> A Link to Equestria > by Mcayon > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Chapter: 1 [revised] > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- A Link to Equestria Chapter 1 You look up from your tablet and out the window. There is a light drizzle accompanied with some wind outside your residence. The rain is lit up and made extra visible by the streetlights. You sigh and go back to your tablet. You open a new tab in the browser and type in the address “equestriadaily.com”. The site loads quickly and you can soon see the familiar homepage. You hope to see something new, but you don’t. You sigh once again and decide to check your e-mail. A smile creeps up on your face as you see the e-mails flooding in. The e-mails you got, usually consisted of news or similar things from the sites you often visited. This was the case now as well, but there was one that stood out from the others. You open the e-mail and read it; “Do you want your dreams to come true? Well, click the link provided in this e-mail and they will.” You chuckle as you read the text, “Awesome! Let's see if this is for real or not.” you say to yourself and click the link. The screen suddenly becomes completely white and the tablet heats up. The heat forces you to let go of the tablet, “Ow!” you yelp. As if the situation wasn't weird enough, it floats up in the air and stops in front of you. Before you can react, you are without warning sucked into the tablet. You feel yourself collide with something hard and black out. As you wake up with a blistering headache, you feel yourself being slumped against something hard. You hear water pouring behind you. “Maybe the water will ease the headache...” you think and slowly open your eyes. You’re met by a bright light and shield your eyes with your hoof. “A hoof!?” Your eyes shoots open and you look over your body to find that you now indeed have hooves and two new appendages aside from the hooves, wings. “What the... how the hell did this happen!?” you blurt out. In panic you try to stand up on two legs as you normally would. You manage to do so, but you promptly fall to your side. “Ouch...” you mutter and rub your head as you sit up. Looking to your right, you see a fountain. Since you’re not able to walk, you crawl over to it and look into the water. The face that looks back at you in the reflection is without a doubt not human in any way. You flinch and back away. You can’t believe your eyes. “This is so not happening, this is friggin’ impossible! I just can’t all of the sudden be some kind of horse....thing, with technicolor hair and fur..!” You ramble, panicking. You lay yourself down on the grass you’re on, letting the side effect of shock and insanity flow through you. You shake in fear as you try to figure out what is going on. “Am I dead? Or is this a dream that is very real for some reason?” You ask yourself, not knowing the answer. You continue to think over the possible explanations to what has happened for what you think is ten minutes, you’re not sure, you don’t have a clock, nor can you see one nearby. You have managed to slowly calm yourself down, the sense of panic and shock is slowly fading away. You decide to sit up and you look around, taking in your surroundings. You discover that you are in some sort of park. You look yourself over again, and you go back to the fountain, once again looking at the reflection of yourself. You think for a bit before deciding what you must be, you’re a pony, because of a number of reasons. The main one being that you’re too short to be a horse, besides, you thought that calling yourself ‘some sort of horse thing’ would get annoying and probably weird in the end. From guessing that the population in the place you’re in are ponies, you’re at first surprised by the fact that you haven’t noticed any other ponies in the park, but as you look up at the sky towards the sun, you realize that it’s around just past lunch-time, which explains the lack of ponies. As you take your eyes from the sky and continue to look around and you see several buildings not too far from where you are. You also see something that makes your eyes widen and the gears in your head spin rapidly, trying to find their place, a big white castle with spires that reach high up in the sky. It is almost like a faint ‘click’ can be heard as the gears are locked into their correct position as you realize where you are. You’re in Canterlot, the capital of Equestria, the country where the fictional TV-series ‘My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic’ takes place. But it seems like it’s no longer fictional, it is real. At the realization of that you are in the world of your favorite TV-show, you immediately feel the need to explore. But you have a big problem to fix before you can proceed with your new plan. You need to learn how to walk on four legs. You carefully stand up again, but on four legs and successfully keeping your balance this time, thankful that no-one, or rather, nopony is around to see you struggling. You smile at your success. You close your eyes, trying to visualize what it looks like when a pony walks. You start with your left fore and back hoof and raise them into the air, with the intention of using them simultaneously and taking a step forwards. But as you do, you feel that you’re about to lose your balance again, so you quickly put them down again. “Nope, that’s wrong,” you say to yourself before deciding to try a different tactic. You start with your left forehoof and take a step, and then you do the same with your left back hoof. It seems to work and you repeat what you just did with your right hooves. It also seems to work, so you repeat your previous motions. You wobble around a bit before you find a good rhythm to what you’re doing. After what you think is fifteen minutes of training, it seems like you can finally walk properly, but you know that it probably looks a bit unnatural and odd to someone, or rather, somepony native to the land you’re in. “Let’s do this.” you say with a heavy sigh before you start to walk towards what you guess is the center of Canterlot As you get closer to the center, you see more and more ponies. You sigh in relief since you for a moment believed that the whole town was empty. As you walk around on what can be considered as a lone tour of Canterlot, you can clearly see that the show doesn’t do the town justice. You think it’s really beautiful and you’re amazed by everything you see. You try to take everything in, but as you walk, it gets pretty difficult as the amount of ponies increases and you have to avoid bumping into ponies. It doesn’t take long before you eventually bump into a number of ponies who yells at you, despite the fact that you apologize for bumping into them; “Watch where you’re going, ruffian!” some of them says. This continues and you keep getting insulted, which puts you in a sour mood and you decide to walk closer to the buildings, rather than in the middle among the other ponies. This works and no more insults are thrown your way, which puts you in a much happier mood and you begin to happily skip along, not watching where you’re going since there is no risk of bumping into anypony. But, you forget that other things might be in your way and you don’t get far before your head collides with a pole and you’re knocked down to the ground. As you sit up again and rub your head, you see two of the Royal Guards approaching you. Since you’re not comfortable with authority figures, you get very nervous as they stop in front of you. “Are you alright, sir?” one of them asks in a voice mixed with concern and authority, just as you expected. You are in a bit of a daze and you shake it off and stand up before you reply, “Y-Yes, a little dizzy, but otherwise I’m alright.” They nod. “Have a good day, sir.” the other one says and they continue their patrol. You sigh in relief and you continue to walk, now wary of objects in your way. After a while you see a bench and you decide to sit down and rest on it. The bench is a little to the side of everything, which gives you room to do some much needed thinking. Because on your way through Canterlot, you’ve seen ponies buying various things, which made you realize something, you don’t have any money, nor do you have anywhere to stay. You think for a good while on what you should do before you decide to go to the castle and see if you can get any help from Princess Celestia. You get off of the bench and you start to walk towards the castle. Unfortunately for you, this means that you have to get back in the crowd of ponies. You sigh again as what happened a short while ago repeats itself. “I expected the nobles to be rude and such, but not this rude...” This is what you think before you bump into a tall, alabaster pony. But this is no ordinary pony, no, you have just bumped into the flank of her Royal Highness Princess Celestia, the pony you intended to speak with. Or have you? “S-sorry, your highness.” you stutter as you recover from bumping in to the Princess. Her oddly rainbow colored mane suddenly shifts into a monochrome color and a sense of fear flows through your body as the alicorn turns around and looks at you with a mischievous grin. You begin to slowly back away as she begins to speak, “My, my, didn’t your mother tell you it is rude to bump into somepony?” You look up at her in both fear and confusion before answering her, “It’s kinda difficult not to when somepony suddenly stands in your way.” She giggles at your answer before looking at you once again with the same mischievous grin as before. “It was a big mistake, bumping in to me, therefore you’ll have to be punished.” she says and takes a step towards you.   “Shit.” > Chapter: 2 - The AMA > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- Chapter: 2 - The AMA You quickly turn around and you run as fast as you can. Not caring about anything else than getting away, you bash your way through the ponies in your way, their yelling quickly becomes inaudible as you run past them. As you continue to forcefully make your way through the crowd and the winding streets, you feel yourself beginning to tire, running in your new pony form wasn’t something that you had done yet. After all, you had just learned how to walk again. Now you’re doing your utmost to get as far away as possible from the sex-crazed Princess that’s chasing you. The wild chase and yelling has alerted the ponies further along the winding streets, which helps you since they move to the side, giving you a somewhat clear path through the crowd. It also gives you the chance to look behind you to see where your pursuer is. As you do so, you discover that despite her larger form, she is fast and has no problems keeping up with you since she’s only a few feet behind you. “There is no use in running, my little pony, I will get you either way,” she says menacingly and laughs. This makes you even more scared and you feel the adrenaline pumping through your body, giving you the extra energy and power needed for you to gain some distance from her. As you refocus on the path ahead, you suddenly see a pony pulling a cart, forcing you to jump, narrowly escaping crashing into it. You hear a loud ‘clop’ as you land back on your hooves and continue to run. Just a second later, you hear the unmistakable sound of wood breaking, you quickly look back to see that Molestia has crashed through the cart and obliterated it. You grin but don’t let it distract you as you refocus on the path ahead. You realize that you’re getting further from the center of Canterlot as you see that the streets is no longer packed with ponies. You look back again, Molestia is still on your tail, but thanks to the adrenaline that’s flowing through your body and her being slowed down, the distance between you has increased dramatically. Though you’re not safe yet. You can see what must be the Canterlot slum not too far away and you run in the direction of it, hoping to lose Molestia there. A foul odor suddenly penetrates your nose as you reach the Canterlot slum, causing you to wrinkle your nose in disgust. Glancing behind you again, you see that Molestia is also having problems with the foul odor, and she’s actually slowing down. You can’t help but grin at her discomfort. You manage to ignore the smell and use it to your advantage in getting away. You continue to run as fast as you can, and as you get deeper into the slum, it seems like you’ve lost her and you slow down. About ten minutes has passed since you last saw Molestia and you’ve gotten even deeper into the slum. You don’t know if she’s still searching for you, but you’ve decided to play it safe for now. Further down the road you’re now on, you see a unicorn mare wearing a dark cloak beckoning for you to go to the alley she’s standing at. “Hurry up!” she hisses. You do as she says and you run to her. You’re about to slow down and stop in front of her when she suddenly grabs you with her magic and yanks you into the alley. At the same time she makes a zipper appear on your mouth, preventing you from yelping. She then conjures another dark cloak up and drapes it over you before she grabs your head with her hooves and forces you to look at the ground. The mare lets your head go after a few seconds and you immediately give her a confused look. She simply smiles and points at your ear and then at the sky. You nod in understanding and turn your ears towards the sky. The sound of wings flapping heavily reach you and your eyes widen as you realize what the mare in front of you just did. Her smile is still present as she motions for you to follow her, which you gladly do. You see her horn light up in a dim silver aura, and you wonder what kind of spell she is casting, it doesn’t take long to figure it out since you can’t hear your hoofsteps. It seems like the mare knows exactly what she’s doing, you still keep to the dark shadows. The darkness of the alley doesn’t give you a good picture of your surroundings, so you resort to simply look straight ahead at the mare you’re following.   You eventually arrive at what you think is her home. It looks very simple and small on the outside, you can only see a wooden door and to the right of it is a dirty window with a crack running through it. “Welcome to my humble abode, stranger,” she says as she opens the door, allowing you to enter. You manage a smile despite the zipper that’s still on your mouth and do so. Much to your relief, the zipper disappears as she closes the door. Surprisingly, the apartment looks nicer than you expected on the inside.  Directly to your right you have the kitchen, and straight ahead is the living room, which you decide to go to. As you look around, you find that it is pretty basic. A couch, a coffee table, a rug and a bookshelf is all you see. The mare enters the room just as you finish your look around in the living room and uncloaks herself and you get to see what she looks like for the first time. She has a ivory coat with small patches of dirt at the back of her hooves. Her mane and tail is unusually short and kind of spiky, and has a light grey color to it that almost looks like silver in the light that shines on it. Her cutie mark is black and looks almost like a ghost from Pac-Man with a hat on it, which is covering the eyes. She smiles and looks at you, “I’m sorry if was a little violent with you, I didn’t want to take any risks.” “It’s alright, you saved me after all,” you say with a smile. “Forgive me for being blunt, but it seemed like you knew that I was in trouble?” “Yes, we did,” she smirks. “We?” you inquire, looking puzzled. She nods and turns around, “Follow me,” she says and you do so, wondering what the hell is going on. The unicorn walks to a bookshelf and browses through it before pulling one of the books out a little, she then lets it go and it retracts to its original place. As it does, the bookshelf slides to the side, revealing a hidden room. Your eyes widen at the sight, eliciting a giggle from the mare. You shake your head and walk after her as she enters the room. As you walk past the bookshelf, it slides back again, sealing the room off and everything goes dark. Luckily, the unicorn’s horn flares and she uses her magic and the room is suddenly lit by a number of lanterns. Now that you can see again, you look around in the room, which is completely different from the apartment. It has a black wallpaper with a crimson stripe near the roof, in the middle of the room is a long rectangular table and around it are a number of couches. “Alright guys, you can show yourselves now,” The mare says, startling you, and ponies starts to appear on the couches. Just ten seconds later you see about twenty other ponies in the room. “What the-” you start but you’re cut off by the unicorn, “My name is Silver and I’m the leader of the Anti-Molesting Alliance, or AMA for short, and if it wasn’t for everypony in this room, you would’ve been another victim of Molestia’s.” “What?” you ask. Silver nods, “One of our unicorn scouts saw you bump into Celestia, and when that happens, she usually changes into Molestia,” she says with a pause, “So he sent out a message to all of us, alerting us of the situation.” You nod. “We did many things to help you on your way here, for instance, the cart that you had to jump over, which Molestia crashed through, that was us,” she pauses again, “As well as that foul odor you smelled when you entered this here slum, that was stinkbombs that we threw at Molestia, we know they give off a nasty smell that can be felt from far away, and we’re sorry if it caused you discomfort.” “It’s alright, it helped me to escape after all. Two things though, firstly, how did you know I would clear the cart, and secondly, is this place really safe, won’t Molestia eventually find it? Silver smirks, “We didn’t, it was a stroke of luck that you actually cleared it. We had two unicorns at the ready just in case. And yes, this place is safe from Molestia, it’s got a perception spell cast on it, so she won’t be able to see it, even if she wanted to, because she doesn’t know what it looks like.”   “Wow...” you say, eliciting another giggle from Silver, “Also, forgive me for not asking earlier, what’s your name?” As Silver asks this question, you realize you haven’t thought of a good pony name, and you don’t want to lie, so you decide to tell her your real name. “Name’s Chase, Silver, it’s a pleasure meeting you,” you say with a bow as you introduce yourself. “Chase, huh? That’s an interesting name.” “Yeah... um.. I’m not from around here...” you say, scratching the back of your neck. Silver smiles at you, “It’s okay, everypony here comes from various places in Equestria, if that’s what you’re worried about.” You shift around nervously, “That’s the thing, I’m not from Equestria... at all...” “Where are you from then?” Silver asks. “I’d love to tell you, but I can’t, not yet at least. It’s rather sensitive, I think, so no offense or anything like that to you guys.” A unified “None taken,” is heard from everypony in the room and Silver looks at you again, “I guess you’d like to know more about us, right Chase?” You simply nod. “Well, have a seat and I’ll tell you.” You smile and the two of you sits down in one of the couches.