Author's Notes:

Sorry for the chapter being late, I had planned the chapter to be released on Thursday, but the website for some odd fucking reason that is against all science took me back to my user page and I lost everything, so I had to rewrite the whole damned chapter out again. At least I'll remember to save frequently next time.

Enjoy! 😀

The orange Pegasus guard led us up the stairs of one of the entrances, with the guards following us from behind. The journey, he explained as we head up the stairs was going to take a few minutes to get there, so if any questions we wanted to ask before we met the princess, now would be a good time.

I was feeling kind of nervous about meeting her, because, you see, I had never actually met royalty, or any form of government before. I had a basic idea of what to do if a Lord Lieutenant met me while he was attending something, but I gathered from what the guards had said that this Princess Mi Amore Cadenza was the ruler of the Crystal Empire. Meeting with a representative of the Queen/Royal family was one thing, but a leader of a nation?

I shook it off, hopefully it's not a big deal, and there's a simple solution to all of this and can go back relatively soon.

The journey to the throne room was a relatively quiet one. Not that I cared, mind you. The foyer was all... well, crystal and shiny - the floors, the walls; hell, there was even a crystal design to the chairs in the foyer. I honestly wouldn't have been surprised if the throne was made from crystals of some sort. If the crystals were replaced by ice, I would probably have sworn we were in that ice palace in Die Another Day. It looked absolutely beautiful. It was... out of this world.

I'm sorry for the pun. I had to say it.

As we approached the throne room, there were two more purple coated, grey maned guards who stood on either side of the large doors. They were looking straight ahead at first, but after a few seconds, they glanced at us, and their jaws drop. Only a little bit, right enough, but it was definitely noticeable.

"A-Are they the visitors h-he was talking about?" the one on the left asked, completely shocked by our appearances.

"Yep, that must be us!" Thomas answered as Flash stopped to talk to the guards.

The one on the right snorted. "He certainly wasn't kidding when he said you guys were tall."

"Either that, or you guys are extremely small." Nathan chimed in.

"I doubt it. You're all taller than Princess Cadance, except maybe you," he replied pointing towards Nathan. "You could probably be the same height as her."

I smirk, then look at him when he says, "Hey, you're probably taller than Princess Celestia, for all we know," while pointing his hoof towards... me?

I raised my eyebrow at this remark, I've not heard of this 'Princess Celestia' that they're talking about. "Princess Celestia? Sorry for asking, but who is that?"

The one on the left just gave me this deadpan look, which I can't help but think back to my English teacher in high school. "You're kidding, right?" I shook my head to confirm that I had no fucking clue whatsoever. "You're not from here, are you?" he asked, albeit with a slightly better attitude than before. Again, I shook my head.

"Nope," Thomas blurted. "Completely lost."

Flash turned round and explained, "You could probably ask the princess for information while you're there. Speaking of which," he turns back to the guards. "Has nothing changed since here since I left?"

The guard on the right is the one that spoke. "Actually, Sergeant, the Prince has just taken a small break from his duties for a while. He's in the throne room along with the princess right now, actually."

"Thank you, Corporal," he replied. Turning back to us, he asked: "Well, shall we continue?"

"Yep." Thomas, Nathan and I all responded, at the same time... again.

FOR FUCK'S SAKE!

With that, he opened the door to the throne room... and the first thing I noticed apart form the Prince and Princess in the room is that the throne is indeed made from some type of crystal.

No surprise there, then.

Flash Sentry then walked forward towards the princess and bowed. After this he brings himself back up. "Your Highness, the visitors."

"Thank you, Sergeant," she replied in a sweet voice that I have never heard the likes of before before. (Growing up in Glasgow was probably a factor to that, but oh well.) "You are dismissed. Return to your previous post."

Flash then saluted the princess. "Yes, ma'am." He then turned around and proceeded to walk back down the throne room towards us and we stood aside to let him pass. He walked out of the door, and the other two guards that had accompanied us followed suit. The door was then covered in some form of glowing, pink aura of sorts and the door shut, while nobody had shut the door.

Interesting, I thought.

We then turned back to the princess, who was a lot taller than the other ponies. The guards were definitely not joking there. She seemed to have both wings and a... horn? So what does that make her? A - pegacorn, or a - unipeg?

She was also... quite pink. Her coat was of a pink tone, with her wingtips having a more purple tone to them. I'm talking a sort of violet colour; speaking of which, her mane and tail was sort of split in its own Tricolore, instead featuring being a sort of light cream, a rather moderate rose colour, and a dark purple that was darker than her wingtip's colour. Her eyes were that of a light purple. She also has a mark symbolising a crystal heart. What the hell is with these marks?

I decided to clear my throat and speak on behalf of myself and the other two, bowing down as a sign of respect. "Your Majesty, thank you for allowing us to speak on such a short notice."

The princess smiled at this, then proceeds to surprise all of us by saying: "Thank you. Rise, I'm not your ruler, so you don't need to treat me as such," leaving us all shocked, but choosing not to show it.

She continued her explanation. "My name is Princess Mi Amore Cadenza, but Cadence is fine. I am the ruler of the Crystal Empire, the place in which you are in now. He," pointing towards a white stallion with several shades of blue in his mane and tail and taking off a mixture of gold and purple armour, "is my husband, Prince Shining Armor."

I rose from my bow and turned towards him. "How do you do, Your Highness?"

To my surprise, he chuckled and said: "I'm fine, thanks. Please, just call me Shining Armor. You can relax, you know. You've been through quite a rough experience after all, haven't you?"

Stunned from what Shining Armor has just said, I managed to get a response out. "Yes, we have, it's been rather confusing..." I turn back and face the princess. "I guess introductions are in order. My name is Jack Luss."

"Thomas Cooper, Your Highness."

"Nathan Lang."

"And before you ask, we're human," I answer the question that I knew was coming next.

The princess smiles at us, nodding her head in understanding. "Interesting names. Where are you all from, if you don't mind me asking?"

"We're from Glasgow, a city in Scotland," Thomas explained. "I doubt you'll have heard of it. It's in a nation called the United Kingdom."

Cadence looked away, to jog her memory. After a few seconds, she turned back. "I can't say I've heard of this United Kingdom before."

"We might be from a different planet altogether," I said, trying to work this out. "We've never seen anything of your kind before. Well, technically we have, but they don't talk, they're not all that brightly coloured and they're not Unicorns or Pegasi."

"We haven't seen your kind before either," Cadence said. "Is there many of your kind come from?"

"Scotland's population is about 5.3 million, but the last population count was somewhere in the region of 7.5 billion across the entire globe." Thomas said.

Both Cadence's and Shining Armor's jaws drop at hearing this. "That's... that's quite a large number..." Cadence managed to say in a rather stunned tone of voice.

"Our world's population can't be more than 1 billion -" Shining said in an equally shocked tone of voice. "Equestria's is only about 84 million..."

About the same as Germany's, I thought.

"Our world's population has boomed over the last seven decades or so," Thomas explained. "It went from 2.6 billion in 1952 to 7.5 billion in 2017."

"How did you get here exactly?" Cadence asked us all. "It will help in us being able to find you a way home."

"Well you see, Princess, it's like this..." I began.

I then told her everything that had happened in the lead up to this, beginning with the bar argument, and then the race that had kind of happened today. Cadence's expression turned rather sad when I mentioned the portal was onyx in colour, and then told her about how we arrived at the castle (or how one of us almost didn't turn up due to probably getting lost again).

Cadence seemed to go into thought for a while. "I understand... I think I know what brought you here. However, I don't know for certain, and it would be unfair of me to give you anything but facts," she finally deduces. "I need to send a letter to my aunts, I was reading a letter from them before you came in. I had earlier sent them a letter earlier regarding you and your situation. They said they hadn't seen anything like you before either, and they would like to meet you. Excuse me one moment."

She turns to her left, and her horn glowed in a similar way to that of the door earlier, only her horn glowed a sort of baby blue, as opposed to the door's aura being that of a purple colour. I was probably going out on a limb here, but because there was only two ponies with horns in the room, I guessed the aura was probably Shining's.

To my amazement, a roll of parchment was levitated in front of her with the same blue aura as her horn was glowing. She also took what I guessed was a quill, and started to write rather quickly. She finished in about twenty seconds and rolled up the parchment. Her horn glowed even brighter, and after a few seconds, her horn shot out a laser which hit the roll, making it disappear. She did this for a second time, although I didn't know why at the time.

"There we go," she sighed before turning back at us, and raised an eyebrow at our facial expressions. "Is something wrong?" she asked as if she's missed something.

"What - the - hell - was that?" I asked, my jaw still wide open. My turn to be surprised, I suppose.

"What?"

"The thing you just did?" I asked again, pointing to my head to prove a point.

"Magic," she said in a way like I'm supposed to know. "Why?"

"We don't have magic where we come from, only in fairy tales and works of fiction," I explained, still trying to process what had just happened.

"Really?" She asked. I nodded my head to confirm. She then laughed and said "Don't let my sister in law hear you say that. She'd go - let's say a bit mental - about hearing that."

"Is that who you sent the second letter to?" I asked, having a feeling that the second letter was aimed at her, probably why she mentioned it in the first place.

"Well guessed, Jack," Cadence said, smiling slightly at my guess. "My sister-in-law is also another princess. Her name is Twilight Sparkle, and she is the Princess of Friendship and Element of Magic."

"How many princesses are there?" I asked out of curiosity. "Just wondering."

"Four," she replied. "There's Princess Celestia, the Princess of the Day, and one of the diarchs of Equestria. Then there's Princess Luna, who is the Princess of the Night and the other diarch of Equestria. Both raise the sun and moon respectively."

"Raise the sun and moon?" Thomas asked, not quite believing what he was hearing.

"Yeah," Shining Armor answered, confused. "Why? Doesn't someone raise the moon and sun on your world?"

"No," Thomas and I replied again, our eyebrows raised as if he asked us if the grass is blue. Thomas decided to elaborate. "The sun on our world is stationary, and we orbit around the sun, with the moon orbiting our planet."

"Wow," Shining Armor replied, probably dumfounded at the concept. "Wonder how they would react to that."

Cadence continued her explanation. "I've already told you about Twilight, and I am the ruler of the Crystal Empire and Princess of Love."

Nathan went wide-eyed and stupidly asked: "Please tell me that doesn't mean what I think it means..."

Cadence's eyes at this point went slightly wider at what Nathan had implied, Shining Armor was giving Nathan a glare that would have killed him if it were a knife, and Thomas and I just facepalmed.

FOR FUCK'S SAKE, NATHAN! SHUT THE FUCK UP, YOU STUPID FUD!

Cadence recomposed herself and replied, albeit with a slight tone of irritation in her voice. " I can assure you it does not mean what you think it means..."

Nathan released a breath. "Oh, thank God." He then turned to me and then saw the grim look I was giving him, that is effectively trying to say do that again and you're dead. He gave a sheepish grin to the princess. "Sorry."

"Fecking idiot," I mutter under my breath.

Yep, we're the best set of diplomats Scotland has to offer, aren't we?

"Anyway..." Thomas chimes in to salvage the conversation. "What happens now, Princess?"

"Well-" Cadence begins, before a flash of light gold appears in the room, along with a scroll with a burgundy ribbon keeping it secure.

"Oh, that was fast." She murmured to herself. She opened the scroll and reads it. A smile appears on her face as she does so. She turned her head to us with the smile on her face. "The Princesses are going to raise the moon, and come down here for a visit, to meet you all. They said they would be here within the end of the hour. Unfortunately, Twilight and her friends can't come today. Celestia said it seems they've been sent on a mission by the map in her castle."

"Well, that sounds brilliant," I replied with a happy smile on my face. The more friends we make here, the better it will be for us to stay if a way back isn't possible. It probably would be, but at least it's given us an eye opening experience.

Either that, or we somehow got really high.

"In the mean time..." Cadence said, turning towards the door. "Why don't we head to the dining hall for something to eat? I don't know about any of you, but I'm feeling rather hungry."

Nathan's and Thomas' eyes lit up like a torch in a pitch black room. "Yes, please!" they both replied excitedly, in unison. This is really beginning to piss me off.

"Well, what are you waiting for?" Shining Armor asked, walking over to the door with his wife, and opens the doors. As I suspected earlier, his colour for magic is the pink I saw on the door earlier. Thomas, Nathan and I paused for a second, then we followed suit.

I wasn't as excited for dinner as my two pals were, for one reason, and it had been bothering me since we went inside the castle. Humans are omnivores, and the ponies were more than likely herbivores. I wasn't ready to go vegetarian any time soon, and I still never will. I'd miss the fish too much. And the chicken nuggets. And the haggis. And the bacon. And the steaks. And the slice/saussage rolls. I could go on.

But then again, if I don't...

"Jack?"

I turned round to my left to see Cadence look at me with a concerned facial expression. "Is everything alright?"

I paused for a moment, thinking of how to word my answer. "Yes, I'm fine, it's just that..." and I trail off again still unsure.

"Jack?" Cadence asked again. "You can tell me whatever it is."

"Well, I'm not sure how to word this... so I'm going to be rather blunt here." I replied, making sure the others raise their eyebrows at me.

...

"Humans - are, most of the time - omnivores." I stated rather bluntly, and looked down, fearing the repercussions... that never came.

"Is that all you're worried about?" I heard Shining Armor ask.

I lifted my head back up to find the confused faces of Cadence and Shining looking at me, with a stupefied expression glued to my face. I was expecting a harsh reprimanding or to get into a debate about the ethics of eating meat, but instead, it seemed they were more accepting than that.

"Aren't you the slightest bit upset?" I asked.

"We have visits occasionally from the Griffon Kingdom and the Minotaurs, who are carnivores. We're not going to hold your diet against you," Cadence replied, adding: "Sure, some ponies may be slightly upset, but you've probably been eating meat most of your life, so a rapid change in diet would probably be difficult to cope with, and while I don't eat meat myself, I don't have an issue with others doing it, like the Griffon politicians."

I breathed out happily, relieved at the fact that they were more forgiving than I had first anticipated. Thomas understood now why I had at first I was worried, and patted me on the back, giving me a thumbs up to show he appreciated what I had done.

"I wouldn't have thought about that until we got to the dining hall. Thanks," he whispered to me.

"No bother, mate."

We walked down the hallway, for quite some time, so I take my Sony Xperia smartphone from my pocket and check the time. 19:17. A bit later than when I would usually get my dinner, but it wasn't too late. I unlocked my phone using my facial recognition and checked in the top right hand corner. No signal, and 94% battery left.

"What's that?"

I turned to see Shining pointing at my phone with his hoof.

"Oh, this is my mobile phone," I explained, turning my phone round to show him. "It allows me to communicate almost anywhere on our world. We all have one."

On cue, Thomas and Nathan stopped walking and pulled their phones out of their pockets as well, a Samsung Galaxy S7 and an iPhone 7, respectively.

"That's impressive," Shining commented. "Much more advanced than anything Equestria has to offer at the moment. How does it work?"

"It has a battery on the inside that contains electrical energy that is used for all of the different functions," I began to explain. "It has a touch screen, so if I run my finger along the screen while it's on, like so..." I proceeded to demonstrate and the screen gets swiped to the left to show various applications I have on my phone, "...voilà!"

"That's incredible!" Cadence exclaimed, the wide eyes showing she had never seen this type of technology before. "How does the communication work?"

"Artificial satellites," Nathan answered. "They orbit our planet, like our moon, only these ones are much closer to Earth, only about 36,000 kilometres above the planet. The phone sends and receives signals from these satellites, and the satellite takes these signals set and "amplifies" it, if you will, so the signal is strong enough to hear."

"Given that these satellites don't exist here in Equestria," Thomas moaned. "They're pretty much useless for that function. And we probably won't be able to charge them either."

"We can play games on them until it does run out, though," I said optimistically. "And we can also take photographs as well."

Cadence's and Shining's jaw was threatening to hit the floor, until Cadence said: "You're not being serious, are you?"

"Yes, absolutely," I replied, which gives me an idea. I turn my phone back around and select the camera application on my phone. "Can you smile for me for a few seconds, Cadence?"

"Yes, of course," Cadence replied, before giving me a smile.

I held my phone in landscape mode and pointed my phone's back camera at Cadence. Happy with the camera angle, I then pressed the button to take a photograph. After it has been processed, I pressed the picture thumbnail on the top right hand corner and let it pop up on the screen. I then turned it round to show Cadence and Shining.

"How's that for a photo?" I ask.

Cadence's face lit up instantly as she saw the photo. Her smile had been replaced by a Cheshire Cat-like grin.

"That's so brilliant!" she exclaimed.

"It also allows us to connect to this service called the Internet," Thomas explained.

"What's that?" Shining asked.

Thomas thought for a few seconds. "It's kind of hard to explain. Think of it like a library with all the information, but no books. And also one of the weirdest places for people to communicate."

No, Thomas! Don't tell them about THAT side of the internet!

"Hmm, I suppose makes sense." Shining seemed to be happy with that answer.

"Anyway," I said, to get the other's attention. "Shall we get going, then?"

The others nodded and we followed Cadence and Shining down the corridor to the dining hall, passing various guards on duty, who saluted us as we approached the door to what I assumed was the dining hall, given away by the distinct smell of food.

That meeting went well. Wonder what they have in store for us at the dining hall?