The black wind and the pink princess

   “A what?” asked Twilight, while returning to Ponyville with her four friends.

   “You’ve asked me the same question eight times already. You should go see the doctor, Twilight,” said Pinkie. “ I said: we’re going to do a Welcome Party for Francisco!”

   “A what!?”

   “Twilight, you’re starting to worry me...”

   “She’s right, Pinkie!” interrupted Rainbow Dash. “Look, I know you have good intentions, but Francisco is not a pony, or a zebra, or a buffalo, not even a friendly dragon, he’s... a thing!”

   The pink pony turned his head to look at Fluttershy.

   “What do you think?” she asked.

   “Uhm... Will we have to enter the Everfree Forest again?”

   “No, we can make the party outside the forest! I’m sure Francisco will come if we call him hard enough!”

   “Then, I think he’ll maybe appreciate the gesture...”

   “Fluttershy!” groaned Dash, seeing that the yellow pegasus was supporting the crazy idea of the crazy earth pony.

   “Please!” begged Pinkie, falling at Twilight’s hooves. “What will Francisco think if he sees that nopony welcomes him to the town? He’ll live alone and sad in the Everfree Forest, and he’ll have no friends, and he will never smile again, and that would be sooooooo saaaaaad, Twilight!”

   And then, she put the eyes. Dear Celestia, those eyes... Even the heart of a windigo would have melted at seeing those eyes. No, actually, the heart of a windigo would have exploded. So, imagine what that stare did to the heart of Twilight, who was just an unicorn.

   “Ugh...” she sighed. “Ok, I guess we can tr...”

   “Yeah!” shouted Pinkie, while jumping. “Oh, I have to prepare everything for the party! We’ll need cake, and balloons, and games, and... I have a lot of things to do! Oh, you have to tell Rarity and Applejack about this! The party will be tomorrow afternoon, at Fluttershy’s cottage, since she lives near the Everfree Forest! Bye!”

   And she ran away, directly to the Sugarcube Corner.

   “You had to accept...” said Rainbow Dash.

   “She used the eyes, what could have I done?”

***

   The next morning, while Pinkie Pie was untiringly bouncing all over Ponyville and buying things for the party, Rainbow Dash went to tell Applejack about the situation.

   “Could yah repeat that again?” asked the orange pony, after the initial explanation of her pegasus friend.

   “Dammit, Applejack, is not so hard to understand: yesterday we entered in the Everfree Forest and met a shapeshifter abomination who probably comes from beyond the dawn of time, and now Pinkie Pie wants to throw a party for him this afternoon.”

   The farmer put her hoof in the front of Rainbow Dash.

   “I think ya’ve been flyin’ at too much speed lately,” she said.

   “I’m not sick! Although, honestly, I wish I was... Look, Applejack, this is serious.”

   “Really? Do yah realize ya’re talkin’ about an embryo in a bubble?”

   “I know it sounds weird, but I assure you: it happened. I don’t really want to go, but you know, it’s Pinkie Pie, she’s very excited about this. We can’t leave her alone.”

   “Ah guess we can’t... An embryo, seriously?”

   “Would you stop thinking about that?” Rainbow Dash flew away. “Don’t forget: this afternoon at Fluttershy’s place.”

***

   Speaking of the yellow pegasus, she was trying to convince Rarity.

   “... and that’s why we have to go to a party this afternoon,” said Fluttershy, finishing her summary of the situation.

   The white unicorn had listened to her very quietly, without missing a single detail. However, as the story had progressed, her face had become the living image of the horror and the disgust.

   “Uhm... are you ok?” asked Fluttershy. “Did I went too fast? Do you want me to repeat something?”

   “You are joking, darling, right?” said Rarity. “Please, tell me you are joking.”  

   “Uhm... I’m afraid not...”

   Then, the unicorn laughed. Immediately after that, she screamed.

   “You can’t really expect me to even be in the same place as such a monster!” was her response. “Only Celestia knows what horrible things will that creature do to a pony of my beauty!”

   “But Francisco is not bad, he saved us.”

   “Probably he was just pretending to be nice! Take look at this!” Rarity went to her room, and then returned with a book on her hooves. “Look!”

   It was The Canterlot Horror, written by somepony named Hoof Phillips Partycraft. The image on the cover showed a yellow monster with several tentacles about to attack a distressed female unicorn.

   “I know everything about creatures like that Francisco you speak about!” said Rarity.

   “Partycraft? I wonder if  he’s related to Pinkie...”

   “And I have several other books that warn about those monsters! The Shadow over Ponyville, The Doom that came to Haynath, The Horse of the Dark... All of them terrifying tales of what happens when ponies meet creatures they weren’t supposed to meet in the first place!”

   Fluttershy gave another look at the cover, and then said:

  “But Rarity, Francisco doesn’t have tentacles...”

***

   “Spike, take quill and paper...”

   “I already have, Twilight,” sighed the baby dragon. “You’ve told me to do it three times already!”

   “Oh, really? Sorry, I am a bit... distracted...”

   Twilight Sparkle hadn’t been able to sleep properly, she had spent almost the entire night thinking about Francisco. Should she warn Princess Celestia about him? He was nearly as powerful as Discord, or at least that was what it looked. After all, he practically had expelled a bunch of evil water spirit, right before teleporting she and her friends outside the Everfree Forest. True that he didn’t seem to be a menace... but a force like that should be watched.

   But Pinkie seemed to trust him. Maybe the Pinkie Sense was telling her that Francisco was not dangerous...

   “What should I do, Spike?” she asked.

   “Go to the party and meet Francisco again. If he’s really a nice guy, you won’t have to write to Celestia about him.”

   “But what if he is dangerous? What if he attacks us at the party? Better safe than sorry, Spike.”

   “But Twilight, if he had wanted to eat you or something, wouldn’t had he done it yesterday?”

   “Maybe he wanted the six of us at the same place! Maybe he knows we are the bearers of the Elements of Harmony and wants to destroy us, to conquer Equestria!”

   “If he knew, wouldn’t he attack each one separately, instead gathering all of you in one place, since together are more powerful?”

   “Uh... good point, Spike.”

***

   Finally, the time of the party came. The six ponies met at Fluttershy’s place, Pinkie had already prepared everything: there was a long table filled with cupcakes, cookies, chocolate cake and punch; right under a signal that said ‘Welcome, Francisco’. There was also a portable Pin the Tail on the Pony, and many balloons of different colours.

   With a green party hat on her head, Pinkie Pie turned to the Everfree Forest and called for Francisco several times. She waited, but he didn’t appear.

   “Could you help me a bit, girls?” she asked.

   The five ponies approached the edge of the forest and called for the entity.

   “Francisco!” Twilight Sparkle.

   “Hey, Francisco!” Applejack.

   “Francisco...” Fluttershy.

   “Louder!” Rainbow Dash. “I mean... Hey, dude, come out!”

   “We are not edible!”, Rarity.

   But there was no response. The six ponies turned their backs on the shadowy trees, Pinkie Pie being particularly sad.

   “Don’t worry, sugarcube,” said Applejack, trying to cheer her up. “This forest is bucking big, probably he didn’t hear us.”

   “I was sure he was going to come...”

   “Well, he didn’t look very sociable to begin with,” pointed out Twilight.

   “Maybe he’s busy with something,” suggested Fluttershy.

   “Well, if he doesn’t come, worse for him,” said Rainbow Dash. “More cake for us!”

   “Phew...” Rarity sighed.

   “Who are we waiting for?”

   The six ponies froze in the instant they heard that voice right behind them. They turned back, slowly, and they screamed.

   A tree had come out of the forest. A moving tree, black as charcoal, with its trunk filled with grinning faces, their yellow eyes and mouths glowing with a ghostly light. And its leafless branches... no, it hadn’t branches. It had tentacles.

   “You said he didn’t have tentacles!” screamed Rarity, hiding behind Fluttershy, who was hiding behind Applejack.

   “What in the hayrnation?!” exclaimed the orange pony.

   The demonic tree giggled, and said:

   “I apologize,” The faces of its trunk gave a sincere sorry look. “I couldn’t resist.”

   “Oh, it was a prank!” laughed Rainbow Dash. “A very good one! But don’t it again. Seriously, never again.”

   Pinkie Pie approached the entity.

   “Francisco?” she asked. “Is that you?”

   “Yes,” answered the moving tree.

   “You don’t look like you looked yesterday...”

   “I like to try new forms every now and then. It keeps my creativity awake. Now, why were you calling me?”

   “Because we’re about to start your Welcome Party!”

   Francisco looked at the balloons and the sweets. Pinkie took a red party hat and put it in one of the tentacles.

   “Is it... for me?” the shapeshifter seemed really surprised.

   “Of course!” smiled Pinkie Pie. “To welcome you to Ponyville, and to thank you for saving us for those meanie wettie kelpies yesterdays!”

   “Ah... It was nothing...” the other ponies couldn’t believe it, but the tree was actually blushing.

   “Come on!” insisted the pink pony, pulling of one of the roots. “We can’t start this party without the honor guest!”

   “I... I don’t think I should...”, Francisco seemed to be reticent to abandon the shadows of the forest.

   “Oh, don’t be shy! It’ll be fun!”

   “Actually, I’ve never been a party guy... I mean, I like a good fun sometimes, but...”

   Pinkie stopped pulling, and looked up to the talking tree, with a sad face.

   “Don’t get me wrong, I really appreciate this, but... It’s just that...”

   “Come on!” said a voice. However, this time wasn’t Pinkie, but Twilight. “We just want to officially welcome you to our town!”

   “Yeah!” Applejack stepped forward. “Don’t be so shy!”

   “That’s my job,” smiled Fluttershy.

   “You were very brave against those kelpies!” said Rainbow Dash. “Don’t tell me that you are afraid of a little party!”

   Even Rarity approached Francisco. Well, sort of. She remained behind Fluttershy. However...

   “You don’t look that hideous from this angle...”

   Pinkie smiled to her friends, and then smiled back at the moving tree.

   Francisco wasn’t sure about what he should do. He had come to that world to escape from the darkness and the loneliness... but he also feared the light, and those colours. What if he was not good enough for them? What if they hurt him, or if he hurt them? That’s why he had sheltered himself in the Everfree Forest, because he was still a bit scared.

   But one can’t be scared always. Sooner or later, he would have to try and embrace that light, those colours...

   Francisco slowly approached Pinkie Pie, completely coming out of the ominous presence of the Everfree Forest, and said:

   “Thanks. Let’s... let’s have that party.”

   “Yes!”, shouted Pinkie, jumping so high that she landed in one of Francisco’s tentacles. “Let’s paaaaaar-taaaaaay!”

   “Not so fast,” said Twilight. “Francisco, would you mind to... uhm... take a less monstrous appearance?”

   “Not at all.”

   The shapeshifter put the pink pony on the ground, and his body began to shrink. His tentacles became a mane, and his roots, a tail. The faces disappeared, and on the trunk sprouted four legs, each one ending in a hoof.

   After a few seconds, Francisco had turned into a black stallion with a yellow eye for cutie mark.

   “How is this?” he asked.

   “Black really suits you,” Twilight smiled. “Now we can start the party!”

   The ponies went to the table. However, soon they realized that Francisco hadn’t moved.

   “What’s the matter?” asked Pinkie.

   “Uhm...” Francisco blushed again. “Could you please teach me how to walk?”

   The six girls blinked and looked at each other. Had they heard correctly?

   “I beg your pardon?” said Rarity.

   “I don’t know how to walk with four legs,” explained Francisco. “In which order do I have to move them?”

   “You’re kidding, right?” asked Rainbow Dash. “Yesterday, when you were that raven, you could fly perfectly, and now you don’t know how to walk? So much for a Super Doozy...”

   “I don’t know how to fly with wings, either. I did this...” and the black stallion started to levitate. “I just flapped the wings to make it look realistic.”

   “Ok, don’t worry,” said Twilight. “We’ll teach you how to walk. Look, you have to do this...”  

   After a lot of trial and error, and the help of six patient ponies, the shapeshifter managed to walk to the table without falling to the ground one single time, even though his steps were still a bit clumsy.

   They spent the next minutes talking, drinking and eating. Francisco told them his story, although he omitted several details. He just explained that he was a visitor from another world, and that he had come to Equestria because his dimension of origin was sad and ugly.

   “Oh, poor thing...” said Pinkie Pie. “But you don’t have to worry anymore! Now we’ll be your friends, so you won’t be sad anymore! Come on, everypony, it’s time to play my favourite game!”

   They allowed Francisco to try first. They put a white bandage on his eyes, and the black stallion took the fake tail with his mouth. Pinkie guided him to the picture of the pony. He only had to walk a few steps forward.

   “All right,” said Francisco, taking off the bandage, once it was done. “Did I do it?”

   He had put the tail on the nose of the pony.

   “Dammit. Can I try again, please?”

   “Of course!” smiled Pinkie.

   And so, the black stallion tried it again. This time, he put the tail on a hoof.

   “Dammit.”

   He put the tail on an ear.

   “Dammit.”

   He put the tail in the background of the picture.

   “Dammit!”

   He put the tail on the nose. Again.

   “Oh, you son of a...!”

   Putting the bandage on, Francisco decided to do it his way. From both of their flanks sprouted several tentacles, and each one picked one of the fake tails of the box. Then, completely at random, he put all the tails in the picture.

   “Aha!” he said, taking off the bandage. “This time I did it, I’m sure! I’ve had to pin right at least one of them!”

   The pony of the picture had tails everywhere: the face, the legs, the mane, the back... Everywhere, except where it was supposed to have the tail.

   “Oh, come on!”

   Pinkie Pie couldn’t help but laugh, and so did the others. Francisco looked at his disastrous performance, and he also laughed.

   The party lasted until sunset. They played more games, they ate cake, they danced... The shapeshifter decided to use his powers to entertain his new friends, and he began to transform into whatever they could think of. Pinkie asked him to turn into a cotton candy monster with lollipop wings on its back and streamer cannons on its feet, and he did. They laughed again.  

   Eventually, when the first stars appeared in the sky, the six ponies decided it was time to return to their homes, so they said goodbye to Francisco, once again welcoming him to Ponyville.

   “Thank you, girls,” he said. “I hadn’t had so much fun in a really long time. I’m truly happy to have come to this world.”

   “Tomorrow we should introduce you to the rest of Ponyville,” suggested Twilight. “And I’m sure Princess Celestia would like to meet you as well.”

   “And I will be happy to meet everybo... everypony on this town.”

   And so, the six walked away, back to their homes. Pinkie Pie was going last, bouncing, as always.

   “Wait...” said Francisco.

   “Yes?”, smiled the pink pony, turning back.

   “You... you did all this for me, and you looked so happy to have found me yesterday... Weren’t you afraid of me?”

   “Well... I have to admit, you were kinda ghostly, and maybe so much that I think giggling at you wouldn’t have worked! But I had the feeling that you weren’t going to hurt us.”

   “Did your Pinkie Sense told you that?”

   “Actually... no. I had a feeling, but it wasn’t one of my twitches. At first I wasn’t sure if you were good or meanie, but after seeing you for the first time, I had no doubt. It was kinda weird.”

   The shapeshifter, who had returned to his black stallion form, smiled.

   “I’m glad that you are the first pony I’ve met in this world,” he said.

   “And I’m glad you’re the first black wind, embryo bubble, moving tree, cotton candy monster thing I’ve met in this world, too!” she laughed.

   “Pinkie, before you go...” Francisco blushed again. “Can I... Can I hug you?”

   He thought that he had said something stupid. He thought that he had said something creepy, and that the pink pony would ran away, scared.

   However, happily as always, Pinkie Pie bounced to his side and gave him that desired, warm hug. Francisco smiled as he had never smiled before.

   Then, he transformed into the black wind, and ascended to the stars, in a spiral movement. By doing so, Pinkie’s mane and tale floated to the breeze. For a moment, they took a beautiful and delicate shape, they were elegant, like the mane and the tail of Celestia.

   For a second, Pinkie Pie looked like a princess.

   “Thank you very much,” said Francisco’s voice, once again. “For everything. I hope we’ll be friends for a long time.”

   And the black wind returned to the everfree forest. Smiling, with her mane and tail back to their natural puffy state, Pinkie Pie bounced back to the Sugarcube Corner.

***

   Francisco was flying through the shadowy trees of the Everfree Forest, trying new forms. He became a gargoyle, then an eagle, then a swarm of mutant bees. He landed on a branch and transformed into a silver spiderweb, with a golden spider on the center. Then he returned to the air, under the shape of a winged snake with sapphire eyes.

   He became a colourful bubble, and started to calmly float over the trees. He was happy. He didn’t hate himself anymore, and he loved his new home and the new friends he had made. His destiny wasn’t darkness and loneliness anymore, now he could reach the light, if he wanted to.

   Francisco was really happy.

   The bubble looked up at the sky, at the constellations, and at the mysterious infinite that was sleeping behind the stars. For a moment, he could hear a voice, the voice of that drooling god, saying:

   “Thank you.”             Next Chapter: Unfinished business, part one Estimated time remaining: 2 Hours, 24 Minutes