No matter how many times I do it, flying is always the bucking way to go.

I was just having one of my daily flying routines, doing daring tricks, and extremely dangerous nosedives, the wind hitting my face with full force, leaving me to get by, by using my instincts, less I hit the ground and come out with more than just an injury.

You know, the usual stuff.

I stopped halfway through a loop when my body began emitting a noise, that cruddy noise I had become familiar with throughout my daily—awesome—routine.

“Oh, guess I’m hungry, heh heh…”

I sped downwards without hesitation and flew myself to the one place that could satisfy my hunger: Sugarcube Corner. Also, Pinkie Pie is there, so I might get something free today.

I stopped in the cloud I always left on top of the place to chill, and then slowly glided down to the place. Turns out, I didn’t find Pinkie, but Mrs. Cake on the counter. Bummer.

“Good Afternoon, Ms. Dash,” she greeted me as I approached her.

“Afternoon, Mrs. C, you wouldn’t have happened to see Pinkie?” I asked, grabbing a muffin from the side and giving it a bite.

“Er… No, I haven’t…” she said with a slight annoyed tone that slightly took me aback. Geez, guess somepony is not in a good mood.

“Oh, well that’s no good. Do you happen to know where she went?” I asked her while eating another muffin, whether she knew or not, my stomach sure was being satisfied either way.

“No. I. DON’T!” she finished by slapping the muffin I had been happily munching on out of my hoof. Somepony must have gotten off the wrong side of the bed, geez.

“Are you planning to buy something, or will you be ruining my customer’s orders some more?” to say I was insulted was an understatement.

“Ah.. What do you me- Oh…” I glanced at the side and saw 5 half-bitten muffins, counting the one she had smacked away was 6, I had forgotten that she wasn’t Pinkie and I had acted out of habit.

“…” her angry glare could give Fluttershy a run for her bits.

“Eh heh heh… I-I’ll pay for this! I promise er…” I began apologizing.

“Oh, you certainly will. Now get out of here,” she ordered me. “Ugh, you are just as bad as Twilight’s new friend!” she added, catching my attention when she mentioned Twilight.

“New friend?” she only gave me another glare, at which point I Dashed out of the place. That pony could be scary when she wanted to.

Planning to eventually pay her back, I decided to let it go for the moment. I flew to my cloud and decided to take a nap, I fixed the shape a bit and positioned myself in a way that I felt comfortable, I closed my eyelids, and let sleep take over.

But it just wouldn’t come.

As soon as I closed my eyes, I began running through my mind what Mrs. Cake had overreactingly said out loud about Twilight’s 'new friend'. A few different guesses ran through my mind, one specifically sticking out from the others.

“A colt friend?” I said out loud to myself, but burst out laughing instantly at how ridiculous that sounded, that mare is waaaay too busy with her books to find a special somepony, so I decided to let the issue go.

Or I would have if I wasn’t so worried about her.

“Alright, that’s it! I’m solving this issue!” I said to nopony in particular, but still said it loudly enough to grab the attention of passerby ponies as I flew down at top speed, then rose to the air, where I began my search.

Luckily for me, I didn’t have to look for long, as I saw Twilight, even from the height I was, I could recognize that mane of hers anywhere. What really grabbed my attention was the strange creature she was resting her head on.

“Wait… What if she has been captured! Or maybe even being controlled somehow! I have to save her! Ooh, ooh! Maybe the Wonderbolts will hear of this event! And then, they will have to beg me t-” I slapped myself with a hoof, my attention was slipping to fame and glory, I needed to stop that.

Well, it can be difficult when you are as awesome as me.

I looked down, and decided to warn Twilight, better if she gets out of the way so she doesn’t get hurt.

It also had the added effect of making me look cooler.

“Don’t worry Twilight, I’m coming!” I yelled, and the creature instantly hid behind her, using her as a shield, the coward.

You are gonna get a taste of the Rainbow, buddy!

------

“Is that blob getting faster?”

“Hush!” was all Twilight said, leaving John to silently shake in fear.

“okay…” he responded so quietly that Twilight didn’t catch it.

“Wait for it…” the blob came down faster, not slowing down, the studious mare’s horn, glowing a bit brighter as the blob got closer. John stared, everything seemingly slowing down, until the rainbow finally came close enough, and John found himself covered by Twilight’s purple magic, something which he quickly took note of.

“What…?”

He looked up and noticed the frame of a blue Pegasus, it seemed to be flying. "No," he thought, it seemed more like it was gliding in place, a purple aura surrounding the three of them. John soon realized what was taking place, as his movements seemed to be slowed down, his mind quickly reacted, but his body would not follow.

The purple aura began shrinking in size, quickly getting John to regain his bearings and nearly falling thanks to his body’s reactions. Twilight stood firm on the ground, focusing her magic on the blue pony, her magic slowly taking her shape, until finally, being put down by Twilight, where she fell back on the ground, her body trying to catch up with her brain.

“D-don’t worry Twi! I-I’ll sav-WHOA!” she lost her balance and fell down on a bush, but she quickly flew out of there, menacingly gliding over us.

“Rainbow. Stop,” Twilight ordered, and the mare called Rainbow hesitated for a moment, but quickly put on a bravado.

“Twilight, don’t let it control you! It’s messing with your brain!” at this point, both human and mare raised an amused brow at Rainbow.

“Rainbow, be honest with yourself here. Do you really think I could be controlled in any way?” she looked back at me as she said this. "By him?" the rainbow colored mare seemed to take what Twilight was saying into consideration.

"Ouch..."

“I guess you raise a valid point,” she responded with nary a second thought, and landed in front of Twilight, who proceeded to give her a hug.

“Whoa, what’s the occasion?” she asked blushing slightly at the physical contact.

“I missed you, of course.”

“You egghead, you were in Canterlot for 3 days!” she casually laughed, obviously thinking it odd to act that way over a few days.

She didn’t know what had happened after all.

“Yeah… I need to talk to you and the rest of the girls about that…” Twilight said, while looking back at John.

“Oh! I nearly forgot. What is that thing?” she rudely began, pointing at John with her hoof.

“Weren’t you in the meeting yesterday? Everypony was supposed to be there,” Twilight said with narrowed eyes.

“Eh, well, heh heh… I may have blown it to do, er, more important stuff…” Rainbow said, looking down and poking the ground with her hoof.

“What could be more important than a town meeting?” asked Twilight, already knowing the answer to that question.

“Catching a few Zs or course!” Twilight facehooved, but still gave Rainbow a smile.

“I missed you, Rainbow.”

The pair exchanged more small talk, leaving third-wheel-John standing on his crutches while the pair spoke, he tried to keep himself occupied by humming a few tunes and playing with his lighter, but his patience quickly grew thin, and he loudly cleared his throat, getting the attention from both mares.

“Oh, sorry! Rainbow! There is a bit to explain, but to start off, this is John Pennick, he is a being called a human," she explained quickly, then turned. "And John, this is Rainbow Dash, the weather pony I was talking about earlier,” she said introducing John, who extended his hand to shake her hoof. Rainbow stared with a neutral look on her face, she spit on her hoof and shook John’s hand with it, who quickly broke away from the contact.

“Ew! What are you doing…?” he complained, quickly cleaning his hand on his shirt.

“Well, I guess he is a normal female creature, then,” Rainbow laughed getting a glare out of John.

BUCK!

“What was that?” John said, turning to the pair of mares who quickly looked around as well, but were also unable to find the source of the voice.

“That was odd…” Twilight said, looking around deep in thought, but broken out of it by Rainbow.

“Oh come on, it was probably nothing. Come on, I’m curious to hear your story!” she poked Twilight, impatiently awaiting for her to tell her tale.

“It will have to wait, I planned to tell you all together anyway. First I need to make a stop at the library so John can rest, if you didn’t notice, he has a broken foot,” Twilight said glaring daggers at Rainbow.

“Oh, big deal; I’ve broken bones far more often and you don’t hear me complaining,” she retaliated giving John a scowl, Twilight only raised her brow at the mention of the word ‘complaining’ getting the rainbow colored mare to grin sheepishly, causing that one sound to come out of her.

“What the hell is that noise!?” he thought annoyed, while the mares continued their talk, ignoring his mental questioning.

“Point taken. We’ll go to the library first, and then I’ll look for the guys.”

“Then it’s a plan. Come on John.” the group began their slow walk (and it Rainbow’s case, glide) towards the library, not realizing that there was somepony behind them, watching their every move.

------

“What was that?”

A green colored mare held her snout close and breathed slowly, avoiding any further sounds to come out of it, cold sweat covering every inch of her body as she hid in a bush just a few meters away from the enemies and the human she coveted, who were all looking around searching for the source of the curse.

The source in this case being Lyra herself, who shook in fear of being found, hopefully for her, the fears were unfounded, as the rainbow maned pony stopped the search by starting another bout of conversation, and then finally, they trotted away, heading in the direction that Lyra knew well. She let out a sight of relief as they turned in a corner.

“They are going to the library,” she said to herself barely holding a whisper.

“Who’s going to the library?”

Lyra jumped at the sudden voice, too scared to yell, and landed on the ground, literally frozen in fear at the sudden scare she’d gotten.

“Are you okay, miss?” she moved her eyes and came upon a filly wearing an oversized red bow on her head.

She didn’t respond at first, but after taking a few quick mouthfuls of air, she slowly got on her hooves, and looked at the filly with contempt in her eyes.

“Don’t you know that it is not nice for a filly to scare other ponies?” she said clearing her throat and fixing her frizzled mane.

“Granny said that other ponies get easily scared when they have something to hide,” Lyra flinched at the accurate response but retaliated with a response of her own.

“Didn’t you know that it’s bad to pry into your elders’ business?”

“Didn’t you know that it’s bad to hide in bushes and spy on other ponies?” the young filly replied with an innocent smile plastered on her face. Lyra’s eye twitched at the young earth ponies’ perception.

“Alright, you got me,” she admitted.

“Ah’ knew it!” she said, beaming with pride.

“Okay, I guess I’ll go home now,” Lyra said, trying to shake her off, ready to return to her quest as soon as they were a good distance from each other.

“But why miss? We want to help!” she turned around and saw two other fillies at her side, one an orange Pegasus riding a scooter, and the other a white unicorn who she quickly recognized as the local tailor’s sister. She gave them all a quick look and realization hit her like a brick at who she was staring at.

“Are you all th-”

“CUTIE MARK CRUSADERS AT YOUR SERVICE!” the fillies yelled in unison in loud deafening voices.

“Er… Yes,” she shook her head trying to clear out the ringing from her ears and turned her attention to the group.

“We want to see it too!” the earth filly began. “The creature with Twilight!” continued the Pegasus “The hue- hue…” the young white unicorn began, struggling to find the word.

“Human?” Lyra completed, getting an over enthusiastic nod from the filly. “Why would you want to see it?” she asked looking over them all, studying their expressions as they looked at each other with the same grin plastered in their faces.

“We want to get our cutie marks on magical creatures! And we figured we could get them with that hue-man thing that Twilight is taking care of, and you were also following them, so I figured we could work together!” she explained, her eyes never leaving Lyra.

“Oh really…” a sly grin filled the lyre playing mare’s features as her drive kicked back in. “I accept your help, and together, we will work to get to that human and study it,” the fillies all nodded and saluted her in a military fashion.

“So where to, miss?” Scootaloo asked closely following behind on her scooter.

“No need for formalities,” she began and turned her head towards the Crusaders. “Call me Lyra.”

------

“See you tomorrow, Derpy!”

“Y-yes, I’ll be here!” Ditzy called back as she left the office, sighing as she threw her bag lazily over her body, trying to get the rather hectic day out of her mind. She began her flight back home thinking of how her bed seemed like a nice thing to be able to get to at the moment, though the sun was still high up in the sky, but the extra delivery work had taken a toll on her.

“I wonder if Carrot made supper,” she asked herself, she savored the non-existent food as she flew, hoping for a warn lunch awaiting her from her roommate, she sped up slightly, instantly losing her balance and flying out of control, yet oddly enough, landing on her flank seemingly undamaged.

“Whoops… I need to be more careful,” she sheepishly began, giggling at her clumsiness, until a package landed in front of her, something that made her jump in place at the sudden scare. She gave the box a quick check, and realized what it was.

“Sugarcube corner! I forgot!” she yelled, turning a few heads, she shoved the package back into her saddle, and flew away, following the already learned beaten path, and of course, bumping into a few ponies on the way there.

She finally arrived at the colorful bakery several minutes later.

“Afternoon, everypony!” she greeted all in the place, and slumped down, breathing heavily, trying to recover her breath.

“Miss Hooves! Are you alright?” she looked up from her comfortable spot and found a stallion she easily recognized already helping her get on her hooves.

“Yes, I’m fine. Thank you, Mr.Cake.” she thanked the baker, giving him a small grin. She quickly recovered and shoved her hoof into her saddlebag, taking out the package.

“Delivery for the Cakes!” she called out loud out of instinct, and from what seemed to be the second floor, a couple of cries could be heard.

“Oh no…” he grimly said, he thanked Ditzy taking the package from her hooves, and ran upstairs before she could apologize. Choosing that things could only get worse, she turned and made to leave, but was stopped by a voice.

“Hold on, Ms Hooves!” she instantly recognized the voice as Mrs. Cake’s, she cursed herself for not leaving faster, and turned to meet the baker mare.

“Here you go! That will be eight bits!” she said, handing Ditzy a bag, she raised a confused brow and looked inside, finding six muffins, and warm muffins for that matter.

“What is this?” she asked confused.

“Why, is your order, Miss! I threw a few extra muffins there complementary, you see, we had a few problems with our early batches, and I’ll spare you the details but some ponies can be rather rude.” Ditzy instantly remembered, she had in fact ordered the muffins that same morning before work, hoping to get off early and get the muffins when she delivered that package. A thought that had completely slipped out of her mind until Mrs. Cake had reminded her.

What she didn’t understand was why she had ordered the muffins to begin with.

She searched her head for any sort of plans she had made, until she finally reached the previous day: the crashing, the meeting with the human, and her promise to visit him daily stuck out like a sore hoof, she facehooved at her forgotten business, and fell down, unable to control her own strength and hurting herself, she quickly shook it off and got on her hooves.

“ThankyouMrs.Cakehereisthebitskeepthechangegottago!” she screeched in a way that even Pinkie Pie would be proud of, and rushed out of the bakery, her hopes for sleep now gone, replaced by her will, she made her way home, getting in the bathroom, ready for a shower before making her way to the public library.

Meanwhile, back at Sugarcube Corner, ten golden coins stopped spinning, falling on the floor with a clunk. Mrs. Cake picked them up with a sigh and swore to make Pinkie Pie work the following day.

“I need a day off.” she said, lazily shoving the bits in the register, and returning to her usual spot.

------

“Do you see something?”

“No.”

“How about now?”

“No…”

…

“Now?”

“No!”

Lyra pulled her mane in frustration. She had thought that getting the fillies to help would have been a good idea. She had been wrong.

The Crusaders kept talking over each other, and she was not able to get a single command to them, since their excitement for their would-be cutie marks was getting the best of them, and instead, they kept talking about it. She had been lucky enough to get them quiet when they reached the library before Twilight (all thanks to the human’s slowness and Lyra’s knowledge of the Ponyvilled roads) and had told them to wait until they arrived for further instructions.

“How about now?” the three said at the same time, she nearly blew on them, but she was not a cruel pony and she came to the conclusion that it had been her own fault, so another solution came to mind.

“We’ll go in,” she said simply getting to the point.

“What? Why? We’ll get caught!” complained Sweetie Belle.

“Don’t worry, I’ll take the blame for everything, I’ll say I used you to get inside,” she felt a bit of guilt as she said it, as she had indeed planned to use them. Not that she would admit it now.

“Well, if you are sure, Lyra....” the crusaders nodded to each other, and then to Lyra, and the four of them slowly approached the front door.

“Here goes nothing…” Lyra gulped and made to knock on the door.

However, the door slowly opened itself, and only darkness could be seen inside, beads of sweat begin falling from the group’s foreheads as they ventured inside, not knowing what to expect.

The inside was pitch black, and she got a bad feeling as she got deeper inside.

“Get out of here, girls,” she called out to the fillies, but it was too late, as the door slammed shut, leaving the group in complete and utter darkness.

Lyra groaned and cursed her luck.

“Buck…”

------

“So let me get this straight—you fly using other machines? And faster than an air balloon?” Rainbow asked looking at John with a bit of awe.

“Well, yes. The machines are different, but there are some that can reach incredibly fast speeds,” he explained, while Rainbow’s eyes shined, imagining the things that could actually pose a threat to her speed.

“That is sooo cooo- I mean, those machines could never be as fast as me, I bet!” she added, trying to recover some pride in her amazement of the machines themselves.

“Well, they are only on my world… as far as I know. Who knows? You ponies have steam engines, so flying machines might not be far off here.” Rainbow grinned defiantly at the statement.

“You don’t think he is so uncool now, huh, Rainbow?” Twilight said walking in the front, hiding a grin.

“Of course not! He isn’t the one flying after all,” she responded with a noticeable blush on her face.

“You ponies can’t seem to be able to hide your blushing very well,” John laughed, looking at Rainbow who crossed her front hooves annoyed at his observation.

“When you recover, you are gonna get it, baldy,” she gave John a glare and walked alongside Twilight, starting a conversation with her.

“Aww, come on, I was enjoying the attention! Besides, I think you are pretty cool yourself,” John admitted, making Dash jump at the praise.

“I’m gonna go ahead.” Dash said, flying at top speed, a feather coming off her wings, it floated in the breeze, and landed safely inside John’s shirt.

“Oh, crap!” he felt the feather travel inside, reaching south, and getting stuck on his jeans.

“Hey Twi, can you he-.. WOAH!” he stop mid-sentence and marveled at what was in front of him.

A tree.

But not just a tree: a giant tree. It easily outdid any tree in Ponyville that he had seen before, but what really impressed him was what it was used for. There were windows, a visible balcony, and a front door. It wasn’t only a tree, but an abode, a place to live, and from the smile Twilight adorned at that moment:

“My new home…” he fell strangely melancholic as he stared at the giant tree, it seemed odd to him how it still maintained its foliage, even after its death.

Twilight moved to his side and nuzzled his leg, John tried his best to hug the pony, but to no avail.

“Maybe you two should wait until you are inside,” Rainbow teased the pair, grinning like a mad mare at what she was witnessing.

“Of course,” Twilight responded simply, causing Rainbow to groan annoyed at the lack of effect her jests were having, trotting ahead and making her way to the door, opening it to find only darkness inside.

“What’s going on, Twilight?” John asked as they made their way inside, already terrified and holding onto her coat. “I think I‘ve gotten enough scares for a lifetime…” he thought as Rainbow joined in as well, and landed besides the pair, unable to fly in the strangely dark room.

“Spike, this isn’t funny,” as the words left Twilight‘s mouth, the door slammed shut, leaving them wandering in the darkness, indistinguishable whispers could be heard around, but none could figure out what was being said. John trembled in fear, not enjoying the experience, and if the dragon had anything to do with it, he was ready to weed him out.

“Seriously, Spike. If you don’t stop this, I’m going to tell everyo-pony about your crush with what’s-her-n-”

A loud bumping could be heard as he felt an object hit his forehead, and as he felt the hit and lost consciousness for the 3rd time in two days, he repeated the words in his mind that by now had become a custom.

“Why does everything hate me so much…?”

Author's Notes:

Surprisingly, I finished this chapter faster than the others.

Anyway, here is more, and I promise you all that he will finally meet the rest of the Mane 6, just trying to establish the other characters here.

On a sad (or happy) note, I will be taking a break on writing for at least a week, I'm just a bit burned out with the constant writing I've been doing.

Anyway, see you all in 2 weeks!

Notes 6 4/3/2018

Going through this chapter made me realize how touchy-feely I could be with Twilight and John. As for the contents, there are two things that I've realized: One, Rainbow Dash was a bit of a cunt here, probably a bit OoC in the way I portrayed her. Two, I've come to realize that having both John and Twilight develop such a deep connection is pushing it a teeeensy bit. But hey, too little, too late.

Around six years.