Carl woke up in the middle of a barn, lying down in a large stack of hay. He stretched his body and yawned as his joints popped loudly. Applejack had been kind enough to let him sleep in her family's barn, but Carl didn't really want to think about the orange pony. Not right now.
Not after what he had been forced to witness last night.

As if on cue, Applejack knocked on the barn door. "CJ! Y'all awake in here?"

Groaning, Carl got up and put on his shirt. "Yeah, yeah. Wassup?"

The door slowly creaked open as an orange face appeared. "How ya doin', partner?"

"Fine. 'Sup with you? You gonna be walkin' funny or what?"

The country mare blushed, attempting to hide behind her hat, à la Fluttershy. "CJ! Rarity's a lady! We ain't been doin' anything that ain't ladylike, alright? We did nothin' of the kind yer thinkin' of."

The young man mildly chuckled as he grabbed an apple Applejack threw at him, biting into it hungrily. "I was there, remember? I saw y'all suckin' each other's faces and shit. I don't wanna know what the fuck you did after that, it ain't none of my business, but fuck! I saw and did some serious shit in my time, but this shit? Damn, man! This was some fucking unladylike, repugnant shit."

"We didn't go any further than that," she said quietly, her eyes shifting around, "sadly."

Carl put his hands up. "Yo, yo, I don't wanna know, okay? For real. What you be doin' with other female ponies truly ain't some' I wanna hear."

"Female ponies are called mares."

"Oh. Well, what we doin' today? Goin' to that Twilight girl an' shit?"

Applejack sighed. "Yup. Ah think yer supposed to meet Princess Celestia this afternoon."

"You comin'?"

"Ah... Ah don't think Ah'm invited." she glared at Carl as she suddenly remembered how lonely she felt at times. Her work usually prevented her from having a busy social life, although hopefully, Rarity would help with that from now on...

"So what? The letter said the castle was in another city. You need an invitation to go there?"

"No, but-"

"No buts, man! You comin' with us, that's all. Look, you the only normal pony in this damn town! I'mma need you by my side, AJ. For real."

Applejack blushed again, though for a different reason this time. "Well CJ, Ah... ah, screw it. Ah'm comin' with y'all."

Carl smiled. "Jeah!" he said, motioning to the door with his head. "Let's go, bitch!"

"Thank you, Applejack. You can go now," Twilight Sparkle said, ready to close the door on the orange pony. "I will take care of our... friend, here." she added, motioning to Carl and attempting to hide her disgust.

"Negative, Twi! Ah'm comin' too."

"What? But the letter did not mention that-"

"Ah don't care. Ah don't need to be mentioned on a letter to take the train to Canterlot. Ah'm comin', and that's final."

"Alright, alright... calm down." the purple unicorn paced around, grabbing various things with her magic and periodically crossing stuff off her seven feet long checklist.

Carl raised an eyebrow at the sheer amount of stuff Twilight was packing up for a few hours in a city that, as far as he knew, was no farther than a couple of miles away. "Why you takin' all that stuff, man? We only gonna be stayin' for a couple hours, right?"

Twilight's left eye started to twitch. "Yes! Yes. We are. We are only gonna be staying for a few hours. Right." she spoke really fast, before going back to her 'preparations'.

Carl rolled his eyes and looked at Applejack. "Thank fuck you here, man... they all trippin', I swear."

The country mare smiled at him. "Don't mention it."

"Hey, where's the lil' dragon dude?" Carl asked, attempting to make small talk with the other pony.

Twilight turned her head to look at him, an eyebrow raised. "Spike? He's with Rarity."

"Rarity?" he said in surprise, turning to Applejack. "The mare you fucked last night?"

Her cheeks turned a deep shade of red as she lowered her hat to hide her face from Twilight, who was grinning. "Twilight, Ah swear Ah-"

"Come on, Applejack! It was about time you two hit it off..." she said with a knowing smile.

"But... b-but... Ah..." Applejack stammered.

"Just watch out, you don't want Spike to know about it," Twilight added with a wink.

"Why the fuck not?" Carl's obnoxiously loud voice rang out, causing both mares to frown at him.

"Spike has a crush on Rarity. Nothing serious, he's just a kid..." Twilight stated dismissively.

"Nothin' serious? Are you for real, girl? His ass gon' get rejected! This shit is serious, c'mon! We gotta go get him!"

Applejack raised a hoof. "Uh, Ah reckon you ain't aware but Spike's been helpin' Rarity with her work for over a year, Ah don't think it's gonna change if-"

"Man, you's a damn girl, what the fuck would you know 'bout that shit? You just wiggle yo' ass and you got a hundred niggas all up in yo' shit! You can't understand, we guys ain't so lucky! C'mon, let's get him before we go to that castle place."

Twilight panted as she slowed down to a fast trot. "Carl! Stop running, for Celestia's sake! I can't keep up!"

Not bothering to look behind him, the young man slowed down too. "What's the matter? You tired?"

"Yes, I am! You're nearly three feet taller than me, your legs are as long as I am tall!"

"So?"

"So you run much faster!"

"More like, your ass is all outta shape, yo. Applejack was leavin' me in the dust yesterday." Carl wasn't too proud of that, but it was true. Applejack ran much faster than he could ever hope to. To his defense, she had twice as many legs, among other reasons.

"I'm a unicorn... Earth ponies are physically stronger and faster than us! They're more fit, but we have magic and-"

"Then use your magic to keep up or some'! C'mon, you're just a lazy bitch! Let's move! You said the train's leavin' in less than an hour."

"Carl, slow down! I can't! Magic doesn't work like that, and we unicorns are different, we're not as fast, strong or athletic as-"

"Bullshit!" he cut her off. "You and I, we gon' hit the gym when we back from visitin' Miss White Bitch. I'mma make you into a fucking racing machine."

After rolling her eyes at the human's antics, Twilight managed to catch up to him as he stopped in front of the Carousel boutique.

"How did you know where she lived?" the unicorn asked, frowning.

"Man, they been tonguin' each other's throats all night. After meetin' in that alley, they went back here. They didn't even give a shit about me, like I wasn't here or anythin', just suckin' faces like no fucking tomorrow. So I just went back to the farm, Applejack's lettin' me stay here for now. But shit, man! I ain't about to forget the shit I saw through these windows..." he said, holding back a retch.

Twilight's frown deepened. "You went with Applejack to that... 'meeting'?"

"Well, yeah. She a big girl an' all, but she wasn't too confident about that shit. Plus, when you get a letter from a stranger sayin' they wanna meet yo' ass in a dark alley at night? You better bring a brother with you, man."

"Maybe... maybe she's right. I might have misjudged you... still, you're loud and... obnoxious."

Carl shrugged and banged on the door. "Open up!" he shouted, before glancing at Twilight. "You sure she still lives here?"

Fool, she told you.

The door opened and an agitated Rarity appeared. "Oh, Twilight, darling. What can I do for-, oh... and um, mister Carl, is it?"

"Yeah. 'Sup, baby? What's crackin'?"

"Uh... Please, come in. I was just, uh... trying to get some work done," she said nervously before turning back. "Argh, Sweetie Belle! Stop that!" she shouted inside.

Carl and Twilight looked at each other and shrugged before following the white fashionista inside her home and workplace.

The two of them chuckled and facehoofed, respectively, at the little white unicorn with a curly pink and violet mane who had managed to set a bowl of oatmeal on fire.

"Sweetie Belle, please! Just... just go back into your room, alright?" Rarity pleaded as she tried to put out the fire. "I will clean up your... mess."

"I'm sorry, Rarity! I just wanted to help."

"I know! I know..."

"Well, I'll be in my room..." the little filly said in a sad tone, before trotting up the stairs. A voice crack followed. "Hey, Spike! Wanna play doctor?"

Had she been drinking anything, Twilight Sparkle would have done a spit take. Rarity simply giggled. "Ah, kids..."

"What do you mean, Rarity? Aren't you worried that Sweetie Belle might do something to-" Twilight was cut off by Rarity's smirk as the white unicorn sat down and levitated a cup of tea in front of her friend.

"Why, of course not. I am not worried at all, those two are always spending time together these days... they really like each other, I think." she grinned, blushing sightly.

"But Twilight said the lil' dude had a crush on yo' white ass," Carl chimed in, blunt as ever.

Ignoring Carl himself, Rarity smiled at her purple friend. "That was true until a few weeks ago, Twilight. I think he gave up when I told him that he... um... oh well, it doesn't matter." she giggled awkwardly, a faint blush creeping onto her face. "What did you need, anyway?"

Twilight sighed. "Well, nothing," she spat out, nearly shouting the second word as she shot Carl a death glare, before bring her voice back to more a more reasonable volume, "I'm sorry to have wasted your time, Rarity...".

"Nonsense, darling. You're always welcome here. Oh, by the way, where is Applejack?" she asked, nervously shifting in her seat.

"She stayed at the library, preparing a few things. We're leaving for Canterlot in about forty minutes."

Rarity's eyes lit up. "Canterlot?"

"Gon' meet the princess an' all." Carl said to nopony in particular.

Twilight rolled her eyes. "We need to go now. Thanks anyway, Rarity. Bye!"

"Later, man."

"Yes, yes... later, creature," she groaned once she thought he was out of hearing range.

Carl shrugged at the white mare's attitude towards him. 'Between the big horse and that bitch... goddamn, all 'em white ones be racist as shit,' he thought.

Once they were outside, Twilight angrily jabbed Carl in the thigh with a hoof. "Now what? With your nonsense, we lost time and we're gonna be tardy!"

The yound man raised an eyebrow. "Tardy? And what the fuck, man? Takin' care of Spike is nonsense to you? I thought he was your assistant or somethin'!"

Taken aback by Carl pointing out just how shitty her attitude had been as of late, Twilight found herself lost in thought for a few seconds before shaking her head and clearing her throat. "Well, no, but... what is it to you, anyway?"

"He's the only other guy I met so far, man! I'm used to bein' surrounded by girls in bed, but not in everyday life! Solidarity between men, in a land full of bitches, you know?"

Twilight booped herself on the muzzle (because facehoofing is too manestream). "Didn't you meet Applejack's brother?"

"Oh... that big ass red dude? Yeah, I did... ah, whatever man, fuck you."

The purple mare thought about conjuring up a steel chair and bashing Carl's face in with it, but she ultimately decided against it. The princess' letter was very clear about his presence being required... though she had been working all night trying to unveil the enchanted ink. Why would Celestia send her a letter with invisible ink requiring extremely advanced spells to even read?
Spells so ridiculously advanced, in fact, that even she hadn't learned them yet.

Celestia had been acting so strangely lately, anyway... and nothing she had done during the past week was really adding up.
As her biggest 'fan', Twilight was really looking up to her mentor, but for the first time in her life, she didn't see her role model. Instead, she saw a pony acting strangely. An obnoxious pony whose unpredictable reactions were starting to freak her out. A mare whose attitude and recently questionable behavior were getting on her nerves.
An emotional wreck.

They walked back to the library in silence, and after gathering Applejack, Twilight's checklist and a few other necessary things, along with several pounds of unnecessary things, the three 'friends' were on their way to Canterlot.

Getting off the train, Carl glanced at his wrist. "We have twenty minutes, man! C'mon, let's move. Bitch ain't gonna be waitin' forever."

Twilight grabbed his watch with her magic, effectively yanking his arm backwards as he tried to move. "Carl, you need to calm down. I don't want you to act like that around the princess."

He grabbed his watch with his other hand and glared at the pony. "Hey yo, stop that shit. I am who I am. I ain't gonna stop actin' the way I always did 'cause some petty fuckin' horse told me to, a'ight? Now let's do the damn thing, and be outta here. I already don't like this place."

Striding forward despite not knowing where to go, Carl was soon out of hearing range, though his tall stature didn't make him exactly hard to track down, even in the busy, crowded streets of Canterlot. Twilight turned to Applejack. "How can you get along with him? He's insufferable!"

"Ya just gotta go along with whatever he says, ya know? Ignore the strange words he uses, ignore his constant swearin' an' all, and don't try to argue with what he says."

Twilight shook her head. "That sounds an awful lot like dealing with an overly authoritarian, yet stupid pony... but then, I guess that except for the pony part, that's what he is, isn't it?"

Applejack rolled her eyes and started trotting after the young man, who was currently trying to walk around without kneeing ponies in the face with each step he took.

"CJ! Quit yer runnin', darn it! Y'all don't even know where we goin'!"

Turning around, he saw the two mares running up to him. "Well, she said we were gonna meet her ass in the castle, right?" he said, before pointing a finger at the gigantic castle in front of them. "Unless there's another one of these 'round here or some shit, I figured this is what we're headin' for."

Both ponies shrugged and took the lead as Carl followed them lazily, eventually bumping into a tall, thin white mare. He raised an eyebrow as he looked at the slender unicorn, his eyes trailing off, and focusing on the white appendage resting on her forehead. What the fuck was up with these horns, and his urges to... touch them?

"Fleur, my dear! Are you all right?" a haughty voice spoke from behind. Carl turned around and saw yet another white pony, this time a stallion, with a blue mane, a monocle and a moustache.

"Yes, Fancy, I am alright, thank you." the mare said, dusting herself off.

Ignoring 'Fancy', Carl wrapped an arm around the pony's thin frame and lifted her up, his face scrunching in confusion as he put on a (pointless) show, trying to roughly evaluate her weight.
How could these ponies be so light? That particularly mare probably weighed less than a hundred pounds.

"Let go off me!"

"Fleur!" the stallion shouted, though he would never consider doing as much as making a move to help her. "Let her go, you... thing!"

"Ah, shit," Carl shrugged, dropping the poor pony. "Trash can bitch!"

Fancy Pants trotted away with his assistant after having helped her back onto her hooves. "The princess will hear about this, you foul creature!"

The human turned back and shouted, "We headin' for a meeting with her right now, you pimp motherfucker!"

Ignoring the glares most of the members of Canterlot's high society were giving him, Carl kept walking towards the giant castle. Both Twilight Sparkle and Applejack wanted to shrink and hide. Or die. Or anything that could get them away from the young man, and away from the prying eyes of hundreds of upper class ponies having just witnessed their 'friend' acting the only way he knew how to act.

TWO HUNDRED PERCENT NIGGA.

"Look, fool. You tell us where Celestia is, and we outta here."

Twilight deadpanned at Carl, who had just single-handedly defeated about ten royal guards after he had failed to (calmly) 'state his identity and business'. She had just had enough. It had been barely a couple of hours, and she was already beyond getting angry. She was, as he would put it, 'tired of this shit'. Applejack was laughing at the pegasus guard squirming in the human's grip. She couldn't help but find the human's radical personality and attitude attractive. In a 'darn, Ah wanna hang out with that fella' kind of way.

Content with his work, the human walked back to the two ponies and gave them a thumbs up. "Yo, we cool. That fool said we was goin' to the throne room."

"Yes, that's where I would have led us if you had let me do the talking," Twilight stated, trying to remain calm. She then turned to Applejack, "I think you're going to have to stay there, Applejack."

The country mare glared at her friend, then at the knocked out royal guards lying around, and finally at the unguarded door. "Nope. Ah'm comin', Twi."

Carl chuckled. "Man, those guys suck. They work for B-Dup or what? This the punks the princess uses as her personal guard? Fucking bitch needs to learn how shit works. A hundred of 'em wouldn't last a minute against real niggas."

Doing her best to ignore her 'guest', Twilight kept walking forward, knowing the castle better than her own library. After all, she had lived here for the vast majority of her life. "Come, this way," she said, motioning to a giant, fancy, golden double door.

"Don't we have to wait or anythin'?" Applejack chimed in.

Carl looked at her. "It's not even guarded! And look, she makes us come all the way here, and we the ones who'd have to wait? Fuck that, man! We goin' in." he said as he walked past the two mares and pushed the doors open.

"No, sister. I assure you, I can handle the situation."

"We do not know, Tia. You look really tired. Maybe you should let us discuss with that human? After all, we know best what it is to be somewhere we do not fit in."

Glaring at her younger sister, Princess Celestia stood up. "Luna, please. Just go back to sleep, I promise you that everything is under control."

"We..." Luna trailed off, remembering what happened the last time she got into a serious argument with her sister. At nearly twenty-eight hundred years old, she was getting too old for this shit. "Fine, we believe you, sister. We wish you the best of luck in your diplomatic meeting."

"Thanks, Lulu."

The Princess of the Night teleported back into her bedchambers as the doors opened, revealing two ponies and just the creature Celestia wanted to see. She had no idea why her feelings were so conflicted as of late, but she was past caring. She had brought him here for one reason, and for one reason only. And even though the young man was pretty far from what she had imagined a human would be like... he would have to do. If her thirty-seven hundred and seventy-seven year long life had taught her anything, it would be to always listen to her own needs.
Unless it poses a direct and immediate threat to her kingdom, that is.
'But even then, you're still entitled to some freedom in your actions... aren't you?' she thought.

She stared at Carl before smiling. Her own needs, just waiting to be satisified... now if only she could figure out what she needed, exactly...

Author's Notes:

As it turns out, I can't write anything worth shit if it doesn't contain romance / shipping / whatever you want to call it (not that I'm any good at writing romance either, but whatever). So this story will contain some. Yes, including CJ, too. Don't say I didn't warn you...

...but then, if you're still reading at this point, you've had enough warnings anyway.