The streets of Ponyville were nothing more than the streets of a ghost town now. Not a single resident had wanted to stay, everyone afraid of the magic anomaly they were now aware of. That thing had taken three ponies into another place, the location where they actually went no one knew of.

As the sun rose over the horizon, Canterlot was abuzz with rumors that varied from the misinformed to the outright ridiculous. One could walk across the street and hear five different stories; like how Twilight Sparkle and her friends were eaten by an evil metal ball that thirsted for pony blood, or about how two pegasi had formed a portal to Hell and accidentally got sucked in themselves when they tried to throw in a unicorn as a sacrifice, or even that Twilight Sparkle was a robot unicorn from the future that had come to the present to bring back Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy, who were destined to save a space-age that was falling apart at its seams. Rose, Lily and Daisy's frantic freak-outs weren't remedying the situation.

Luna had really wanted to tell those gossiping foals off, but she stuck to the mission she was on—saving the unicorn and her friends. She flew solo to the now-abandoned Ponyville, passing by the guards that were stationed around the borders of the city, to the location of the portal. Of course she was unsure about doing this, and she had had second thoughts, but her determination overcame her fear as she located the portal in an alleyway on the main street. One of her biggest concerns was that Twilight was no longer near the portal's exit, and that she and her friends have already journeyed off to find their way back to Equestria, assuming they were no longer in the country.

"This is it," Luna said quietly to herself as she focused her magic into her horn, and shot out a bullet of energy right into the spark floating above the ground.

The spark immediately expanded into a large ball of shiny steel. It was very ominous to Luna—the sphere was unwavering and didn't make a noise, it simply hovered motionlessly in front of her, giving a slight tug at her horn, beckoning her to enter it.

Luna took a deep breath and flew straight into the portal, ready to face whatever lay on the other side. Her body created small ripples in the surface of the sphere, as if she was entering a ball of water.

Inside, Luna was in a dark ball, a tiny circular room inside the sphere. Beyond the seamless surface of the sphere was a vivid and strange version of the world. Luna was speechless as she watched everything around her suddenly change at the speed of light. She could see the outside from inside of the sphere, only the entire world outside appeared very warped and twisted; all the colors things were supposed to have been were completely different. The world changed so rapidly that she couldn't even make out what was going on, or where she was going. After only several seconds had passed, the entire world came to a screeching halt, and Luna could finally see outside of the sphere that she was in a small acre of grass, a house to her right. The sphere dropped her onto the ground and disappeared in a shower of sparks and light.

Disoriented, she slowly got up onto her hooves, head dizzy, and her stomach feeling ready to relinquish her of her breakfast. She could feel her entire body pulsing. No, wait a minute. That wasn't her, it was…music?

Luna was now aware of the loud rhythmic booming from inside the house she had teleported next to. Taking a quick glance around, she couldn't see anything out of the ordinary from this suburban neighborhood, though everything felt…different. Bringing her attention back to the noise coming from the house, she decided to investigate it. If Twilight had been brought to the same place Luna had, she may have taken refuge in the closest house, assuming the ponies that lived there were hospitable enough. It had been only one day since the incident, so hopefully they were still there…

Luna walked up to a large glass patio door to peer inside the house. The music she had clearly heard now suddenly stopped, and she heard somebody say something.

"…Every day I'm shuffling."

Luna was startled when the music suddenly started booming again, but what really overcame her was when she saw the weirdest looking creature she had ever laid her eyes upon. Some tall, bipedal creature, perhaps a head taller than she was and no hair, save for the curly mass of it on the top of its head. It was doing what appeared to be some strange…mating dance, perhaps? It kept bobbing its head and was walking in place, pumping its fists back and forth. She should probably leave before the thing sees her…

"PRINCESS LUNA!"

Luna twirled around at the sound of the voice, recognizing it immediately. She saw Twilight Sparkle in a doorway to the backdoor of the building several yards away. Without a second thought, they both ran up to each other, a huge smile spread across Luna's face, tears of joy streaming down Twilight's.

"I can't believe you came! We received the letter from you earlier, but we weren't sure how long it could take before you found out a way to bring us back!" Formalities completely forgotten, Twilight grasped Luna around the neck; she was hugging her extremely tight, as if she was afraid that Luna would disappear if she let go.

Luna gave Twilight a comforting pat on the back. "It's alright Twilight Sparkle, you're all going to be fine now. By the way, where are Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy?"

Twilight's was talking fast, still extremely excited. "Oh! They are inside the house! Also, Fluttershy is pretty sick because of the cold weather or something," Luna shivered, now aware of the freezing outdoor air, "and we need to get her out of this world and into a hospital because Pierce doesn't think it's a good idea to give a pony human medicine, and-"

The last part of what Twilight had said caught Luna's attention. "What? What do you mean by 'this world'…and what is a 'human'?"

"Oh, uh, the metal ball thingy took us to the human world, which I think is an alternate universe or something…" Twilight had already accepted all this strange information as fact, but now that she was close to getting back home she was ready to do some investigating and question-solving. But first she needed to tell Rainbow and Fluttershy the good news. "Come with me, Luna!"

Twilight escorted Luna through the door, both of them walking through the garage to another door leading inside the house. "Pierce is a human that lives in this house, and there are a bunch of humans that live on this planet. Ponies exist too, but they aren't even sentient beings! In fact, none of the animals that live here, sans the humans, are intelligent in the slightest! What do you make of that, Princess? OH!-" After having just remembered Luna's royal position, she quickly bowed in place; she was sorry that she hadn't done so sooner.

"Please, Twilight Sparkle, I require no need for such formalities. Anyways, I'm very curious about this 'Pierce' you speak of. Wait, was that the two-legged thing I saw in the window just now?" Luna hadn't known what to think about the strange dance he had been doing.

"Uh, yeah, probably. He's teaching Rainbow Dash how to do the 'shuffle' or something. I was just about to get some fresh air myself," Twilight looked over excitedly to the alicorn again, "and out of nowhere, YOU showed up! This is great!"

Exiting the hallway into the large living room, Twilight tried to get Pierce's attention with a waving of her hoof, since the music was too loud for anyone to hear anything else. Pierce was facing the opposite direction, surveying Rainbow's version of the shuffle—having to do it differently since she had two extra legs and no arms. Rainbow saw Twilight, and greeted her with a nod of her head, then her jaw dropped when Luna came out the hallway as well.

"LUNA!" she shouted at the top of her lungs.

Pierce whirled around to see the validity of Rainbow's claim. His jaw dropped as well when he saw the royal alicorn walking into his living room. He hastily shut off the "Party Rock Anthem" he had been playing to give her his full attention; she was certainly giving him her full attention, eyeing him up and down, giving him a full once-over. He stuttered as she examined him, "Uh, um…wha? Er-" What do you do when a princess is just staring at you, not saying anything? Should he bow? Come to think of it, Luna never did like it when other ponies acted really formal and kept bowing to her. Actually, that was just what he had read in all the Luna fanfics that had been written prior to the Nightmare Night episode, so…

Pierce hastily bowed to Luna, "Princess," he acknowledged. Luna rolled her eyes; even this creature that didn't even know her was doing those stupid formalities. Wait—he knew she was a princess? Sure, she was wearing the crown and the fancy footwear, but how exactly did he know she was a princess, and not a queen or something to that extent?

"You know who I am?" she questioned the human.

"Eeyup," Pierce replied with an air of pride in his voice, "you are Princess Luna, pony princess of the moon and one of the two alicorn sisters that rule the Principality of Equestria, along with your sister Celestia, princess of the sun."

Luna turned to Twilight, doubt on her face. "Are you sure it is a good idea to tell this human so much of our land? I mean, no offense to you," she said reassuringly to Pierce, who just shrugged, "but this strange world has quite a few unknowns, and we don't want to jump headfirst into diplomatic affairs with a common citizen. Again, no offense," she said again to Pierce.

"None taken, I understand. But Princess Luna, there is something that you don't understand." Pierce said this with a tone of cockiness; though he wasn't offended by Luna's remarks, he still enjoyed telling off somebody that gave him a bad rap, no matter who it may be. He gave Luna a moment to look confused, and then continued, "See, I've known just about everything about Twilight Sparkle and her friends without her having to tell me, including their adventures in Ponyville ever since she traveled there for the Summer Sun Celebration. Besides," he had refined his speech since that last time he told it, now keeping the plot twist at the end on purpose, "it is my favorite TV show, so why wouldn't I know so much?"

Luna's eyebrows had scrunched more and more as Pierce kept talking the impossible, but that final statement really did it for her. She had no idea what to think anymore. "…What?"

Twilight chimed in to help Luna understand the situation, "We're all trying to figure out exactly how this is, but it is true Princess. Pierce is one of many 'bronies': adult human men that watch a show called 'My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic' that features my friends and I, including any of the misadventures we have had over the years. I've taken a look at the episodes and the vast 'fanbase' surrounding us all; you in particular are very popular, you should be proud!" Twilight felt it was best that she didn't mention to Luna the "Trollestia". Pierce himself hadn't wanted Celestia's Faithful Student to know that most people saw the Alicorn of the Sun as a jerk that used other's turmoil for her own enjoyment, mainly because he knew how Twilight would react when she discovered this. His hypothesis on her reaction when she found out had been right on the dot, but she had gotten over it by now. It took a lot of explaining from Pierce to the three ponies that not all bronies were 'in their right mind', as he put it (he himself had found Trollestia jokes hilarious, but he wasn't going to tell his favorite pony that). Thankfully, rule 34 was a topic that hadn't been brought up since it appeared in the Google autocomplete.

"So…there are more of you people that know so much about Equestria?" Luna asked.

"What do you mean, you people?" Pierce replied instantly.

"These, er…'bronies', as you put it."

"Well, if I were to guess, there's probably hundreds of thousands of 'em, if not a million or two." Just a rough guesstimate, Pierce really had no clue how many bronies existed.

Luna seemed to have a hard time comprehending, or perhaps accepting, this crazy information she had just been told. When she had entered that portal, she expected to come out in another part of the world—that is, their world—at the worst. Instead, she had uncovered another dimension full of tall bipedal beings that watched a show about her and her subjects for entertainment. It made her feel so…what was it she felt? There was a strange feeling in her heart, but she didn't know how to explain it; helplessness, loneliness, perhaps even witlessness or stupidity. Seeing her strained reaction to everything happening, Rainbow walked up to the princess and put a hoof over her shoulder.

"Hey…c'mon, cheer up Princess. There's gotta be a good explanation for all of this—and you, and me, and Twilight and everypony else is gonna work their brains off if it means finding an answer. I'm just as confused as you are, but now isn't the time to question all this weird stuff going on. It's about time we went back home—Fluttershy is still sick, and we should really get her to a pony hospital."

Luna shook off the bad feelings and smiled to Rainbow for comforting her before saying, "Ah, yes, Twilight Sparkle had mentioned earlier that the cold weather had given her a fever. Where is she at the moment?"

Pierce pointed to the pink tail sticking out from under a blanket on the living room couch. Fluttershy, having been mentioned, peeked out from under the blanket to see if she had been spotted. Upon meeting eyes with the dreaded Nightmare Moon, she quickly slid the blanket back over her face, uttering a weak "meep!" in the process.

"Dammit, Fluttershy! Now's not the time for this!" Pierce didn't like being mean to the shy pegasus, but this really wasn't a time for her to freak out over a harmless pony. Besides, how does that probably make Luna feel?

Fluttershy uneasily lifted the blanket from her head again, obeying Pierce's suddenly authoritative figure. Her bloodshot eyes were clearly visible now; while her mentality had stabled and she no longer had any bad headaches, her physical condition was still declining, and she had started to cough earlier in the morning. While she wasn't in desperate need for medical attention, it would be in her best interest if she got some form of medicine soon.

"Now, Princess Luna?" Twilight was eager to get to the point now, "How are we going to get back to Equestria?"

Luna smiled to the unicorn, happy that she now had knowledge of an actual plan they could carry out. "As the portal we have entered was a one-way-in portal, a small group of soldiers and I went out to locate a one-way-out counterpart to it, which had actually been a success. With a few calculations and estimations, I can find out the location of this one-way-out portal and effectively activate it in Equestria from this human realm with my magic."

The room grew silent. There was one more small detail that everyone had forgotten to mention to Luna. And now, because of this, what will become of her plan?

Luna looked uneasily at the other four in the room, all of them now looking around the room, trying to avoid eye contact with her. She didn't want to believe what she thought they meant by this, but she had a feeling that that was the only answer. Without a second thought, she drew her magic into her horn to make sure that everything was in check. Except that nothing happened. Luna was slowly going into a panic as she realized the gravity of their situation. Her carefully mapped plan had just ripped at the seams, and now they were all stranded in an unfamiliar world.

"Yeah…um…magic doesn't work here." Pierce finally said.