>you are sitting on your porch.
>you have two puny pegasus pony people accompanying you, plus however many changelings are living inside of your skull, plus whoever may have stealthily followed you outside in being bored of observing the inside of your soul-rendingly angular human home.
>you're playing checkers.
>Rainbow Dash is on the other side of the board, insistently nudging her pieces across at the speed of a snail.
>this is what you decided to do today for fun.
>when enough of them come through to fit one on each button of a video game controller, you might be able to play a more modern game with them.
>it'll be a good exercise of cooperation.
>you'll need fifteen ponies total, each working with one controller command.
>considering almost all of them will be here in that scenario, you might as well have two humanesquines at each analog stick so everyone can participate.
>then again, you could just have one earth pony on each side of the top of the controller, one unicorn by each analog stick, and one Pegasus on each side of the shoulder buttons. Someone else could work the auxiliary buttons, then they could play competitively with each other and you wouldn't feel guilty about having an unfair advantage.
>someone would have to periodically sit out because of the odd number of players, though.
>it would need to be an abstract level of coordination. Synchronization would be pretty important, sort of like those old cartoons where a bunch of diminutive characters need to shout commands at each other to drive a car.
>you're thinking you should introduce them to Valiant Hearts first if this exercise should be anything more than one of entertainment and communicability.
>Rainbow Dash is trying to lift her current piece to hop it over one of yours.
>she's actually very strategically proficient at the game.
>and as it turns out surprisingly strong for her mass.
>you just see a checker piece hovering a centimeter above the board like a flying saucer.
>she grunts and tosses the red disc over your black one.
>you lift the defeated disc off of the board (much to Rainbow's chagrin) and place it on the pile that took her ten minutes to balance.
>taking your turn, you jump the piece that took a half-minute to displace and slap it down right next to Rainbow Dash (causing her to leap a few relative feet in the air) before jumping another one of her pieces and flipping yours over.
"King me."
>you hear an anguished groan.
>Rainbow sits down and leans back against her nearest defeated piece.
>"This is getting kinda boring," she says. "When are we actually going to get a good look at your world?"
"When Derpy is rested and you get feeling back in your wing."
>Rainbow mutters something under her breath and blows her hair out of her face.
>you lean in closer to Rainbow Dash.
>she glares at you and stands up on tiptoe to give you a death stare.
>you continue leaning.
>eventually, you lean in close enough for Rainbow to reach up and hang onto your nose.
>you sit perfectly still at this, as you feel the treads of her shoes scraping against your skin for a few seconds until she finally pulls herself up and onto your nose.
>you cross your eyes as she scales the bridge and prepares to pounce on one of your right eyelashes.
>in an effort to reduce the risk, you half-close your left eye a split second before Rainbow slams into the lid.
>her hands grip the eyelid.
>if you open your eye too wide, you may just squish her.
>thankfully she stands and leaps up to the eye's respective brow and parts its hairs.
>"Wake up!" you hear her yell.
>you hear a yelp and feel Derpy land on your eyelid before she slides down into a bed of eyelashes.
>"You weren't even sleeping? Are you kidding me?" Rainbow shouts at your eyelash.
>"I was just resting," Derpy replies, climbing back on to your eyelid and weighing it down a little in the process. "It's not like we have anywhere to be anymore."
>you hear a frustrated vocalization from Rainbow Dash.
>instead of pulling her own hair out in anger, she uproots a few of your eyebrow follicles.
>it isn't too painful.
>in fact, it's kind of nice.
>Rainbow sighs in irritation. "Sorry, Anonymous."
"It's what I'm here for."
>Rainbow slides down the bridge of your nose and hops off, swan-diving towards the table before opening her wings and landing crouched with her hand outstretched on the ground.
>majesticasfuck.wmv
>she stands up and looks to you.
>"Can we at least do something that isn't checkers?"
>you lean in.
"Such as?"
>a look of sudden realization jumps to her face.
>"...Do you have anything here like breath mints?"
>you lean back.
"Was that an insult?"
>"No! I mean, like, chewable breath mints. Sorta crack when you break them, shaped like a squashed ball, explode in soda?"
"Mentos?"
>"Is that what you call them here?"
"What do you call them?"
>"Marhos."
"Sounds like some kind of Greek myth."
>Rainbow Dash rolls her eyes. "Of course it does. Do you have any?"
"...Yeah."
>they never kept your head as clear as they ought to.
>you should've just chewed gum or something.
>"How big are they here?"
>you spread your thumb and forefinger about an inch apart.
>as you do this, Rainbow flies onto your thumb with a whistle and examines the gap.
>you notice it's nearly twice her height.
>only now do you realize just how mercilessly minuscule she- and likely everyone who comes after her- is in this world.
>you whimper a little, realizing what she has in mind.
>she looks to you.
>"You don't think I know what I'm doing? This experiment is the sort of thing that only ends in laughter, Anonymous."
"Or tears."
>"Tears of joy!" she smiles widely and raises her arms in enthusiasm.
>you can't stop her.
>she's going to do this either way, and right now she's just offering for you to watch.
>"She'll be alright," a different voice in your mind assures. "She's practically indestructible in any universe."
"Alright. I bought a new bottle on my way back home the other day."
>Rainbow Dash rubs her hands together in anticipation, still beaming like a lunatic, and flies up to the knuckle of your forefinger, allowing you to close your hand.
>you shake the checkerboard off into its box and scrape the remaining pieces off of the table before folding up the board and shutting it into the box.
>you re-enter your house, keeping an eye on the floor for your other guests, and open your refrigerator.
>your stash of Coke sits on the door, resembling rounds of ammunition in its collective position.
>you do have other beverages, of course. You just use the door for your regular Sleep-No-More supplement.
>it's like you were expecting to get fired.
>you remove the top leftmost of the bottles, completely lop siding the stash in the process, and close the door.
>you pull a roll of Mentos from your left inside coat pocket, in which you always have them available, and squeeze a breath mint out of the open end.
>Rainbow flies to the palm in which it lands, and, struggling mildly, lifts the mint up on its edge.
>it's nearly twice her height.
>her arms still supporting the pearly monolith, she does a wolf whistle.
>"Very, very nice," she says. She looks back to you. "Mind giving it a lick?"
>ew.
"Why, exactly?"
>"Unless you can tie me to it without snapping me in half, it's really the only way I'm going to stay stuck to it."
>you take the mint in your left hand.
"This... isn't really all that sanitary, you know."
>Rainbow grits her teeth in frustration.
>"I'll take a bath, then! Just do it, you wimp!"
>in a way not unlike with a napkin, you dab your saliva on the mint with your fingertip.
"Alright. Go ahead."
>Rainbow rams into the mint, cartoonishly forming a tiny crater in the center in the shape of her body.
>she's frozen in a sort of jumping pose.
>it probably looks kind of like a fossil without her in the center.
>you'll have to take a picture of it later if there's anything left of it.
"You okay?"
>her jaw can hardly move. "I'm amazing, thank you."
>you pick up the cola and take Rainbow back out to the porch.
>Derpy seems to be watching intently, from the feeling of your eyebrow being parted.
>you uncap the cola with your right hand, causing it to fizzle, and feel a shivering in your left hand.
>you look at Rainbow again, and see she's gone back to her twisted smile as well as starting to literally jitter with anticipation. The mint is cracking under the pressure of her excitement.
>you don't need to ask if she's ready.
>you drop the mint into the bottle and watch as it submerges in a sea of carbonated resonance.
>you back away as the stuff rockets out of the bottle and seeps between the floorboards.
>maybe it'll rain today.
>"It's... beautiful," Derpy whispers.
>the small geyser created by the wasted bottle must appear almost volcanic to the physically puny Pegasus pony person.
>you're still trying to set a record for how many relevant editions you can apply to that alliteration.
>the suds ceases spewing.
>you read the radius of the reaction for Rainbow Dash.
>"There's... soda... in my everywhere..."
>you look to the source of the sound, and see Rainbow climbing out of the bottle neck.
>pieces of Mento still stick to her.
>she's sopping wet, as if she's been drowned.
>and she has never looked more happy.
>"Oh! Thanks, Anon!" she shouts to you. "I don't think that anypony has ever done anything like that before. Is it even possible outside of this scenario?"
>she pulls herself up, crumbs of mint falling off of her like gravel, and lifts her leg over the bottleneck.
>in getting the leg over, she ends up losing balance and falls flat onto the funnel of the bottle, sticking to it.
>she peels her face off of the bottle and winces in pain.
>her right hand slowly peels off of the plastic as well, so as to reach up and rub her face.
>"I think I might actually have to take that bath, though."
>you nod.
>this time, you'll be careful with the bowl.
>she looks back at her wings, which appear to be stuck together.
>she unsticks the rest of her body from the bottle and stands up.
>she reaches back to her wings and wrenches them apart with a grunt of pain, before dropping her arms and sighing in relief.
>you reach down to her with your fingers outstretched, and she flutters clumsily from the bottle to your palm, landing in a hugging pose.
>hugging.
>you can even feel something like warmth in your hand.
>like the tiniest grain of pure loyal companionship.
>like something no man has ever truly felt before.
>does she mean to hug you?
>is she just stuck there?
>would you really feel this warmth if she was?
>you feel Derpy cautiously touch down on top of your right cheek.
>you see a little yellow-and-gray blur out of your right eye.
>she sits down with her knees to her chest and hums an unintelligible tune that sends the smallest vibrations through your face.
>you hope she doesn't notice as your eye closes a little.
>as you smile.