Chapter I

Holiday In Equestria

Short of breath, I gasped as I was lying on my back in the plush grass of the forest I woke up in. Sitting up, I remembered one of the things that had just happened before I passed out. “Thank God that panic attack stopped,” I thought. “I hate those things.” I looked around at all the trees surrounding me. They were all trees of different kinds, which made me suspicious because where I lived there weren’t that many kinds of trees. There were mostly fir and maple trees, but that’s not the point. With a short grunt, I hoisted myself back up onto my feet and began to wonder where in the hell I was. “Rachel? Jadon? Alex?” I called out, hoping my friends would come out laughing that it was all a joke. I waited for what felt like forever. It finally got to the point where I couldn’t stand it anymore, so I just started walking in the direction that light was coming from. It was so dark in there that I was lucky I COULD see light coming from somewhere.

I emerged from the huge forest to find myself in a perfectly-formed, emerald green landscape. The cold December air put a paper-thin layer of frost on the dirt road that lead out of the forest. I looked around in disbelief of my surroundings, as they were so brightly colorful that it seemed more like I was dreaming. I started walking towards a small bunch of houses in the distance. It was so realistic that I couldn’t believe that it was a dream. I finally came upon a familiar sight… the sight of… Fluttershy’s cottage.

Believe me, I am a HUGE fan of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. Bigger than the majority of people I know who watch the show. Trust me when I say that I would know Fluttershy’s cottage anywhere. I just stood there staring at the sight of her house, wondering if I was just having a dream or if one of my friends had slipped me a hallucinogen at some point earlier that day. Shaking it off, I ran towards the cottage thinking that if there was anyone there who would take me in willingly, it would be Fluttershy. She’d probably just think I was a new kind of animal she’d never seen before.

Before I could register, I had tripped on a tree’s root and hit my head on the ground, breaking the skin and starting a flow of blood from my forehead. I could officially rule out the dream hypothesis because my head hurt like hell from that fall. I got up, stumbling around a bit, and I knocked on the door to Fluttershy’s cottage. The door opened to reveal a yellow blur. My eyesight was still disoriented, but I already knew it was Fluttershy. After all, she was the only small yellow being that lived in that house AND was capable of opening a door. “Hello?” she muttered softly.

I said nothing.

“Oh!” she exclaimed after seeing a “new animal” at her door. “I’ve never seen something like you before! Oh, my, you’re hurt! Here, let me help you with that nasty cut on your forehead.” She grabbed my hand with both of her yellow hooves, pulled me inside and sat me down in a chair where I sat, waiting for her to return with something. She came back with a bandage and quickly put it over the cut.

Considering she thought that was all that needed to be done, I figured it was time to show her that I was sentient and capable of communicating with her. “You know, the smart pony knows that a bandage doesn’t heal wounds, it only hides them.”

She jumped behind the chair in sheer terror. “What?! Who’s there?”

“It’s me,” I laughed. “I’m on your level of communication. There’s no need to worry.”

“Wow,” gawked Fluttershy. “So you’re some kind of two-legged pony?”

“No, I’m a human,” I explained, hoping Lyra wasn’t listening. “I’m a bipedal sentient being that is quite familiar with pony culture… In other words, I’m a smart creature that stands on two legs and knows about ponies.”

“This is amazing!” Fluttershy whispered. “I have to show you to Twilight! She’ll have so many questions!”

“Slow down there!” I stopped her. “You barely know anything about me and you think taking me to your friend is a good idea. What if I were dangerous?”

“You don’t seem dangerous,” she replied, smiling like a child.

“I guess there’s not exactly a point to arguing on this, so I’ll just oblige,” I thought out loud.

“My name’s Fluttershy, by the way,” she introduced herself. “What’s your name? Do you have a name?”

“I have a name,” I smiled. “My name is William. As strange as that may sound, it actually does mean something.”

“What does it mean?”

“I’ll tell you when we’re with Twilight.”

It didn’t take too long before we were both in Twilight’s treehouse library. She was pacing back and forth in deep thought as to why there was a human in Equestria. “It doesn’t make sense!” she yelled, her wings flailing out in her frustration. “Humans aren’t supposed to exist! They’re all mythological!”

“Where I come from, Dragons are mythological,” I spoke up.

“Well… ah, forget it!” Twilight sighed, apparently giving up any hope of finding a scientific explanation for this as I had a while before. “Anyway, what’s your name?”

“William,” I stated proudly. “It means chosen guardian.”

“Interesting” Twilight said, writing it down. “What are you a guardian of?”

“I…” I stuttered. “I don’t know.”

“Well… that’s… quite a predicament.”

“What’s your cutie mark?” Fluttershy asked suddenly.

“Humans don’t get cutie marks” I explained. “We never get any indicator as to what our special talent is. We’re forced to search on our own using trial and error.”

“That doesn’t sound easy or fun,” Twilight butted in.

“You bet your purple plot it ain’t” I grumbled.

“I’m guessing you know how you got here?” Twilight continued.

“Well… sort of,” I said nervously, scratching the back of my head a little. “I know I was in the middle of a HUGE panic attack when it happened and I was with my friends celebrating my Birthday.”

“Today’s your birthday?” Fluttershy interrupted. “Happy birthday! Oh, wait! Oh, no, it’s Friday the thirteenth isn’t it? I’m sorry.”

“Oh, Fluttershy, Friday the thirteenth is just a superstition. It isn’t real!” Twilight assured her.

“Ah, don’t worry about it!” I stopped them.

“Anyway, tonight is a big festival in Ponyville in honor of Starswirl the Bearded. He died many years ago on December 13th so it’s the anniversary of his death. We always celebrate tonight to show his spirit that we remember him” Twilight continued. “It’d be a perfect way to celebrate your birthday, too if you were to come.”

“Considering I’m not really going anywhere any time soon, I guess I’ve got nothing to lose” I snickered.

“Great!” Twilight squealed. “It’ll be really fun! Trust me!”

And at that, I had several hours to kill until the festival. I figured I might as well check out what books there were in the library so I began searching the shelves carefully. As I scanned the shelves in the Fiction section, I found a few odd looking books. The first one to catch my eye was a hardcover-bound book that had “The Binding Of Isaac” printed out on the spine in large shiny golden letters. My eyes widened as I remembered the countless hours I spent playing the game of the same name. Shaking it off as a coincidence, I plucked the book from its snug place on the shelf between the end of one shelf and another book whose title I didn’t bother looking at (or yet anyways).

I sat down on the library’s couch in the middle of the room and flipped the book open to the first page. I began to read at my standard pace, which seemed fairly decent for the fact that I was but a Freshman in Highschool. As I read, I realized that the resemblance between the story of the human-made game and the story of the book I held, which had been written by ponies, was downright uncanny. I read through the short book in a matter of two or three hours. Flipping the book shut revealed to Twilight a jaw that was open to the point where you could probably see where my tongue ended (wherever the hell that was).

“What?” Twilight asked, puzzled by my extremely surprised expression.

“This book has a story unusually similar to one I’ve found in the human world” I told her. “Where the hell did this book come from.”

“I don’t actually know.” Twilight looked at the spine of the book I held. “Oh, that book’s author was never found. That’s actually one of my favorite books! Such a driving story and it’s amazing how much the author could get done in such a short book!”

I thought momentarily if this was some kind of connection between the two dimensions, but I once again passed it off. The book made a strange noise as I slid it back into its place on the shelf. I looked at the book adjacent to it. The spine read “The Assassin’s Creed.” I was just about ready to pass out at the sight of that. I would have snatched it off the shelves and read it cover to cover right then and there, but Twilight poked me in the back with a hoof saying, “It’s time to go down to the festival!” I sighed and abandoned the book that I so suddenly craved to read.

The festival was all-out. They did pretty much everything they could to make it fun. I didn’t do much myself, but it made me happy to see everyone having a good time. Eventually, Rainbow Dash caught up with us and joined in. Me and Rainbow Dash didn’t have too much in common, but we were still able to have a nice conversation which was certainly a nice change from just watching. The town square was covered in ponies in small jackets, but there was no snow anywhere. I was guessing Celestia didn’t actually make it snow until it was officially winter.

I was hungry as all hell after about two or three hours at the festival. All the bright lights gently lighting up the darkening streets of Ponyville made it a little easier to tell where there was food that I could actually eat. Regardless of all of that, there seemed to be nothing available within my budget… which was zero bits. I was lucky enough to have Rainbow Dash with the group because she just flew off quickly and came back with a few apples for all of us. I looked at the apples she had given me wondering how it got so perfectly ripe, but I remembered that it was a cartoon’s universe so there’s not much sense in questioning it.

It was true what everyone said, because those apples were strangely good. They were unusually filling as well. It was only around 7:30 or so when another familiar face came up. “Twilight” Rainbow called. “We have a little problem.”

“What?” responded Twilight. As soon as she had turned one hundred and eighty degrees her eyes grew in size exponentially. A mysterious pony in a cloak was approaching from the shadows. I eyed the figure suspiciously in an attempt to find out who it was, but I wasn’t able to even come up with a guess.

“What is that thing?” said a voice that was familiar to everyone in Ponyville. It sounded a little similar of Kathleen Barr’s voice for Marie Kanker… I put the puzzle pieces together to come up with my guess right as she stepped out of the darkness and into the light. “What are you?” she asked.

“I’m a human, Miss Trixie.” I stared at her blankly as Rainbow Dash gave her a death glare.

“What are you doing back in Ponyville?!” Dash growled angrily.

“Why, Trixie is simply here because Trixie is HOMELESS!” Trixie responded sarcastically. “If Trixie still had her cart then maybe Trixie wouldn’t be here. As a matter of fact, Trixie would probably be as far away from here as possible.”

“I wouldn’t consider that surprising” I said with little emotion.

“What do you mean by that?” Trixie scowled.

“I only mean that it’s understandable that you wouldn’t want to be here” I explained calmly. “Considering there are numerous ponies in this town that you hold resentment towards, you’d want to stay away from those ponies.”

Twilight shook herself out of a daze from hearing something she hadn’t thought of first from a human and whispered to me, “Don’t bother talking with her, William. She can’t be trusted at all.”

“I don’t feel that she isn’t trustworthy so much as she isn’t…” I stopped to find the right words. “She isn’t properly understood.”

“What the hay are you talking about?” Dash butted in.

“I’m talking about something that you aren’t smart enough to understand, Skittles!” I snapped.

“Don’t talk to her like that!” Twilight gasped.

“She… she doesn’t know what it’s like,” I sighed, looking down.

“Can somepony explain to Trixie what the hell he’s talking about?” Trixie interrupted.

“You watch your language!” Twilight replied. “What do you want anyway!?”

“I was wondering if I could borrow this… human, was it? I need to test something and I can’t really use a pony for it.”

“No!” Twilight and Rainbow shouted in unison.

“HEY!” I roared over them. “I can make my own decisions, thank you very much.”

“I will NOT allow you to go with her!” Twilight stated.

“I don’t think you have the right to make this decision for me.” I gave a long sigh to calm myself a little and turned away from Twilight, Dash and Fluttershy (who was cowering behind Twilight). “You gals have showed me a good time and I had fun tonight, so thank you, but I’m going to go with Trixie.” I glanced back over my shoulder at them. “I have a better reason than just a gut feeling.”

“And what would that be?” Trixie asked, no longer angry but instead, curious.

“I’ll tell you later,” I answered blankly. I turned and began walking the way Trixie had come from. She gave one last glance at Twilight, then turned and trotted up to my side. I didn’t exactly know how I would explain it all to her… but I had to… somehow.

Chapter title from the song Holiday In Cambodia by The Dead Kennedys

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