I Hate Bats
Admiral Biscuit

There are many places in Equestria where one can appear, although most inter-dimensional travelers wind up in or near Ponyville. That's probably just as well; not many would want to visit Griffonstone (and to be honest, the griffons are also quite relieved by this).

He did not arrive in Ponyville. In fact, despite his vast knowledge of Equestria, he did not arrive anywhere he knew.

To be fair, though, his point of arrival was pitch-black.

Presently, our perfect protagonist deduced that he was in a cave because it smelled and sounded like an empty basement, only considerably bigger.

Those were not the only smells or sounds. There was a horsey smell (which is not really a surprise for Equestria), along with a kind of fruity smell he couldn't identify straightaway. And there was a continual soft skreeing from above his head, and at that moment he realized that the fruity smell was mangoes and it was mangoes because batponies love mangoes and he was in a goddam cave full of goddam batponies.

He screamed.

It is important to note that this was not a scream of terror. While there are undoubtedly some things that he is afraid of, batponies are not on that list. No, it was a scream of dismay, because he hated batponies.

He didn't like their cute little fangs.

He despised their leathery, bat-like wings.

The skreeing noises that they made to communicate with each other and to echolocate annoyed him.

Biting fruit and drinking the juices was overly cannibalistic, in his eyes.

He thought ear nibbles were a threat.

Nor was he a fan of adorable tufted ears.

Oddly, he didn't have anything bad to say about their cat-like eyes.

This primal scream of dismay woke the batponies up, and they immediately dropped from their perches, calling out in confusion, filling the cave with a cacophony of noise.

Imagine for a moment that you were peacefully sleeping in your bed and you were suddenly awoken by a horse. Screaming. (In dismay, not terror.) Wouldn't you be a little bit confused, too?

It did not take the batponies too long to identify the source of the noise, the stranger in their midst, and they quickly circled down to study him. While this is of course perfectly normal batpony behavior, to him it was understandably alarming. He couldn't make out any shapes in the darkness, but he could hear the whooshing of air over their wings, and could feel the air currents as they zipped by close enough to touch, had he dared to reach an arm out.

He was a conundrum, an enigma, and they chittered and skreed to each other, discussing this interloper in their cavern. He was no predator who had sneaked in—of that, they were sure. Anything further, they had no idea.

They could have easily enough simply returned to their perches and ignored him. Unless he had some heretofore undiscovered ability to jump, he could not have grabbed a single sleeping batpony even if he had tried. Even in the darkness, he would have found a way out of their sleeping chambers eventually.

Despite his deep-seated dislike of them, they were gracious to a fault and decided to treat him as an honored—if unexpected—guest. Several flew over to their mango piles and selected the largest, ripest, sweetest fruits, and they grasped them reverently in their hooves and flew them over to him, setting them gently at his feet.

Others, observing his clothing, came to the entirely logical conclusion that he might be cold, and despite his protests, proceeded to cluster around him, gently nuzzling him and also nibbling at his ears because that's how they show affection.*

*I wish I could say that this display of respect and unconditional love softened his heart and made him love batponies, but regrettably that was not entirely so.

As much as we wish otherwise, sometimes a person (or a pony, I suppose) is so set in their ways that they simply cannot change, no matter what evidence is presented to the contrary. No matter the action they will always find fault with it.

Deep in my heart, I do not think that of our protagonist—this must be clear. Nobody can wholly resist a nuzzle, nor can they deny the comfort of running their hands across the soft coat of a pony even if they think that such an action was unobserved.

Batpony caves generally have two features—darkness and isolation. The first is rather obvious; caves are dark in general, and a nocturnal creature will of course prefer to sleep in a dark cave rather than a well-lit one. The second is perhaps less obvious, but given that batponies can fly, and that they sleep during the day, having a cave that isn't frequently explored by day-dwellers is a huge advantage.

Being well suited to darkness, they of course have no need for artificial light, and as such escorting him out of the cave was quite the challenge. Batponies aren't dumb, and of course it didn't take them too long to figure out that in their cave he was . . . well, blind as a bat.

Nevertheless, they persisted, and once he'd deigned to rest his hand on the guide's back, they got him out of the blessed darkness of the cave and into the dusklight that filtered through the mouth of the cave.

His eyes by then were well-adjusted to the dark, and so from there it was little trouble to make his way to the mouth of the cave, and—

Remember how batponies can fly? Well, there are probably no unclimbable mountains to an experienced mountaineer with the right equipment, but he was not and had not, and thus found himself stranded at a small opening in a large cliff with nothing but the clothes on his back and an pocketful of fruit.

A moment before, perhaps his opinion of batponies would have been swayed. The memory of his hand upon her back as she escorted him through the twisting tunnels of their warren, or the enticing smell of mangoes, or the velvety feel of a muzzle nuzzling him could have drowned out the hatred in his heart, but alas! Here he was, peering out over a yawning chasm with no way down.

“I hate bats,” he muttered.

Y'all know who this is for.

Also, first time using edgenotes and I'm not sure that I did it the best way. Distracting? Confusing? Let me know in the comments!