A train wreck of a hook-up attempt
If you want something, go get it.
It was an attitude Princess Twilight Sparkle understood well, even if she seldom viewed it as such. She often did it naturally, much like how stressing out epically is natural to her.
However, there was one thing, or rather person, she desired, but shyness prevented her from going after them.
Flash Sentry.
But now, Twilight was finally ready to land the boy of her dreams. Unfortunately, her heart raced and pumped ferociously; butterflies danced about in her belly in a not-so-pleasant sensation of dread as she crept to Canterlot High’s front doors. Her feet – yes feet, because the alicorn was in the human world and therefore in her human form – felt to be anchored to the ground by balls and chains. She had never asked out a stallion, let alone someone of a different species. What if it ended in a bust?
No, she couldn’t think that way and potentially psych herself out. She had waited too long as it is.
Or maybe it would have to wait a little longer: with this being outside school hours, Canterlot High was closed. Twilight peered through the locked doors, but the school’s halls bore no signs of life.
“Oops, I came too late. I should have told Sunset I was coming in our journals.”
Debating if she should return to Equestria, head to Sunset’s apartment for Sunset’s assistance, or try to track down Flash solo, Twilight turned away from the school. An amber figure strutting down a sidewalk managed to catch her eye.
The figure was Flash! Twilight could thank fate for tossing her a bone later; she had a boy to make hers. Summoning the inner strength her past heroic, life-risking battles against villains had forged, she willed her feet and knocking knees forward, one by one.
‘Relax, Twilight,’ she thought. ‘Just remember what “A Beginner’s Guide to Asking Out Stallions” advised, and repeat what you did during practice.’
“Oh, is that you, Princess Twilight?” Flash stopped walking and waved a greeting hand toward Twilight. “It’s great to see you again.”
“Y-yep it’s me–whoa!” One of Twilight’s feet tripped over the other. Her sense of balance delivered an unexpected resignation and the Princess slammed face-down on the sidewalk; her face barely missed smashing into Flash’s feet.
What a start for the adorkable one.
“Whoa there, are you okay?” Flash leaned down, offering his hand.
Twilight bounced to her feet and brushed off her blouse and skirt. “I-I’m okay, and as I was saying, it’s me in the fur–uh, flesh.” She mentally groaned, then shook her head, trying to reset the situation. “I’m glad to see you too. Do you have a muppy?”
“Muppy?”
“N-not ‘muppy’.” Twilight slapped her cheek. “I meant, minute.”
“Sure, I got a few minutes. What’s wrong?”
Twilight glanced at Flash’s hair – blue and a little spiky – and his black jacket. She couldn’t grasp why, but the jacket sprinkled an extra level of appeal to him, which further melted her knees.
But that was enough of gawking at her crush. She came to score her first-ever date.
‘Uh, what was I supposed to do again? Oh, right. Here goes nothing.’ Twilight flicked her hair to the side.
No response.
The pony-turned-human flicked her hair a second time, followed by batting of her eyes.
“You feeling all right?” Flash asked with a puzzled frown and tilt of his head.
“Uh, yes, I am. I’m very all right, So right, I don’t know what’s ‘left’. Ha, ha, ha?” The maker of poor puns rested a finger on her cheek and thought, ‘I need better jokes, but flicking my hair and batting my eyes was intended to show I’m willing to date. Maybe stroking my arms will be more successful.’
A giggle eeked from Twilight’s lips and she stroked one of her arms with a finger, her cheeks reddening. She was supposed to stroke Flash’s arm as a way of flirting, but her infatuated brain’s instructions laid an egg. Or continued to lay eggs, colossal ones, given how awful (albeit courageous) this train wreck of a hook-up attempt has become.
“Uh, are you nervous?”
“Ye–I mean, no.” Twilight instinctively balled her hands into fists and fiddled them. “Um, did I not do it properly?”
“N-no, there’s no ‘wrong’ way to rub or stroke your own arm.”
“Oh,” she said, a frown waning on her lips. ‘Great. I made a mistake somehow, but I can’t ask him how I flirted incorrectly! Maybe I should have brought Spike or Starlight with me for moral support.’
“Wait, I think I know what’s going on.”
“You do?”
Flash nodded. “Yeah, but if I’m wrong, I’m going to feel so embarrassed. Do you want to ask me out on a date?”
“YES!!” Twilight shouted as she jumped in the air. She gasped, relaxed herself, and said much more calmly, “Um, yes, if it’s okay. How did you know?”
“The way you were blushing, stuttering, flicking your hair, and batting your eyes were all hints. Ponies from Equestria act the same way humans do, huh?”
“Hehe, more or less. So, what do you say?” she asked, but a new realization widened her eyes. ‘I forgot! I’m not a true human! Would humans consider an interspecies relationship?!’ She scraped the sidewalk with a foot, thanks to the nervousness of what might come next. “B-but if it would feel…weird to date somepo–uh-someone who’s really a pony, I will totally understand.”
“No,” Flash said as he shook his head. “It wouldn’t be weird–well, maybe it would be a little weird at first. Still, pony or not, you’re one of the cutest, most amazing girls ever. I even had a crush on you!”
Insert high-pitched *squee* from the now-happiest girl in the Multiverse, her lips brightening into her most joy-filled grin of all time. This was too good to be true! “You mean it?!”
“Yes, but–”
“Great! Then let’s–wait.” Twilight’s smile collapsed. Her heart tightened. “Why did you say ‘but’?”
Flash rubbed the back of his neck. “Uh, please don’t be mad, but I think it would be a bad idea for us to date.”
“Why?! Did I say something wrong?!”
“N-no, you did nothing wrong.” Flash gazed toward the pedestal containing a portal to Equestria. “It’s just, we literally live in different worlds. You’re a princess too, so you gotta be crazy-busy.”
"I-I don’t be that busy! It’s true I don’t visit this world often, but it's not because I can’t!”
“Still, wouldn’t it be hard for us to hold a relationship? Sunset even told me it would be best to get over you.”
“Sunset said what?”
“She told me you and I had no chance due to how little we see each other. I thought it over in case she was wrong, but there really is only so far a relationship between us could go. If it makes you feel better, I would have happily gone on a date with you if Sunset hadn’t given me her, uh, ‘pep talk’!”
“Sunset Shimmer said what?” Twilight asked again, unintentionally more sternly than before.
“But it’s all fine!” Flash laid a hand on Twilight’s shoulder. “Besides, you deserve way better than me. I’m just an average guy who isn’t anything special, and you’re an incredible, world-saving princess!” He lifted his hand off the incredible, world-saving Princess.
“N-no! Don’t talk like that!” Twilight grasped both of Flash’s hands and held them together. “Can’t we at least try? Maybe treat it as an experiment that we could abandon if need be?”
“No.” He looked away, as if seeking to alleviate Twilight’s pain from the daggers of rejection he reluctantly threw. “It might end up making the truth more painful for us to accept. I’m sorry.”
“I understand. You did raise some valid points.” With her heart growing heavy and squirming from rejection’s cuts, Twilight hesitantly let her crush go, in more ways than one. “I would never force you into something you’re unsure of anyway, so it’s okay. I’m okay.”
Flash smiled, turned his head back to Twilight, and blew a guilt-releasing sigh. “Oh, great! I was worried I broke your heart, and we can still be friends, right? Later, if you promise not to laugh if they are lousy, I could show you some songs on my guitar that I’ve been working on.” He let out a tension-cutting chuckle.
“O-of course we can be friends, and I'd never laugh at you!” Twilight said with a smile. Under the smile, though, she gritted her teeth as she brooded more and more over a certain girl. “Anyway, I need to, um, do something. Until next time?”
“Until next time.”
After giving a friendly wave, Twilight walked off. Her steps strengthened into heavy stomps. Before she could proceed to gulp down a ton of heartbreak-soothing cider, she had to give a “friend” something.
Sunset Shimmer lay across a sofa in her living room. Her fingers testingly stroked her guitar’s strings as she tuned the instrument.
“This is by far the least fun part of playing guitars. I wish I knew a quicker way to–”
*Knock knock knock*
“I’m coming!” Sunset laid her guitar beside her, then pushed herself off the sofa and strode to the front door. She opened the door, ready to cheerfully greet her visitor.
A lavender fist rammed into her jaw.
*POW!*
“Ow!” Sunset flew backward from the punch given to her, and slammed on her back onto the floor.
“How could you, Sunset Shimmer?!” Twilight asked, the owner of that previously mentioned fist while still holding it threateningly in the air.
“Welp, I knew this day would come. Not as painful as I imagined it would–”
“Answer me!” Twilight pointed an irate finger at the floored girl. “Why did you tell Flash Sentry that he and I had ‘no chance’?!”
“Wait, this is about Flash?”
“Yes! I just tried to ask him out, but he turned me down! He said he would have accepted my offer, but thanks to you telling him it wouldn’t work out between us, he’s afraid to try!”
Sunset snapped her fingers in realization. “Shoot. I did tell him that during our trip to Camp Everfree, and I’m sorry! He was becoming a mess without you, so I had to encourage him to move on. He even came close to hitting on this world's Twilight–and before you run to KO her, she isn’t interested in him.”
“So why didn’t you tell me about his true feelings?! If I had known, I would have asked him for a date ASAP without fear of being rejected!”
“My first thought was to tell you once I got back home, but be honest; do you truly not think an interdimensional relationship would eventually hit a wall?” Sunset forced herself off the floor and to her feet. “Would you give up your princess title and move to this world if you ever wanted to marry him?”
“I…uh, I don’t know.” Twilight rubbed her arm, flames of rage fading from her eyes. “I didn’t think that far ahead.”
“And Flash dreams of performing in a professional rock band. Would you really want him to throw it away so he could live in Equestria with you someday? I would consider moving back if I fell in love with a stallion there, but I was born in Equestria!”
“No, I wouldn’t want him to surrender his dreams for me.” Twilight moaned and sat on Sunset’s porch. She looked back to Sunset with remorseful eyes as she said. “Sunset, I’m sorry for how I acted. I was just mad at myself for being…too late, and I took out my anger on you.”
Sunset smiled warmly and sat beside Twilight, laying a hand on her shoulder. “It’s okay.” She massaged her jaw with her free hand. “Having a sore jaw for a day or two is nothing I can’t handle. For somepony only partly used to a human form, you pack a pretty mean right hook.”
“Hehe, thanks, and thanks for understanding. You’re a good sport with a huge level of tolerance. You didn’t get the slightest bit upset over being punched.”
“Maybe, but I thought you leveled me for–” Sunset’s pupils constricted. “–uh, yep, I’m a good sport! A really good sport! How about we forget this ever–”
“Hold on. If it wasn’t related to Flash, why did you think I, uh, ‘leveled’ you?”
“Well, I…fine, I better get it over with.” Sunset stood from her porch, taking a bracing breath. “When I visited you three months ago, I ruined your favorite Starswirl the Bearded book by spilling a drink on it.” She grinned and laid a finger on her face sheepishly.
“You WHAT?!”
Sunset defensively raised her hands in front of her. “B-but it was an accident, I swear! I tried to fix it with my magic, but because I was so rusty with unicorn magic, I made the book blow up. Still don’t know how I did that.”
“Oh, so that’s why I couldn’t find it anywhere! That book was one-of-a-kind and it took me years to finally find it! All the time I spent tracking it down…humiliated myself by begging its original owner to sell it to me…45,000 bits I spent for it…my precious ‘The Life of Starswirl the Bearded’ book is gone forever…all because of you…”
A harsh growl rumbled from Twilight’s throat as she gritted her teeth. Blood vessels branched in her scowling eyes; foam started bubbling from her lips.
Knowing she was in trouble, Sunset fearfully gulped. “I’m dead, dead, dead.”
“You’re not dead, dead, dead yet. As penance for punching you before, I will grant you a three-second head-start. Take it.”
Sunset scurried away in a blur. Three seconds later, Twilight leaped from the porch and chased her target down streets in her own blur.
Yes, that’s right, Sunset Shimmer. Keep running. Run for your very life!
You are probably dying to know if baconhair survived. If so, tough luck, because I ain’t telling or showing what happened!
However, I will reveal that Twilight eventually remembered another Flash Sentry was still up for grabs, in Equestria. If the human Flash liked her, then surely his pony counterpart did, right?
Well, about that…
Four months earlier, inside the throne room of the Crystal Empire’s palace…
“Are you sure, Princess Cadance?” pony Flash Sentry asked.
“I’m sure. Princess Twilight indeed had a crush on you, but she is a pony who goes after what she wants. If she hasn’t made any moves by now or talked to me about it, she must be over her crush.”
“Can’t I give it a shot anyway, just in case?”
Cadance shook her head. “No. I won’t order you to not try, but you’d just make her feel guilty over having to turn you down. She’s a kind-hearted pony that hates hurting anypony unless they ruin her favorite books, then they are dead, dead, dead.”
Flash yearned to protest. Cadance encourages her guards not to be intimidated by her and to say what they really think. Yet her judgment, especially about matters of love, is usually sound. Thus, he nodded in acquiescence. “Fine. You are the Princess of Love, so if you say it’d make things worse by asking, I won’t.” He hung his head to the floor and groaned. “Why didn’t I ask her out back when I helped her up? Now I’m too late.”
“Oh, Flash, come here.” Cadance wrapped a wing around her guard and soothingly whispered, “I know it hurts, and I am so sorry. If you need some time alone to start getting over Twilight, you may take the rest of the day off. You can also have the next few days off, and I’ll even allow it to be paid leave. Okay?”
A little smile eased itself onto Flash’s lips. “Well, maybe I could take a day or two off. Thank you for being so supportive, Princess Cadance.”
“You are very welcome.” The Princess of Love lifted her wing off Flash. “What kind of princess would I be if I don’t support my loyal guards if they need it?”
“I'm lucky to work for you and Captain Shining Armor. Since I have your permission, I will leave and drink some cider.”
“Do whatever you need. Just try not to drink too much.” Cadance gave a playful wink.
“Heh heh, I won't.”
Flash left the Crystal Castle to drink his heartbreak away, though Cadance’s kindness successfully mitigated it.
Three months and many cups of cider later, Flash managed to rid himself of his feelings for Princess Twilight. He grew quite content with living a single life and no longer had an interest in getting together romantically with his former crush. He would be happy to be friends with her, however.
I wonder how far alicorns fly from being punched.