"What?" said Apple Bloom in disbelief. "You mean ta tell me y'all have never heard the story of the yellow-eyed pony eater?"

Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo sat opposite the campfire beneath the starry night sky. "I can't say I have..." Scootaloo replied, now well over her fear of ghost stories. Besides, Rainbow Dash, Applejack and Rarity were a few paces away, asleep in their tents. They would surely scare away any 'yellow-eyed pony eaters' that might happen by.

Apple Bloom smiled, glad it was finally her turn to tell a scary story Sweetie Belle couldn't ruin by giving away the ending. "Good." She dimmed the lamp and put on her scariest story telling face. "A long time ago, when Ponyville was still just a few farms and a fruit stand, my granny said she'd hear something shriek out in the woods!" Her two friends sat quietly. "She'd tell me her Pa had always said that if you leave the woods alone, it'll leave you alone. He said there were things in Whitetail Woods that no pony need mess with—not even the princesses themselves!"

"Wait, hold on a second," Sweetie Belle interrupted. "You're tellin' me something in these woods is too scary even for the princesses?" She shot Apple Bloom a skeptical stare. "I don't believe it."

Apple Bloom's face twisted in frustration. "Ah let you finish that lame story about split-ends that no shampoo could ever cure! The least you could do is let me tell my story!" Scootaloo chuckled behind her hoof as Sweetie Belle folded her forelegs in a pout. "Thank you. Now, like Ah was sayin', somethin' just awful lived in them woods, and sometimes ponies heard a terrible noise nopony could explain! Everypony was content ta just let it be... until one night, it came out of the woods!" Apple Bloom waved her forelegs menacingly, making both Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle jump.

"Granny says that one night, during the harvest festival, Mr. Carrot had a brand new organ he’d wheeled out ta play so everypony could dance. Everythin' was fine for the first few hours, but as the cider started flowin', the shriek of the yellow-eyed pony eater echoed from the woods!" Her friends were now leaning forward a bit, their faces in eerie shadow as the fire began to die. "Everypony just ignored it at first, but nopony had ever heard it so close before. Then, out of nowhere, it flew out of the sky!"

"Hang on, so it can fly now?" Scootaloo asked flatly.

"Yes, it can fly. Now hush, and let me finish my story!" Apple Bloom demanded. "Anyway, it flew out of the woods, and all anypony could see were its yellow eyes! Some swore they were red! But, since it was dark, nopony could get a clear look at it, until it swooped down and smashed Mr. Carrot’s organ into a million pieces! Granny says she saw it for a half-second, but what she saw was somethin' so horrible, she'd wished she'd stayed home that night! It had big wings, like a dragons, but it was shaped like a giant sparrow. 'Cept it had four legs, like a pony! But on the end of its legs were horrible claws that could rip a stallion in half!" Sweetie and Scootaloo gasped. "Granny said it cast one of them yellow eyes on her, and it was all she could do to hide beneath an apple cart until it left. Nopony ever talks about it, and hardly anypony believes it anymore, but Ah can tell ya, you won't find none of the old folks campin' out here."

Sweetie Belle raised an eyebrow. "So, is that it?"

Apple Bloom's expression fell. "N-no, she also told me he likes ta eat the horns right off unicorn's heads!"

"No!" Sweetie Belle covered her small horn with both hooves.

"Yes! And he'll gobble up pegasi wings for dessert!"

Scootaloo drew her tiny wings close to her sides. "But I haven't even gotten them to work yet!"

"All right, that's enough, Apple Bloom," Applejack said from her tent, her sudden intrusion startling all three fillies. "Quit scarin' your friends with Granny's old ghost stories and come ta bed."

"But Granny said that one really happened!" she protested.

Applejack rolled her eyes. "Granny says a lot of things, sugarcube. Now c'mon ta bed. That goes for the rest of y’all."

Apple Bloom entered the tent she shared with her sister, settling in to her sleeping bag. Once Applejack zipped up the flap and got comfortable, she whispered, "So, are you sayin' Granny wasn't tellin' me the truth?"

Her older sister rolled over and smiled. "Naw, darlin'. Granny just has trouble rememberin' things right sometimes. She wouldn't lie to ya on purpose."

Only the chirping of the crickets filled the tent for a moment before Apple Bloom spoke again. "So... do you think the yellow-eyed pony eater is real?"

Applejack laughed. "No sugarcube, he ain't real. It may have just been a dragon. There were a lot more of them roamin' around back then, ya know."

"Okay..." Apple Bloom sighed, rolling over in her sleeping bag. "G'night, AJ."

"Goodnight, Apple Bloom."

She closed her eyes but hardly managed five minutes of sleep before she swore she heard a faint, barely audible shriek echo through the woods.

A flash of lightning illuminated the cobblestone streets of Canterlot as torrential rain poured down on the capital. After a second flash, two ponies appeared in the middle of the street. They sported lightly tanned coats, almost khaki in color, as well as auburn manes. The mare wore a rather old-fashioned, olive green dress and emerald tie, while the stallion wore a similarly colored sport coat and tie. One could be forgiven for thinking they were twins.

"Well, this is a fine spot for us to arrive," she said, looking toward her companion. "Oh my."

He glanced over his female counterpart. "’Oh my’ indeed. It appears this place is much different from the others."

"I must agree. Curious that he would have been sent to such a peculiar place, brother."

He nodded, their manes still inexplicably dry and tame in the harsh weather. "Curious indeed. I can hardly imagine such a locale. A world in which equines are the dominate species," he mused.

"Still, probability allows for all types of alternates. I suppose ones we haven't considered are still viable." She looked down the empty street in both directions. "Perhaps we should make our way to an inn. This weather is simply dreadful."

"Assuming these creatures are familiar with such concepts," the stallion beside her commented. She smiled at his assumption.

"Come now, brother, they've built a city; surely they would have need of an inn. Let us hope it is not a mere stable."

A crack of thunder startled Celestia from her slumber. Her wide eyes sagged as she realized what had awakened her. Though she knew it necessary, nighttime thunderstorms were of the most annoying variety. However, she had approved it herself, so she had nopony to blame. She stared at the top of her four-poster bed, trying to will her eyes closed again. Two more flashes illuminated her chambers.

She bolted upright in bed. Something was... wrong. The feeling had hit her like so many bolts of lightning outside her window. Alien though the feeling was, something about it felt... familiar. Yes, that's what she'd call it. Familiar.

She pondered for a moment. Where had this fleeting familiarity come from? It was not recent, that much she knew for certain. Perhaps nearly a century ago—not an obscene amount of time for somepony who'd lived for as long as she had, but certainly a considerable length for her subjects.

It was a feeling as though something was in Equestria that didn't belong. Two somethings, if she had to guess. But what?

However, these things—whatever they were—did not mean Equestria harm. Or so she felt. Her thousands of years of life had endowed her with a near sixth sense for danger. Even during times when it appeared to all others that she was oblivious, she could sense an upcoming event. Whether it was beneficial, like her student’s ascension to princess-hood, or detrimental, like the changeling attack, remained to be seen.

Celestia got out of bed, a guard swiftly knocking on the door upon hearing her hoofsteps on the marble flooring.

"Your Highness, is everything alright?" he called from beyond the door.

"Yes, everything is fine," Celestia replied. She levitated her royal regalia onto her hooves, neck and head before opening the door to her bedchamber.

"Your Majesty!" one of her guards yelped in surprise. "The sun is not due up for another five hours. Is there something we may do to aid your sleep?"

"No, I shall be in the library. You are to retrieve me when it is time for the dawn to break."

They snapped a crisp salute. "Yes, Your Highness."

Celestia trotted down the hallway. The feeling she'd experienced began to fade, though that certainly did not mean the things that didn't belong had left. She did not know from whence these feelings came, but she would certainly find out.

"Well, that was certainly unnecessary. Why couldn't we have just gone here in the first place?" The stallion and mare stepped into the lobby of a small inn on the eastern side of Canterlot. The front desk attendant pulled himself from his magazine to find both ponies looked remarkably similar.

"Because this is the only timeline in which the Songbird exists. No others, or did you forget the last ninety-seven years of our search?" she asked, as they both bickered in the lobby.

The stallion stifled a chuckle. "Ah, surely you of all people—er... horses, recall the passage of time is merely—"

"A matter of perspective? Recall who you're talking to," she quipped.

The pony behind the front desk took the lull in their conversation to address them. "You two looking to rent a room?" he asked. They turned slowly toward him, then faced each other once more.

"It appears as though they speak the King's English. I suppose you win again," the mare said calmly.

"You know, it's just not as satisfying as I envisioned."

"Yes, well, they can't all be, can they?"

The desk pony cleared his throat rather loudly. "So is that a 'yes' or...?"

"Perhaps we should take care of this," the stallion suggested.

"Perhaps you're correct." She stepped to the desk and glanced at the attendant. "Yes, we would like a room for exactly one night."

He smiled. Now they were getting somewhere! "No problem. That'll be ten bits."

She looked back to her stallion companion. "I don't suppose we have any 'bits' do we?"

The look on the stallions face was one of mild surprise. "A variable we hadn't accounted for? Impossible."

She sighed, turning back toward the attendant before digging a purse out of her dress. "Well then I suppose this will have to do." She dropped ten large, silver coins onto the desk.

The night shift pony stared at the coins blankly. They seemed to have a large eagle on one side, and a... thing on the other, he wasn't sure what. He certainly had no time for games, however. "Look lady, it's ten bits, as in Equestrian money," he insisted. "Now if you don't have any, I'm afraid there's nothing I can do for you."

The mare looked back at the stallion. "Well then, I suppose we'll have to go with our contingency plan, won't we?"

"It appears that way. It seems you've won this round," he admitted with a sigh.

She turned back to the innkeeper. "Tell me, if we had these 'bits' which room would you have given us?"

He was a bit taken aback by the request, but saw no harm in answering. After all, without a key, they weren't getting inside anyway. He glanced down at his registry book, reading off his next available room. "Uhm... it's room 110, but I don't know why..." When he looked up, the two ponies had vanished. He hadn't heard the door open, nor heard hoofsteps leave the lobby.

"Huh... no wonder nopony wants to work the night shift..."

Author's Notes:

It was only a matter of time before someone wrote something involving bioshock infinite, right? Might as well be me!