+Really? Twilight did that?+

"Oh, yeah. A whole room full of the dogs. They fought over that cursed stone like drowning men after air." I speared a piece of cantaloupe and chewed while Max looked on, interested if somewhat dubious. "And then get this, Sparkle goes all limp; the mutts all tore each other apart. Literally tore each other to pieces. God, by the time it was over the whole thing looked like Satan's mural or something. Blood got everywhere." Now he looked queasy. Better move on. "So then your pony goes all catatonic. Guess her mind broke or whatever and so I had to carry her the rest of the way. Saved her life and everything."

Okay, so I may have painted myself in a slightly better light, but it's not like anyone cares.

Max pondered my words, tapping the pencil to his chin before writing down, +She never said anything about it.+

I scoffed. "No surprise. Guess she doesn't want her little friends to get wind she's a certified murderer. Actually," I said after a pause. "I guess the technical term would be mass murderer, seeing how she killed a whole bunch of them in one sitting. Exactly how many lives does one have to take to be considered a mass murderer, you think?"

He frowned and scribbled hastily. +That doesn't sound like Twilight.+

I resisted the urge to roll my eyes, opting instead to shove another piece of fruit in my mouth. "Yeah? And what does sound like her?"

+She's a good pony. She cares for me and her friends. If it wasn't for her, I would have ended up in a very bad place.+

My eyes glanced to the stairs, making sure the little princess wouldn't drop in on us. Probably not necessary, but just to be safe. For the last half hour Twilight had shut herself in the upstairs bathroom, paying homage to the porcelain throne.

Thing about the purple pony, she was a creature of habit, at least where her morning routine was concerned. From what I heard from Max and Sparkle's slave/pet gecko(who apparently was male, by the way. Guess its balls haven't dropped yet) Twilight had been known to have an erratic sleep schedule, for brainiac that she was, she tended to pull all nighters dedicated to her studies.

Still, every day she followed the same pattern. Wake up, go to the bathroom to shower and do her business, comb her hair and then come downstairs to partake in a meal her house slave cooked up and every time accompanied by a mug of hot tea.

Well, I hadn't been twiddling my thumbs these past couple of days and so I plotted to find a way for the little princess to get out of my hair for a while. To my luck, in one particular spot at the base of her weird treebrary, there just happened to grow a little plant called wormwoorth that, should you take its leaves and steep them in hot water, you'd be left with a bitter drink that acted as a powerful laxative.

Simple, but effective. I slipped out in the night, grabbed a fistful and mixed them in with her little tub of loose tea leaves. After that, nothing to do but wait and not an hour passed after breakfast that Her Royal Ponyness' digestive tract started brewing up a storm. Cheeks flushed, the little princess raced upstairs and locked herself in the bathroom and had not come down since.

I would have cackled in malicious glee if it wouldn't give me away.

With her gone, only Max and I remained. Oh, and Twilight had loaned her pet to Rarity for a day of hard, unpaid, backbreaking labor or something like that. Small miracles be praised.

With the house, er, tree empty, it was finally time for my human counterpart to have a little chat of our own. Well, I talked while he just scribbled and listened, mostly. He'd tried doing the whole hoof language thing, but I still hadn't fully picked it up so I mostly got fragments that proved annoying to sift through.

I grilled him good, wanting to know everything that happened while he'd been here, hoping that with the little princess gone, he wouldn't hold anything back, which then caused a good deal of confusion with me.

He... actually seemed to like it here. Here. In this candy horse world with brain dead humans and only mutants/freaks of nature as the sole means of conversation. I dunno if the ponies drugged him or brainwashed him, if he was suffering from Stockholm syndrome or his time here finally caused him to snap, but yes, it did actually seem like he was content being here.

Sheesh...

Well, hopefully he'll come around to my way of thinking and help me get out of this town, but man, it must have really messed him up in the head, everything he had gone through since his arrival. Granted, I too haven't exactly escaped with my full sanity intact so I guess I could understand to a degree.

The door to the library then opened and in came the poster child for addictive personality disorder better known as Pinkie Pie.

Her eyes widened ever so slightly after catching sight of me, but a hasty smile quickly replaced it. "Good morning everypony. How are we all doing today?" She asked brightly.

"We were doing fine," I said. Max shot me a reprimanding look before smiling at the pink pest and waving hello.

"Great!" She said obliviously. "So where's Twilight?"

"Up in the bathroom. But I wouldn't interrupt her. Princess came down with a bad bout of explosive diarrhea so you should probably come back later." Or hopefully never.

"Oh. Really? That's too bad, because today's my turn to spend time with you."

I nearly choked, and after a bout of violent, hacking coughs I said, "With you?"

She nodded happily. "Yeah. I know we got off to a rough start, but I think we can put it all behind us. What do you say?" She promptly stuck her hoof out at me in a gesture of goodwill. I eyed the appendage warily. No way she'd simply let go what I did to her... right?

Hmm, better play it by ear. "Sure. Whatever." I bumped her hoof with my fist, causing her to smile even wider.

"See? I knew we'd get along. Just you wait, by the end of the day we'll be super duper friends."

I seriously doubt that. "Yeah... friends..." I said with a smile that probably resembled a grimace more than anything.

"Anyway, I have to go and tell Twilight I'll be taking you. Be back in a flash. She then hurried up the stairs, legs working furiously before turning back to the only other occupant in the room. "Oh, hi Max!" She screeched, waving like a madman and disappeared from sight.

Great. Now I have to spend the day with her as company. The little princess' moans of misery did raise my spirits, though.

One of these days, I will burn this whole damned town straight to the ground.

Wishful thinking? Perhaps, but a girl had to take solace wherever she could. Twilight, despite her cronies’ misgivings, insisted we push on with this reformation agenda of hers.

The pink pony was by far the worst of them all. Oh, she didn't try to get payback. She wasn't mean, she didn't try to get me to do unpleasant labor and in no way acted hostile with me. Quite the contrary, really.

Since she picked me up from Twilight’s pad, she'd been nothing but smiles and good cheer. Shortly after lunch, the party pony came to collect me and, too emotionally drained to give much a shot either way, followed her and hoped we could get the ordeal over with quickly.

“So, whatcha wanna do today?” the pink pest asked as she trotted merrily beside me, loosely holding my leash in a hoof. Yes, I had to wear a collar and leash. Apparently, humans here—owned humans at least—had to wear them as a sign that they belonged to someone else. That way, you know, it was less likely some random pony would try and snatch me up, thinking me a stray. That, and according to the princess I was… eh… cute or pretty or something and that much more likely that a pony would try to take me in if I did not have an owner.

I gave the pink pest my best take on the 'Troglodyte look' I could force myself to do. Obviously Pinkie was as brain addled as she came over because she asked me this question in broad daylight, while in the midst of her unwashed brethren.

Me.

The supposedly rock stupid human.

As tempted as I was to just tell her that I wanted to dig a hole, put her in it hooves up and then fill it up again just for the hell of it, but for whatever reason beyond my comprehension I had agreed not to reveal my intelligence out in the open after the purple princess all but ordered me not to. She kinda won me over in the end when Max pointed out that there could be unsavory ponies out there who would go to great and criminal lengths to get their grubby mitts on me and it would be the best for all of us if I played along.

They were welcome to try, certainly.

Nonetheless I agreed to play the moldy piece of bread. Necessities and all.

"Hey, didn´t you hear me? I asked what ya wanna do today?"

Gah! Suddenly my complete field of vision was filled with hot pink!

I could not help myself but to make a step back at the massive invasion of my private space. The pink pony had no qualms about getting up in my bubble. And I really, really like my bubble. So while telling her off proved tempting, I settled instead with a non-committal grunt.

That seemed to get my message across as a look of comprehension dawned upon Pinkie´s face as she exclaimed. "Ohh, right. I'm sorry. I kinda forgot you're not supposed to..." She looked around, making sure no ponies were nearby and leaned in, talking in a conspiratorial whisper. "S. P. E. A. K." she said, grinning broadly, even going so far as conking her own head lightly with one hoof, not unlike a human would have done with a hand.

Out of the corner of my eyes, I noticed quite some of the peasant horses around us regarding us with suspicious glances. Obviously this was strange behavior, even for the town's cook. "Shut it, you! There's ponies staring..." I said in a harsh whisper. Luckily, no one seemed to notice and the pink pest took the hint.

Granted, she still talked. What about I'm not sure since I wasn't paying attention and merely focused on getting today over with. At some point we found ourselves in this so called Sugarcube Corner—even more an eyesore in daylight—and Pinks proceeded to take me to the back of the kitchen. The inside was actually empty, the shop closed, basically the pony version of a Sunday when everything shut down as was common in hick, podunk towns like this.

"Oh joy, I'm back," I muttered. "What are we doing here anyway? What's the little princess gone and try to get you to teach me?"

"Well you see, Mr and Mrs. Cake are off visiting their family in Trenthoof and they left the twins and the shop for me to take care of."

"Twins? What twins?" I asked, looking around.

Almost as if on cue, two ponies that I swear were sucrose and syrupy sweet made flesh came down the stairs. Well, one of them, a unicorn, enveloped itself(couldn't tell their genders) in some sort of magic bubble and came bouncing like a beachball down the stairs, giggling all the while, while the other, a pegasus, fluttered down, wings working furiously like a hummingbird.

"They allow you to take care of children?" I asked in incredulousness as the two little pieces of moe fluff were scooped up by Pinks.

"Yes indeedy," the pink one nodded her head, causing that fluff of cotton candy glued to her scalp to fly to and fro. "'Cause aunty Pinkie is just the bestest babysitter in all of Ponyville. Well, not counting in Miss Love Tap I guess but anywho." She then held the two infants out to me. "Jackie, I want you to meet Pound and Pumpkin Cake." She introduced us. The infants stared at me wide eyed... good lord, the eyes of adult ponies were already ridiculously large but the eyes of these two infant ponies nearly made up all of their faces! How could that even work?

"Gooo on~" Pinkie sing-songed out of the blue.

"Eh, what?" Was all I could ask in my bafflement over the ridiculous anatomy displayed to me.

"I can tell you wanna take them in your arms and give `em a big ol `huggie."

"No. Keep them away from me," I said in a clipped tone. Didn't seem to register with her.

"Aww, don´t be such a grumby-wumpy Jackie," Pinkie continued in an insisting tone of voice that somehow made it clear that she would not relent until I, ugh, got into physical contact with those babies.

So I snagged the orange haired baby–Pumpkin, if I was not mistaken–out of Pinkie´s arms by her scruff and held her in front of my face not unlike one would do with a dog or a cat. Holding the diapered pony there, I droned out a flat, "Hello, baby pony."

Strangely enough this caused Pumpkin to explode in pearling giggles despite the fact how I was holding her and to top that, she even reached out with her tinsy hoof and boobed me on the nose. "Gwumpy!" She then exclaimed in a high pitched voice, clapping her hooves together in an undeniable adorable display of infantile joy.

Argh!

As much as it caused me heartburn to admit but somehow, the small pony was adorable.

"See? I just knew you would come around," Pinkie exclaimed, taking the still giggling Pumpkin back while I still stared dumbfounded. "Now, just let me take the Twins to their play-pen and then I can show you what I came up with. I´ll promise you´ll just love it," Pinks said, undoubtedly thinking in an assuring way as she somehow put both babies on her back safely and cantered off.

Having nothing better to do, I just decided to follow suit. Fluttershy had tried to rope me into caring for her filthy animals, Daisy Mae had tried to get some free labor outta me in her failing farm and I could see how they might consider this would be able to mellow me out a bit. But Pinks? Well, apparently her goal was to have me bake.

"You're joking, right?" I asked as the pest bounded all over the kitchen, already wearing a big, poofy chef's hat and a weird sort of pony apron that clung to her body despite it only having the traditional two straps.

"Eh, maybe? I dunno, I joke a lot," she said as she gathered a number of mixing bowls and laid them on the long, wooden island in the middle of the room.

"I mean how is my doing... this," I picked up a particularly large whisk for emphasis, waving it around. "Supposed to help me be reformed?"

"I dunno," She shrugged and went about gathering eggs, milk and cream. "Twilight just said to use our best judgment, and since I couldn't think of anything else, I thought we could have a little fun baking."

"Great, just great," I muttered an pinched the bridge of my nose. "You do know I've never actually baked before, right? Hell, the closest I've come to it is heating up chicken nuggets in the oven."

"What's a chicken nugget?" She asked obliviously.

I smiled, seeing an opportunity to screw with her. "Do you know what mass production is?" She shook her head. "Well, I dunno what you've heard from Max, but our particular home country invented and refined it to a tee. Basically, it means humans can manufacture a fuckton of goods in an industrial scale. Hell, there's factories that are capable of churning out billions of pieces of candy per day."

Yeah, this got her attention alright. "Hard candies, caramels, chocolates, lollipops, nougat, taffy, peanut brittle... they're churned out by the tons." A starry look settled on Pinks, obviously trying to paint a picture of what I just said. However, we also do the same thing to our foodstuffs. Chicken nuggets for example.

Basically, we breed chicks when they've just hatched, put them in cramped little spaces with four hundred other chicks, stuff them full of food and drugs and when they grow up they're tossed into what is basically a giant meat grinder, turning their flesh into unidentifiable mash, shaping that mash into little nugget sized pieces. Bread them, fry them, freeze them and send them to grocery stores all around the country where humans of all ages can enjoy them to their leisure. Children are particularly fond of them. Gobble them up like you wouldn't believe. All a part of a well balanced meal."

I could almost hear the gears inside Hot Pink's head shatter as she stared at me. Her eyes were wide, with pin-prick pupils, her ears had long since vanished in her mane and speaking of which, that unruly mob of hair seemed to miraculously have changed its texture from fluffy to straight in a single instant. That together with her thin line of a mouth almost made her look like one of those cookie cutter horror film psychos. For an undefined amount of time, Pinkie just at there, not even blinking and me? I stood there, relishing the look of abject horror on her fuzzy mug. Heh, finally managed to wipe that idiotic smile off her face.

Just the moment I began to worry ever so slightly, a slight giggle began to bubble up from her chest as her mouth grew into a blood chilling smile, or well, it would if she would have been something else but a cuddly little horse.

Anyways, as I slowly backed up the giggling stopped just as abrupt as it began and as if a switch had been flipped, Pinkie´s mane poofed back into its original state with an audible sound effect like a god damn cartoon and her pupils grew back to normal.

"Eh he he... okay now~," Pinkie stated "Let us pretend this never ever happened oki-doki?" Then she trotted up to the counter and looked over the assorted ingredients she already had gathered.

Unable to suppress a smirk, I just gave a little shrug. "Whatever you say Bubblegum."

This in turn caused the annoying pink pony to showcase a new smile of her own, giving me one of those weird looks along the lines of 'gotcha now' or something.

"What?"

"I knew you would eventually start to come around," Pinkie said as she inspected a bag of flour "after all, nopony or in your case, nohuman can withstand the homely charm that is Sugarcube Corner, the bestest working place in the whole wide world."

I cringed at the word 'nohuman'. Fuck those stupid midget horses and their word new creations, they just felt so... wrong. "What are you even talking about? You are making even less sense than before."

This elicited a giggle-snort from my pink pony overseer as she waved a hoof in the air in my general direction. "You just gave me a nickname Jackie and that means you just made another step on the long Road of Friendship. Uh, I do sooo love traveling, you get to see new places, got to meet new ponies and the best thing of course, get to eat all the new and super duper delicious new treats you never knew they existed before...." She babbled as she went of the tangent by several miles.

Are all ponies weird or...

"So, today we'll be making a scrumptious new recipe from Germaneigh called Black Forest Cake." She proceeded to explain a bunch of baking terminology, thus making even less sense than before. "Did you get all that?"

"Sure." Why not? Watching so many cooking shows back home, I'd lie if I said I've never been curious about cooking and baking. Well, it's probably not gonna be Iron Chef here, but at least it should prove interesting.

"Great! Here," she gave me a stainless steel bowl with four eggs. "Alright, so crack these eggs and whisk them good. We'll add a little sugar and butter to them later. You do that and I'll go work on the frosting."

"I thought the frosting you usually do last, while the cake's baking." Well, I dunno. Who knows how well television translates into real life, much less a pastel world infested with midget horses.

"Yeah, but this way, I can sample it while everything else is being done," she said with a big, mischievous smile.

Shaking my head, I got to work and not for the first time questioned the logistics of this world. Ponies are herbivores. One would think they'd shy away from eating eggs, right? Well, not so much. I'd even seen Sparkle's pet gecko fry up a couple of sunny sides for his mistress' breakfast and I think I even heard of some pegasi with a fondness for fish. How does that even work?

Nope, nope. Out of sight, out of mind. Better not try to make sense of these things, lest I want my brain to implode. I set about my work, cracking the eggs easily enough and whisked them to scrambled perfection, and no sooner did I look up to ask Pinks what she wanted me to do next that I froze.

Frankly, I blame myself for this serious lack of foresight and common sense. I mean, I already knew ponies were fond of grabbing onto things with their bacteria-infested mouths, but never did I suspect this also translated into the freaking kitchen!

I watched aghast as the gross pink pony grabbed two sticks of butter in her mouth before placing them in a mixing bowl of her own, complete with cocoa powder, sugar and what I assume to be corn syrup or something along those lines. The pony then grabbed a whisk and set about mixing them, using her mouth to work the appliance.

My gut churned, and faster than you could say 'health code violation', I doubled over and emptied my stomach's contents all over the counter.

I could hear the pink pest screeching something, not sure what. I staggered backwards, trying not to think of all the food I'd pilfered from this wretched shop and popped back like so many beer nuts. The smell of sick quickly overshadowed that of sweet, baked goods as Pinkie Pie rushed off to find something to clean up the mess and me? I got the hell out of there.

Bursting out the back and taking deep breaths, I breathed in the fresh aroma of pony and mud. Not exactly pleasant, but you worked with what you had. A few passing equines shot me inquisitive looks as I burst out of the shop, but dismissed it soon enough.

I walked on until the shop was no longer in sight and plopped down at the base of a tree, relishing the cool ground under the shade. Apparently, the weather factory scheduled an extra warm day today and so not many ponies roamed the streets at this hour. I tried to fan myself, only to find the hem of my shirt snagged by that accursed collar, which I promptly tore off and flung in a random direction.

Closing my eyes, I leaned back against the trunk and brooded for a bit. Yes, I brood. Only sometimes, though. This seemed as good a time as any.

Something shuffled, coming closer. God, was it too much to ask for some alone time? I paid it no mind and kept my eyes closed, hoping whatever it was would simply go away. Yeah, no such luck.

Something poked my cheek. I kept on the act, hoping a higher power would answer my prayers. Another poke and this time, followed by something sniffing practically next to my ear.

Alright, that's it!

My eyes snapped open, ready to slap the hell out of whoever disturbed me, only... it was a human. A human girl, to be precise and one that looked oddly familiar. Young, heart shaped face. Short, curly auburn hair and hazel eyes.

She gave a soft chirp and cocked her head as she drew a little closer, crawling in her hands and knees. Oh, and she was also wearing a rather baggy pink shirt a few sizes too large, the obligatory collar every human wore and nothing else. How do I know this? Because from her position, the collar of her shirt drooped enough that I got an eyeful of what lay beneath. Not too shabby, all things considered.

"Oh, it's you. What do you want?"

She merely blinked obliviously.

Argh, of course. Despite her not all that unsightly looks, she was still one of those troggs the ponies called humans around here.

"Blossom? Blossom, where... oh, there you are!" A snooty, grating voice suddenly cut through the air and no sooner as the girl, who was obviously named Blossom, looked over her shoulder and gave another of these weird chirps the clip-clop of hooves could be heard. "Blossom, I told you not to run off all the time. What if one of those peasants got their dirty hooves on you?" The same light pink filly I had seen earlier doing this little picnic thing with the grey, glasses wearing filly asked the girl as it came trotting up to us. Hey, wouldn´t you know it, fitting to her whole snooty little princess vibe, she was even wearing a sparkling little diadem on top of what looked like one of those ridiculous pricy hair-do´s one always saw on the crème de la crème of the super rich.

Now it clicked with me why this Blossom girl looked so familiar, I had seen her sitting on the side of this little picnic, just like a brainless pet, scooping up the little bites her equine masters threw her.

"Hmm, what do we have here? Have you found a stray, Blossom?" The pink filly asked while giving me a scrutinizing gaze. One that I did not like one single bit.

"Not all that bad at all," the filly stated as she poked at my clothes "but these clothes, blech, so peasant and they stink!"

Why, thank you very much you little freak. I would like to know how you would smell after all I had gone through today.

"Hmm, no collar..." Pink filly stated as a expression bloomed on her fuzzy mug that did not sit well with me at all.

Blossom choose that moment to sidle up to me and... well, there is no other way to describe it, rubbed herself against my body in a disturbingly animalistic way. The very act made my skin crawl but what she did next, I would never have imagined.

In a fluid motion, she brought her face close to mine, extended her tongue and dragged it all over my cheek, leaving plenty of slobber behind!

That... that was just too much!

I jumped to my feet to bring some distance between... that... that... argh, her and me, rubbing my burning cheek with the back of my hand to get rid of the spit while that confounded mockery of a human looked up to me like a confused puppy.

"Grah, what the bleeding fuck is wrong with you? Uach, that is so much more disgusting than everything I have seen in this little hovel so far!" I almost shrieked, feverishly scrubbing my cheek... only to realize my mistake.

Absolute silence filled the air around us, well, except for the weird sound effect of falling coins one would hear in a cartoon when a character imagined riches. Good lord, if the inhabitants of this blasted world would not drive me over the edge, it´s weirdass physics would do it for sure!

I stared down at the tiara wearing filly who in turn stared up to me with a smile that would put any Wall Street banker to shame and her unholy big eyes sparkled with the unmistakable light of pure greed.

"Oh. My. Stars! You can talk! A talking human!" The filly pointed her stumpy hoof at me "An uncollared, talking human! What a lucky day..."

Without even thinking, I lunged forward, wrapping my hands around the little beast's mouth. "Shut up. Shut up, you stupid little brat!" I hissed next to her ears. "Everyone is gonna hear you."

Her eyes bulged in fear, but quickly enough, she calmed down and her oversized orbs now scrutinized me anew. Meanwhile, Blossom was busy licking her arm not unlike a cat, seemingly without a care in the world...

I let the little brat down, and was thankful no ponies were around, and her, well, her pony eyes still shone with greed, she rubbed her hooves together and a disturbing smile stretched across her mug as she whispered feverishly to herself how lucky she was, what a great opportunity this was and how much bits she could make out of this, the fame it would bring her and how some 'blank flanks' would be jealous of her or something.

And that was my cue to leave... or I would if not for a weight to suddenly cling to my arm... pressing it into something soft?

Looking down, I felt the heat return to my cheeks as I found what exactly felt so soft.

Blossom holding onto my arm, pressing it against her chest and subsequently between her... well... her breasts while doing these weird chirrups again over and over.

I wondered if one could die from embarrassment at this point but no such luck obviously.

"L-let go you stupid, clingy, c-c-cute mockery of mankind!" I warbled out, unsuccessfully trying to free my myself from the surprising vice grip that girl had on my arm.

The filly let out a prolonged, girlish giggle. "And look, Blossom already likes you! Yep, you'll be a keeper," she said and trotted closer, eyeing me with a smug little grin. "Alright you, you're coming with me."

"What?"

"From this point forward, you have the honor of being my pet. I think I'll call you Snowy."

"The hell you will!" I screeched in response, my eyes wide in horror and disgust.

"Oh come on now, think about it," the little abomination fluted in the same tone the devil would probably use to sell salt to a man dying of thirst in the desert. "With me, you would have a roof above your head, a warm basket to sleep in, you would never be hungry, eating only the best kibble my daddy's bits can buy and you would have lots of new... friends Snowy."

The way she just said friends almost made me want to vomit again, triggering every alarm my instincts could offer.

I was about to ponder if I just should snap that little filth's neck and bury her body in a shallow grave in the forest and if I could get away with it as another set of clip-clops heralded the arrival of yet another of those damned horses.

"Diamond? Diamond Paris Tiara, where are you ?"

The filly waved to an adult mud pony, probably in his middle age and with a cutie mark of money bags. "Daddy, daddy! Look what I found." She pointed to me. "See? She's an actual talking human!" Diamond Tiara said with no small amount of enthusiasm.

Her father barely spared me a glance. "That's nice, sweetheart. Now come on, it's time to go back home," he said in that tone between exasperation and amusement parents often use when their rugrats make outlandish claims such as hers.

Obviously, Diamond picked up on this, for a pouty frown entered her face. "I'm telling the truth. She talks, see?" She then turned to me. "Come on, Snowy, say something. You can do it, girl."

Her father eyed me with a bored expression and when—surprise, surprise—I uttered nary a sound nor a word, he addressed his spawn anew. "Yes," he cleared his throat. "I see. Very impressive, Diamond. Now come on, get Blossom and we can be on our way."

"I'm not lying!" The brat exclaimed, complete with a stomp of her hoof. "Bad girl, Snowy. Bad! Start talking!"

"Diamond, if you don't come with me right now, I'll halve your weekly allowance."

The brat's face blanched, her eyes bugged out. Her father already fastened a leash to Blossom's collar and looked at his daughter expectantly.

Diamond Tiara bit her lip, not knowing what to do. You could practically hear the gears in her head working furiously as she tried to come up with a way to salvage the situation.

It wasn't long before her eyes gleamed as inspiration struck. The little brat launched herself at my leg, clutching it for all she was worth and looking up at her dad with big, pleading eyes.

"Can I keep her, daddy?"

Wow, and here I thought these little beasts could not fall any lower. But well, consider me surprised.

Diamond Tiara´s dad on his part seemed to suffer the very same fate as every parent ever that was subjugated to the pleading puppy dog look. Either he would cave in or he would show that he had an actual spine and put his foot... hoof... whatever down and tell his little brat 'No!'.

Of course I could have not an ounce of luck here as it took not even a minute before her father´s head dropped visibly together with a loud sigh. "Alright, alright Diamond, seeing as... Snowy here has no collar, you may keep her BUT," the spineless miniature horse conceded before his voice regained a semblance of authority again. "We will have Dutiful Service and the other employees put up flyers saying that we found a stray human. Seeing as she is wearing clothes, she probably has an owner who just forgot to put on her collar today or she somehow squirmed out of it. So if anypony comes to our mansion and utters as much as a single word that he or she is the rightful owner of your Snowy, you will give her back without a single complaint, are we clear young lady?"

This seemed to at least somehow satisfy the little brat clinging to my leg because she hurriedly began to rapid fire the typical phrases along the lines of 'Thank you so much daddy, I´ll take good care of her', 'I´ll always take her for walkies, feed her, clean her...' And all that other drivel kids normally blabbered when they managed to successfully bend their parents to their whims.

I almost yelled out a 'You can´t be serious!' But bit my tongue instead. It was worse enough that this Diamond Tiara made me break my charade, two bodies would be so much harder to hide, not to mention double the work.

Weighing my options, I deemed it best to just book it, but once again, Blossom was at my side in a flash, clinging to my arm again and nuzzled the crook of my neck. Oh, but that wasn't the worst of it, no, for she completed the transaction with an affectionate nip just below my ear. I barely repressed a shudder.

Whether it was because it creeped me out or it felt kinda good was uncertain. If I would not knew it better, I would have said she just played the part of the rock stupid trogg and took a secret delight in torturing me with all this... affection stuff.

"Come on, Snowy. Let's go to your new home," the brat said as she tried to nudge me forward, frowning when I didn't comply.

Telling her to shove it up her little plot proved tempting... oh, so tempting. Still, I didn't want to bring an inquisition down on me, so I decided to remain silent and not move from my spot. The way I figure, the brat's dad is already impatient and if I prove uncooperative, he'll just drag her along anyway.

But alas, no such luck. A voice permeated the air. A familiar, screeching tone that grated on my ears. The Pink Pest was out and about, screaming my name. No doubt she noticed my absence and now frantically looked for me. Whether this was to inflict revenge on me for that little debacle or because she feared her overlord would execute her or something for losing me, I did not know.

So I had two options, go with the little brat and her weird human girl or stay and risk being found by the Pink Menace, where I would once again be subjected to her and returned to the little princess.

…

Well, this doesn't take a genius to figure out. I followed the obnoxious filly, who grinned in triumph, obviously thinking she'd won me over.

After I don´t really know how long, we reached our destination just the moment my brain managed to reboot; a large and ostentatious house more akin to a mansion built on the outer perimeter of the mud village. Unlike the other dwellings which were built of wood, grass and mud, this sucker was made of what looked like white marble, with all those tall columns around the entrance, large, perfectly trimmed greens dotted with ridiculously styled bushes and a large iron fence all around the estate, complete with a bigass gate that was topped with a expensive looking exhibit of metalcraft saying 'Villa Rich' just about the gates arch. A pristine walkway made of the same stone like the whole building curled its way from the gate to the mansion.

All in all, it looked extraordinarily out of place.

Making our way to the front door, I couldn't help but marvel at the sheer luxury in display. Polished, high quality floors lay beneath us, echoing the clip clop of hooves and two servant ponies, mares, dressed in an equine version of maid outfits, greeted us or rather, Diamond Tiara and her father, whom they referred to as 'Mr. Rich'. Heh, modest much?

Rich went on to do whatever it is he did, leaving his brood with a warning to not cause too much noise, as he had work to do. Diamond took Blossom's leash and led us to the opposite end and to the backyard.

A first glance was all I needed to know. I had to turn around and get the hell out of there. Why? Oh, it might have been the dozen or so humans roaming around the fricking yard! Was... was it even qualified to be a yard? It looked more like a habitat than anything, for Chrissakes.

The place was large and I mean large, like half the length of a football field, with healthy, vibrant green grass blanketing the lot. Holes were strewn here and there where the humans had obviously dug and even a couple of them poked their heads out of the ground like fucking groundhogs as we neared, only to return and keep on digging, throwing dirt every which way.

And did I mention the toys? Rubber squeaky animals, ropes, plushies and balls littered the yard. A couple of males holding said ropes in their mouths, lowered on all fours and struggling to outdo the other, complete with dog-like growls only fuelled my desire to get out of this freak show as soon as possible. A single massive oak planted in the middle had a few tire swings hanging from its branches and surrounding it were brightly colored plastic slides, climbing platforms, obstacle courses and playhouses like one often sees in a children's playground. To my silent horror, there were even oversized version of those weird water bottles you always saw in the cages of small critters and a god damned feeding trough filled to the brim with something that looked like dry food for dogs.

Jesus Christ in heaven, I think I even spied an human sized version of these hamster wheels on the far side of the compound.

"Do you like it Snowy?" Diamond asked me as she led us to the big tree. "Only the best daddy's money could buy for my prized humans. Everything is top grade, the most entertaining toys and playground equipment to give you and your new friends enough exercise and the food is made with the newest findings in human research," The pink brat rattled of proudly. She then gave me a look over the shoulder with an smug smile. "Wouldn´t you say that this is way better than anything you could ever hope to get in your whole life when not being my pet?"

"It's... it's..." I struggled, my voice thick with emotion, unable to find the right words.

"Great? Amazing? Everything you could have hoped for and more?” Diamond Tiara asked, both hooves clasped together and looking at me with a happy smile.

Words failed me. I had literally no words. I mean, I thought the human kennel was bad, but this? Just... ugh!

"I see," Diamond Tiara said. "You're so overwhelmed by gratitude that you don't know what to say, right?" She nodded sagely, or... tried to, anyway. Came off more as an awkward bob of her head. "Alright Snowy. I'm gonna go tell Silver Spoon all about you so she can come see for herself."

"But...but..."

"Hm? What is it?" DT asked, looking genuinely concerned. Her eyes quickly widened in realization. "Ohh, I see. You don't wanna be alone, do you? Well don't worry. There's plenty of humans here to keep you company."

Turning around, the oblivious filly whistled and from her summons came two other human girls, again, about my age. One was blonde with fair skin and her hair done in two braided pigtails. Oh, and a bikini composed the entirety of her clothing, sky blue like her eyes. The other had slightly darker skin, her black hair trimmed rather short, almost like mine, but styled with a more practiced hand... er, hoof and wore nothing but what might have passed for dark green gym shorts and nothing else, leaving her top exposed. I caught a flash of perky breasts and brown nipples before quickly averting my gaze.

"These are Bubbles and Buttercup," DT said, pointing respectively at the blonde and brunette. "They and Blossom are my most behaved humans. They'll keep you company until I get back, okay?"

Before I could even attempt to say anything, Diamond unhooked Blossom´s leash and not sooner she had done so, that Bubbles and Buttercup positively swarmed me.

"Whoa, what are you...?" 'Bubbles' clasped my shoulders, leaning in and sniffed the nape of my neck, then my head and trailed on lower. 'Buttercup' was more reserved, scrutinizing me with a glare as if trying to size me up or something.

Does not compute...

While my brain was in the process of rebooting, the troggs had not been idle. Obviously, I passed some sort of inspection, for Buttercup closed in and, for lack of a better word, started to louse me. Being slightly taller than me, she stood on her tiptoes, running her fingers through my head, searching for... I dunno, bugs or something and all the while, the other two troggs surrounded me and proceeded to do as their ilk, diligently looking for any kind of ticks, lice or any other insect that might have taken habitat in there. Sometimes, they even ran strands of my hair through their lips for crying out loud. Well, weirdly enough mostly Blossom seemed to do that while Bubbles seemed to be content with looking over my arms, even going as far as pulling my collar or lifting the hem of my shirt to search under there.

"Awww, they like you so much already Snowy, isn´t that cute? They are socializing with you." Diamond crooned with a sick smile while her pets had their infernal ways with me. "Anyways, I must be off now if I want to get ahold of Silver Spoon to tell her about you. Now, be good as long as I am away and maybe I will get you a nice treat, hm? Tata~" With that, the little beast turned around and left the compound, leaving me in the clutches of her trice damned pet slaves.

Oblivious to my discomfort, the three humans kept on prodding me, running their fingers through my hair. Of course, this was made all the more awkward when the clueless humans practically mashed their chests to my face!

Buttercup was the worst. She pushed my head down while standing on her tiptoes, causing my face to come in contact with... "Get... off!" I yelled and shoved Buttercup, whose tits were stuck to my face.

She fell back with a startled yelp while her compatriots retreated, hissing and eyeing me warily. Buttercup rose to her full height, huffing and scowling, baring her teeth. Fists clenched, low growls escaping her throat and her head lowered.

I was by no means an expert on Equestrian humans, but if I were to guess, I'd say she tried to project aggressiveness. Deeming it best to show her here and now who the top dog... er, human was, I followed suit, rising to my feet. She towered over me by a scant two inches.

Buttercup stalked forward, her face only inches from mine, growling in an attempt to get me to back off. She tried to make herself as big as possible. Kinda hard, considering she was already on the petite side. Nevertheless, I was not the least bit impressed and responded to her show of force by planting a hand on her face and shoved her hard to the ground.

Blossom and Bubbles whimpered as they saw their compatriot fall down, hurrying over on all fours and converged around the felled human. Buttercup rose to her knees, eyeing me with much more caution, her face considerably more subdued. Soft murmurs escaped her throat as she crawled closer, still on all fours and avoided my eyes at all costs. Hesitantly, she extended her hand, head bowed in some sort of weird human submissiveness.

"What the...?"

Oookay. Now what? Did she expect me to smell it or something? Well, I wasn't about to do so. Instead, I opted for the next best thing and clasped her hand, pulling her to her feet. She squeaked in surprise, obviously not expecting this. Her hand found my shoulder, using it to steady herself. Her face flashed with fear.

I had to remind myself she wasn't like me. Fuck, her train of thought is probably more akin to a dog's than anything. She probably thinks I'll hurt her or something.

"H-hey... come on now. It's fine," I said lamely, patting her head, not knowing what else to do. Still, my meager attempt seemed to work, for her face and stance relaxed considerably, almost content. She hummed in agreement and just like that, her mood did a complete one eighty. She pressed herself to me, nuzzling the side of my face.

"Quit it, you," I muttered, trying to prod her off me. Christ, I almost didn't want to. Buttercup resisted as well she could, softly nipping my neck. Uhh, why is getting hot??? Blossom and Bubbles joined in and like their ilk, proceeded to rub themselves against me, nuzzling where they could and even licked my neck a couple of times.

God help me...

Author's Notes:

This chapter was brought to you in collaboration with Schroedingers_Katze. That's right, she's not just a pre-reader anymore.