//------------------------------// // Dusk to Twilight and a Doctrine of Memories // Story: We're all Equestrians now // by Wrinklenator //------------------------------// We're all Equestrians now Chapter 2: Dusk to Twilight and a Doctrine of Memories I followed my new friend to her home. “I have an extra guest room upstairs. Nopony has used it in a very long time. If you ever wanted the sheets changed, new pillows or anything else, I’d be happy to help you out.” “Thanks, Hollynight.” I said. We approached her home and she unlocked the door. “My home is a bit messy. If I knew I had guests coming over, I would have at least made the place presentable.” She said. We entered the room and saw a round table in the middle of the room with documents on top of it along with a few mugs and spare paper and pencils. Pencils? How do they write with hooves?! Or do they use their mouths? That’s got to be annoying. An old couch was to the left with a coffee table in front of it. A couch? I don’t get that. Wouldn’t they just lie on it with any need for the back? Do ponies sit like humans? At least they don’t have park benches. Seeing a pony sit like a human would just be just as creepy as a human sitting like a pony. A small but nice looking chandelier hung from above with some cobwebs on the top of it. Behind it were several medals and certificates with shelves of books on the right hoof corner wall. A staircase going upstairs was to my left. “What’s all of this?” I inquired. She went up to her kitchen counter and started to wash some of her dirty dishes. “Those are medals I got for studies in law. See my cutie mark.” I looked at her flank and saw the balance scales. “It’s the balance for justice. I take pride in protecting and fighting for liberty for all ponies. Remember, Capidas, nopony is above the law!” She look back to smile and then turned around again. My stomach growled. I went up to her and asked. “Hollynight? What do ponies eat, hay or something? I’m starving.” She nodded and said, “I’ll get you something, just try to lie down and relax.” I went to the couch and paused. “How do you ponies sit down?” I asked. Hollynight just facehoofed and rolled her eyes, “You can sit on your butt you know.” I sat down just as a human would. Hollynight used her magic to float two tea cups and floated one on the table. She sat down next to me and used her magic to lift the cup to her mouth to take a sip. I reached for my cup and realized I had no fingers. “Hollynight, how do I pick this up?” “Oh it’s easy.” She put down her cup on the table to pick it up with her hoof. “See?” My jaw dropped. “How did you do that?” “You just pick it up,” she responded and did it again, “come on, it’s not difficult, try the pencil.” She hovered a pencil to the table and picked it up with her hoof. “Now you try.” I tried to scoop the pencil with my new hooves as she did and every attempt was in vain. “ARRGGG! This is so frustrating!” I looked down a bit sad. “Capidas, don’t worry, you can get this in no time.” She said and after four minutes I managed to pick up the pencil and then my mug. I still don’t know how I did it. It’s like… I… forget it..... screw logic in this odd world. I went upstairs and got into her guest room which was the second door on the right. It was dark and had a lamp on a table that gave the room all of its light. The bed in the corner looked a little bit old and its side was underneath the window. I hesitated for a minute and thought as to how I was to get into the bed. I moved the sheet and put my front hooves on the bed and kicked up with my back legs hurling myself on the bed. I went to pull the bed sheet on me, but I forgot I had no fingers. Here we go again. I lied on my side and closed my eyes. Why am I here? Is this all a dream? It seems so real. My mind was churning with all of these questions and more. My anxiety shot up and I couldn’t help but turn over repeatedly. “Capidas, you’ve got to get some rest.” I whispered to myself. No, that's not my real name, though! Then what is it? I just couldn’t do it. I decided to sit on my bed as a pony would and look out the window and stared at the moon. The moon. Even from Equestria, the moon looked the same way it always. I stared and stared until my staring was sore. I let my eyes become droopy and lay my head down and finally allowed my body and mind to rest. I found myself in the abyss. I was standing on what appeared to be nothing. Everything was completely black. I saw two silhouettes that were black but a somewhat lighter than the rest of the abyss. The silhouettes were human shaped to my surprise. One looked as if he was a bit unsure about something and the other, the taller one held out his hand. The shorter one thought hesitantly and then shook his hand. They were frozen like statues. I saw an odd orb made of fog floating in the distance. There was a weak feminine voice that came from it. It sounded no louder than a mumble. Suddenly, the whole place turned gray and foggy. The gray turned to white and I woke up. I looked at my hands, but they were still hooves. “I guess this isn’t a dream after all.” I became sad and felt my ears drop as they now reflected my mood. I just sighed and said to myself flatly: “I am a pony.” I trotted downstairs and saw Hollynight was making breakfast. “Good morning, Capidas. I made you some toast!” she said cheerfully, “Did you sleep well?” I sat down on the chair and looked at the two pieces of toast with some slices of pears on the side. “Yeah, kinda,” I replied, “I always hoped this was just a dream, but only now I know this is real.” Hollynight sat down and gave me a concerned look. “Why would it be bad that this is real? Don’t you like things here?” she seemed a bit hurt by my comment. “I didn’t mean it like that!” I tried to recover what verbal damage I caused, “It’s just that I-” “No, I understand.” Hollynight interrupted me. She smiled weakly, “You had a life before this with a family and everything. I understand why you would want to go back home.” I grinned a bit. After breakfast, we got outside. Hollynight looked around, “Okay, Capidas. Let’s go meet Glaciem at the Library.” I nodded. We trotted down to the Library and knocked on the door. That same purple dragon named Spike answered again. “Hello, Spike.” Hollynight said, “Is Twilight here this time?” Spike nodded. “She sure is. Twilight! We have company!” Spike yelled “Glaciem must be running late.” Hollynight said. I saw a purple mare step from a room into the main floor of the large room. “It’s bigger than it looks.” I said expressing curiosity as we strolled into the odd tree building. “Hello, there.” Said the mare. “I’m Twilight Sparkle. I’m sorry I wasn’t here to help you yesterday but I’m sure I can make it up right now. What do you need?” Hollynight looked at me and gave a motion that was suggesting that I was the one who should ask Twilight. “Twilight,” I started, “do you have any books or other information on humans?” Twilight looked confused and shocked at the same time. “Humans?” She inquired, “Why humans?” she walked over to the shelves and started to look around. “Because they- uhh” I got nervous. Should I reveal that I am a human? Nah, she wouldn’t believe me. “They have magical properties that are interesting.” Hollynight blurted out and winked at me thinking she came up with something that was somewhat intelligent. It was my turn to facehoof. “Humans have no magical powers, Hollynight.” Twilight said turning and raising an eyebrow. Twilight pulled out a book with a levitation spell and started to walk toward us as she flipped the pages searching for something. I sighed and I knew I had to admit it. “I’m a human and I need to know how and why I got here.” Twilight went wide-eyed, “Are you serious?” I nodded, “Yes. I woke up and Hollynight found me on the outside edge of the Everfree forest. I have no memory of being a human and I want you to help me discover the truth.” Twilight looked at me cocking her head and replied, “Now that, I believe.” She put the book down. “I have a better idea.” Twilight said walking up to me, “I could try a memory spell so you could recall how you got to become a pony.” “You can do that?” I asked. “Sure I can.” “Will it hurt?” she then giggled a bit and said in a calming voice, “Just close your eyes.” Her horn glowed and I obeyed. Twilight’s spell caused my body to feel like a liquid turning around as if I was being morphed with mind. I entered that same abyss like the ones in my dream. The dark clouds were starting to form into shapes to make up a brown room. The room was being decorated by the floating whips that become what looked like to be odd voodoo looking objects, tiki things on the walls and shrunken heads. Strange candles were lit everywhere and a table with an old purple cloth appeared in the middle of the room. There was a bookshelf that appeared with both books and potions and powders of some kind. All of this and two humans, not ponies, were sitting at the table where a stack of cards had just formed. Once the last floating whips formed the last decorations of what was a memory, the scene started to play out. I was just a floating 3rd person like object observing the scene; like a narrator of a storybook’s view. The two people sat at the table. One was a man wore clothes that were brown and tattered. He had white paint on his skin. He had purple eyes which were exceptionally bright. The man had his voodoo necklace and other related trinkets on his neck and clothes. The other one was… I. I saw my 17 year old self. I was at the table. There I was with my shaggy brown hair and I looked a bit curious and nervous. “I completely understand, my friend,” said the witch doctor, “I understand that you’re in a bad position.” He started to shuffle his cards. “You’re depressed with life. You feel like you’re going nowhere.” His voice was a bit cunning yet soothing. “I know you want to start a new life in a whole new place. You want to be free and gallop from destination to destination; go where ever is your destiny is sayin’.” He chuckled with a sinister but reassuring tone as he snapped his fingers with one hand and spun the cards with his other making them vanish. The ‘me’ in the memory jumped back in my wooden seat. “I think I know just the way to help.” He said slowly. “You can do that?” I said eagerly. “Oh of course, we just got a couple rules, regulations and other quotas to establish entering this here world.” He replied as he pulled out a very old book with its pages being old and decaying. It had some unrecognizable text that was probably hundreds of years old. He searched frantically and then stopped at a page. “Quotas? Rules? World? I thought you were to help me with my life, not start a new one.” I said sounding a bit demanding. “Helping your life, eh?” he seemed to avoid the question, “I too was just like you.” He said. “I was never fortunate to gain anything enough until one day I met some… interesting beings…” he laughed with a villainous joy and sounds as if ghosts were laughing came from around the room. My memory self jumped in my chair and started to shake a bit. “Now, I am a very busy man.” He said and he pulled out an old rag to place it on the table. “I have to say it’s been awhile sense I did this old spell.” He pulled the rag up and a mini mixing bowl appeared and some bottles with materials in them. “I want to get out of this place just as much as you. I would be gone by now. The one drawback to voodoo, kid, is that enchantments have to be done on someone else. It forces generosity. Before I begin, I need to know that you’re in on this.” I went to shake his hand he held out but I hesitated. “I don’t know. Begin a new life? Start over? Completely?” I put my hand back down. “LISTEN TO ME YOU LITTLE-” he started to yell but then inhaled. “Listen, kid, you know you’re never going to amount to anything in this life and you know it. This is your chance.” My face turned from uncertainty to a bit sad and somewhat angry. “Aren’t you tired of living under the stress of the unknown yet sure to be sad future ahead? Aren’t you tired of seeing those other successful people who are only there in their places because of luck? You know, luck you never had.” My face turned from a mix of sadness and anger to anger with the desire to take action. “I am on a very tight schedule, friend.” He looked around his hut with a sense of worry at his voodoo masks on the walls. “I need an answer now!” He snapped, “Are you ready for this?” I saw my own face go from pensive to smiling with essence of despitefulness and eagerness. “I… am...” “Come now, shake my hand.” I saw myself reach out and shake his hand with confidence and enthusiasm. “YEAH!” he shouted with glee. Suddenly, strange drum beats started to play from nowhere and the candles went out to make the room’s color from a dull yellow to a dark green with purple light swirls forming and wriggling through the walls and floor. “HAHAHA! EEEYESSSS!” he hissed. He snapped his fingers and the ingredients on the table started to float in the air then mix themselves. A red powder was made and the cards on the table separated and spun around the Witch Doctor. He grabbed one and the red powder dropped from the bowl and landed on a card. “Now we’re talking!” the doctor yelled after blowing the powder and it divided into green and purple floating swirls. “Come, boys. Take us both and make sure he can’t remember this.” The doctor Beckoned. “What? Why?” I yelled over the escalating noise of the sound of the nonexistent drums. “It’s better that way, kid. Besides, I got things to do and I don’t want anybody getting in my way.” I watched myself shake with slight fear and amazement as my real self was surrounded by the green swirls and the witch doctor was surrounded by the purple swirls. Both of our bodies turned into just green and purple silhouettes and then we evaporated leaving the room empty. Everything in the room then turned into gray smoke and then the smoke formed into Twilight’s house reappeared with Hollynight, Glaciem and Twilight. Glaciem must have come while I was out. I just sat in the room with a blank look and I collapsed and put my hooves on my head. “Capidas, you were frozen for about a minute or so. Are you okay?” Hollynight asked. “I’m fine but my head is spinning a bit. How long was I out?” I replied. “You were in a state of daze for about four minutes,” Twilight said, “Whatever tried to erase your mind was pretty powerful. I had to boost the power of the memory spell for it to get through.” I felt perturbed by the memory. “What happened? What did you see, Capidas?” Glaciem asked interestly. “I saw myself as a human in this witch doctor’s hut. Apparently, I met the man to help me out with my life. I had malaise about my life. I felt like a failure and wanted help.” All of the three mares were leaning in and listened intently with wide eyes. “I needed this man and I asked him to help me out. The thing that now worries me is that he may have needed me more than I needed him.” Hollynight then look perplexed, “Why would you say that?” I stood back up on my four legs and answered, “He talked about being on a ‘tight schedule’ and instead of helping me out, he wanted me to enter a new world and he seemed eager to come along too.” Glaciem put her hoof to her chin in thought. “He wanted his pals to erase my mind so he could focus on his tasks he wanted.” I continued. I then explained every bit of detail I had in the memory to my fellow ponies. Hollynight thought for a few seconds after I finished and then she drew a conclusion, “I have drawn a conclusion! He probably is in deep trouble with somepony, or something.” “Like some kind of debt. In order to have a debt, that means somepony has to have given you something you need to pay back.” Glaciem added on. I felt my stomach churn with uncertainty and worry. “Do you think I am a pawn or was I just a stepping stone?” Hollynight walked up to me and tried to calm me down, “Don’t worry about it, Capidas. You got us, right?” “Yeah,” Glaciem jumped in, “he’s off doing his own thing right now. You gained something from it too you know. You’re a pony now and being a pony is much more awesome than being a human.” I puzzled and puzzed until my puzzler was sore, then I thought of something I hadn’t before. Maybe Christma- wait, wrong story. What Hollynight and Glaciem were saying was totally true. I did have them. They were my new family. The life I had behind me was now just my past. I could now achieve anything in this place. “The witch doctor actually did give power,” I started to say. “WHAT?” Twilight, Glaciem and Hollynight cried out in unison. “He gave me the power to change Equestria.” They all sighed with relief. I laughed a bit. “I have a new life now and I can make it anyway I want it. I now have a clean slate.” I turned to look at Hollynight and Glaciem specifically, “I need you two to teach me all about being a pony.” They both embraced me and it felt like it lasted hours. Le Story continues! Please leave criticism or any other interesting stuff belooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow "It's much easier to hate than to create." -Smart People