit the stallion back.

Then a fight broke out between the teenage white colt and the young scrawny stallion, while the filly just watched in frustration and disappointment. "Guys, can you stop fighting?!"

"Shut up, fatass!" the colt hit his filly friend in the head, which actually caused the filly to display a very rare look of rage.

"Oh, that's it!" the filly shouted before joining in the fight, as all three ponies just fought dirty with each other.





The Crusaders looked all around the street for the ponies they were supposed to meet, they swore they saw them from a distance a minute ago. Then they heard some commotion from an alleyway behind a building nearby, they even saw some ponies looking in to see what in Celestia's name was going on. When they arrived in front of the alleyway, they saw a sight they weren't expecting to see. The three ponies they were supposed to meet were in a pile getting into a brutal hooffight with each other, they could even see some blood on them.

"Hey! Stop!" Scootaloo yelled, which did the job of making the three stop fighting and look up at her, it seemed like they were completely oblivious to their surroundings, then they stood up. "What are you doing? Doofus, why are you fighting foals?"

"Hey, he started it!" the stallion accused the much younger colt next to him, which gained some weird looks and snickers from the ponies watching the whole ordeal. "Yeah, go ahead! Laugh! You won't be laughing if you had to deal with this kid every day!"

"Okay, okay, calm down." Sweetie Belle reassured the tall young stallion. "Let's just all relax and apologize for whatever you guys said to each other."

"There's only one guy who needs to apologize around here." Doofus glared at Question Mark, which was surprisingly joined by Smiley Face.

"What, man? I was just messin' around, man." the colt said innocently.

"Apologize..." Smiley Face ordered slowly, which made Question Mark accept.

"Fine...Doofus, I'm sorry. I'm sorry...that you're such a short-fused simpleton! Bahahaha!" the colt laughed hysterically.

"I'm short fused?! You're the one who yells at us all the time, you fucking...!" Doofus was about to yell before Sweetie Belle cut in to prevent another fight from happening.

"Okay, okay! Let's not fight again!" Sweetie Belle said panicked.

"Hey, Question Mark! Guess what? We've found it!" Scootaloo shouted victoriously while holding the colt's backpack high up in the air. "Y'know what that means?"

"I can finally get away from you three?" Question Mark said.

"No, it means you're gonna stop being such a big jerk! You're gonna stop insulting others and calling ponies names, and the first thing you're gonna do is apologize to Doofus!" Scootaloo pointed at the skinny stallion who smiled smugly at the colt.

"Yeah, no. No way." Question Mark said plainly and walked toward his backpack.

"Well, too bad." Scootaloo said confidently as the backpack is suddenly enveloped in a light green aura and levitated high enough beyond the colt's reach. Question Mark stared in shock and he looked back to see Sweetie Belle crossing her forehooves and smiling smugly at him as well.

"Hey! What are you doing, Marshmallow Brat?! Give that back!" Question Mark yelled as he jumped up attempting to grab the floating backpack a few times before quickly up.

"You're gonna have to say sorry to your friend Doofus first, and since you just insulted Sweetie Belle you're gonna have to apologize to her too." the pegasus filly said.

"Oh, for fuck's sake! I don't want to!" Question Mark refused.

"Apologize." Scootaloo commanded again.

"No means no, Bill Cosby!" Question Mark shouted.

Scootaloo didn't know what the colt just called her, but it obviously wasn't anything good, so she decided that was the last straw. "Oh, well, then. Guess you won't mind us spilling out the stuff in your backpack." the orange filly gestured to Sweetie Belle as the white unicorn filly used her magic to slowly unzip the backpack.

"NO! Alright, jeez, fine, man! I'll do it! God, I'm pretty sure legally...this is blackmail." Question Mark exclaimed. Scootaloo gestured to Sweetie Belle to stop what she was doing to let the colt speak. "Okay, I'm sorry, okay? I was acting like a total dickhead and I shouldn't have, now can we please just move on from this?" Question Mark said to Doofus Dweeb, who looked at him skeptically.

"That wasn't a really good apology. But honestly, the fact you actually attempted to apologize for something for once should be considered a miracle in and of itself." the stallion said, which caused the colt to breathe a sigh of relief. Smiley Face even looked at him proudly, as if what he just did was a massive accomplishment.

"I suppose that's good enough," Scootaloo said. "Well, here's your backpack." Scootaloo ordered Sweetie Belle to give the backpack back to its rightful owner and the unicorn levitated it back softly on the ground in front of Question Mark.

"Yes, my backpack! I knew it could be found!" the colt exclaimed happily and hugged his backpack tightly. This was the first time the fillies saw Question Mark display a genuine form of happiness, Smiley Face just smiled at him while Doofus rolled his eyes tiredly. 

Suddenly, Question Mark's happy demeanor ceases as he turned to the fillies who were now standing together in front of him and gave them a cold glare. "You didn't look inside the backpack, did you?" he asked with a sinister voice.

"Uh, no! Of course not!" Sweetie Belle answered nervously.

"Don't lie to me! Did you touch anything in my backpack?!" Question Mark asked again, his voice getting louder.

"N-No...honest! We didn't wanna look inside! It's rude ta look inside a colt's bag!" Applebloom answered nervously as well.

"Are you sure...?" Question Mark asked yet again, his voice sounding borderline villainous.

"Well, I did wanna look inside at first, but Sweetie and Applebloom stopped me. We didn't look inside at all." Scootaloo answered this time.

"Really? You didn't see or touch my makeup palette, porn magazines, or ultra ancient alien death ray that has the ability to destroy entire planets?!" Question Mark asked again, aggressively this time.

"Wait, what? You have those things in your backpack?" Sweetie Belle asked, the fillies just looked at the colt confused this time.

Question Mark then dropped his sinister demeanor and changed back to his normal self in the blink of an eye. "Oh, so you really didn't look inside? Wow, I'm actually surprised, I did not expect that."

"Y-yeah, see? We didn't look inside. We figured it's best to respect your privacy and just let you show it to us when you actually want to." Scootaloo said wisely, still stunned at Question Mark's quick mood change.

"Okay, glad we got this over with. I'm just gonna head back to the castle and..." Question Mark said before getting nudged on the withers by Smiley Face.

"Hey, remember what we talked about?" Smiley Face said as a mother would to a foal.

"Alright, fine. Look, I'm sorry I acted like a complete asshole to you guys..." Question Mark said with a sincere voice.

"And me too!" Doofus protested.

"Shut up. Anyway, it was wrong of me and I wish to fix that. Do you think maybe we could uh...hang with you and you can tell us more about Ponyville and help us understand what's going on around here?" Question Mark asked.

The fillies were genuinely surprised by the colt's sincere apology, but they were happy with it. They all grinned cheerfully at the three strangers. "It would be tha Cutie Mark Crusaders' honor!" Applebloom spoke up.

Then the three fillies bumped hooves in the air. "YEAH!" they all exclaimed.

Smiley Face smiled at the Crusaders, and she was happy for her friend for actually managing a genuine apology. "So, you wanna take us somewhere?" the pink teenage filly asked.

"Oh, maybe we should take them to Sweet Apple Acres an' show 'em our clubhouse!" Applebloom suggested excitedly.

"I think we should show them the School of Friendship! They'll love it there!" Sweetie Belle came in with her own suggestion.

"Girls, why don't we decide along the way?" Scootaloo said.

"Okay, then!" Sweetie Belle said happily. "C'mon, guys!" the unicorn gestured to the three strangers and the three of them followed the Crusaders.

"Oh, jeez..." Question Mark said as if out of breath.

And all six ponies walked through the streets of Ponyville for their next destination of Adventure.

"By the way, did you actually have all those things you said in your backpack?" Sweetie Belle asked the white colt.

"No, of course not, I was just bluffing."
> Chapter 9: The School of Friendship
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

The Crusaders and the three strangers have decided to visit the School of Friendship, and the six of them all trot excitedly to their destination...well, four of them are, Doofus was pretty indifferent and mostly just curious, same with Question Mark, who seemed to be conflicted between not wanting to go a public place to see anypony or any creature and forcing himself to follow the others for an important purpose. The Crusaders felt happy at the fact they had new friends to talk to about what they do and show them around town, though it was mostly Smiley Face they talked to since she seemed to be the only one interested in talking and befriending the fillies, Doofus was just too awkward to talk to, not to mention the stuff he did talk about was boring and none of the fillies got what he was talking about, while Question Mark was listening and seemed to keep what they told him in mind, but he wasn't really...listening. Like he doesn't really care about what their accomplishments meant. It was kind of funny to Sweetie Belle since she heard from Rarity that usually it's the stallion who rambles on about uninteresting things while she and a lot of other mares just sat there pretending to be interested, this time it was the other way around.

It was a good thing the pink teenage filly was as talkative as she was compared to her two friends, otherwise, the walk would've been awkward. 

"So basically, you three go around helping others find their talent and true calling in life?" Smiley asked in awe.

"Yep, one time me, Sweetie, and AB got together everypony and every creature we've ever helped to convince my parents not to take me away from Ponyville. It filled up the entire town square." Scootaloo said.

"Wow, that's pretty amazing. And you three are still so young, I never got to help as many people like you three, and God knows our home could use more kids like you. Everyone I see back home is just so sad and lost all the time." Smiley Face said praising the Crusaders to no end.

"Do you also discourage talent, because we sure need to tell a lot of individuals back home that they don't have any talent despite how famous they think they are...you know which ones I'm talking about." Question Mark added, then spoke to his two friends specifically at the end.

"Of course not, ev'rypony has a talent within them waitin' ta be used but jus' hasn't been found yet." Applebloom responded to the older colt's mocking statement.

"Trust me, you three haven't witnessed the horrors I've witnessed. Not a single shred of talent, dignity, or purpose on those guys." Question Mark spoke as if remembering a traumatizing event.

"He's got a point, I mean, look at me, I don't have a single special talent in anything at all. I'm pretty much useless in every way. I mean, what can I do? Change the channel? Browse the internet? Work as a cashier on the lowest wage? Set up a world record for most failed dates and social interactions?" Doofus said, hammering down on himself.

"Hey, don't say that. Everypony has a special talent, even when they don't realize what it is yet. We all get our cutie mark sometime, except for you...what's going on with your mark anyway? I've never seen a grown-up pony without a cutie mark before." Sweetie Belle asked.

"Good question, I have no idea. It's probably what I just said." the stallion answered.

"Yeah, better believe him, Stay Puft. The only use this guy is to me is that he's the only one out of the three of us old enough to get us places we can't go on our own, other than that...nah." the colt added.

"Use? That sounds really demeaning. It sounds like you're talking about him as more of a lackey or a tool than your friend." Sweetie Belle said, a little weirded out by how the colt talked about the stallion.

"I mean, that's 'cause he kinda is. Nobody in our town wants to be this loser's friend, let alone me." Question Mark responded. 

"It's true, and honestly, I can't really blame them, I wouldn't wanna be my friend either." Doofus said.

"Don't say that! Every creature deserves a friend! In fact, if Question Mark isn't gonna be a good friend to you, I'm gonna be your friend right now! I promise you, I will find you friends, as many special someponies as you want, your own herd, and I will help you get your cutie mark!" Sweetie Belle said confidently.

"Uh...gee, thanks, I guess." the tall skinny stallion blurted out, not knowing what to say after the small filly talked about helping him out so openly and genuinely, it was clear most ponies just said things out of pity to him, or out of mockery.

"So your first true friend is a little girl pony that helps other ponies get their ass branded? Well, that's weird as shit, I'll give you that." Question Mark said, this being the first time he addressed the stallion in a non-mocking tone.

"Yeah, it really is. But considering everything that happened to me, this is a pretty good headstart." Doofus replied.

"Yeah, I guess it is." Question Mark replied back in a surprisingly sincere tone.

"Look, guys! I think this is the place!" Smiley Face called to her two friends, pointing to the building in front of them.

The six of them arrive at the School of Friendship which rested on a hillside and its entrance surrounded by two waterfalls and a large body of water with three different passages leading to it. The school was primarily purple in color and had a lot of star emblems covering it to signify Twilight's ownership of the school before she became princess of all Equestria. It had a lot of flags and towers as well, it looked like what most ponies would think of when they hear the word castle more than the Castle of Friendship did.

"All this just to teach friendship? Jesus, man. I could understand Hogwarts, but this?" Question Mark exclaimed in disbelief at the structure before him.

"What does hog warts have ta do with a school?" Applebloom asked.

"It's uh...never mind, forget I said anything." Question Mark brushed off what he said earlier as the six of them walked on the bridge atop the lake toward the front doors. 

When the six of them crossed the bridge and opened the two front doors, they have officially entered the School of Friendship. The entrance hall was filled with students walking around, relaxing as it was the weekend and they got to spend the entire day spending time with their friends and schoolmates. Over the past few years, more non-pony students started to attend, the fillies heard they just got a kirin student recently. Smiley Face stared in awe and excitement, Doofus stared in confusion and bewilderment, Question Mark had a look of confusion on his face but in a different way...a less positive way.

Ever since the Crusaders first met Question Mark, the colt always looked like he had two opposing thought processes and emotions constantly in conflict with each other every time he reacts to something new. On one hoof, he looked amazed at the school and its students and is eager to know more, but on the other, he seemed to always have a disdainful feeling to everything around him, which caused him to frequently look confused as to how to react, sometimes his internal conflict could be present on his face once in a while.

"So, whaddya guys think of the place?" Scootaloo asked happily.

"It's cooler than I thought it would be, it really is like a real-life Hogwarts like you said!" Smiley exclaimed in her usual excited tone as she spoke to Question Mark at the end.

"I didn't exactly say that." the colt pointed out monotonously, but Smiley wasn't listening. Applebloom wanted to ask again what this 'hog warts' deal was but decided not to ruin the moment. The little farm filly then noticed the colt's face.

"Um...Question Mark? What's wrong?" Applebloom asked.

"I just don't understand this place, man. Look at it, this school better be free, 'cause I can't imagine parents having to pay God knows how much for their kids to learn a bunch of 'Clifford the Big Red Dog' basics." Question Mark annoyed, gesturing to the school.

"Who's Clifford the...?" Sweetie Belle was about to ask before Question Mark cut her off.

"Do not interrupt my rant with unimportant questions, this is important scientific observation!" the white teenage colt exclaimed at Sweetie Belle dramatically. 

"Anyway, as I was trying to say before I was so rudely interrupted..." Question Mark glared exaggeratingly at the unicorn filly. "I mean, look at those students going to the library to study, what could they possibly be so excited about? 'OMG, girl! I just studied the curriculum on how to talk without getting an anxiety breakdown!', 'Hey, hey, dude! I just passed the final test on how to say 'please' and 'thank you' and stuff!', 'Hey, look, mom! I don't need to not take schizophrenia pills anymore!'" Question Mark said every line with a different voice, all of them exaggerated and said in a mocking tone.

"Hey! That's not nice! And this school ain't like that either!" Applebloom scolded as she and the Crusaders and even Smiley Face eyed him angrily, while Doofus just stood where he was bored with what was going on.

"Yeah, maybe if you actually look around and see what's going on instead of automatically resorting to saying bad stuff all the time, you'd understand why this is a good school!" Scootaloo added.

"Hm, you've got a point there. So go ahead, show me around, enlighten me." Question Mark said, the first part sounding sincere but the latter part sounding sarcastic and mocking.

"Oh, we will! You'll be eating your words later!" Scootaloo said. The fillies then gestured to the three strangers to follow them so they can show them around the school.

They first headed toward Pinkie Pie's class which taught laughter, while they walked there the three strangers gained a few curious and weird looks from the students they passed, they did stand out in every crowd they were in.

"This is Pinkie Pie's Laughter Class." Sweetie Belle introduced the room, which had some students in it finding new games to play with each other.

"So you have a class just to teach kids how to laugh? That sounds really depressing." Question Mark said while staring into the class with a look of confusion.

"No, it's not! This class is used to teach kids how to have fun and spread happiness to others!" Sweetie Belle said.

"Still sounds really depressing." the colt said again.

"A class that teaches how to have fun?! Man, if my schools were like this I would've actually been able to go to college!" Doofus said happily.

"No, you wouldn't." Question Mark said plainly.

"Yeah, you're right." Doofus blurted out, immediately giving up on what he said a second ago.

"You know, this should really be a real lesson to teach in school back home. I can't stand seeing so many depressed young people all the time." Smiley Face said sadly.

"I know, right? They really get on my nerves, every time they talk about themselves they always have to say stuff like: 'Uh, god...my depression is killing me from doing stuff.', 'I cry three times a day, in the shower, on the computer, and before bed', 'I look at memes to make sure I don't kill myself', or 'my family is bad'. Like shut up, man, I'm tired of hearing these kids complain about the same shit all the time." Question Mark said in exaggerated voices and in a mocking tone again.

"Hey! You shouldn't make fun of them like that, and that's not what I meant." Smiley Face said angrily.

"Yeah, I know. Just wanted to share my thoughts on the subject." the white colt smiled smugly.

"Uh...let's move on to the next class." Sweetie Belle said awkwardly.

They moved on to the rest of the classes, where the Crusaders did all the explaining. Smiley Face still hasn't rid herself of her awed expression, while Question Mark had suddenly decided to finally stop talking and listen to the fillies, while Doofus didn't really have a comment on anything. After a long tour of the classes, they bumped into the six top students of the school, Sandbar, Gallus, Yona, Smolder, Ocellus, and Silverstream, who were walking down the hallway to spend some time outdoors.

"Applebloom? Oh, wow, it's been quite a while." Sandbar greeted, shaking the yellow filly's hoof.

"Nice ta meet ya too, Sandbar." Applebloom greeted back.

"Who've you got with you?" Sandbar stared at the three strangers behind the fillies.

"Oh! Sandbar, everycreature, Ah'd like ya ta meet some three newcomers ta Ponyville. This here's Question Mark, this is Smiley Face, and that's uh...Doofus Dweeb." Applebloom introduced the three strangers, hesitating at the end. The three of them just stared in shock at the students, as though they'd never seen creatures beside ponies before.

"Jesus, what was God smoking when he made these guys?" Question Mark whispered to himself under his breath.

"Hello, nice to meet you all!" Smiley said happily.

"Um...hello." Question Mark said monotonously.

"Hi....guys?" Doofus greeted awkwardly and confused.

"So, um...what're your names?" Smiley Face asked.

"Hi, I'm Sandbar."

"Me Yona!"

"Hey, name's Smolder."

"Um...Hi, I'm Ocellus."

"The name's Gallus."

"I'm Silverstream! Ohmygosh, you're so adorable, and you're purple too!" the young female hippogriff exclaimed excitedly.

"Well, I think I'm more pink than purple." Smiley Face smiled nervously. 

"Oh, yeah, right. I was about to say I could make 'purple twins' seashell necklaces for us. I did that with Princess Twilights and Headmare Starlight." Silverstream said awkwardly.

"You make seashell necklaces? Oh my gosh, I used to do that when I was little whenever me and my family went to the beach!" Smiley Face said happily.

"Really?! Oh my gosh, we could be the 'seashell maker sisters'!" Silverstream exclaimed happily again as she and the pink filly held each other's forelimbs and jumped around and squealed excitedly.

"Oh god, please no. It's already tiring dealing with one idiotic hyperactive girl, I don't need another." Question Mark said in a dreadful tone.

"So, uh...what are you guys supposed to be?" Doofus asked, confirming the fact they've never seen non-pony creatures before.

The six students just stared in surprise at the young stallion who was around their age, maybe a little older. "Um, what do you mean?" Gallus asked.

"Oh yeah, we forgot to mention...these guys are apparently suffering some kind of amnesia, that's why they don't know anything." Scootaloo explained.

"Amnesia?!" the six students exclaimed, all in different tones, some out of worry, others out of curiosity.

"Oh, jeez, that's terrible." Ocellus said.

"Aww, you poor things! Don't worry, it'll be alright." Silverstream pulled Smiley Face into a dangerously tight hug.

"Uhm...don't worry too, we're fine...other than a little confusion, there's nothing wrong with us..." Smiley attempted to speak through a throat tightned by the hippogriff's embrace.

"Let go of the filly, Silvy. You're gonna suffocate her." Smolder told the young purple hippogriff.

"Oh, right...sorry, heheh." Silverstream finally let go of the younger pink filly from her grasp.

"So, uh...Doofus, was it? You asked what we were? Well, I'm a..." Gallus attempted to answer before the white colt interrupted him.

"Wait, wait! I think I know what you guys are. Let me see if I can remember. Let's see...you're a griffin." Question Mark pointed at Gallus. "You're obviously a dragon." he pointed to Smolder. 

"Heh, yeah, obviously. I mean what else would I be? A pigeon?" Smolder chuckled.

"You're a...yak, I'm guessing?" the colt then pointed to Yona.

"That right! Yona yak!" Yona announced proudly, as well as saying it like a teacher awarding her student.

"You're a griffin too, I think...oh, wait, no. You're a hippogriff!" the colt then pointed to Silverstream, correcting himself when he noticed her hooves on her hindlegs.

"That's right! I almost corrected you back there." Silverstream said.

"You...well, no confusion with you." Question Mark said when he pointed at Sandbar, causing the young stallion to chuckle. "And you...actually, I don't know what you are. What are you supposed to be?" the colt said when he pointed at Ocellus.

"Oh! Me? I'm a changeling." Ocellus answered with a smile.

"Changeling? You? I thought changelings were evil creatures who kidnapped babies and switched them out for themselves or something like that. I don't know, I never really researched them." Question Mark said.

"Haha, well we did use to kidnap other creatures and replace them in order to infiltrate their territory, but we don't do that anymore, so you don't need to worry about anything." Ocellus explained and reassured.

"Ah, okay, that's nice to know." Question Mark said, not in a relieved way, more just like 'quick fact check' way.

"So, what brings you to our school?" Sandbar asked.

"Oh, nothing much, really. We're just taking a look around this...lovely little town. You know, introducing ourselves to our new environment." Question Mark answered.

"New? Are you guys not from around here?" the yellow young stallion asked.

"Eh, no. We came from somewhere else, we just can't remember where." the white colt answered again.

"Well, if you guys have amnesia, there's probably a chance you're from around here and just don't know it." Gallus suggested.

"Ah don't think so, if they were Ah would've seen them before. Ah've never seen them around these parts in mah life." Applebloom shot down Gallus's suggestion.

"Oh, yeah, good point." Gallus said, rubbing the back of his head.

"So you guys are like...the star students here? Well, what a...wonderfully diverse group you have." Question Mark said, attempting to say anything that doesn't make him silent the whole time.

"Uh, thanks, haha." Sandbar chuckled. "I think our friendship did help set an example to Equestria and the other kingdoms that we're stronger together."

"Yes, yes, very nice. By the way, you said you're a changeling, right? Can you actually do some changing? Transforming? Shapeshifting? You know." Question Mark ignored what Sandbar said and immediately shifted his focus to Ocellus.

"Oh! Uh...yes, I can, actually. I think we can change into almost anything we want." the young blue changeling answered.

"Well, then show it to me! Verbal explanation isn't enough, you know?" Question Mark said.

"Um, okay, what do you want me to change into?" Ocellus asked.

"I don't care, anything." the colt said plainly.

"Ooh! Ooh! Can you change into a stallion-sized chinchilla?" Smiley Face requested.

"That's a pretty random request." Question Mark thought out loud.

"Alright, then." Ocellus said, then her body was covered by a swirling circle of blue flame-like magic, then in the place of the young blue changeling was now a giant chinchilla the size of Big Macintosh. The three strangers just stared in shock at what took place before their eyes.

"Oh, Celly, you never fail to amaze me." Silverstream said in admiration for her friend.

"Cooolll." Smiley Face gasped out in disbelief.

"Woah, very nice. Very nice indeed." Question Mark said, nodding his head. "Y'know, I'm more surprised you guys haven't taken over the world at this point. 'Invasion of the Body Snatchers' type shit, y'know."

"Ooh! Change into me!" the pink filly requested again. Ocellus accepted her request and changed into the pink filly in front of her, imitating her every move like she was a mirror, which caused Smiley Face to laugh.

"Now turn into him!" Smiley pointed at Question Mark. Ocellus took a few steps to the filly's right to be right in front of Question Mark then transformed into him, having the same lowered-eyelids expression as the white colt, but also putting up a smile that the colt was lacking most of the time.

"Oh God, is that really what I look like?" Question Mark said at Ocellus's imitation of himself.

Before Smiley could voice her request, Ocellus already knew what she would say and moved on to the scrawny stallion, again changing into him.

"Wow, I already thought I looked pretty bad, but this is worse than I thought." Doofus said looking at himself.

"Ooh! Now turn into...!" Smiley Face exclaimed before Question Mark put a hoof over her muzzle.

"Enough! You're gonna tire the poor thing out." Question Mark shouted then forced a smile and spoke in a quieter tone at the end.

"So, uh...I keep hearing about this 'herd' thing where a bunch of ponies like... gets into a relationship with a lot of others. So, are you guys like...together or something?" Doofus asked, which caused the six students to look at each other awkwardly.

"Well...not really, not yet anyway, but Sandbar has been suggesting the idea for a while, and we've sort of been considering it. But so far, it's mostly two of us with each other. Sandbar and Yona, Gallus and Silverstream..." Ocellus explained.

"So, are you with the dragon chick?" the stallion asked again.

"Yep!" Ocellus answered happily.

"Nah." Smolder shrugged off.

The dragon and the changeling stared at each other in shock. "Smoldy, you...don't wanna be together with me?!" Ocellus asked, sadness creeping into her voice.

"We were together?" Smolder asked, legitimately confused. Luckily, Question Mark spoke up before any arguing could happen.

"Wait, so a pony with a yak, a griffin and a hippogriff, and a dragon with a...weird shapeshifting bug horse thing? And a chance they're all gonna get together into one couple orgy? What the hell is this madness?" Question Mark asked himself.

"Why? You got a problem with that?" Gallus asked threateningly, he and Smolder glared at the colt.

"Now, now, guys. He has amnesia, remember? He probably just still doesn't understand..." Sandbar tried calming the two of his most headstrong friends doing anything rash.

"Of course I have a problem! I mean, you're all different species, which means whatever offspring you guys'll produce will be a hundred percent deformed and brain-damaged." Question Mark said angrily, which caused a loud gasp from the six students and the three fillies.

"What'd you just say, ya little...?!" Smolder yelled as she tensed into fighting position followed by Gallus. Smolder, who came from a mostly male-centered society, wasn't afraid to get physical with a male as the ponies would, which caused the Crusaders and some of the dragon's friends to grow worried.

"Okay, I think it's best you get out of here right now." Smiley Face chuckled nervously as she pulled her colt friend away toward the opposite direction and spoke through gritted teeth at the end. They were followed by Doofus and the Crusaders who all had angry looks on them.

"Yeah, let's just ignore them and get on with our day, Smolder." Sandbar said nervously as well, holding back his dragon friend with Ocellus. He avoided calling her any pet names at the moment since he knew that would only cause her to get angrier.

"They'll turn out retarded, I swear to you!" Question Mark shouted to the six young creatures once he was far enough from them, Smolder tried to fly towards him but got held back by her friends. "God, they just let anyone be parents these days."

Smiley smacked Question Mark on his poll while scowling, letting him know she was not happy at all. "You just broke your promise, you jerk!" she scolded. Smiley said she doesn't really use words like 'jerk' too often when addressing her friend, she usually only used it when she's really unhappy with his behavior. 

"What promise?" Question Mark asked.

"That promise of not acting like an asshole to others so you can, y'know, learn stuff from them?!" the pink filly continued, she was joined in by the Crusaders who also wanted to glare at the older colt.

"Oh, that one? I thought that was only meant for those three." Question Mark pointed at the Crusaders. "Besides, you know I don't really do promises."

"That is still not an excuse to behave like that!" Applebloom joined in on the scolding.

"Yeah! You know, it's a miracle that Smiley still wants to be your friend after everything you've done!" Scootaloo also joined in.

"Hey, man, believe me, I'm also confused as to how this girl still wants to be around after all this time." Question Mark said.

"You know what? I hope that you don't find a special somepony and form a herd with her! Because you'll be a terrible coltfriend!" Sweetie Belle scolded as well.

"Good! One girl is already gonna be a pain in the ass to deal with, I don't need an entire harem of them on my ass!" Question Mark shouted back.

"What's going on here?!" a voice shouted, the six of them turned to see Starlight and her herd walking down the hallway to see what all the commotion is. "Oh! It's you three. So you've decided to take a look at the school, did you enjoy it." Starlight asked happily when she saw who the ones making the noise were.

"Oh yeah!... I forgot you guys existed." Question Mark said with fake enthusiasm at the beginning but devolving into disinterest at the end.

"And I see you've made some new friends!" Starlight noticed the Crusaders in front of her, pretending not to hear Question Mark's comment.

"We're certainly friends with Smiley and Doofus!" Sweetie Belle proclaimed happily. "Question Mark? Not so much." the filly said grumpily. 

"Oh, well...that's kind of a shame." Starlight said, trying to hide any tone that suggests that she doesn't blame them, seeing the colt's behavior.

"Hey, Headmare Starlight!" Starlight heard six voices from the other end of the hallway, she saw it was the six creature students, who seemed to have noticed her and decided to greet her for a moment.

Smolder noticed the white colt standing next to the headmare and immediately shifted to anger. "You're still here, are ya?!"

"Here, there, and everywhere, man." Question Mark said deadpan.

"Ah, I see you three have also met this school's star students." Starlight chuckled nervously, trying to make sure nothing ugly happens.

"Unfortunately, I have." the colt said in a sarcastic tone.

"Well, I'm sorry, students, but I don't have time to talk right now. I need to speak with these three with Vice Headstallion Sunburst and Counselor Trixie, so I guess I'll see you around later?" Starlight explained.

"Fine by us, Headmare Starlight. C'mon, guys." Gallus signaled his friends to continue with what they were doing.

"You three should probably get home, your families might be looking for you." Starlight said to the crusaders.

"It's fine, Starlight. Our families know we're goin' 'round town today. Hey, let's tell them about what happened!" Applebloom suggested, then the three of them ran out the front doors.

"So, uh...what are we doing now exactly?" Doofus asked.

"We're going to discuss your stay here in Ponyville and what we're gonna do with you three." Starlight answered in a serious tone.

"Uh-oh." Question Mark said quietly, feeling something bad is going to come out of this.