“So we’ve tried stand-up comedy, gem cuttin’, clockwork, a pizzeria, bein’ vets-“

“Hey, did Fluttershy forgive us for that yet?”

“Fluttershy forgives everypony. But we should stay away from her cottage for another week just to be safe.”

“There were so many noodles…”

“…so what haven’t we tried?” Scootaloo asked from the hammock that Applebloom had recently installed. Her efforts were quickly making the clubhouse a home away from home.

“House buildin’?”

“Too much work.” The pegasus said, putting her hooves behind her head. The position was much more comfortable the one would think, considering they were hooves and not something soft.

“Formin' a band?”

“Remember the talent show? That was kind of the same thing.” Said Sweetie.

“Mechanics?”

“Clockwork. Same thing. Well sort of…”

“…surgeons?” Applebloom tried, glancing up from the list rolled out over the desk.

“Eww, no! I don’t wanna be inside you!”

“Calm down Sweetie Belle, it’ll just be your hooves, and you could wear gloves.” Scootaloo said, sitting up at the sound of something potentially cool.

“We’re not destined to be surgeons.”

“Ugh, fine… crime fighters?”

“What crime?” Applebloom deadpanned. “Ponyville’s as tame as an earthworm. That and Ah’m pretty sure ponies wouldn’t wanna try a life o’ crime in Princess Celestia’s backyard.”

“We are kind of her backyard, aren’t we?” Sweetie Belle mused, moving to the window to look at the distant shining castle. “…hey, who’s that?”

When Sweetie Belle pointed to somewhere outside the clubhouse, Scootaloo and Applebloom moved to join her. Her hoof was aimed at an unfamiliar pony who appeared to be napping under a tree.

“Never seen her before.”

“…or is it a him?”

“Hard to tell with that hat and coat on…” The stranger was clad in a black hat with the brim pulled down over the eyes, and a long black coat that covered the back and flanks. What little else they could see of the pony suggested a deep green body, and a dirty yellow mane.

“…think it’s a bad guy?”

“Could be… Looks like a hitpony.”

“What’s that?” Applebloom asked, turning back to Scootaloo.

“Well, when you need a dirty job done, you call a hitpony.”

“Like farmwork?”

“Different kind of dirty. Like, evil dirty.”

“And that pony looks like one of those?” Sweetie Belle asked, turning back to the stranger with wide eyes.

“Yeah. We should investigate. Might be here for somepony in town. Or maybe in the castle.”

“Princess Celestia?!”

“…that pony must be stopped.”

“Awesome! We’ll be the Cutie Mark Crusader Justice Brigade!”

“…wait, we should be secret about this.”

“Why?”

“Because if Applejack found out we were tryin’ to save the princess, she’d make us stop.”

“Cutie Mark Crusader Secret Service?” Sweetie Belle suggested.

“…yeah.”

“Awesome.”

--

Up close, they could at least see that they were dealing with a stallion. Resting next to him was a large set of saddlebags, black like the rest of his ensemble.

“…that’s wierd…” Applebloom noted, looking the bags over.

“What? They’re just bags.” Scootaloo said, turning her attention to the ordinary leather.

“Don’t ponies have their cutie mark on their bags though?”

“…now that you mention it…”

The bags were completely unmarked, save for a few scuffs and a bit of dirt here and there. Well traveled, but no evidence of a cutie mark.

“…think he stole ‘em?”

“But wouldn’t they have a cutie mark on them then? Just somepony else’s?” Sweetie Belle asked, looking them over.

“What if he stole them from a foal like us?” Said Scootaloo, eyes widening.

“…they’re a little big for a foal…” Applebloom noted. They looked like they could belong to Big Mac, really.

“Hey, what is his cutie mark? Couldn’t that tell us what kind of pony he is?”

“Can we check? Is it safe?”

“…well we haven’t even been whisperin’, and he’s still asleep.” He hadn’t even turned over at all. He was obviously a deep sleeper, if nothing else.

“…onetwothreenotit!”

“Not it!”

“No- aw darn it!” Scootaloo cursed, stomping a hoof into the ground.

“Now ya have to.”

“Come on! It’ll only take a second!”

“Fine fine, don’t rush me!” The pegasus hissed as she stepped closer.

Keeping as much distance as she could, she reached out a trembling hoof and started to lift the hem of the stranger’s coat. And gasped.

“…that’s impossible…”

“But… look at how old he is! He’s like, as old as my sister!”

“…maybe he’s as old as mah brother.”

“Big Mac? This guy isn’t as big as him…”

“Nopony is as big as Big Mac.”

“Point taken.”

“That still doesn’t explain why his-“

“heyshutuplook!”

“Oh come on, wha- oh my sun.”

The three fillies turned to see that the stranger was now awake, not amused, and awaiting an explanation as to why they were staring at his flank. It was hard to tell under the low brim of his hat, but it was likely one of his eyebrows was raised.

“…oh, uh…”

“Erm…”

“…cheese it!” Scootaloo shouted, turning tail and taking off as fast as her legs and little wings could carry her, the other two crusaders not far behind.

The stranger watched them go, huffed in irritation at his nap ending prematurely, and got to his hooves.

…by the sun’s position, it was probably around noon. Not a bad time to go looking for work, he supposed.

He ducked his head under his bags, and straightened to let them slide down his neck. Bags now comfortably rested on his back, he set off towards town.

--

“hey wait why did we run back here.”

“Oh moon, he knows where we live now!”

“More like he knows were we hang out sometimes.”

“Shut up Scootaloo, this is serious! He could be outside right now.”

“…or he could be leaving.” Sweetie Belle said, peering out the window to see the stranger starting towards the general direction of town.

“…it’s like he doesn’t even care that we woke him up!”

“Well, it’s not really that big a deal, is it?”

“…I guess not… he’s still pretty shifty though. Think we should warn anypony?”

“…Ah have a plan.” Applebloom said, a devious glint appearing in her eyes.

“…plan?”

“A sure-as-shootin’ way to figure out what kinda guy he is.”

--

“Heya stranger!” Shouted the pink blur as his personal space was suddenly very violated. “Never seen you before! I’m Pinkie Pie! What’s your name?”

He wondered idly if he should answer. The mare addressing him was obviously very loud trouble. Also perhaps a touch insane.

But he noticed that several of the passers-by were stopping to look. If he ignored her, it might cause a scene. And since that was best avoided…

“Ivan Hooves.” He answered, hoping to the sky that nothing would come of it.

“Weeeelllll Ivy, it’s your lucky day!” He begged to differ. “Surprise party is a goooooooo-“

The surrounding area exploded in a display of streamers and confetti as ponies started setting up tables and putting out food and drinks. Within fifteen seconds, a DJ had set up shop and loud music was filling the square.

“…what.”

“It’s for you! Welcome to Ponyville!”

“…not here long.”

“Then it’s a goodbye party!”

“Never met.”

“Then it’s both!” Pinkie continued, grin never faltering. Then it did, as her eyes widened in amazement.

“…welcome and goodbye party. Double party.”

“…um-“

“Double party!” She announced at the top of her lungs. All activity stopped (with a record scratch for good measure) as everypony pondered just what that meant.

…eventually one of the caterers shrugged and got back to serving cake, and the party resumed completely unchanged. Though it was now a double party. Somehow.

“Say, lemme introduce you to all my bestest best frie-“

“General store?”

“Over that way. So lemme introduce you t-“

“Thanks.” Ivan said, turning away from the loud ball of energy towards his original target. Or at least, he was before the oddest sensation assaulted one of his hind legs. Looking down, there appeared to be a little alligator latched on.

…Shouldn’t he be in incredible pain right now? Ah, it had no teeth. Odd.

“Oooh Gummy, good job boy! Don’t let him escape! Come on, you can’t leave yet!”

Ivan sighed as discretely as he could as Pinkie lead him away. The toothless alligator was probably the universe slapping him on the hoof for trying to take the easy way out. He decided not to find out what would bite him if he tried to get away twice.

--

“Well he’s not tryin' ta leave no more. Only an evil spy hitpony would refuse a Pinkie party.”

“He tried to though. His character is amdo… amba… that word that means uncertain.”

“Ambiguous?” Asked Sweetie Belle.

“Where’d ya learn that one?”

“My sister was talking about this one stallion who had his mane done up in a scrunchie, and-“

“So,” Scootaloo said, cutting off the story before it began. Most things that involved Rarity were boring. “He didn’t refuse the party. That’s good.”

“Yeah, who knows how evil he would’ve looked if Gummy didn’t get him.” Applebloom mused.

“Well… we don’t know what his eyes look like! They could be red and evil!” Sweetie said, pointing at the stallion’s hat.

“Red is evil? Two ponies in our class have red eyes.”

“…huh… black as the darkest void?” said the unicorn.

“That’d be pretty evil. They could be that.” Scootaloo admitted.

“We should find out… hey, do we still have that fan we borrowed?” Applebloom asked.

“Oh, I knew we forgot something!”

“Let’s get one more use out of it before we give it back…”

--

Ivan’s saddlebags had been removed, but before he could kick the trespassing pony in the face for the attempted theft, they were placed aside, nearby. His jaw tightened, but he kept quiet, instead resolving to keep an eye on them while trying to weather the storm.

Then every other pony suddenly had to weather the storm.

A fierce wind started blowing into the square.

--

“This is one heck of a fan!”

“Ah know, right?!”

“…wait, what the hay?!” Scootaloo shouted in disbelief, pointing at the offending hat the stranger wore.

While pretty much every other hat in the square was blown off their respective heads, the black target remained completely unshifted.

“…is there a spell on that hat or something?!”

“Turn it to high! We are mightier then that hat!” Applebloom replied as Sweetie flipped the switch all the way. The winds were slowly approaching hurricane force…
--

“Ahhh! My double party cupcakes! Dashie, do something!”

“On it!” A blue pegasus replied, shooting into the air.

Ivan watched her take off, and cast an aside glance to Pinkie Pie, who was panicking and trying to save the rest of the party food.

He stepped towards his saddlebags as slowly and unassuming as he could manage, only to find that the alligator from earlier was sitting on them and staring him in the face with those empty eyes.

“…well played.” He admitted quietly.

--

“And what do you think you three are doing?”

“Uh… playing a… prank?” Scootaloo answered, looking up at her hero.

“Yeah!” Applebloom said. “Ah mean, party starts and suddenly windstorm! Hilarious, right?”

“Well yeah…” Rainbow Dash conceded. “But Pinkie takes her parties seriously. And it’s not even for her. It’s for that new guy. She wouldn’t be happy if you ruined her first impression, would she?”

“Ah guess not…”

“Exactly.” Dash said, flicking the fan’s switch off. “Now come on, might as well join the party while you’re here, right? Free cake!” She took off back to the square, declaring how awesome it was that she stopped a windstorm in ten seconds flat.

“…so did we get the hat?”

“Nope.” Sweetie said, having been watching the square the whole time. “Didn’t even budge.”

“What the buck.”

“Applebloom! Language!” The scandalised unicorn scolded. Applebloom rolled her eyes.

“Hey, if mah sister says it, then Ah can say it! And come on, what is up with that hat?!”

“…think one of us could tug it off?” Scootaloo wondered, watching the stranger shuffle away from the way Rarity was very probably criticizing either his plain clothes, or his shaggy mane. Or, knowing her, both.

“Can you fly that high?”

“…for a little bit. I could play it off like an accident. Nopony gets in trouble for a ‘mean-spirited joke’ too!”

“Ah like it! Let’s do it!”

--

“…and that’s how I discovered the wonders of alexandrite.” Rarity finished, looking very self assured that the tale she just told was extremely impressive. She leaned forward to better hear the reply she was probably expecting, when-

“…woooooooo-“ Ivan turned his attention to the side and saw an orange pegasus flying forward at speeds he wasn’t comfortable feeling colliding with the side of his head. He was just barely able to whip his cranium out of the pony’s path, though the filly’s teeth closed around the brim of his hat.

The result was catastrophic, in his opinion.

The sheer velocity of the little pegasus now holding onto his hat for dear life threw his neck harshly to the side.

Both ponies tumbled painfully to the ground, Ivan’s hat tearing from the initial attack, and coat shredding on the rough road. His concentration broke, and the hat came free from his head, the attached pegasus flying through a nearby window with it.

Ivan tried to untangle his legs, only grunt painfully when one of his fronts wasn’t moving the way it should. And the cobwebs in his vision were increasing…

--

“Oh my goodness, somepony go get a stretcher!” Rarity yelled, “Fluttershy, go check on Scootaloo, Pinkie, clear a path for the doctors to get th- oh…”

She paused when she saw Ivan’s horn, formally hidden by his hat. While a normal horn was somewhat blunted at the tip, this one was sharp as a tack. She wondered briefly if he had it filed that way, and thought, terrified, at what might have happened by accident while he and the young filly were falling to the ground, but shook it out of her head and got back to delegating the crisis into something manageable.

Who said Twilight was the only one with leadership skills?

--

Ivan awoke in a hospital room, and took note of the cast around his elevated left front leg, and wondered how in Equestria he was going to pay for this.

He then took note that he was without his hat and coat, and had to take a deep breath to calm himself now that all his secrets were on the table.

Worst of all, with the probably broken leg, he couldn’t just move on to the next town to avoid the questions or annoying judgement. Resigned, he went over how much money he had in his saddleba-

…where were his saddlebags.

--

“Ah, Mr… Hooves?” A pony called when the door to his room opened. Ivan turned a glare on the doctor, still in an extraordinarily bad mood at his present circumstances.

“Er… you have visitors…” Ivan huffed, but nodded. The doctor opened the door a little wider and escaped as the visitors trotted into the room. Rarity, he remembered, since she was one of the last things he had seen before he blacked out. An orange mare about the same age as Rarity walked beside her, and they were followed by a trio of fillies that he also remembered waking him up earlier that day.
He then noticed his black saddlebags on the new mare’s back, and immediately levitated them towards him to check on the contents, only to stop when he noticed the condition of the bags themselves.

They had been cleaned and restored, to the point where they looked almost new. The underside of the strap had also had a slight cushion sewn in. When he flicked open the bags themselves, he discovered that not only was everything where he had left it, but they were now lined with velvet that was near the same green as he was.

Faced with the changes in his bags, he turned to the assembled ladies with a raised eyebrow.

“Er… I felt absolutely terrible for what had happened to you, so I took the liberty of sprucing up your bags, and fixing your clothes… free of charge of course…” She trailed off awkwardly and nudged the little pegasus beside her. She gingerly stepped forward with the familiar coat folded neatly on her back, hat on top. Neither looked remotely damaged.

Putting his horn to use again, he examined the floating coat and hat closely. The coat was well mended and lined with the same material now in the bags, and he wondered how comfortable it would feel. The hat was virtually unchanged, though it had been fixed and laundered as the coat was. Checking the inside, the folded photograph he had stored was still there, same as it had been before.

Aside from the fact that the incident had happened in the first place, there was certainly nothing to complain about. The bags moved themselves to the bedside table, with his refolded coat and hat resting on top.

“Thank you.” He said sincerely. What had been done were comforts he couldn’t really afford on his own. Now if only one of them could somehow mend his leg, everything would be perfect.

“Now, ain’t you glad Ah didn’t let ya attach all those gemstones to ‘em? Look how satisfied he is.” The orange mare said, elbowing Rarity playfully. The unicorn scoffed. Ivan twitched at the thought of whatever else might have almost happened to his possessions and thanked the sky for her level-headed friend.

“If you had let me have my way, we could’ve made him look like a king. I can’t imagine who would be dissatisfied with any of my work…”

“He seems like a simple sort. Like me. Gems are nice, but Ah don’t wanna wear ‘em everywhere Ah go. You don’t.”

“…well… Scootaloo! Don’t you have something to say to Mr. Hooves?” Rarity replied, smoothly switching the subject away from any potential losing an argument to the cowpony.

“…um… could I talk to him alone please?” The pegasus asked unexpectedly.

“Why would you want that?” Rarity asked, searching the child for some form of hidden agenda.

“It’s embarassing…” The filly said, making full use of her large eyes to charm the elder mares. The two exchanged glances, and in the end, the orange one shrugged.

“…well… alright. But make sure you apologise. Ah’ll hear about it if ya don’t!”

“Yeah Applejack, I know why I’m here!”

“See that ya don’t forget. C’mon Rarity, let’s see if Pinkie Pie’s stopped panickin’ yet. Not every day somepony gets horribly mangled at one of her parties.”

“Oh come now, it’s not that bad.”

“With the way she was carryin’ on, she sure don’t think so…” The other mare, now identified as Applejack, said as they left. Looking back down at the pegasus, he noticed that the other two fillies hadn’t left with the two mares. Settling back into his raised pillow, he awaited whatever the assembled girls were going to get off their chests.

He didn’t expect them all to burst into tears and leap onto him in his bed.

Through the jumble of loud apologies, he managed to separate several different explanations that all came together in the series of events that had effectively assassinated his day. And more, given the state of his leg.

One particularly forceful jostle bounced the cast out of the sling holding it up, and caused it to fall and bang hard against the metal side of the bed.

The loud ‘ding!’ and pained hiss of the stallion halted all crying as three pairs of eyes shot up to his pained expression. The crying and hugging and begging for forgiveness then resumed at twice the volume.

--

When they had finally calmed down, he had ordered them out of his bed. They now stood lined up at his bedside, awaiting his verdict.

“Again. Slower.” He directed as sternly as he could. The three exchanged looks, heads drooping a little, before the earth pony lifted hers.

“…um… Ah’m Applebloom. This is Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle.” The other two nodded when their names were called. Ivan committed them to memory, having the feeling that he was going to be seeing a lot of these three during his recovery. He prayed that he survived.

“We’re really, really, really sorry for wakin’ ya up from your nap… and tellin’ Pinkie Pie that you needed a party… and for causin’ a windstorm at the party…” That raised his eyebrows, as he wondered how any of them could’ve managed anything like that. Applebloom noticed.

“Oh, we’ll explain that later. And… um…”

“I’m sorry for charging you and breaking your leg.” Scootaloo offered, eyes tearing up as she said it.

“…on purpose?” Ivan inquired, suspicious as to how the apology was worded.

“We, uh… wanted to see what was under your hat… That’s why we started the windstorm, but it didn’t come off. Were you holding it on with magic?” Ivan nodded.

“Oh, so that’s why it hung on so well when I grabbed it…” The stallion found whatever ire he had before slowly evaporating. He wondered if he had a soft spot for kids that had gone unnoticed in his travels.

“Why?” He asked, gesturing to the hat that was still resting on top of the pile. Sweetie Belle took the opportunity to chime in, perhaps because she hadn’t said anything yet.

“Well we were wondering if your eyes were evil or something since you were hiding them, and we had never seen you before so…” She trailed off, now realizing just how weak that reason was. Especially now that the three were faced with Ivan’s blue, and very not evil eyes.

“Ya were hidin’ stuff, and we kinda wanted to know what they were.” Applebloom supplied. “…it was… kinda dumb. Really sorry. Really.” The three bowed their heads again. Ivan sighed.

“Don’t do it again.”

“We won’t!” The three chorused, looking up at his face. He nodded.

“Accepted.”

“You mean our apologies? You talk kinda weird.” Ivan shrugged. Nothing much to say about that.

“…so why don’t you have a cutie mark?” Sweetie Belle asked, glancing at the flank that was hidden by bedsheet. The other two snapped their gaze there as well, reminded of the rather shocking discovery they had made.

“Never got.”

“Why not?”

“…yours?”

“Well we haven’t found our special tall-…you too?” Ivan nodded.

“…but you’re like, old and stuff! How could you not find it?!” Scootaloo asked. His eyebrow raised, but his only answer was a shrug.

“Don’t you care?!” The pegasus demanded.

“No.”

“How could you not care?!”

“No changes.” Really, it was true. Nothing would change if his cutie mark appeared. And sure enough, the earth pony and pegasus started agreeing, gazes lowering in apparently self doubt. He wondered if phrasing it that way was a mistake, since he had heard kids were obsessed wit-

“I understand.” Sweetie Belle said, eyes wide with apparent enlightenment.

A sudden sense of foreboding swept over him as her friends listened with rapt attention.

“You’re unmotivated!” The little unicorn declared, leveling an accusing hoof at the injured stallion. “You don’t respect yourself or what your cutie mark could mean! So that’s why it hasn’t appeared!” He didn’t even have the chance to ponder why Sweetie Belle’s words stung so hard before her friends were eagerly jumping on the bandwagon.

“Ooooh, that makes perfect sense!”

“So what do we do?!”

“We help him! We’re the Cutie Mark Crusaders! But that doesn’t mean we should be concerned with just our cutie marks! We should be willing to help anypony who hasn’t received theirs!”

“Hey, yeah! Hey, mister, you’re going to be in town a while, right?”

“Well of course he is! Travelin’ on that leg of his would be bad for ‘im!”

“So we have time! We will atone for our sins by granting him direction in his life! He will leave a changed and improved stallion, ready to seize the world and his life with renewed vigor!”

“Dude, Belle, have you been listening to your sister again?”

“Well it was epic, wasn’t it?”

“…point.” Scootaloo agreed. The three turned to leave, eager to start planning.

“Don’t worry mister! From this day forward, you’re a crusader too!” Applebloom declared, as they exited the room.

Ivan winced when the door slammed behind them, and quickly concluded that his life had taken a turn for the worse.

…he should’ve taken his chances with the alligator.