Authors Note: Yes, the plot drop is suppose to be abrupt, if not absolutely confusing. I'm testing around really what it is would be best to venture into.

I stood up and started walking toward the barn door. I had wondered to myself what had transpired the night before in my dreams. If there was one thing I knew, it was that sooner or later the answer would show itself if I stayed the course [In other words, you're too lazy to actually investigate properly]. I cleared my eyes and stepped outside the barn. Applejack and Big Mac were both out on the fields already [those two red and orange blobs could be anything, you know]. I lightly jogged to out to the apple fields. I stopped once I found both of them.

"Mornin' there sunshine," said Applejack "how you feeling for some applebucking? Now I know that applebucking is nothin' like cherry sorting, but I think you'll get the hang of it pretty quick." she assured.

"So, what should I do to get started?" I asked.

"Ya can start from here and we'll work till we finished this patch of apples." She said. I looked and estimated about 40 trees were in the patch we were designated to buck. The most time consuming part of this would be bringing the baskets back after they were filled. Applejack walked up to a tree and signaled for me to follow.

"So, just bring back your legs and strike the tree as hard as ya can. Since this is your first day, we'll get you focused on bucking, Mac and I'll get the baskets. One thing though, don't wear yourself too much, kay'?" briefed the orange pony.

Okay, I've done harder things in life than kick a tree. I spent a few hours just yesterday with the demonic voice that is on par with omochao on levels of annoying. At least omochao let me throw him if I wanted to at enemies. With a omniscient voice, you can't really do anything to it. [You're just trying to stall having to buck the tree aren't you.]

I took a shallow breath and brought back both my legs. I slammed my leg back against the tree, making a loud, audible slam. To my surprise, only one single, lonely apple fell. Applejack had been watching and shook her head.

"Too much of the energy got turned to sound. Ya have to control your buck!" She said.

I took her suggestion to note as I warmed up to try and strike the same tree again. I brought my legs back once again and struck the tree, trying to keep my hooves as stiff as possible. Although 2 more apples than last time fell, my legs felt most of the impact from hitting the tree.

"I think I'll leave you to your work right now. Mac and I'll get some baskets for all of the... erm, apples you've knocked down." the orange pony said.

Applejack came back and started to lay baskets under all the trees. While she was doing that, I started think of ways that I could try to knock down the apples. I first attempted to run head on into the tree. Needless to say that I might need a trip to Fluttershy's soon. I next tried to 'punch' the tree with one of my hooves. This method ended with me repeatedly shaking my hoof in an attempt to even out the pain.

I just decided to just run at the tree once more to try and strike it with my hooves. I started to run when I remembered what happened last night. Even though it was a dream, it was still worth a shot since things in dreams sometimes can be significant somehow [You really have to learn how to be subtle, you know that?]. As I was 20 feet in front of the tree, I imagined the supernova once more, and as I somewhat expected, I ended up going blue and charged the tree at a blistering fast speed [Really? That's just a little convenient don't you think? Some member of a omniscient species taught you some sort of special move to what, knock down apples?]. Once I made impact with the tree, I could see the tree slowly react to the impact of the hit, followed by the apples slowly losing their grips on the tree. After about 3 (at least what it seemed like to me) seconds, the apples started to fall at normal speed and the tree stopped shaking slowly. I assumed that after I charged something, time around me becomes dilated somewhat, or just magic, I decided.

I went over to another tree with baskets already and tried my last method again. Once more, every apple had fell into the basket with the tree firmly stemmed to the ground. I repeated this process until every tree that had a basket was striped. By the time I've reached the last one, I felt an exhaustion that I have never felt in my life before [mainly because you never get out.].

"So, let's see how far ya go- and woah nelly!" She exclaimed, "You got all those trees already? That was faster than me and Big Mac can handle together!"

She ran back to her house while I just waited at the last tree I charged. She came back with a coin purse in her mouth. She put it in her hoof and she extended it to me.

"Here's 20 bits for today. I think you've earned this, and it's only morning so you can go off and do what you like. Also, looks like you've got another mark on ya forehead. Go see Fluttershy about that, I don't need you hurt from the job the first day." She said.

I think my first day of work was a success. Now, I only have to figure out what the hell happened last night and still the question of why I'm here. Oh, and visit Fluttershy. All I needed was some excuse of why to go there. Looks like I have one now.

I walked over to Fluttershy's cottage and knocked on the door. I noticed that as I did, the door opened outwards a bit. I peeked inside to see a rainbow maned cyan pony laying on Fluttershy's couch. I ran through all possible explanations and scenarios through my head and prepared to step side ways.

"Hey! Who are you!" shouted the pegasis. She flew straight towards me, and as she did, I did a small sidestep to the left and she went flying into a tree about 50 feet from where I was. That's a bit of a gross overshot if you asked me.

I walked over to the pegasis rubbing her head over by the tree and helped her up. She shook her head and remembered what she was doing.

"Wait a second! What were you doing going in Fluttershy's house?" She shouted.

"What were you doing trying to run over random people for the smallest reason possible?" I retorted back. She did have a nasty habit of doing that in many fan fictions. "Also, I was here to get my head checked because I hit my head while trying to buck some apples." I added.

"Alright, fine. But I'm keeping my eye on you. Anyways, Fluttershy isn't here right now. She's down at the spa with Rarity. You'll have to wait for her to get back." Rainbow Dash said.

I had to ask it sooner or later, "So, who are you and why are you in Fluttershy's cottage right now?" I asked.

"Me? You don't know who I am? I'm the fastest flyer in Equestria!" Watch out, we got a badass over here. "I'm at Fluttershy's house since she asked me to look over the animals while she was out."

That alone raised some more questions. First off, why she would ask Rainbow Dash, out of everypony, to watch over animals. Also, what ever happened to her pet turtl- I mean tortoise [That's a completely unrelated question!].

"Anyways, I'm Mark, and do you mind if I stay in the cottage until Fluttershy gets back?" I asked. Once I did, Rainbow Dash developed a smug smile on her face.

"Sure, let's walk back first." She said.

After we got to the house, the cyan pegasis began to speak.

"Well, now that you're here, I guess I won't have to look over the animals anymore, see ya!" She said while bolting off.

Well, that's just atypical Dash.

I looked inside the house and found essentially a zoo of animals.

How hard can looking over a bunch of furry creatures for a few hours be? [I have to look over you, and I have to tell you it's exhausting.] I looked into a nearby mirror and saw that besides my gray body, I had a bright grayish white mane. Well that's real imaginative, I thought.

I sat down on the couch and began my shift.

3 hours later.

"Okay! No, stop! Don't eat that! And you! Stop biting my leg! AHHGG!" I shouted.

The door of the cottage opened and in came the light yellow pegasis.

"Oh my." she said.

Once she entered the room, all the animals went back to their beds and started to act as if they didn't do anything. Guess they're too afraid of her one hit KO stare.

"What happened here?" Fluttershy asked.

The couch was overturned, there were feathers everywhere, my mane was frizzled up, and my one of my eyes was twitching slightly. I turned over to Fluttershy stalling my eye twitch and acting as if nothing happened.

"Oh hi there Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash asked me to look over the animals since I was waiting for you to come back." I said with cheer.

"Oh, well I hope they behaved themselves." Said Fluttershy.

"They... Were.... Just... Great...." I said while holding back the urge to scream.

"So, what do you need me for?" She asked.

"Oh, I have a little bump on my head, nothing big, and also, I have quite a few scratches on my back." I said while laying down tired on the couch.

She got out her toolkit out of seemingly nowhere, "I'll patch you right up!" she said cheerfully.

After the somewhat painful process of waiting for Fluttershy, I decided to stop by Rarity's since by coincidence, I had another excuse to visit her. My mane would probably end up with her being stressed until she fixed it. Of course, I feared of just what she would fix it into.

Right now, it was about midday. I could make it to her house in about an hour. [Have you ever thought of using the charge for travel?] (That would be recklessly dangerous to anyone else on the roads) [You could try to not go as fast by not focusing as much magic at once, but instead a gradual flow.] (Really? Wait... Did you just tell me something useful for once?) [Don't get used to it.]

I took my own advice and attempted to charge down the road but with less speed. The road in front of me was empty, and as I started to run, I instead imagined a star forming (in fast forward obviously, if I were to imagine it in real time I would be long dead before the first stage would be completed) and the constant reactions to keep it burning. As I did, I noticed that I started to accelerate faster and faster. I reached around 40 mph at least when I whipped into town square. The ponies I passed wondered what the crazy pony running around was doing, and why he was doing it. I managed to avoid anyone in my way, mostly because and pony who saw me ran like crazy out of the way.

I eventually made it to the Carousel Boutique when I decided to stop the magic flow. As i did, I forgot the fact that I was still going at a pretty fast speed when I decided to stop, and when I tried to put my hooves down to stop, I instead ended up rolling forward and hitting into the door, propping my head against it rather uncomfortably.

"Coming!" Said a voice inside.

The door to the Boutique opened and my chin hit the floor of the store hard.

"What in Equestria's name happened to you!" She exclaimed.

"That? Oh, my mane is a little messed up. That and I have a slight headache right now." I said with a slight mumble.

"We need to get you fixed up right this instant!" She said while magic-ing me into a chair. "There's so much to do! I guess I'll start with a-"

Oh what have I done.

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About 2 hours later, Rarity finally let me go. I ran/charged back to the barn as fast as I could and looked into the mirror Rarity gave to me. My mane was now shining beyond the limit of how shiny manes could/should get. It was also inexplicably in curls, which I straightened out immediately after laughing a slight bit.

Since I've met everypony so far, I decided to go to Sugar Cube Corners to tell Pinkie that the party could commence any time she was ready. As I opened the door, a huge shock wave pushed me back, with the sound of 'Welcome to Ponyville Mark'.

What happened was so predictable, it was completely unpredictable. Somehow Pinkie knew that I had met everyone I wanted to and decided to get the party ready because she knew I would come down to the place. That or it was her Pinkie sense.

I stepped inside Sugar Cube Corners and noticed that a large chunk of Ponyville was there, and also Princess Celestia.

WAIT WHAT! Pinkie invited HER to come to a welcome party?! Doesn't she have princessy things to do... Like be a princess?

I walked up to Pinkie in midst of all the chaos and decided to ask her.

"You invited Princess Celestia? And she agreed to come?!" I whispered.

"Yep! She said she would be happy to come! She said she never ever ever met you before and would really like to!" Said the bouncing pink terror.

The tall alicorn walked up to me and started to inspect me.

"Mark? I've never met you before in all these lands. Where are you from?" said the princess.

"He's from Fillydelphia, at least that's what he tells us." Said Applejack walking up to us.

I had a feeling that Celestia already knew that I wasn't from around here, and I decided to not go through the really odd process of finding out that one is not like the other. [Might i start mentioning how inconsistent you are with your choices and mood? First you decide to make up who you are, and after all that 'work', you're just going to blow it? Man, it's only been 2 days and already you've failed at everything which should be covered by people coming to Equestria. First you think people will think you're crazy but nooo-] (No matter what you say I'm still going to do this)

"Actually, I'm from a planet called Earth where I used to go to school until I got ran over by a half ton machine of moving metal. Then somehow I ended up here." I explained while trying to sound as nonchalant as possible.

Everypony in the room was listening and had looked at each other to try and put together what they heard from this new pony in town.

"That would in fact explain one thing, but leaves many other questions." Said the princess, much to my confusion. "Sorry to cut this party short, but Mark and I must get going." She nudged me to go outside of the building where she then teleported both of us to what I know is the throne room in Canterlot.

"So, have you seen anything out of the ordinary since you got here." She questioned coldly.

"Well, there was this one dream of somewhere called the 'divide' where this pony taught me how to use a magic move. But that's about it." I said. [That's it? Really. That's it. You've been here two days and have not seen anything else odd?]

"Odd. I never heard of this happening before. Especially with the information nexus disabled." She wondered.

I had no idea, once again, what she was talking about. I decided to ask her.

"What information nexus?" I questioned.

"Well, even though I have no reason to. I feel that I can trust you." She smiled. Soon after, I felt my body start to coat in magic.

I suddenly then found myself in the chapel much like the one in my dream but with a monolith where the black plate once stood, once again cold and dark. Celestia, next to me, started to speak.

"The information nexus is a means of sending information to a user. Where we are is a center of one of the connections which leads back to the main archive."

"Why have I never heard of these before?" I asked.

"No one outside a few have." She answered back.

I felt the urge to ask, "Why?"

She sighed, "I am afraid that if our technology grows too far, then the 'Swarm' might come once more."

My mind was going in 15 directions. What the hell was the swarm? Why is it because if technology grows too far the swarm might come back? Why? And why is it that the situation that they want to avoid remind me somewhat of Mass Effect?

"Before you ask, the 'Swarm' is a race of what we believe to be aliens that come and wipe out most of civilization if they reach a certain level of technology."

"And how do you know this?" I asked.

"The information Nexus contains the discoveries made by the last ones who were almost completely wiped out. Most of their technology stemmed from the technology of the last race, and it's because of that they were able to reach the level at which the 'Swarm' felt it necessary to wipe them out." She explained. [So that's what you meant by a plot drop...]

"To what end?" I asked.

"Even we are not sure of that. But nothing that they had was sufficient in destroying them, so even with what we are given, how could we hope to destroy them?" She sighed.

"Is that the same Princess Celestia that believed that the 6 could stop Discord? Is that the one who believed in the power of friendship could stop Nightmare Moon?" I tried my best without laughing at my terrible 'pump' speech. "Also, what if they just come one day for no good reason and decide to wreck havoc?"

"We hope that the pattern would stay. And for that reason, we have purposely made it so that technology has not budged a significant amount ever since the discovery of the nexus. I just don't think that we can defeat the 'Swarm'" Said the alicorn.

"At what stage of technology did the swarm come?" I questioned.

"It seemed about after the time where the last race had discovered how to travel beyond the stars we can see without the use of magic." Said Celestia. "When they struck, they struck fast. The last race was unable barely able to get out a message to warn others around the planet before the connection broke. All we know is that they are numerous, and that one must always watch their shadow.

"It might just be me, but I find that all of this is rushing a bit too fast for me. I mean today I was just bucking a few apples and already I'm thrust into something that dates back possibly hundreds of thousands of years." I thought aloud.

"Well, be that as it may, it isn't your fight. We have to see what got you here and what exactly happened to you." Said the princess.

I felt my body being surrounded in magic once more and in a flash, I found myself in the middle of a lab with four ponies I've seen not a day before.