“There is an old story about the castle.” The tour guide says, as people take pictures. “A thousand years ago, England was very different, most of this area was a mix of forest and brush land. The Normans began a conquest across the region and castles began to be built to secure areas.”

Motioning at the old crumbling walls, “Small keeps like this would be used as outposts. Places to house troops and protect them as well as acting as a command center. Each one, though, is different, built by different architects, with different materials, based on the land. As the story goes, Justine Abbott’s daughter encountered a unicorn in these woods.”

Moving to an old picture of the castle on a waterproof board, “The unicorn gave the daughter several gems, as well as a golden crown to help pay for materials. With the unicorn’s blessing, they were allowed to cut down some of the woods for the castle.”

“In honor of the unicorn, several additions were made to the castle, though the purported dome for star gazing was never found. In response to the contributions the family made to the castle, the local Lord allowed for the addition of the unicorn to their family crest.” Turning, the tour guide brings her group to the tour bus, “We have four more castles to see today on our tour so hurry, please.”

Beth humphs as the tourists leave and looks at Tommy, “Americans will believe anything.”

“You do realize, many of them think the USA won the Battle of Britain and captured the first Enigma device.” He says with a chuckle.

“Yep, everything in the movies from unicorns to the Easter Bunny must be real.” She giggles, and sits down, opening the newspaper.

Tommy opens his newspaper and digs into his chips, the truck had probably some of the best cod and chips in England. Though both of them have a spot saved for the fried and battered mars bars, nothing is better comfort food.

“One thing I missed about here was the food. London has some great places, but they are always expensive. 10 pounds for something that’s only 5 pounds here is just silly.”

“Well, they do serve it on fancy plates rather than in cups or baskets with newspaper.” Tommy chuckles and takes another bite of the fish, “So I guess they charge more for sitting in a restaurant than sitting outside.”

Taking off her baseball cap, she shakes her hair out, the cap is starting to hurt a bit. Looking down she adjusts the head band to one notch looser so it will fit better. Looking back up, she sees the shocked look on her brother’s face, “Yeah don’t tell me, I put the hat on when my hair was still wet so it’s a mess. I’ll brush it out later.”

“Sis, how scared were you before?” He asks, looking timid himself now.

“Very, my heart was racing, why?” Looking around, she tries to see what seems to have captivated him.

Slowly he pointed at her, “Your hair, it’s…”

Her hair has never been really long, shoulder length at best. She reaches over and grabs a bit of it, pulling it around, already it is noticeably longer, nearly down to her shoulder blades, and the color seems to have been drained from it, her normally dark brown hair has become pale, somewhere between blond and an almost a silvery white.

Sitting down heavily, she looks at it, shocked, it’s just…wrong. Hair doesn’t change color like that… does it?

“Sis, should we go to the doctor?”

“And say what? My hair turned white, I’m seeing visions, hearing things, do you know what they would do to me? I’d be in the loony bin before sundown.”

“This is getting serious sis, what are you going to do?”

“I… I’ll go to the doctor when I get back to London, check in to the clinic there, and see.”

A house sparrow from the upper levels of the castle flaps down and lands on Beth’s shoulder. To both her and her brothers shock it starts chirping at her. Turning her head, she looks at the little bird, then at her brother.

“Too many humans around, maybe it’s looking for food.” Tommy says. “Or it’s trying to talk to you.”

“Talk to me?” She looks back at the bird and offers it a chip.

The bird looks at the chip, apparently confused, and pecks at it before taking it and flying back up into the castle.

“Nope, I never did get into Twitter.” Beth says, confused.

*** Ah-Pee across the pond ***

“Every single style has something different it can say,” Ah-Pee sings softly as she works on the grill, “There’s nothing wrong with being unique, and special in your own way.”

Smiling she flips the pancakes, one by one, before hip checking the Corporal out of the way. Her mess, her rules, and luckily the army cook has learned not to argue the point with the little pony. He’s already seen her hoof a bag of potatoes across the mess, she has a lot of power in her legs.

“Um, whatcha want me to do then?” He asks, looking down.

“Make sure the condiments are on the table first. Then get to stirring the maple syrup, we want it warm and thick. Not too thick though and we don’t want it burning on the bottom of the pot.” She says, “we’ve got a big group of ponies, who are going to be feeling down and depressed.”

“Sucks that they missed the gate,” he says, putting out the butter on the tables. “Now they have to wait two and a half years to go through.”

“Unless they decide to stay,” Ah-Pee says, checking the Okonomiyaki too.

“Why would they want to stay? Equestria is where they belong.” He says more than asks as he loads the napkin dispensers. Freezing, he realizes what he has just said, and slowly turned to look at Ah-Pee.

“Listen here, I may be a little filly from New Mexico, but you’re the one with hoof in mouth. Sugarcube.” Ah-Pee says, holding up a box.

Eric walked in and laughs, “HAH, I knew you said sugarcube!”

Ah-Pee looked at Eric, “What else do you call these?” she says, pointing at the box.

Walking forward, Eric looks at it and grumbles. “Square sugar concentrates for warm beverages?”

“Right, Songbird.” She says, with a giggle.

“Okay, I’m sorry for making fun of ponies singing. How can I make up for it?” Eric says, with a smile.

“Stack the trays if you would be so kind. With the four strays, we have a total of fifteen ponies to feed tonight, most of whom probably haven’t had real food in days, so I figured a pancake dinner with apple pancakes and banana pancakes.” She smiles.

“What are those?” Eric asks, looking at a few being prepared off to the side.

“Umm, Cheese filled potato pancakes, covered with bacon, topped with seaweed chips, and covered with a mix of ketchup, Worcestershire, and soy sauce that’s blended with a few other spices.” She says, humming as she works.

Eric blinked, “Ok that would be for the pegasi and humans, I take it.”

“Yep, course everyone’s free to have the regular pancakes too.” Ah-Pee says, then she turns and smiles, as the ponies start to file in. She moves forward to serve them.

“So which do you want Eric?”

“Little of both please.”

Smiling she hands out food in big country servings to all the ponies, making sure the little ones get extra, they may be adults in mind, but their bodies are still growing, and they need the extra pick me up for their spirits.

“Here you go Feather,” She smiles, handing out a large pile of banana pancakes for the foal, and a mix of apple and banana for Cloud and Candy.

“Thank you aunty,” Feather chirps, wiggling her tail, and brings her friends over to a table.

“Earth ponies are always a grounding influence,” Sanchez says as he walks in, “their food, their faces, their ties to the earth, help ground others, and act as a means for all the tribes to gather.” He smiles brightly at the earth pony.

Ah-Pee actually blushes at that one, looking down. “Now you’re just sucking up.” She says, handing out some Okonomiyaki for him.

“It’s true though, from what I saw and understand, the pegasi would be hunter gatherers, picking up whatever they can get quick, to bring back to the clouds. Unicorns, would likely have foraged and browsed. But the real agriculture had to have been done by the earth ponies. Without that, there wouldn’t be great cities. That means it’s the earth ponies that bind the tribes together.” Sanchez says to her. “The true magic of the earth pony.”

Skuffing a hoof a bit, “Yeah but this is Earth, so that’s not the way it works.” Shaking her head, she looks up, “Have you seen the LT, or Fleetfoot?”

“They have been in the communications hut all day. They were faxing off the… letters… to the families. They are using a bus, train, large scale car accident as the reason in most cases. The bodies burned beyond any recognition.” He says softly and picks up some Okonomiyaki, heading over to a chair.

“That must be hard for them. Especially James.” Ah-Pee says, sighing, and then nods, “Well I know what to do.”

Turning she gets back to cooking. She is going to make something special for those two, something they can share, so beef is out. She will make something though, that will help them be a little happier, even if it is hard at this time.

*** Sugarberry ***

“So what was it like?” Sugarberry says, crossing her forelegs and looking at Henry.

“Awful, I mean downright horrible.” Henry said looking at Sugarberry less than impressed, though she wasn’t sure if it was the topic or the experience.

“Ugg, I meant using magic.” She huffed, “look I’m not asking about the color or such… just the magic, doing it. I didn’t even know I could do magic till I saw Velvet do it, and then had to work when she trained me.”

“Mostly I just… well I used your touch TK trick, I didn’t do it right away and honestly it was strange. It sort of came to me without thinking about it when I needed it.” Henry responds.

“Unicorn magic is supposed to be like that, I just didn’t know enough about unicorns when I changed.” Sugarberry sighs, “It’s strange, now that I do it, it’s like second nature. I can do it without thinking about it now, but until I learned how it was so alien.”

“It’s sort of like walking, riding a bike, or such. It seems so hard when you can’t do it, seems like it takes forever to learn how to do it, but once you know, you don’t even seem to think about it when you’re doing it.”

“Henry, can I ask you something?”

“Sure? What’s on your horn?” He says with a chuckle.

“Have you eaten meat since you got back?” Sugarberry tilts her head, looking at him intently, “I’ve seen you push it around on your plate but not eat.”

Henry blinks and thinks about it for a moment, trying to remember if he had, “You know I just… I haven’t considered it. I just didn’t feel like it I guess.”

“Sorry, might be a carryover from your cutie mark, you were a unicorn, so meat is not on the diet.” She says, looking down, her ears dropping.

“Oh come on, do I ever get to catch a break?”

“It’s not so bad, you didn’t even notice it till I brought it up, but I thought I’d ask before we were in a situation where you’d have to.”

“Yeh it’s something I’ll need to experiment with, man at least the others can eat bacon, fish and poultry.” Grumping once, “I can’t even eat alfalfa so I’ll need to take vitamin supplements.”

“Alfalfa?”

“It comes in two forms, the cube form is for roughage, to help digestion, full of fiber. The pellets are for nutrients.” Henry says, looking down, “I read all about it when they sent it to me for you. Humans can’t digest it though. So for me it’s figuring out what I can eat.” He huffs softly and looks at his hip.

Sugarberry puts her hoof against his hip, “Consider yourself lucky, I’m still not sure what mine means. It can be hard sometimes, but you have your friends, and us to help you through this. Don’t worry, we may not say it but what you guys did, going to Equestria, risking your lives.” She looks up into his eyes, “That means something to us.”

“I’m sorry, I know you girls still have your problems. Having your cutie mark but not knowing your special talent must be so hard compared to being a blank flank… at least then when you find it you know.” Henry sighs.

“Even the internet hasn’t helped, it shows Sugarberry with berries as her cutie mark from older generations, but all it says for current is, ‘I helped in Winter Wrap Up, ice skating.’” Sugarberry sighs, “but again, we are here to help you two. You wear the mark, so you get treated like anypony else.”

“I really don’t want to be stuck as a unicorn again though.” Henry says, his face falling.

“And I NEVER want to get stuck as a human again. Walking on two legs? No magic? Ugh, no thank you. So tell me, because I never want to be human, does that mean you won’t treat me as one?” Sugarberry looks up at him.

“Ok that’s different, I treat you as a human because you’re intelligent.”

“And we’ll treat you like ponies because you went to Equestria, you risked your lives and fought for us, you were touched by Equestria’s magic, you earned your cutie marks. So to the Unicorn Club at least, even if you never go back to being a unicorn, you still deserve to be treated as one. With all the respect and dignity one deserves.”

“Like with apple pancakes for dinner?” Henry says, looking to the mess area.

“Oh yeah, that’s now, let’s go before they are all gone… some of us really can eat like a…”

*** Velvet ***

“Horse apples, this is heavy!” I say, concentrating as I hold the bronze slab in the air. “Watch your positioning Ballad.”

“Beep, Beep, Beep.” Ballad responds as she backs up slowly, using her TK more to adjust and position rather than try and lift.

“A little to the left girls,” Blaze motions with his wing, “Ok now bring it down slowly.”

Lowering the slab, I stop, holding it a few inches off the ground. Ballad with her magic tugs and positions it the final little bit till it is lined up with all the screws. Finally with one loud clang, it drops to rest on the concrete slab.

“Jeepers, how much did that thing weigh?” I say, shaking my head.

“650 pounds according to the transport sheet,” Blaze calls out.

“Oh yeah leave us girls to manhandle 650 pounds...” Ballad says, putting the bolts onto the screws and spinning them.

As each bolt is secured it glows red and melts a bit, fusing to the metal. Watching Blaze gives us a weird look, “Which one of you…”

“That’s me,” I said, “It was under armor care and repair in the EUP field guide. Sort of a spot welding spell, it also apparently works for starting camp fires, and heating tea.”

Sitting down, we take a look at our work, the old plaque had been removed, and replaced with a new one that the DOD sent down. The top of the plaque has 2 winged unicorns, they looked more like earth horses, but for this that is good. They were posed in a yin-yang style circle chasing each other, below them is the text.

In honored memory, to all those who have fought and fallen for the right to live in peace and harmony.

To those who gave their lives in the fight against those that sought only to bring chaos.

To those who’s sacrifice may go unknown to most, or who’s names could not be found.

This plaque is left in their honor. May we never take for granted the gifts they have given us.

The bottom left corner of the plaque has Celestia’s stylized sun mark, the right side bears Luna’s moon and stars. Between them and along the bottom are the marks for each branch of service, Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard. Finally at the bottom of the plaque:

In remembrance of the battle of the Five Score. June 1, 2020. For more information please contact United States Army Criminal Investigation Command, 571-555-4375.

“Your words?” Blaze asks, putting his wing over my back.

“Kind of, I handed it off to the LT who approved, then sent it off to Special Forces Command, they added the -for more information part. And got it approved by the Pentagon. Each branch apparently signed off, hence their marks on the plaque. I have no idea how they got it done so fast but... we need something here.”

“Yep. I think it’s perfect. Any pony that see’s it should recognize it.” Blaze says, “A marker for the unknown pony.”

I nod once, “And still a number to call, CID knows what happened so they can answer questions or help if ponies call in.”

I give Ballad a playful hip check, cutie mark to cutie mark, “Come on, let’s go get some dinner.”

Ballad giggles and prances into the tent, swishing her tail happily, we’ve both worked hard to get that darn plaque in place. She has to be just as hungry as I am.

Heading in, I look around at the score of ponies present. We still needed to figure out where most of them are going to stay permanently. Just the fact though that everyone is clean, eating, laughing and having fun though, means a lot to me.

Henry though, turns and throws up on the grass, looking really green. Trotting over, Sugarberry was rubbing his back shaking her head. She’s looking rather worried too.

“What’s wrong?” I say coming to a stop, biting my lower lip.

Sugarberry looks up and half smiles, “Umm its ok, Henry just found out he carried a unicorn’s stomach back with him through the change. No meat allowed. It’s what his cutie mark is telling him.”

“Oh yeah, I guess I remember that feeling.” I say and hug him gently.

“I know, its ok, even without alfalfa there’s a lot I can still eat, just bacon didn’t agree with me.” He says, “I just can’t get a break. I’m the multiverse’s punching bag.”

*** Back across the pond ***

“We’re back!” Beth says, walking in with her brother. Taking off her cap, she hangs it up on a peg on the wall. Shaking her head she KNOWS something is wrong right away, and the look on Tommy’s face is enough to say it.

Looking in the mirror she blinks, her hair is down to the middle of her back. It has become a flowing silken white mane, and even her eyes have changed, now they are a soft baby blue from the normal brown she had before.

Sitting down hard on the floor she looked at her brother, “What’s going on?”

Tommy looks as their mum comes in and blinks, looking at Beth. “What the…”

“She’s trying out a new look, we spent all day down at the salon, hair extensions, colored contacts. I’ve never been so bored in my life.” Tommy says with a grumbling huff.

“Why can’t you just be content with your normal hair, you don’t have to be ashamed of yourself.” Her mum says, and then turns “Dinner will be ready soon.”

Looking at her brother she hugs him tightly, “Thanks, honestly I don’t know what’s… happening. Nothing makes sense.”

“I’ve never heard of any normal thing changing your hair and eye color and making your hair grow like that.” Tommy says.

“I’m getting really scared, what… what’s going on?”

“Maybe we should go to the clinic tomorrow?” Tommy gulps.

Slowly Beth stands up and walks into the dining room, her dad looks up, a little shocked and confused but doesn’t say anything. Instead he just scowls at her new…style. Sitting quietly, she lowers her head.

Her mum comes out smiling, and puts down plates of bangers and mash in front of everyone, “Quick and easy dinner, but I know how much you like it Tommy.”

“So what is with the hair?” Her dad asks.

“I’m 25 dad, I thought I’d try a new look for a few days.” She smiles at him, “Don’t worry I’ll get rid of it. It was just something fun to do.”

“Fun? Fun? Going to a movie is fun, going fishing is fun. Changing your hair color like that, is trying to show you’re being different.”

“I talked her into it Dad,” Tommy says.

“Why would you do that?”

“Simple, I figured she should do something to make her 25th special, memorable. Total makeover, pictures, then have fun around the castle like when we were young.” Tommy smiles at their dad.

“Waste of money if you ask me.” Is the response.

Getting up, Beth heads into the bathroom, she doesn’t want to deal with this right now. Locking the bathroom door, she lifts the toilet cover and pulls down her track pants and knickers, flicking her tail to the side she sits down to pee.

Glancing down at her side she looked at her tail and flicked it once beside her. The fur is silken white like her hair, though a bit tangled after being in her track pants. Running her fingers through the tail hair gently, she pulls knots out of it.

Cleaning herself up, she stands up, careful not to get her tail into the toilet, and lowers the lid and flushing. Carefully pulling her track pants up, she quietly walks out of the bathroom and heads for the front door.

“Beth?” Her mum called her, “Are you going to finish your dinner?”

Not responding she turns the door knob opening it and walks outside. She makes a quick decision, and starts walking quietly in the direction of the castle.

“BETH!” Tommy calls and blinked, watching her walk. He runs back inside, closing the door.

Hitting the road she stops. She closes her eyes and takes a slow deep breath, the sounds of the birds, the wind through the trees, a train off in the distance. They are all muted out by the volume of her scream.

The tears start to fall as she starts to run as fast as she can, this can’t be happening to her, she’s got a tail… people don’t have tails. They shouldn’t have tails, it’s just not possible. Running she finds her way to the woods and sits down, hugging her knees. What is going on? What is she going to do now? She had no idea what was happening.

All she can do right now is sit and cry. She isn’t even sure how long it goes on for, but after a while, she hears something beside her. Looking down, it is the little vixen she had seen before, lying beside her, it is crying too. Looking up at her, its ears are down as it whimpers.

Gently she pats its head once. Sitting up the fox tilts its head, panting softly.

Looking around she sighs wipes her tears away. The fox’s ears swivel and its head turns, at the same time her ears picked up the sound too, footsteps through the brush. The fox turns and vanishes into a den as quick as it can.

“Beth? Are you here?”

“Yes Tommy. For now.” She says sadly.

Tommy comes over and stops, looking at her shocked.

“I have a tail…” She says simply. She buries her face in her hands.

“Um, you have ears on top of your head too.” Perking quickly, he smiles brightly, “Wait! What kind of tail? Dog, cat, fox?”

“Wait what? What difference does the kind of tail I have make?” Beth says, looking at him.

“Well, if it’s a cat tail, you’re a Nekomimi. If it’s a dog tail you’re an Inukami. And if it’s a fox tail you’re a kitsune!” He says with a chuckle.

“You watch too much anime, way too much.” Grumbling Beth pulls her tail out of the back of her track pants showing him.

“Umm, horse? Really?” Tommy looked at her and grumped.

“What?” Beth looked at him worried. “Are they bad?”

“Nope, I got nothing. They don’t show up in any anime I know of. I was hoping for fox, they tend to be really stacked.”

“TOMMY!” Beth smacked him hard, “That’s gross.”

“I was kidding!” He says, laughing, “It’s usually small animals, bunny, fox, cat, raccoon dog. Nothing big.”

“It’s not the sort of thing I want to hear about.” Beth whimpers.

“Um Beth, I wasn’t joking, you have Kemonomimi.” He says.

Beth looks at him like he grew a horn in the middle of his forehead. “What?”

“Um, animal ears. Your ears are on the top of your head.”

Slowly reaching up she feels her ears, whimpering slowly, she takes out her phone and activates the camera, pressing the icon for the face cam, she lifts it and looks at herself. Turning her head side to side slowly she drops her phone. “I’m going insane aren’t I?”

“If you are, I’m seeing this too so I’m going nuts as well.”

“What would Dad say?”

“Oh that’s easy. He’s say, see what living in London gets you, all that pollution, you should have stayed in the country and got a nice job at the local store like your brother did, or better yet, marry that Walter boy and settle down.” Tommy replies, nodding.

“I… I…” Beth looks at him then falls back, laughing, “Oh God he would say that wouldn’t he.”

“Let’s wait till it gets dark, then we can sneak you back in, until then.” He smiles and pulls out a box of biscuits, some crisps, some sweets, and water bottles. “I brought us some snacks.”

*** Ah-Pee ***

Balancing the tray on her back, Ah-Pee walked into the communications trailer, being careful not to spill anything, it’s not easy but she manages it, how the ponies in the show make this look easy, she has no idea.

“Officers dinner!” She says, looking at both the LT and Fleetfoot. Using her mouth she slides the tray off her back onto the table.

“What is… what is all of this?” The LT says in wonder.

“Deep South Texan barbeque, we have Buffalo wings. Bacon wrapped asparagus, bacon wrapped deep fried pickles, grilled plantains, grilled eggplant all fresh off the grill for you. Fried and stuffed mushroom caps. Don’t worry Fleetfoot, the wings are actually boneless so you can eat them easy.”

They looked at each other, then back at Ah-Pee, both of them are speechless.

“Oh you also have your home loaf bread, and of course apple pie. You two have been doing a stressful job, so I brought you something you could share with each other. Everything there is safe for both human and pegasus.”

Fleetfoot fluffs her wings, “Ah-Pee, you didn’t need to make something special for us.”

“Yes I did, it’s an earth pony thing. Food can raise spirits, raise the morale. I know the letters you’ve been working on, so yes, you NEED your morale raised.”

“If you’d be so kind LT, Fleetfoot will need some help with some of the food.” Ah-Pee nods and turns around, trotting back out of the tent.

Smiling innocently, Ah-Pee knows perfectly well everything she served there is finger food, meaning the LT would need to feed Fleetfoot. Now she just needs to give them privacy.