“Morning, Karyn! What’s doing?”

“Hey, Derpy. Just trying to straighten up a bit around here.”

Karyn had no propensity for neatness, but as Derpy surveyed the room, she found little to complain about, except the desk. Papers, envelopes, and folders were thrown around in a haphazard arrangement.

“At least it looks like you’re getting some studying done.”

“I know, right? Some people say that a messy desk is the sign of a hard worker.”

Derpy looked up. “Dinky doesn’t have a messy desk though, and she does study.”

“Yeah, but she can also probably magic everything straight.”

“Good point.”

Karyn swept up all the remaining paper into a pile and tapped it on the desk until it at least resembled a rectangle. “In my case, though, yes, I have been hard at work on a research paper. You’d think that if I’m studying IT, they’d have less actual paper involved.”

“Why?”

“Well, because it’s all about recording information not on paper, but in digital format.”

Derpy shrugged. “In Equestria, we do everything on scrolls and it works out fine.”

“You have a much simpler world. So many modern conveniences you lack. I wouldn’t want them to creep too much in, and destroy your rustic beauty.”

“Why, Karyn! That’s awfully nice of you.”

Karyn ran over her last sentence in her mind, then figured out the non sequitur.

“I didn’t mean you specifically. Your beauty is more cloud-like. Anyway, I’m just about done here, so let’s grab some breakfast.”

“Sounds good.” Derpy headed to the door, but then stopped. “Breakfast! Darn, I forgot to feed the cat. I’ll be right back, I promise.”

“Why don’t I come with you?”

“No, that’s OK. I’ll be back in an infinitesimal amount of time. You won’t even notice I’m gone."

Before Karyn could react, Derpy had turned on her spell and was back in Equestria. She hoped that Muffinhead would still be in bed, but didn’t have any luck. He was pacing around his food dish, impatiently tapping his paw. When he saw her, he pointed at the empty bowl.

“Yes, I’m sorry, I know,” she said. “I think you’re getting more Equestrian all the time. Soon you’ll want to meet Opal and have kittens.”

He looked at her skeptically, and tapped the bowl again. She filled it quickly and was all set to go back to Earth, when a knock on the door caught her attention. She put down the spell.

“Mornin’, Derpy.”

“Applejack! What brings you around?”

“Are you busy right now?

Derpy was about to respond yes, but realized that Karyn would wait as long as she needed and still not notice. “I have some free time.” Literally, she thought.

“I need some pegasus assis—pegusasst—I need help from somepony with wings!”

“Those I have. What do you have?”

“We’re having a get-together at the farm. Not a full-blown Apple family reunion, but a select few dozen ponies round for a nice sit-down dinner and bonfire.”

“Sounds nice,” said Derpy. “Where do I come in?”

“It’s going to be a picnic at night in the clearing of a grove, but unless we want to stumble over each other in the dark, we’ve got to string some lights in the trees. We could do it ourselves, but we’d have to climb each tree one by one, and it’d just be so much easier for you.”

Derpy had an idyllic image of a large group of earth-toned Earth ponies sitting at picnic tables in the grove, all under the burning lights that she would string up. She also had a less-than idyllic image of herself spending hours of wing-breaking labor getting scratched by pointy leaves. One question remained in Derpy’s mind.

“Why come to me? Surely Rainbow Dash would be better suited to—“

“I already asked her,” said Applejack. “But she’s training for a big race that’s coming up.”

“What about Fluttershy?”

“Fluttershy has a squirrel who’s sick. She has to take care of him. I had actually swung by her place on the way to yours, but, you know.”

Derpy was disappointed both that her pegasus friends couldn’t help and that Applejack had gone to them instead of her. “There’s Thunderlane. He’s always available to help out.”

“Sprained his wing.”

“Cloud Chaser?”

“Emergency storm duties in Baltimare. They’ve had a drought there all month.”

“Cloud Kicker?”

“Also in Baltimare. They got the name wrong when they sent for Cloud Chaser.”

“Flitter?”

“Helping out another friend who’s also having a get together.” Applejack shook her head. “What are the odds?”

Derpy saw her odds of escaping the favor dropping. She desperately tried to think of anypony else who could help.

“How about Snowflake?”

“That big stallion with the tiny wings? I don’t even know him.”

“Wild Fire?”

“Busy with some deadline. Apparently she’s a writer. Who knew?”

“Unnamed Pegasus Mare Number Seven?”

“Derpy! Put down that list of pegasi!” Applejack stomped her hoof impatiently.

Derpy changed tacks. “How about Pinkie Pie hopping from tree to tree with the lights the same as when she hops over buildings in a parade? Or she could warp from one to the other the way she does.”

“She can only do that when nopony’s looking. Or when it’s funny.”

“Can Twilight use her magic to put them up?” asked Derpy.

“Hmm. . .”

“Yes? Can she?”

“I don’t like to impose on her.”

Derpy’s face fell. “Well, then, I suppose I’ll be happy to help.”

“I knew I could count on you.”

They trotted over to Sweet Apple Acres. On the way, Derpy explained that it was her day to spend with Karyn, and that she was time-locked now, waiting for her.

“I’m not sure that figures right,” said Applejack. “When she goes from Earth to Equestria, time there stops, but when you do, it keeps moving.”

“No, that’s not how it works. See, there’s a ‘home base’ for both of us at any moment. If that home base is Earth, and we leave and come back, then it’s the same time. If the home base changes to Equestria, then time moves on Earth.”

“But what changes it?”

“Well, it’s magic,” said Derpy, waving her hoof. “It’s very contextual. If Karyn came here to live, time would probably move on Earth, because it would have to. But so long as it’s just visiting, it doesn’t. It’s probably the same for Lyra’s human.”

They had reached the orchard. Big McIntosh and Apple Bloom were doing most of the work, but there were a few of the guests who, having arrived early, were pressed into service hauling picnic tables and the like. Granny Smith was at one of those tables, snoring loudly.

One of the ponies who was setting the table heard the tail end of their conversation. He was a short and stocky stallion with a shoe for a cutie mark. “What’s that you’re talking bout?” he asked. “I’m always interested in how magic works.”

Applejack pointed at him. “Derpy, meet my third cousin from Galloping Gorge, Apple Cobbler. Apple Cobbler, my friend Derpy.”

Derpy shook hooves. “AJ, you have two other cousins from there?”

“No, meaning that he’s the grandson of one of Granny Smith’s cousins. Three generations back, so third cousin.”

“Oh, so that’s how that works. I always find it confusing.”

“Not as confusing as a pegasus pony who hangs out with a human.”

Apple Cobbler spoke up. “That’s what I want to know about. What’s a human?”

That got Derpy going. It was impossible for Applejack to get Derpy’s attention and start her on the light stringing. She regaled Apple Cobbler with tales of some of her adventures with Karyn. There was a coal bin for when the Apples would be grilling, so Derpy took a piece of charcoal and a sheet of butcher paper and drew a crude picture of Karyn, labeling some of the parts where humans differed from ponies. After twenty minutes of this, Cobbler burst out laughing.

“Sorry, I just couldn’t keep a straight face anymore! That there’s got to be the tallest yarn I ever heard and no mistake. Humans indeed!”

“No, it’s all true!”

“You’re pulling my leg, darlin’. Got to be. Such a creature couldn’t exist.”

Derpy was a little frustrated. “I just left her an hour ago.”

“All right, little filly, tell me this. Is it very dark on this Earth world?”

“Sometimes. Not today.”

Cobbler smirked. “Well, if the humans don’t have any magic, then how do they raise the sun? Tell me that!”

“They don’t have to. In their world, the sun is a massive object that their planet revolves around.”

“And what pushes it?”

Derpy’s mouth hung open. “It just goes, all right? They have a lot more physics there than we do.”

“Well, let’s just pretend that that could happen. So you’ve got a round world going around a sun. How would you ever have seasons? The sun would just keep beating down on the world. It’d be always summer or always winter.”

“Nuh-uh! Because it’s not a circle. It’s an ellipse.” Derpy was proud of having researched that fact on one of her internet sessions.

“Can’t be. You need two points of focus for an ellipse. What’s the other one, the moon?”

“Exactly!”

The skeptical Cobbler rolled his eyes and picked up the drawing. “Look at what you have here. The forelegs don’t reach the ground. There’s no way for this creature to stand up and balance. We don’t build tables and chairs with only two legs for the same reason. Three is a minimum to avoid falling over.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about. Humans aren’t tables and chairs. They balance themselves by constant adjustment.”

“Ridiculous! They’d have to have muscles like Big Mac to do that. And consume three bales of hay a day.”

Derpy decided not to try to convince him that humans didn’t eat hay. “I’m telling you, that’s how it is.”

“Even if they could stand, how would they walk? As soon as they took one hoof off the ground, they’d be on only one. Don’t try to tell me that anything can balance on one leg.”

“Humans can do that too, for short periods of time. But as for walking, that’s exactly what they do. They fall over, and move the other leg in front to stop them from tipping all the way.”

Apple Cobbler shook his head. “Again, you don’t get it. Yeah, ponies might do that, because if they fall and break a hip they’ve got hospitals and doctors to fix it, but a wild creature who hurt themselves couldn’t survive if they didn’t have balance. You need a sturdy, quadruped body in order to achieve civilization. Any biologist will tell you the same.

“And furthermore, look at the eyes. You can’t have drawn this right, or rather, it’s a perfectly plausible drawing of a ridiculous creature. They’re too close together. This thing would have no peripheral vision. Any predator could sneak up on it from the back or sides and it wouldn’t see until it was too late.”

Derpy just stood there and fumed, trying to think of something that he couldn’t argue with. It was Applejack who came up with the direct solution. “Derpy, why don’t you just magic on back and pick her up and introduce her round? Then everypony here will be able to see for themselves.”

“You shouldn’t encourage the filly in her delusions,” Cobbler said, but Derpy was already gone.

Back in the dorms, an exasperated Derpy was relaying what was said. Karyn listened, but she found the whole thing more amusing than annoying.

“But he said that you were unable to walk, and that you’d fall victim to predators! He insulted you!”

“It’s not insulting, because it’s not true. He’s just ignorant. We should enlighten him.”

“I have to do that anyway,” said Derpy, “when I go back and string the lights.”

“That’s not what I meant, but take me with you and we’ll do it together.”

Back in Equestria, Derpy quickly found Apple Cobbler again. “Now this is my friend, Karyn the human.”

Karyn waved her hand and laughed at the expression the stallion wore. Despite living in a world of magic and wonder, her simple form made his jaw drop.

He trotted around her, looking from all sides.

“Well, I’ll be a donkey’s uncle. I still don’t get how you’re standing up though.” He gave her a gentle nudge with his head. She compensated and regained her balance, then stood on one foot and stuck her tongue out.

Derpy joined her in razzing the skeptical Apple Cobbler. “Well, Karyn, do you want to help me with helping Applejack set up? Your hands would be really useful in positioning the lights she needs.”

“I’d like nothing better,” Karyn said, mounting Derpy as she took off, leaving Apple Cobbler slack-jawed.

Once they were out of hearing, Derpy burst out laughing. “Oh, you really frazzled him! It was hilarious.”

“You shouldn’t laugh at him. He’s a country pony, so he’s probably not used to the idea of someone from another world.

“In the first place, Ponyville isn’t exactly the center of Equestria either, so it’s no excuse. In the second, there’s nothing wrong with being a farm pony, but courtesy is still expected. He talked down to me like I was a filly, so I enjoyed getting him back.”

“Well, that’s not so bad I guess.” They had reached the edge of the clearing, Derpy hovering by a tree. Karyn wrapped the cord for the first light around a thick branch.

“Hmm.”

“What’s the matter, Derpy?”

“All that arguing made me hungry. Do you think anypony would mind if I. . . ?” she reached her hoof toward one of the apples hanging temptingly from a branch.

“Probably not. Applejack’s always generous.”

“That’s Rarity you’re thinking of. Applejack’s the element of honesty.”

“Yes, but having one element doesn’t preclude you from showing other virtues,” said Karyn.

“Good point, and I shouldn’t argue it, because then I’ll get more hungry, and have to take more apples.”

Derpy grabbed an apple with her hoof and pulled it off with a satisfying snap. As she flew on to the next tree she bit into it. Karyn was treated to a symphony of smacking, chewing, and “Mmm”s.

“That really hit the spot!” Derpy said. Karyn was rigging the next light, and Derpy’s face was right in front of the tree. “Well, they surely wouldn’t notice two apples gone any more than one, right?”

“Are you asking me? I say go for it.”

“Do you want one?”

“No, thanks. I’m not that hungry,” said Karyn. But when she had done a couple more lights, and when she had heard Derpy gushing about the taste at each one, and when she found herself staring at a shiny apple that had such an intense redness, she started to waver.

“Go ahead, take it. Come on, when has anything bad ever come from eating an apple offered by someone close to you?”

Karyn looked down suspiciously, but Derpy’s expression was hidden by their position. She didn’t know if Derpy knew of forbidden-fruit legends and was making a joke, or if she was being serious. Still the apple was held on Derpy’s hoof, and Karyn, not being particularly religious, shrugged and bit in.

It wasn’t long after that that they were flitting from tree to tree, munching indiscriminately as they worked. As each apple was finished, they slipped the cores onto Derpy’s flank.

“I’ll toss them out when we get back on the ground,” she said.

“That’s the problem with certain foods like apples. They leave evidence of how many you’ve eaten.”

Derpy thought that droll, and almost lost the cores as she laughed. She righted herself and they finished the job.

Landing back by the picnic tables, Derpy surreptitiously found a trash bag and tipped the apple cores into it. She turned hastily to find Applejack coming up.

“We got the lights all up.”

“Thank you kindly. And just in time, too. We’re about ready to start and the sun’ll be setting any minute now.”

“Any minute?” asked Derpy, looking up. “We don’t know which? Is something wrong with Princess Celestia?”

“No, I just mean soon, and I didn’t want to look it up exact. Anyway, thanks again. Say, d’you two want to stick around?”

Karyn said, “Isn’t it Apple Family only?”

“Nah. Like I said, it’s not an all-out reunion. And we got plenty of food.”

Applejack pulled a large table into the clearing and removed its tablecloth. Underneath was a spread of desserts. Tarts, pies, and strudels steamed into the air.

“It all looks good,” said Karyn, “but I really couldn’t eat another bite.”

“Another?”

“Um, I mean, I had a big meal back home.”

Derpy had already tied a napkin around her neck. “Well, you don’t have to ask me twice! I’m gonna dig in!”

“Didn’t you have a big meal too?”

“I didn’t have any of this crumb cake,” she said, reaching, “or this tart, or this apple cobbler.”

“Did I hear my name called?” The stout stallion had returned and taken his own seat between Derpy and Karyn, helping himself to a large plate of desserts as well.

“I think Derpy just meant the actual dish,” said Karyn, pointing.

Cobbler looked at her finger. “I’ve got to apologize to you for before. I guess you’re every bit as real as ponies are. I just never figured it could be so, but I’ve led a limited life it seems.”

“It’s not me you need to apologize to.”

“Of course. Sorry, Derpy, for doubting you.”

“Cut me a slice of pie and we’re all even!”

Cobbler laughed and paid his penance. Karyn poked daintily at a few caramel-covered bits off a tart. She whispered to Derpy, “I don’t know how you can still eat after all you had before. You must have a separate stomach for dessert.”

“No, that would be the ruminants like cows. I’ll introduce you to some of them sometime.”

While she wasn’t hungry, Karyn certainly enjoyed the atmosphere of ponies laughing and chatting. The Apples, other than Cobbler, saw nothing odd about a foreign creature visiting them.

Much of the talk stemmed around farming, and the problems they had with growing and organizing their farms. Karyn did more listening than talking, getting an education in problems like dealing with insects, preserving plant life through winter, and keeping an inventory of crops.

At one point, Apple Cobbler was talking about how much trouble he had with paperwork.

“I can figure out how to store apples just fine,” he said, “and how to know where they are at any time by writing that down. But what I don’t know is how to store all the scrolls I have that tell me where my apples are. My work-desk’s a huge mess.”

Derpy put down her fork and nudged Karyn in the ribs. “Sounds like somepony else I know.”

“I wonder,” Cobbler said, “about how you handle it, Miss Karyn. You live in a whole nother world where everything’s different. What do you do to keep track of things on your farm?”

“Oh, I don’t have a farm myself.”

“Heh. I’m too used to everypony I know growing crops.”

“But the farms we do have on Earth are the last to get the kind of things you’re talking about.” Karyn cast her memory back to some of her textbooks. “We have ways of organizing information, but there’s a whole big, complicated infrastructure involved. It's not something that could be moved wholesale to Equestria.”

“Mm. I would like it though if you could stop by my ranch sometime and see if you can’t find anything I’m doing wrong.”

“Oh, my. Look at the time! Derpy, don’t we have to be getting back to that. . . thing, back at the place?”

Derpy was a little disappointed to have to cut her sixth dessert short, but she saw that her friend was in trouble. They trotted off together.

“You know, it’s funny,” she said. “Back on Earth, you’ve got Albert, who doesn’t know I exist and believes something anyway, and here there’s Apple Cobbler, who knows you exist, and I think he still doesn’t believe it.”

“Yeah.” Karyn had a sinister grin. “Hey, Derpy, do you still have that mind-switch spell?”

“We couldn’t!”

“I know, I know,” Karyn said.

“But it would be funny.”

They laughed as they flew off.

Author's Notes:

Here's everypony's favorite section, the preview!

Karyn shook her head as if trying to clear it of water while she picked up a card.

“At least it hasn’t broken since then.”

“Huh?”

Karyn repeated herself.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Hmm. . . wait, you said it was gradual, but it happened all of a sudden.”

“Yeah, but it started all of a sudden,” said Derpy.

“That’s true of everything that happens gradually.”

“I suppose, but this is no time to be quibbling over semantics!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That's all for the quotes, but I'll tell you that we'll have a certain mint-green guest star!