GREEN   302   0
   26834 150.7 KB    1835

Anu

By meslam
Created: 2024-01-30 22:46:38
Updated: 2024-07-24 07:53:38
Expiry: Never
pony/ptfg/transformationpon-esfwpon3

  1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXEnNyPV9QE
  2. [Komorebi - Backwoods]
  3. >There was an endless tape you had playing in the foggy depths of your head.
  4. >It was a recording of every time your mother had called your name.
  5. >”Anonymous.” ”Hey, Anonymous.” “Anon.” “~Good morning Anonymous!” “Anonymous!” “Anon...” “Anonymous?” “Good night, Anonymous.” “Eat up Anon!” “Oh, hello Anonymous!” “ANONYMOUS.”
  6. >It all appeared to you in a grainy film view, projected on a wall you weren’t familiar with.
  7. >You were still a pony, and you could feel your fur rubbing against the grain of the fuzz of the air mattress beneath you.
  8. >The atmosphere was damp and smelled like sea-spray.
  9. >From the one window in the tiny room you were in, up on the wall to your right, you could hear the sound of waves crashing nearby.
  10. >Your mother’s changing faces reeled by, from smiling to grinning to laughing to crying to staring to-
  11. >Suddenly the scene in the film shifted, melting away like a bad artifact in an old video file, into a shot of a streetlamp with a dozen moths fluttering around it.
  12. >Then reality shifted as well and you duly assented, parsing the information in front of your mind’s eye, but processing it..?
  13. >You were staring at the streetlamp, watching the moths flap around pointlessly, occasionally banging into the plastic casing of the light they’d never quite reach.
  14. >Sighing, you put your hands in your pockets and started walking down the street, on two feet.
  15. >Really, you were human again.
  16. >Wearing jeans again, wearing a normal hoodie again.
  17. >A short laugh, so short for the moment.
  18. >Was it you who laughed?
  19. >Wait, you weren’t you.
  20. >You were a pony again.
  21. >The neighbourhood was never yours from the beginning.
  22. >Everything was in the wrong way, and in the wrong place again.
  23. >Houses clustered together and piled on top of each other with sheets of corrugated metal and debris branching roofs one to the other.
  24. >It was a sprawling favela.
  25. >You saw yourself, as a pony, go flying off the roof of one bodega on a skateboard.
  26. >She did a kickflip and promptly bit the dust when she landed on the pavement in front of you.
  27. >But when you looked at her, she was fine.
  28. >You stood there, and you stood there, staring back at yourself.
  29. >Then to your right, you saw yourself again, human, male, standing there.
  30. >He was staring at a streetlamp.
  31. >Suddenly a your face burned with stinging pain.
  32. >The scene changed to be replaced with another, and it was like twisting the lens of a kaleidoscope, all flash and colour.
  33. >You were fighting in a pit of gravel and slate.
  34. >Fighting a unicorn, with patches of scales in his fur, metal wings on his back and claws on his hooves.
  35. >The rain was beating down on the both of you but he looked untouched.
  36. >No, you were laying on a sofa.
  37. >You could smell soap.
  38. >The smell of ozone was strong in the air, and as if to punctuate it, a great bolt of lighting reached down from a thunderhead above and struck the unicorn’s wings.
  39.  
  40. >His fur was white, so white your fur could not be called white anymore, especially with how tarnished it had gotten in the mud and the rain.
  41. >His scales and wings were of burnished brass.
  42. >The fabric of the sofa was soft and nostalgic, it reminded you of days you thought you’d forgotten, when you were just 3 years old.
  43. >You were kicking with all your might against the unicorn, going blow for blow, buck for buck, as he struck back and parried with his horn.
  44. >Five times he nearly gored you on the end of it, and four times he cut just askance with his claws, tearing your flesh.
  45. >The sun was shining through the window, on your face
  46. >You blinked and everything was bright.
  47. >Everything was okay.
  48. >You were comfortably snuggled up in a fleece blanket, laying on a fat red sofa, with your head smushed into a pillow.
  49. >Your memories of the journey through slumber that you’d only just quit moments ago, were quickly sifting their way out of your mind as you blinked and fidgeted.
  50. >You just managed to hold on to the memory of that lonely room by the ocean, and started to recount it to yourself in your head to remember better.
  51. >Then the crackling, spitting sound of bacon frying made your ears twitch and turn.
  52. >There was also talking somewhere behind you, a familiar feminine contralto, and a stranger tone that answered it.
  53. >You tried to lift yourself up, and that comforted feeling you had was washed away in a sea of vertigo.
  54. >Your face fell back into the pillow, and you moaned feebly.
  55. “MMnnnngghh...”
  56. >Your head was like a cup of apple sauce, you felt like if you moved at all, you’d tip it over and just spill your brains everywhere.
  57. >Without moving any part of yourself besides your eyes, you took in your surroundings, just now starting to associate them with your memories.
  58. >Right, this was Aisling’s house.
  59. >There was the fireplace, no fire in it now.
  60. >The scorch marks on the floor, the open book on the coffee table, two empty cups beside it.
  61. >Sunbeams speckled by dust gleamed through the window behind your head to land on the wood floor.
  62. >Across from you, on the other side of the room, you could see the dinner table, with the window looking out on the back yard behind it.
  63. >But you couldn’t see the kitchen, where everything was happening.
  64. >”-et the bread? I do-”
  65. >That was Aisling.
  66. >”-en she wak-”
  67. >Who was that?
  68. >It was all still meaningless to you, the talking.
  69. >A strange smile tugged at the edges of your lips, you could understand bacon, but not English.
  70. >If you could just... shift...
  71. “rrrGGnnhh...”
  72. >You slid your head up a few inches, and it made you feel like you were swimming upside-down in a turbulent surf, being battered by the tide.
  73. >Your vision pulsed and wavered, before finally coming into focus again.
  74. >With breathless blowing, you shifted the blonde strands of your mane out of your eyes.
  75. >Over the counter, inside the kitchen, you could see a black unicorn standing on a wooden stepping stool in front of the stove.
  76. >Aisling.
  77.  
  78. >Her horn was glowing softly, maintaining a magic hand with a spatula in its grip.
  79. >The metallic ribbon that was her tail bobbed left and right to the tune of her humming.
  80. >Thank God she was fine.
  81. >But for all her carefree joy, and all the comfortable things you were surrounded by, you felt totally numb and hollow.
  82. >Where was Chad?
  83. >The last thing you remembered before waking up just a minute ago was him stomping out of the fairy circle.
  84. >Regrets only piled up from there; getting scared when the gnomes were pursuing, freezing up when they appeared, losing your head to your hobby while the gnomes surrounded you, giving in to Clapperleg’s demands with barely a fight...
  85. >...Casting that spell, with the worst possible timing, right after Chad gave himself up to stop everything.
  86. >Your breathing came faster and faster as you watched your, mercifully, living friend hum and cook.
  87. >But you were still too weak to call out to her and ask about Chad.
  88. >The logic that if Aisling was okay, he must be too, was dreadfully tempting, though you reeled at the thought of clinging to it, in case you were wrong.
  89. “Uuuuuurrhhg...”
  90. >As you quietly agonized, Aisling flipped the whole panful of bacon onto a plate, her humming rising to a crescendo of actual singing with the motion.
  91. >Then, deftly, she went about cracking and frying eggs next.
  92. >The mare smiled and tossed her silvery mane as she looked behind her to flick off the boiling kettle, still not noticing that you were watching her.
  93. >”Got the bread.”
  94. >Your heart jumped in your chest, and your ears pinned themselves flat to your head as your disbelieving eyes stared at the horror that had just walked in.
  95. >There was a giant talking bird in the kitchen.
  96. >You could just see the head of it, like a massive hawk’s, over the top of the counter.
  97. >The sharp yellow eyes on it may as well have been shooting lasers they looked so piercing.
  98. >One ragged breath escaped your muzzle before you managed to stifle it, worried that the raptor might notice you were there.
  99. >It had spoken to Aisling like it was nothing.
  100. >And, like nothing, she turned her slender neck and answered,
  101. >”Thanks. It’s almost ready. Maybe you should try and wake her up?”
  102. >The bird somehow dumped the loaf of bread on the counter-top next to Aisling with its leg?
  103. >Were you still dreaming?
  104. >What-
  105. >Without turning his head, the predator’s eye locked onto yours.
  106. >Your heart was pounding so hard it hurt, as a crooked smirk forked across the hawk’s face.
  107. >”Really, half past zero-dark-thirty and you’re only awake now?”
  108. >Half past zero-dark-thirty, the code.
  109. >‘Hurt, but still alive.’
  110. >You gasped, and sobbed as all the horror was flushed away with relief.
  111. >Chad, the hawk was Chad.
  112. >Your barrel rose and fell abruptly from the harsh staccato of your breathing.
  113. “Chad...”
  114. >You cried weakly.
  115. >Tears were welling in your eyes and your fore legs were kicking desperately beneath the blanket.
  116. >You wanted so much to fly off the sofa and tackle him, but you just couldn’t.
  117.  
  118. >Chad’s rictus smirk drooped, his eye, so sharp a moment ago, grew dull and nearly glassy.
  119. >Slowly he stepped around the counter and you got a look at what he’d become.
  120. >Front half of a hawk, back half of a lion.
  121. >Grey, white, rust.
  122. >He had the feathers of a ferruginous hawk.
  123. >Everything besides his expression looked like it was shaped for the purpose of killing.
  124. >Right now, you didn’t care.
  125. “You’re... alive... thank... God...”
  126. >You breathed out between great sobs.
  127. >Chad’s talons scratched and clipped against the wood floor as he walked over to you.
  128. >That was when the most unfathomable regret of all struck you.
  129. >It was your fault he was like this, all of it was your fault.
  130. >You sucked down air and tried to regain your composure, to apologize properly and promise to make amends.
  131. >But before you could, Chad set a scaled hand on your head, and mussed up your mane.
  132. >”Don’t apologize.”
  133. >He was smiling.
  134. >Aisling was smiling too, her chin resting on crossed hooves.
  135. >Your face twisted up into a ball of regret, your lips pulled right back and you grimaced.
  136. >You could taste your tears, dripping past your mouth.
  137. >This wasn’t right, you didn’t deserve their smiling.
  138. >All you could think of was what a coward you had been.
  139. >You sniffed and rubbed some of the wet from your eyes with one hoof, only to cry more.
  140. >A hoarse, bitter laugh broke past your mouth, and you choked,
  141. “FUCK... you...”
  142. >”Anonymous...”
  143. >Aisling murmured.
  144. >Chad just shook his head and sighed,
  145. >”You were cornered, do you seriously think I’m going to blame you for that?”
  146. >Your anger flashed hot and short like gunfire.
  147. “If YOU were cornered, I KNOW you would blame yourself!”
  148. >The stupid crying just wouldn’t stop, you could hardly breathe, and Chad wasn’t taking you seriously.
  149. >Even around that beak, you could tell he had not been bothered by your outburst at all.
  150. >Who could blame him?
  151. >You looked ridiculous right now, just a snivelling little horse in a blanket.
  152. >He’d probably saved your life and Aisling’s life twenty odd times while you literally just snoozed away.
  153. >Fuck.
  154. >Fuck this.
  155. “Fuck being a pony.”
  156. >For the first time, your words seemed to have some impact on Chad, and he stepped back from you.
  157. >Your eyes darted to Aisling.
  158. >But she was gone to flip eggs or whatever.
  159. “I’m so...”
  160. >You breathed, and breathed, fighting back the sobs.
  161. >Finally, with one great gasp, you managed to get some air in your lungs, and you wiped away the tears from your eyes.
  162. >You grunted and tried to push yourself up on your hooves forcefully, ignoring the dizzy spell that struck.
  163. >Chad reached out to stop you, to put you back on your side, but you slapped his claws away with a hoof before stumbling off the couch and onto the floor.
  164. >You laid there in a pile, groaning, when a sudden and sharp pain cut your breath short.
  165.  
  166. ##Gratitude
  167.  
  168. >Reflexively, you wrenched your body off of it’s side and turned your head to check the damage.
  169. >The lead feathers of your right wing were bent almost all the way backwards against you, and just twitching the affected limb netted you fresh jolts of pain.
  170. >Burning with frustration, you snapped,
  171. “Fuck.”
  172. >Chad simply sighed and shook his head as you struck out with your mouth to lay the feathers back as flat as you could.
  173. >Then you jerked your wing up against your barrel, where it still throbbed harshly.
  174. >Now, bracing yourself with short breaths, you planted your hooves on the boards and started the laborious process of standing up all over again, when a scaly yellow hand was lowered in front of your face.
  175. >You looked up into Chad’s waiting face.
  176. >Your eyes twitched over his sympathetic expression, as he started to say,
  177. >”Anonymous-”
  178. “I’m fine.”
  179. >You replied curtly.
  180. >Groaning and aching, you forced yourself to stand.
  181. >With great pains, wobbling twigs for legs and nausea so bad you nearly threw up, you were finally on all fours and breathing hard.
  182. >What even was this anyway?
  183. >A magic hangover?
  184. >Magic was such horseshit.
  185. >Aisling and Chad were both standing in front of you now, with no expressions to be read on their faces.
  186. >Out of everything, it hurt you the most to see them like that, because you knew it was your actions that had put them in this position.
  187. >All the more, it made you feel like this was the right thing to do.
  188. >You had to take responsibility first, even if that came across as callous or ungrateful.
  189. >So, as gravely as you could manage, you sunk your head low into a bow and apologized.
  190. “I’m sorry, please forgive me. I will help fix this.”
  191. >For a minute neither of them responded, and you didn’t move, you just stared at the floor.
  192. >All you could hear was your own heart, and the occasional spit of grease from the pan on the stove.
  193. >It was kind of soothing on your magic hangover actually, like a recovery position.
  194. >Suddenly your ears twitched to the sound of Chad’s claws scraping the floor, and the clopping of Aisling’s hooves soon after.
  195. >You lifted your eyes, expecting to seem them walking up to you, maybe for some corny make-up group hug.
  196. >...That you half-way wanted.
  197. >But they had taken their seats at the dinner table instead, where Aisling already had breakfast all laid out.
  198. >You blinked.
  199. >And stared.
  200. >Chad snipped off a section of toast with his beak, popped in a strip of bacon, sucked an egg yolk out from the white and chased it all down with most of his share of coffee before Aisling had hovered her fork over.
  201. >Grunting approvingly, he reached over to pat and rub her hoof on the table while looking her up and down like they were some elderly couple.
  202. >Aisling just rolled her eyes and laughed before digging into her eggs.
  203. >”Hey, geek.”
  204. >Chad’s voice snapped you back into yourself.
  205. >He was hitting you with a baffled expression.
  206.  
  207. >As if it was the most obvious thing in the world, Chad jabbed a thumb talon out next to him, at another plate of food.
  208. >”Breakfast come on, you need it.”
  209. >Your heart sunk, you tucked one fore leg behind the other, and blood rushed to your face as your tail swayed left to right.
  210. >You were in the rapid process of actually waking up, and the more your brain pumped, the stupider you felt.
  211. >FUCK this was embarrassing now.
  212. >It just hit you that you’d been a self-centred moron all morning.
  213. >Refusing help, and insisting on apologizing while secretly waiting for your friends to just forgive you and make up right away anyhow?
  214. >Chad rolled his eyes at your expression, then held his claw out at you as he shook his head, brashly imploring,
  215. >”Don’t make this any weirder alright? We’re already two unicorns, a dozen gnomes, and a griffon away from normal. Let’s at least eat breakfast like it’s nothing.”
  216. >Aisling just smiled at you a little wanly, her eyes glancing at your friend as he emoted.
  217. >You bit your lip.
  218. >You’d been desperately melodramatic, you realized, and now you could feel the secondhand embarrassment of your friends.
  219. >Just... Relax, you thought.
  220. >Nodding without speaking another word, you walked over and clumsily climbed into your seat, without Chad or Aisling offering you any assistance.
  221. >You resolved yourself to just stay quiet and eat for now, get your energy up before you said anything else.
  222. >But before your mouth reached the plate, Chad spoke again.
  223. >”I don’t forgive you, because there’s nothing to forgive.”
  224. >Your eyes flicked to him, watching him vigorously dab his toast into the yolk of his second egg.
  225. >He snapped up a bite, and spoke around it with his eyes more intent on his bacon than you,
  226. >”And obfiously ur gonna help stupid.”
  227. >Aisling chimed in, and her eyes gleamed meaningfully at yours.
  228. >”If anything, I have more to apologize for than you, but if we started now, we would be at it all day.”
  229. >Chad stabbed his last strip of bacon with a talon.
  230. >”Then there would be no time to kill that thing.”
  231. >You sympathized immediately with the dark look in his eyes.
  232. >For the first time all morning, there was something you could speak to with confidence, like a gleaming bit of gold you’d swept the sand and grit away from.
  233. >The feeling was as if the fact had been revealed to you in your dreams last night, though you could sift what memories you had of them and know for certain it wasn’t.
  234. >Calmly, you said,
  235. “He’s not a gnome.”
  236. >And punctuated it with a bite of egg.
  237. >Aisling tilted her head from behind her hoisted mug, curiously, and her ears flopped to the side.
  238. >Your griffon friend just paid rapt attention, crunching toast awkwardly with his beak.
  239. >For the next moment, you took a bite of your toast while you formalized the explanation in your head.
  240. >They both waited patiently, eating too, until finally you swallowed and continued.
  241.  
  242. “It’s the nickname that gave it away, Clapperleg. I got halfway to making the connection when he said it back then, but dropped it because uh...”
  243. >You stuck your tongue out and set your head askance, staring at the floor while you thought of a good euphemism for “I was quizzing a gnome on what myths about his race were true while they had us surrounded”.
  244. >Chad sighed and leaned back in his chair, drinking more coffee before he cleanly capped off your sentence.
  245. >”You were busy.”
  246. >With your mouth in a thin line, you nodded to him.
  247. “Yeah. I was busy.”
  248. >You took a deep breath and focused again, this next part was too important to fuck up.
  249. >Looking straight at both of your friends, you continued.
  250. “His real name is Cichol Gricenchos. They’re Fomorians, not gnomes.”
  251. >Faint recognition was dawning in Aisling’s eyes, but there were wrinkles of doubt on her brow too.
  252. >Chad just nodded.
  253. >”How do we kill Fomorians? I tried steel and it worked pretty good.”
  254. >For a moment, Aisling had opened her mouth and raised a hoof to cut in, but stopped and stared at Chad instead.
  255. >The bird brain was leaning his chair way back on two legs in front of a clean plate and an empty cup of coffee.
  256. >That arrogant smirk on his face made you feel like nothing had changed, at least not since the day he got duct tape off of your fore legs with olive oil.
  257. >You grinned and laughed right at Chad, while he looked on, bemused.
  258. >The unicorn at the end of the table let out a little giggle too.
  259. >Peering at you, he asked.
  260. >”What?”
  261. >And eventually you packed your mirth in enough to answer.
  262. “You got turned into a griffon by stepping out of a ring of mushrooms last night. You don’t even know what a Fomorian is. I... I may as well be talking Star Trek right now, and you’re just going to run in there and kill them anyway?”
  263. >Chad shrugged.
  264. >”As far as I’m concerned, you always are. I already know what I know, and what I don’t know I know you know.”
  265. >Aisling and you just gaped.
  266. >Letting his head fall back out of exasperation, Chad splayed out his arms and pointed his next remark right at you,
  267. >”You remember what you said, back in high school, after that big fight.”
  268. “...What. Not... not that ‘you hold the monopoly’ right?”
  269. >You shook your head after you answered and started pecking at your eggs again, hardly believing that was even something you’d considered.
  270. >...But the silence was ominous enough to make you look up.
  271. >Chad was grinning.
  272. >”I hold the monopoly on violence. Always liked the way you put it back then, nice vocabulary. ‘You hold the monopoly on violence, and you dispense with it judiciously.’”
  273. >He quoted.
  274. >The memory flashed through your head; you’d just gotten out of a schoolyard brawl with Chad at your side, not totally on the winning end of the scale.
  275. >He was bummed out, wiping the blood out of his mouth, until you had put on a mocking, drama club kid voice and said something corny to lighten the mood.
  276. “That was a jok....”
  277.  
  278. >In a disbelief so profound that you failed to keep talking, you watched as the bird brain in front of you held a set of claws to his chest and spoke again using that odd locution unique to him.
  279. >”I trust that you can trust me to dispense the violence judiciously on your behalf.”
  280. >Aisling was halfway to rubbing her face off with her hooves.
  281. >You wanted desperately for him to just stop talking.
  282. >Telling him anything ever was a mistake.
  283. >Your tail was whipping the chair so hard it stung, and your cheeks were burning with blush.
  284. >Sensing your discomfort, Chad broke things up with a chuckle full of bravado as he set his chair aright again and smacked you on the withers.
  285. >But he felt the need to fire one last torpedo of a sentence at your ears as he reached over and stole your untouched bacon too.
  286. >”You point. I shoot. I don’t care what Fomorians are really, but go ahead.”
  287. >There was nothing you could do but physically cringe away while Chad crunched happily at the strip of meat.
  288. >...Aisling was the first to break the silence, with a question pointed at you.
  289. >”It’s a bit of a stretch to say they came all the way here don’t you think?”
  290. >You gathered yourself, munched up some toast, and nodded.
  291. “Yeah, but I really don’t see any other explanation. It all fits together way too well. Clapperleg is an actual word that has been used as a translation for Cichol’s epithet, Gricenchos.”
  292. >Now you looked at Chad and asked him directly,
  293. “He showed you his feet right?”
  294. >And Chad nodded back, with some disgust lingering on his lips at the memory.
  295. >”They were fucked.”
  296. >Nodding, you turned your gaze back to Aisling, who was looking a little more convinced at this point.
  297. “There’s another detail I haven’t really mentioned yet,”
  298. >You started.
  299. >But first you had to confirm your suspicions with Chad.
  300. “You mentioned earlier that steel worked on them, does that mean you couldn’t hurt them without it?”
  301. >Chad nodded and showed you his left hand bristling with sharp talons.
  302. >”I stuck Clapperleg or Cichol or whatever with these and he didn’t even bleed. But before that I remembered something you said about fairies so I stabbed him in the chest with my knife and nearly killed him before he got away. Tore another one of them in half, no blood, still alive. The knife was definitely the only thing that could hurt them. Left it back there in one of their skulls.”
  303. >Hearing that made you completely certain of your theory.
  304. >You sipped some coffee and continued what you were going to say before, with your eyes on Aisling especially.
  305. “I could hurt him, with my own body. He bled after that kick. No iron necessary. That’s what really confirms it for me, it must be my Celtic ancestry that allows me to do it.”
  306. >”Partholón...”
  307. >Aisling murmured.
  308. >Finally, Chad seemed curious, and looked to you inquiringly.
  309. >You broke it down simply for him,
  310.  
  311. “Basically the Fomorians were this mythical race of subterranean slash deep sea people or creatures depending on how you interpret the writings. They were the original inhabitants of what we call Ireland now. Partholón was a man who came with group of settlers to the island, he was supposed to have killed Cichol, Clapperleg, and scattered the Fomorians. Although there are accounts that say Partholón only defeated him.”
  312. >The griffon seemed satisfied, and walked away to get himself another cup of coffee.
  313. >Aisling pushed her empty plate aside and leaned over the table far enough to have both of her fore legs on it, her tail idly swishing back and forth as she pressed you with another question.
  314. >”So what do you think they’re doing looking like gnomes? Their methods with the verbal contracts were very specific.”
  315. >You finished off your eggs and answered,
  316. “If we think about it this way, now that the existence of these things is confirmed, we should assume that much of, if not all mythology is real in one way or another.”
  317. >Pressing a hoof to her chin, Aisling laid into the table and thought for a minute.
  318. >Then she said,
  319. >”There are a lot of trickster spirits in myth after all... And the Fomorians were portrayed as being a kind of mix of different creatures. Maybe they can shape shift? And they just decided to look like gnomes for that encounter?”
  320. >You shrugged.
  321. “It probably doesn’t matter too much either way, but at least we won’t be surprised if they look different when we see them again.”
  322. >Chad was back from the kitchen, with a fresh mug of hot coffee in his grasp.
  323. >Speaking to the both of you he proposed,
  324. >”Let’s turn on the fake news, see if Anon’s spell did anything noticeable.”
  325. >You both nodded, and got up from your chairs.
  326. >For a second you eyed your half full cup of coffee, regretful to leave it behind, when suddenly it was wrapped in a turquoise glow and floated off.
  327. >Aisling gave you a smile, her horn glowing and both your mug and hers hovering by her.
  328. “Thanks.”
  329. >”Yeah, no problem. I should try to teach you how after this.”
  330. >That lit a flame of excitement in your belly.
  331. >You could cast spells now, it made you want to try it right away.
  332. >For the moment though, you just sat down on the couch with your friends, in front of the TV and the empty fireplace.
  333. >Chad was laying a bit like a sphinx, with his arms crossed over the arm rest beside him.
  334. >His face was turned intelligently at you, like many birds of prey you’d seen before, and it felt a little uncanny knowing this was your friend.
  335. >You sat up straight between his lion back half and Aisling.
  336. >Passively, you turned your head back to peek out the window.
  337. >It was bright and sunny outside, but probably still frigid, since the snow hadn’t melted down much at all.
  338. >Aisling drew the curtains to keep the glare off the screen, obscuring your view, so you turned back around.
  339. >With a quick spell, Aisling flicked the TV on.
  340.  
  341. ##The Reveal
  342.  
  343. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0GKHaQ2MpuI
  344. [Aphex Twin - Stone in Focus]
  345. >The grainy recording of an infomercial appeared on the screen, and the scene was an older man spilling a glass of milk down his shirt.
  346. >Click!
  347. >Your ears were pummelled with an exceedingly generic electric guitar riff, causing them to flip flat to your head, while on screen two boys were gunning each other down with foam dart blasters.
  348. >Click!
  349. >While you watched Aisling tumble through the channels, you braced yourself mentally.
  350. >The worst case was that any amount of PON-E was enough to be permanently transformed, and the dwarves had started putting it in food.
  351. >You swallowed as the channels came and went; commercials and pre-recorded programs blaring for a second before giving out to the next number’s moment of white noise.
  352. >Aisling was clearly searching for something live, and with how fast she was going one might have thought she was getting frantic, but her face hardly seemed to have lost any of that relaxed glow from breakfast.
  353. >Now that you thought about it, her and Chad had been given a lot more time to process all of this...
  354. >It made you wish that you had asked some pointed questions earlier, instead of sperging out about ‘blame’ and ‘responsibility’, but it was too late now.
  355. >Whatever the outcome of the spell was, that was just it, the outcome.
  356. >All you could do now was observe.
  357. >Despite that, your thoughts still hurriedly rounded back to the possibilities, while your body fidgeted and fretted.
  358. >You had to stop yourself from trying to bite one of your hooves like it was a fingernail.
  359. >If the worst case was true, and it likely was, there would have been a sudden mass outbreak of transformations.
  360. >And if not yet, then soon...
  361. “Fuck...”
  362. >You whispered, hardly audible over the insensate babble of an advertisement for a cereal brand.
  363. >...The insidious option of a slow poisoning had just smuggled its way into your head.
  364. >Although it was technically an even more horrific possibility than instant widespread transformation, it left you with the tempting possibility of deferring blame over time.
  365. >But you quashed it right away.
  366. >In that last moment before you had blanked out from the magic flooding through your brain, you’d seen real fear in Clapperleg, in Cichol’s eyes.
  367. >The Fomorian’s gnomish contract deception had been clever and calculated on a surface level, but the more you poked and pulled at their nature, the more you saw the attack for what it was.
  368. >A desperation play.
  369. >This idea of a slow, drawn out extinction of mankind through PON-E tainting was just not possible.
  370. >The Fomorians did not have that kind of time.
  371. >You had no idea why they didn’t, but still you had no doubt.
  372. >Before you could form a more concrete basis beyond that first gut feeling, Chad cut in, clicking his beak and pointing with his claw.
  373. >”Go back one. That was the news, it was just on commercial.”
  374. >Aisling nodded and acquiesced.
  375. >It was the middle of some car advert.
  376.  
  377. >As the seconds ticked by, and the corny ‘uplifting’ piano in the ad plinged and plonged, your heart pumped faster and faster.
  378. >You knew no matter what had happened your friends wouldn’t blame you, and that what Chad had said earlier was more than just.
  379. >But your body just didn’t seem to believe it.
  380. >Your ears rotated all about to the tiniest noises, your tail kept twitching and shivering almost violently, and your withers were tensed up as solid as rock.
  381. >Suddenly, your sweater felt uncomfortably warm, and with a jolt you realized you were panicking.
  382. >But you were so hopped up on adrenaline that even knowing you were was not enough to calm you down.
  383. >In a motion about as smooth as grinding two millstones together, you turned your head to look at Aisling.
  384. >Once again you were amazed at her constitution.
  385. >She tipped her muzzle so deftly to drink from her cup of coffee, that only a single hair in her mane drifted over her eyes.
  386. >And it seemed to just melt back into the molten silvery flow as she straightened out again.
  387. >You had been half hoping for some encouraging words, but her gaze was fixed so raptly on the screen that she didn’t notice you looking at her.
  388. >Somehow you couldn’t muster the energy to talk right now anyway, so you turned away.
  389. >On screen, the featured SUV was coming over the top of a hill on a quiet highway through a coniferous forest.
  390. >A man’s voice with a British accent extolled the virtues of the vehicle while your eyes wandered to the right.
  391. >Chad seemed calm at first glance, and just as fixed on the TV as Aisling.
  392. >Suddenly though, the sound of tearing fabric reached your ears, and the source was immediately obvious.
  393. >Your griffon-friend’s talons were steadily puncturing the arm rest as his claws locked up.
  394. >Aisling didn’t seem to notice.
  395. >You motioned to let him know, but your voice never left your throat.
  396. >The climax of the commercial was coming, it was the typical trope of the SUV coming to a full stop before hitting something.
  397. >After the stunned, yet relieved face of the actress driving the car faded to a logo on a black background, your muscles all tensed up in anticipation.
  398. >The screen had gone totally black, the final jingle of the ad had ended.
  399. >Aisling and Chad and you were all leaned as far forward in your seats as you all could be without falling over.
  400. >The screen flashed white for a moment, dazzling your eyes, before displaying the typical intro animation of the morning news segment.
  401. >All three of you sighed loudly, and fell back into the couch.
  402. >You lowered your head, as your anticipation turned into pent up frustration.
  403. >To vent some of it off, you forced a second, longer, more lingering sigh from yourself while you stared holes into the floor.
  404. >Suddenly, the recognizable jabber of a news person started up from the television and you snapped your head up as fast as you could.
  405.  
  406. >Your eyes locked onto the lit screen, and immediately your whole world gave out below you.
  407. >Reality was impossibly more terrible than the worst thing you could have thought of.
  408. >There was a newscaster babbling excitedly and nonsensically to the camera.
  409. >She was a pony.
  410. >A raspberry pink pony with a sandy blonde mane, and earmuffs pointlessly pressed to the sides of her head.
  411. >Her speech was queer, full of strange turns of phrase that made everything she said completely unintelligible at first.
  412. >But then your brain started to catch up, to process it properly.
  413. >”-ut everypony is now wondering if the federal government is going to trot in or if they’re going to be delegating this relief effort to a particular somepony, like the minister of health, or if there’s any sort of plan at all. Earlier this morning the Prime Minister released a statement asking ponies to-”
  414. >It was all ‘horsetalk’, that was the first word that came to your mind.
  415. >Since you had been transformed, you had experienced instances where in your head you thought up replacement nouns, verbs and colloquialisms that weren’t real, but suited your new body better: everypony, on the other hoof, etc.
  416. >You’d never said them out loud, except as a joke maybe.
  417. >But this reporter was spitting them out like it was second nature, there was no put upon act or any indication of a joke in the tone of her voice at all.
  418. >She was being completely serious.
  419. >Behind her was some government office, surrounded by thousands of stampeding figures.
  420. >They were all ponies.
  421. >There wasn’t a single human in sight.
  422. >Pegasi soared through the air all around, trash cans and other debris were floating up in magical lights before being flung limply at the walls of the besieged edifice by screaming and whinnying unicorns, normal ponies bucked and kicked and tumbled over each other in the snow and the mud.
  423. >And everywhere, always, resounded the cacophony of clopping hooves.
  424. >Aisling whispered beside you, her breath whispering like the wind.
  425. >“They... reversed...”
  426. >Taking PON-E will turn a human into a pony.
  427. >“So... now-”
  428. >Chad cut her off, and stifled your thoughts with a brief flare of hope.
  429. >”This might just be a local thing. Switch to 33, then 48, then 56.”
  430. >Aisling’s magical hand worked the remote in a fury, flicking through all the channel numbers Chad had rattled off in quick succession.
  431. >A scene in Washington, ponies were stampeding up the steps of the Capitol Buil-
  432. >Ten ponies were all bucking in unison, against the glass door of an Apple store on a cobbled street corner in Londo-
  433. >Two unicorns were sat across from each other in a newsroom, while a video of ponies wrapped in blankets, all standing around in Moscow’s Red Squ-
  434. >Back to the local news.
  435. >The field outside the building had been thoroughly stomped into muck at this point, and a news anchor, a light green stallion with a slicked back teal mane, was commenting on the situation.
  436.  
  437. >”Yes well err... The PM has come out with another statement affirming that this is a nationwide issue affecting... Well, everypony. A general state of emergency has been declared-”
  438. >Chad ripped out a fistful of the armrest and flung it at the television, while Aisling sighed and rubbed at her eyes with a hoof.
  439. >You breathed out from your nostrils and tried not to boil over.
  440. >But there was no doubt left, this was clearly not just a mass overdose.
  441. >The rules had changed.
  442.  
  443. >NOT taking PON-E will turn a human into a pony.
  444.  
  445. >You were practically catatonic as you swiftly iterated through the full scope of the calamity, struck so dumb that your tongue actually lolled out of your gaping mouth.
  446. >Every breath was a rugged struggle, but your heart and mind both raced frenetically.
  447. >To begin with, your level of thinking had been far too shallow, rather than just making PON-E a more powerful drug, the gnomes had used the existence of PON-E to strike at the very nature of ‘humans existing’.
  448. >Cichol had specifically said: ‘the effects of PON-E’.
  449. >Effects, plural.
  450. >It must be, that only one other thing had been reversed.
  451. >Before, if a human overdosed on PON-E, they would turn into a pony permanently.
  452. >So now, if a human overdosed on PON-E, they would turn into a pony temporarily.
  453. >You, as a human, took one and temporarily turned into a pony.
  454. >So you were going to turn back after 24 hours.
  455. >You sucked down air.
  456. >Then because you weren’t taking any PON-E, you would permanently turn into a pony.
  457. >You blew it out
  458. >Even in the spirit of the promise Cichol had made to you, as opposed to the literal words he’d said, it had been a half-truth.
  459. >If you took two PON-E, you would ‘temporarily’ turn into a pony.
  460. >So your transformation was now temporary, but at the same time, there was no escape.
  461. >Aisling was permanently a pony, Chad wasn’t human anymore so none of this applied to him anyway, and nothing had really changed about you.
  462. >You would have hands, for not even a noticeable moment, then lose your wings and horns, so that you couldn’t even have the snowball’s chance in hell of casting a reversal spell.
  463. >It was over.
  464. >Your heart sunk past your chest and into the floor, and your lungs went totally flat.
  465. >Everything was black.
  466. >You were falling, maybe thousands of feet through the air.
  467. >”-nymous. Anonymous.”
  468. >The falling feeling stopped, then burned away like fog in sunlight.
  469. >Reality bled back in through your senses
  470. >Claws pressed against your chest, a hoof rubbing against your shoulder.
  471. >Piercing yellow eyes, and mirror-pool turquoises peered into yours.
  472. >Chad’s fearsome beak creaked opened to whisper soft words into your steadily waking ears, as Aisling’s face swam out of view.
  473. >”Let’s lie down okay? You need to breathe...”
  474. >You blinked slowly, and inhaled, the air rasping it’s way through your dry throat.
  475. >Strong arms and sharp claws guided you down onto your side, then gently they moved your legs in towards your body to make you more comfortable.
  476.  
  477. >Gradually you settled into a breathing rhythm again, your barrel rising and falling at a more natural rate.
  478. >Your heart sort of hurt, it felt like it was beating too slow after all that rush a moment ago.
  479. >Chad slumped over on the floor, but kept his head level with yours, still looking you straight in the eyes with his face pressed in close.
  480. >Your gaze wandered over to where you’d seen the unicorn go.
  481. >”You drooled over yourself, Aisling went to get some stuff to clean you up.”
  482. >Like a magic spell, you could suddenly feel the dampness on your furry chest.
  483. >”Hey,”
  484. >The griffon whispered to you as quietly as he could, literally touching the inside of your ear with the tip of his beak.
  485. >His downy neck brushed against the end of your nose as he spoke.
  486. >”You stopped breathing there, was that the same feeling as when you woke up, or just panic?”
  487. >After asking, Chad slowly brought his face back, and looked you straight in the eyes.
  488. >Not with concern, or pity, but with plain ‘care’.
  489. >The entire sequence had been so wonderfully honest and simple, that it made you want to cry so much, that you couldn’t cry at all.
  490. >Chad’s gesture was like a beacon leading you back to consciousness and sanity.
  491. “...panic...”
  492. >You croaked, and almost laughed.
  493. >Your friend nodded his feathery head deliberately.
  494. >”Uh-huh. I can uh... see why.”
  495. >There was a sudden outburst of sound from the TV screen, some voices were raised in hollering, and the dull sound of flesh beating against flesh drummed away.
  496. >Anyone else would have turned around to check the television behind them, but Chad reached for the remote and shut it off instead, without moving his face at all.
  497. “...Sorry.”
  498. >You gasped out, then this time you actually managed to force out a laugh.
  499. >Chad smiled and took a wet towel from Aisling.
  500. >As he dabbed it against your messy fur, he answered,
  501. >”I told ya that you have nothing to apologize for. You have to look out for yourself a little before you start trying to help other people you know.”
  502. >A silver hoof gently rapped on Chad’s back, and you heard Aisling scoff,
  503. >”That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you, both of you are so stupid.”
  504. >He didn’t seem to pay the comment much mind, besides a shrug and a bigger smile while he daubed away.
  505. >Eventually satisfied with the cleaning, Chad handed the towel back to Aisling before pressing his beak up to your ear again to whisper like he did earlier.
  506. >”That was a panic attack, I used to have them all the time. How do you feel?”
  507. >Then his face was back in view, his eyes blinking just once.
  508. >You pressed your lips together and nodded to show that you understood.
  509. ”Better... almost normal, just, tired.”
  510. >Chad nodded, and without breaking eye contact with you, motioned with his claws behind your head.
  511. >You heard the sound of blinds closing completely, and the room got much dimmer.
  512. >Instantly you felt an extra degree more at ease.
  513. >There was nothing to look at but Chad’s face, nothing to feel besides the sofa underneath you and nothing to hear besides your breathing, his breathing, and Aisling’s hooves clopping softly.
  514. >”Let’s just relax.”
  515. “Yeah.”
  516.  
  517. ##Calming Down
  518.  
  519. >Beams of sunlight, thin like strands of gossamer, faintly illuminated the room with a sleepy glow.
  520. >Everything was still, besides the sparse few motes of dust that gleamed between the lights.
  521. >Aisling seemed to have gone upstairs, you couldn’t really tell because your best friend’s hawkish countenance was your whole world right now.
  522. >Chad’s eyes were almost unblinking, and in this dimness they had assumed a warmer yellow than before, like honey.
  523. >This was the first time you had taken proper stock of him.
  524. >While his hawk’s head was totally alien from his human face structurally, there was that unmistakable shimmer of Chad’s soul behind every little element of it.
  525. >So much so that it made you wonder how you hadn’t recognized him at first.
  526. >The way he held his gaze, the expression on his mouth, even the way the little feathers on his cheeks were arranged seemed nostalgic to you.
  527. >Your eyes traced the slope of his brow, curving up and back and down in that characteristic shape of a bird of prey.
  528. >Chad’s whole head was like a boxy teardrop, with his smooth, curved beak being the tail end.
  529. >Something about the speckled rusty spots was ‘him’ too, as if it couldn’t be any other way.
  530. >You wondered if he saw something similar, looking into your face.
  531. >Was the white fur ‘you’?
  532. >Did he tousle your blonde mane and still think of the shade your hair was before?
  533. >Looking into your blue eyes, was he staring through those same two windows to the soul that he had stared through countless times before?
  534. >Were other people considering this now that they had been transformed too?
  535. >The content of all this thinking could be disheartening, probably should be, but with Chad here you found it impossible to despair.
  536. >It felt like you were floating on an overwhelming wave of peace moving from him to you.
  537. >Because he was not worried, you could be calm.
  538. >Besides that, the more you groped ahead mentally into the teeming void of unknowns that these transformations had engendered, the stronger your grip over yourself became.
  539. >Seeing the differences between the griffon Chad and the quintessential man himself, from the unicorn Aisling to the girl who spent too much on books, and even the stallion Tam from that bubbly woman in those earlier days, that seemed now to have been years ago...
  540. >It was not like setting one thing down to look at another, there wasn’t just; human, then ‘other’.
  541. >A more suitable metaphor would be the act of staring into a prism struck through with light.
  542. >Behold it at first and you’ll be dazzled with one end of the light’s wavelength, some shot of azure or shock of red.
  543. >Twist it and suddenly green comes flying out.
  544. >But the light passing through the prism has not been swapped out, it is just the prism’s position has changed.
  545. >Though it has been warped and twisted around inside the glass, the light shines through, and it is still the same light that went in.
  546. >A smile played on your lips.
  547.  
  548. >Basically, griffon Chad was still a numbskull, just a feathery numbskull.
  549. >Gently, you bumped the end of your muzzle against the sleek side of Chad’s beak.
  550. >But what is that ‘light’ really?
  551. >Your eyes were half lidded in a relaxed reverie as you mused,
  552. “What are you?”
  553. >Chad smiled and blinked, answering honestly,
  554. >”I’ve never been a philosopher at least.”
  555. >You yawned and felt your tail flop around as you stretched on reflex, reaching your hooves to the sides of your friend’s head.
  556. >The little loose feathers around about his face swayed in the shifting air after you exhaled.
  557. >There was still a dull pain in your chest, and the stretch teased it out a little stronger, but it was a comfortable ache.
  558. >It made you feel like you were 13 again, staying home sick from school.
  559. >Some of those times, you had found yourself celebrating internally when you woke up the next morning just sick enough to take another day off, this was exactly like that.
  560. >You wanted to stay like this, almost forever, barring the tempting prospect of a warm shower.
  561. >Eventually, when you were all carefully balled up just the way Chad had placed you before, you followed up on what you were saying earlier, asking,
  562. “Yeah, but, I was just thinking that... Well, I think you still look like yourself. Do you know what I mean?”
  563. >Those sharp golden eyes didn’t roll, and there was no irony in Chad’s voice when he answered.
  564. >”I think so. For me, when I looked at you for the second time, I remember I thought: ‘Yeah, that’s what he would have to look like.’”
  565. >The warmth of that honesty and sympathy glowed inside you, making you curl your legs into yourself.
  566. “Same. Actually that sounds better than how I put it in my head.”
  567. >”How did you put it?”
  568. “It was kind of an overbearing metaphor about light through a prism...”
  569. >Chad sighed, looking at you like he didn’t know just what to do with you.
  570. >A stray sunbeam traced the smile around his beak in gold.
  571. >Your tail batted softly against the sofa, stirred by that little joy you’d stocked up from his words.
  572. >For a while longer, the two of you just rested quietly, not moving.
  573. >Birds tittered and sang outside, Aisling’s hooves clopped upstairs, once in a while.
  574. >You mulled over the soul with nothing to distract you, then there was a brief exchange between you and Chad, just about pleasant nothings like videogames.
  575. >Eventually Aisling came back down from her room upstairs to set out some tea and a plate of homemade biscuits.
  576. >Just the smell of the flour and the Earl Grey got you to laugh.
  577. >Chad made something of a show of trying and failing to cleanly peck away at his crumbling biscuit.
  578. >He couldn’t help but thrust his beak into it every so often like he was trying to pull out the innards of a rabbit.
  579. >The first time he did it, you nearly fell off the couch laughing at his face full of exploded crumbs.
  580. >While he fussed about that, Aisling taught you how to use magic to lift things.
  581.  
  582. >At first you couldn’t even summon up the magic in your horn, and Aisling’s explanations of how she envisioned casting the spell just confused you.
  583. >But once you’d understood that she was basically separating the tasks in her head, then doing them synchronously, you had a joyous flash of ingenuity, and your horn lit up with that strange black light your magic assumed.
  584. >After five minutes of practice, you were floating teacups and food around with relative ease.
  585. >You could twirl them in your grasp, spin them in the air like a top, float them up, sink them down and generally just place them wherever.
  586. >But Aisling was clearly more precise and capable.
  587. >”Watch...”
  588. >She murmured, her eyes locked on your teacup.
  589. >”I realized it’s all about how you make the magic ‘flow’. If you can get a better picture in your mind, of the magic moving, the level of control gets higher.”
  590. >You watched her intently, while the griffon next to you indelicately munched away.
  591. >A turquoise gleam gradually wound it’s way up the fine spiral of her horn, producing a faint hiss like a silken sheet falling to the floor.
  592. >There was that same magic light sparking up from the pits of her pupils too.
  593. >Little glints would start up, shine and then fizzle down in highly intricate geometric patterns.
  594. >Finally, when her horn was fully lit, Aisling cast her spell.
  595. >A single spark appeared in the bottom of your cup, drew the Fibonacci sequence, and fizzled away.
  596. >You smiled a little regretfully at the failure, and turned your head aside to look at Aisling consolingly.
  597. >But she was still utterly focused, and simply asked you to,
  598. >”Look.”
  599. >As you watched, the liquid tea floated up and away from the cup, with no clear signs of magic at all.
  600. >Then, piece by piece, the entire contents of your teacup agglomerated together into one perfect brown and gleaming sphere.
  601. >Aisling breathed softly, and the magic around her horn pulsed with a quiet rustling like bells over autumn leaves.
  602. >In response, the ball of tea rippled, like a single drop had fallen into it.
  603. >You couldn’t help but gape.
  604. >The dusky unicorn’s horn sounded again, and this time the ball twisted, assuming the distinct and paradoxical shape of a Klein bottle.
  605. “Holy shit...”
  606. >”Damn.”
  607. >Chad agreed.
  608. >It was just a wondrous sight.
  609. >Flowing in on itself, the Klein bottle melded back into a sphere, and Aisling gently began to put it back.
  610. “Wow Aisling, that’s-
  611. >Suddenly, Chad’s beak flashed out.
  612. >He dipped the end of it into the ball and sucked nearly half of your tea away before you had the good sense to magically grab a pillow and start whacking him with it.
  613. >All you got was one squawk, before he laughed maniacally.
  614. >Aisling looked desperately like she wanted to giggle, but couldn’t for the need to maintain the spell.
  615. >So you laughed for her, and Chad did his bit too, the tea thieving fuck.
  616. >As soon as she’d gotten what was left back into your cup, she joined in.
  617.  
  618. >The rest of the tea break was spent ribbing one another about the strange caveats that came with each other’s new form.
  619. >Well really it was just you and Aisling ganging up on Chad to try and regain the lost ground from having no hands or physical strength.
  620. >At the end of it all, you were feeling wholly yourself again, full of biscuits, jam and joy, so you decided it was time to take a shower.
  621. >Chad stood up and patted you on the back after you said as much.
  622. >”Not that it will do much.”
  623. >It was lucky for him that you didn’t know where was the best spot on his body to kick him yet, so you just stored that comment in the repository of un-repaid favors.
  624. >Smiling a little ruefully, Aisling shot you a look and said,
  625. >”The tea-tree oil shampoo is what I use, and there’s a conditioner bar in there too.”
  626. >Nodding gratefully back, you retired to the washroom, feeling a little unsteady on your feet.
  627. >As soon as you got inside, you lowered your front end and started to slip out of your hoodie.
  628.  
  629. >Anonymous wandered off into the bathroom, and you watched her go.
  630. >Her walking pace was clearly slower than usual, and she was hesitant in finding her footing at times.
  631. >She rounded the corner slowly, and her blonde tail flicked ‘round after her.
  632. >Those new wings and that horn, frankly, looked awkward on Anon, but right now you knew you’d just be kicking her while she was down if you tried to tease her about it.
  633. >...Maybe you could spin it into a compliment?
  634. >Maybe not...
  635. >You already felt enough like an idiot for letting her watch the fake news.
  636. >From the very beginning when she had woken up just to scrape and apologize, it was obvious that she would take it bad.
  637. >Regretfully, your mind went back to the forest last night, when you had Clapperleg at your mercy.
  638. >Just a little deeper maybe, and none of this would have been an issue.
  639. >Worse, if you had just flown back into the forest after dropping the girls off...
  640. >You started up suddenly from your daze, drawing your eyes away from the floor.
  641. >That had been a pointless hypothetical, clearly, there was no reason to entertain it.
  642. >God only knows what would have happened if you’d actually left Aisling and Anon alone yesterday.
  643. >Sighing, you licked raspberry jam off of your talons then swiftly snatched up the last biscuit before Aisling could wrap her magic around it.
  644. >She stared at you with the most vehemence you’d ever seen in those eyes before, paired with an expression that was frighteningly cold and dry.
  645. >Anger just wasn’t the word for it.
  646. >Hatred, maybe, was appropriate.
  647. >With a smug smile, you slowly lifted the baked good up and then dangled it over your gaping beak.
  648. >You held that pose for maybe half a minute, never losing eye contact with the seething unicorn across from you.
  649. >...Before relenting, and handing off the stolen item.
  650. >Laughing good naturedly, Aisling promptly split the biscuit in half with you in a flash of magic, then said, around bites of her treat,
  651. >”It’s... good. She’s... Ah, looking better.”
  652.  
  653. ##Peer Pressure
  654.  
  655. >You nodded slowly in response, pecking absentmindedly at your biscuit and staring indistinctly into Aisling’s chest.
  656. >As soon as she spoke, that quiet moment with Anonymous had come barreling through your train of thought.
  657. >That had been...
  658. >Something like a black swan event, you realized, your own mental bank run, so to speak.
  659. >When he was human, Anon’s words had always excited and grabbed at you, because through him you found that your own ideas held water.
  660. >So you listened to everything he had to say and shared your most honest thoughts and sentiments with him.
  661. >Anonymous was one of the only people like that for you in the whole world.
  662. >Anonymous was your peer.
  663. >His thoughts were on par with yours.
  664. >Physically it had always been a bit of a mismatch but he held his own as a man.
  665. >As a pony, and more distinctly, as a girl, the content of her thoughts hadn’t changed, but something in the delivery was different.
  666. >There was probably a more precise word for it that she would use, but you’d settled on ‘softer’.
  667. >At first it had been uncanny, you remembered that cigarette shivering moment in your dorm room, that first time you laid eyes on her and she’d spoken the code word without missing a beat.
  668. >The mannerisms, translated down to that equine body, and remembered only because they stood out as strange.
  669. >Subtle morphs and bends had slung themselves against your apprehensive mode of thinking.
  670. >You’d been scared half out of your mind, and you only overcame it out of your sense of duty to protect your friend in distress.
  671. >The trick you pulled on your stupid head to pull it off, was to play the role of: ‘protector’.
  672. >You were softer on her, sometimes you just humored her when she spoke, oftentimes you had snubbed the people around her to keep her totally safe.
  673. >Your beak clicked together unconsciously.
  674. >You would never have done that shit before.
  675. >But even as you rejected the sentiment, it still clung to you and you to it.
  676. >The drive to protect was uncannily familiar, and you weren’t sure yet if that scared you more, or less.
  677. >”What are you?” she had asked, and you had almost asked her the same.
  678. >Were you getting acclimated to her transformation, or yours?
  679. >At least you knew that what scared you most was that one day you might think nothing of these things.
  680. >Anonymous would just be Anonymous, the pony.
  681. >Habit would erode all the blocks you threw in the way eventually.
  682. >It seemed already to have worn her down some, she had transformed much earlier than you after all.
  683. >A rough sigh rattled down your throat as you thought of something even more worrisome: that one day soon, you might look back on a memory with her as a pony and yourself as a griffon, and feel more fondly for it than the ones from when you were both human.
  684. >Earlier on the couch, when you whispered in Anonymous’ ear, and by doing so made that memory dearer in both of your minds, was when the ghost of that possibility had first laid its cold hand on your shoulder.
  685.  
  686. >In the background, the hiss of the shower and the whirring fan in the bathroom resonated.
  687. >Your eyes were still locked on the undifferentiated blackness of Aisling’s fur.
  688. >The relationship you had with Anonymous, as Keyboard Masher, was not like before.
  689. >She was not your peer.
  690. >Just a while ago, you knew that you would have found that thought unthinkable.
  691. >But now it was undeniable, neither of you acted that way anymore, just as you looked a little down at her, she looked a little up at you.
  692. >A piercingly clear thought struck you as you realized that.
  693. >Anonymous still had her honor, but it had morphed into such a different shape it pained you as if she’d lost it.
  694. >She held her own as a pony, not a man.
  695. >It had all started when you saw her typing clumsily on a laptop atop your bed, with pens strapped to her hooves, looking too fucking cute for her own good.
  696. >The memory reeled past your mind’s eye like an old family 8mm tape on a projector.
  697. >Anon laid there on the soft sheets, her pen equipped hooves pecking away at the laptop nestled between her forelegs.
  698. >Her mane was a natural ribbon of gold falling in a wave from her head, never really straight, and actually a bit of a mess from all the tumbling around she’d done before meeting up with you.
  699. >It immediately reminded you of the one time a girl had been in your bedroom, back in high school.
  700. >She’d had messy hair too, red though, with more lascivious intentions compared to Anonymous.
  701. >The pony rolled her body so that she laid on her side, and breathed deeply while she went about proofreading her essay.
  702. >Anon’s fur was short, and white as linen.
  703. >You reached out to touch it, and passing your hand over it had a similar feeling to duvet.
  704. >But in places like her chest and the nape of her neck, you noted with gentle fingers, it was fluffy.
  705. >...Anonymou-
  706. >You blinked and flicked your gaze to the window.
  707. >A cardinal blitzed past when it saw your upturned face, but you could still track it precisely with your eyes and count each ruby red feather.
  708. >Now that you had the personal experience of having wings, you could appreciate how well the teensy sprite moved.
  709. >He bent his wingtips so subtly, catching the smallest updraft to send himself wheeling in an upward arc to the tree across the lawn.
  710. >But it all seemed in vain, when in your head you could draw the perfect line to fly along and snatch him out of the air.
  711. >The desire to really do it pestered you in the background, a subtle itch.
  712. >You sighed, and then you abruptly intoned,
  713. “She’s had too much pressure put on her. I don’t want to see her get like me, anxious, it’s a fucking cancer.”
  714. >That was deadly ironic, right back to protecting again huh?
  715. >You felt your heart pump one solitary note of building frustration with yourself.
  716. >Letting your relationship with Anonymous get twisted any further was a loss you couldn’t abide.
  717. >But at the same time... she really did need your help right?
  718.  
  719. >Aisling nodded her head as she took the last sip of her tea, agreeing, but looking so collected it made you wonder which part of your sentiment she was agreeing with.
  720. >”We kill Cichol, and it’s over. All the gnome’s magic will be undone.”
  721. >Your eyes widened at her sudden remark, and a hopeful smile resolved itself on your face.
  722. >With vim and vigor you swept away all the useless, probably Fed voice-to-skull planted thoughts from your head and brashly spouted,
  723. “Well, I went for the kill as soon as I could. But I’ll be honest I wasn’t really thinking of it as the ‘best’ solution.”
  724. >A tricky smile danced on Aisling’s lips, and she looked at you askance.
  725. >”I was digging through some books while I was upstairs, just refreshing my memory of the myths relating to the Fomorians.”
  726. >The knowledgeable unicorn started.
  727. >You shuffled in closer on the couch, flexing your wings to get comfortable while she continued,
  728. >”The accounts are conflicting, but, interpreting the texts, I think that whenever their leader is killed, they disappear off the face of the earth.”
  729. “Didn’t that never happen though? Clapperleg was supposed to have been killed by that... pancake guy or whatever. But they’re all here anyway, along with him.”
  730. >Aisling nodded, smiling.
  731. >”That’s just it, they’re back. It’s not that they’ve just been around all the time, all THIS time. There are several instances in Celtic myth where they are defeated and all their dominion vanishes. So, logically that must mean they come back.”
  732. >You grasped at your beak with a claw, beginning to understand.
  733. >Again, thank fuck you had weird friends.
  734. >People into this kind of stuff were about one in a trillion these days, common core had thoroughly squashed the kind of light people got in their eyes for it.
  735. >Aisling looked up into your face, softly glowing with just that light and excitement you meant, but calmly waiting for an answer.
  736. “Alright, makes enough sense, in that nonsense faerie way that things have to make sense in since last night. Let me think about it for a sec.”
  737. >The mare clacked her fore hooves together approvingly, while inside you crunched the logistics for gnome slaughter.
  738. >Have to be during the day.
  739. >Have to be done with steel or iron.
  740. >Have to have friends to watch your back.
  741. >Have to find the gnomes.
  742. >Have to kill them quick.
  743. >...Girls like to stay clean.
  744. >In the vein of an analog computer, you printed the answer out, as fast as the physical limitations of your brain would allow.
  745. “That’s a farm next door right? Do they have guns?”
  746. >”Yes, they’d probably let us borrow some too. I think a newly minted family of ponies would be willing to listen to a story about maleficent gnomes hiding out in the forest, from a griffon and two unicorns.”
  747. >Aisling didn’t even miss a beat.
  748. >She smiled at you thinly, like a paid dealer handing you a four of a kind, while she reached over and stole the last of your tea.
  749. >You rubbed your hands together, and licked the edges of your beak clean of jam.
  750.  
  751. >She had no qualms about killing them, no qualms about firearms either, and it was safe to assume Anonymous was the same, from that conversation over breakfast.
  752. >You looked over Aisling’s head, at the clock on the stove.
  753. >1100.
  754. >Daylight, check, friends, check.
  755. >Third of the way there already.
  756. >You grinned, and felt the thrill of endorphins rushing through your powerful body.
  757. >In a clear, authoritative tone, you said,
  758. “We’ll leave after you get cleaned up. Then you and Anonymous can get all our gear ready while I scope the woods out. We’ll have lunch, then aim for an assault no later than 1500 hours.”
  759. >It was a conscious effort to stop yourself from digging your talons into the sofa.
  760. >You could feel the claws inside your paws slipping in and out as you tensed and relaxed all your muscles in anticipatory excitement.
  761. >Your tail whipped against the cushions.
  762. >”Chad, you’re purring.”
  763. >Aisling quietly uttered, her little smile veiled behind a dusky foreleg.
  764. >You blinked in surprise, and listened.
  765. >Nothing.
  766. >Instantly your face twisted into a sarcastic grimace, and you reached out with all claws to make the biggest tangle of Aisling’s mane that you could manage.
  767. >But she ducked away, sliding off of the couch like water, while giggling.
  768. >You opted not to follow, and she just danced her way back into the kitchen, magically carrying all the dishes in tow.
  769. >Instead, you reached over to where Aisling had been sitting and grabbed the remote.
  770. >More from a passing curiosity than from feeling some need to get additional information, you flicked the TV back on.
  771. >Instantly the scene made your gut wrench and twist before kicking out an ironic guffaw.
  772. >There was a ‘human’ on screen.
  773. >Of course, it was some delegate from the UN, come to inspect how the nation was handling the newly dubbed “Pon-E-vent”.
  774. “I’m always fucking right. Always...”
  775. >You spat under your breath.
  776. “Shapeshifters.”
  777. >Just once you wanted the motivation behind some economic disaster to be only greed, or for there to be a perfectly logical paper trail of private interests that didn’t dovetail into ritualistic child sacrifice.
  778. >”What? What’s up?”
  779. >Aisling exclaimed from the kitchen, peeking her head up from the dishwasher.
  780. >Laughing again, you slung back in your seat, laid your paws to rest on the coffee table and your arm on the back of the sofa, then looked her straight in the face with a smug smile and answered,
  781. “Oh you didn’t get the memo?”
  782. >You waved some talons at the screen.
  783. >Aisling rolled her eyes at you from over the countertop, before hopping down and trotting around to see what you were talking about.
  784. >As soon as her eyes met the screen, and saw the ugly, paunchy looking politician there, her delicate brow furrowed.
  785. >A single silver hair off her mane went astray.
  786. >Then for the first time, you heard Aisling curse.
  787. >”What in damnation is that supposed to be?”
  788. >She whipped her head around at you, frowning deeper.
  789. >”Every human should be a pony right? What?”
  790.  
  791. ##Back of his mind
  792.  
  793. >Your smile grew ten sizes, and you lifted up your claws to make airquotes.
  794. “””A human.”””
  795. >Aisling sighed and shook her head, before turning back to the television.
  796. >On screen, the “””human””” was receiving an oddly old looking, wax sealed scroll from the mouth of the pony prime minister.
  797. >It symbolized the nation’s statement of intent: to follow in lockstep with UN proposals for the duration of the emergency.
  798. >Most of the nation’s politicians on screen were ponies, which surprised you greatly, especially since all of the reps from the UN, along with a few feds with ‘certain’ citizenship ‘situations’ seemed to have magically avoided the fate that befell humanity.
  799. >This made it unlikely that the ponies were just stand-ins, if that were the case then they should have just replaced everyone and kept the populace under the illusion that they were all human.
  800. >You wondered if they were changelings or if Icke was right.
  801. >Hell could be both.
  802. >The thoughts kept flowing, the next step must be faking a few remaining pockets of human-
  803. >”WHAT IN THE FUCK.”
  804. >Your eyes snapped right.
  805. >Anonymous was back and already looking thoroughly de-relaxed after her shower.
  806. >With her fur still damp, and a towel wrapped around her head, she goggled at the screen in disbelief, her hooves planted wide and her wings spread aggressively behind her head.
  807. >”WHY DO THEY GET TO BE HUMAN???? WHAT.”
  808. >She turned to Aisling first, who simply shrugged, and you repeated the gesture, still smiling while you focused your gaze on the television again.
  809. >Ohh what a treat.
  810. >You were on the edge of your seat, with your tail twisting up and batting around behind you like a cat’s might.
  811. >There was one particular delegate that caught your eye, just as “””human””” as he could look, with the most transparent smirk of duper’s delight that you’d ever seen.
  812. >For a few seconds he aimed it straight into the camera.
  813. >You smirked right back at him, and half entertained the thought of paying him a visit later.
  814. >It would just be a body double anyway...
  815. >More formalities were walked through, and some new platitudes were rolled out.
  816. >The prepared words for the crisis seemed to be ‘transitioning’, ‘returning’, ‘on-ramping‘. ‘off-ramping’ and ‘changing pace’.
  817. >In particular, the key phrase ‘re-factoring infrastructure to meet new requirements’, was uttered in several different ways.
  818. >As the action on screen began to wind down, and states-ponies featured more prominently, Aisling started off to the washroom, sighing and magically flattening her mane out again.
  819. >Her silver tail glimmered ‘round the corner, then you heard the door shut.
  820. >Anonymous still stood there and gawked, her wings slowly drooping at her sides.
  821. >Her tail was dripping wet still, lying limply at her back.
  822. >It had been so long since something this juicy had appeared on live TV.
  823. >This was better than Clinton collapsing into a car, better than Dave Dave, better than... fuck, anything.
  824.  
  825. >Staring doggedly at the television, you reached for the remote again and flicked the channel.
  826. >”Hey!”
  827. >Anon protested.
  828. “Who else.”
  829. >You uttered simply, not looking at her while you swapped to an American station.
  830. >You took her silence as assent.
  831. >The CEO of a certain large social media company was being interviewed on how his platform would change, he was “””human””” of course.
  832. >After having waned some, your crooked grin was back.
  833. >That key phrase came tumbling out of the freak’s mouth, this time in the form of ‘...the plan is a sort of easing down, re-factoring our service, then transitioning out of the previous paradigm to meet these new requirements...’
  834. >Out of the corner of your eye, you could see Anonymous watching your expression with exasperation.
  835. >You really had to wonder what these things were.
  836. >Your first thought had been changelings, though it didn’t add up, if they were changelings then you of all people would have seen at least one before PON-E.
  837. >Instead, your first sighting had been just a while ago, when the city was already crawling with them.
  838. >There was no reason for the gnomes to want changelings and the C4NG3 drug that produced them around either, it went contrary to their motives.
  839. >So there were competing interests in this intrigue?
  840. “Reptilians...”
  841. >You mused.
  842. >If so, it was remarkable that you and Anonymous had just happened to get caught up in the thick of it.
  843. >The last time you’d been in the middle of a mess like this was that counteroffensive in the ancient city, when you were the gofer with Gideon’s crew out west.
  844. >A shiver passed through your whole body, ending at the tip of your bottlebrush tail, when your thoughts just skimmed the memory of what you’d seen in the drained poolrooms of that chthonic complex, carved in the bedrock.
  845. >You swiftly flashed through the news channels and took an approximate tally of what you were tentatively referring to as reptilians.
  846. >It seemed maybe a third of celebrities were not human after all.
  847. >But there had been a few surprises, like Ellen appearing as a pegasus stallion, and the whole cast of The View being ponies.
  848. >All of the news casters were ponies, no matter how popular.
  849. >The filter, besides Freemasonry, seemed to be net worth.
  850. >Past a billion, it was practically all “””human”””.
  851. >Especially in tech, there wasn’t a single one them who had been ponified.
  852. >The fact that you could check it all so quickly just flicking through the channels like this made it pretty obvious that this was intentional.
  853. >They really were gloating.
  854. >You laughed, nibbling at the end of one of your talons.
  855. >Then you switched off the television, feeling just as sick of it as you were entertained by it.
  856. >What was more important than this ‘who’s what’ crap was that key phrase, and the language they were throwing around.
  857. >The tone was all ‘phasing out’, ‘toning down’, ‘slowing’.
  858. >Wh-
  859. >”Why do you have to be right?”
  860. >You locked eyes with Anonymous.
  861.  
  862. >She appeared to be at the end of her rope, enough so that it struck you with a pang of frustration, thinking about how you’d just brought her down from that panic attack earlier.
  863. >Sounding bitter, she asked,
  864. >”They’re not human right? None of them are.”
  865. >There was a hint in her eye, that told you to answer seriously.
  866. >So you sat up properly, at least as properly as a griffon could, and answered,
  867. “Yeah. My best guess is they’re reptilians. They’ll probably fake their way out and say some small pockets of humans around the world avoided being transformed. Then produce footage of these ‘people’.”
  868. >”Why?”
  869. >You stared down at your talons, interlocking and unlocking them again as you slipped into deep thought.
  870. >...This conversation made you want to reach for a cigarette you just didn’t have.
  871. >Everything that was to come out of your mouth next was the wrong thing to tell Anonymous.
  872. >None of it was going to help her any, or you.
  873. >It was a senseless knowledge that only served to increase your anxieties, and you were about to give it to her like a poison.
  874. >You may as well jump over and peck at her fetlocks for an hour, for how productive this was going to be.
  875. >But her eyes brooked no euphemisms or denial, and if you denied her that right then you felt like you would be treating her even less like a peer.
  876. >So you pressed on, meeting Anon’s blue eyes directly.
  877. >You felt a grim determination settle over you as your brain retraced thoughtpaths you’d walked bare, many years ago.
  878. “They’re doing it to keep the masses placated before they announce they’re leaving for space. This is one variation on their fallback plan in case of some global upheaval. I imagine in this case they’ll say PON-E has completely tainted the water and so they’re leaving Earth to preserve the human race. Really they’ll just be in bunkers.”
  879. >”Really I-”
  880. “Because space is fake and gay.”
  881. >You added, pedantically.
  882. >Anonymous lowered her head, pressed her lips together and glowered straight down her muzzle at you, prompting you to at least look a little apologetic while you finished,
  883. “I was thinking the same thing by the way, about being right. Wish it would stop. Seriously.”
  884. >She looked like she wanted to protest some of what you’d said, but after a few seconds of intense staring, your friend just heaved out a long sigh, and shook her head as she unraveled the towel from her mane.
  885. >Water droplets beaded from her neck down onto her back, and if you looked close enough, you felt you could see the needless weight you’d laid on there too.
  886. >Casting a simple spell, Anonymous started patting down her wet tail with the towel and stated,
  887. >”Sometimes I think ‘they’ just wait for you to think something up, and then do that. You should try filing a patent next time you have an idea for making this dystopia any worse, they seem to respect copyright law at least.”
  888.  
  889. >You laughed and lolled onto your back to stretch your legs, poking out each hidden claw in your paws one by one, then countered with,
  890. “But then nothing would happen, we’d just be frozen in the middle.”
  891. >She rolled her eyes, when a flash of inspiration suddenly lit up her face.
  892. >You watched curiously, expecting a spell.
  893. >After setting her towel aside, Anonymous stood with all her legs spread evenly.
  894. >She breathed in deep, shut her eyes, and lit her horn black.
  895. >It was quiet, then there was the rushing sound of wind against a rockface, and all her fur was blown up on end as if she was standing under the exit of a carwash.
  896. >Anonymous’ platinum coil of a mane twirled around and around along with her tail, visibly becoming wavier and wavier.
  897. >She stood there like she was in the eye of a typhoon, her cheeks all puffed up and her eyes shut tight against the wind.
  898. >You couldn’t help but laugh, even though you pictured getting a hoof to the head for it.
  899. >At the end of all the enchanted blow drying, she looked like a marshmallow with peeps stuck to both ends.
  900. >She was dry though.
  901. >You whistled and smiled.
  902. >Grumbling some curse in response that you couldn’t understand through all the puff, Anonymous shook herself like a dog and set about flattening everything down, obviously not confident in her control to try and use magic to fix it.
  903. >You slid off the couch and started to help.
  904. “Your mane’s gotten longer.”
  905. >You said, as you threaded your talons through it, teasing it back into position around her black horn.
  906. >From under all that hair, your friend’s muffled voice answered,
  907. >”Believe me I’ve noticed. Should just chop it off up to my temples.”
  908. >It relieved you to hear her talk like that, but at the same time-
  909. “Nah, you don’t need to.”
  910. >The words just came right out of your mouth, without you really thinking about it.
  911. >For a second, you’d caught yourself off guard.
  912. >Anonymous turned her head up to look at you straight, and confusion played on her bright blue eyes, between locks of her golden hair, as she asked you her favorite question,
  913. >”Why?”
  914. >You clamped your beak on your tongue and looked away, at the corner of the ceiling to your right.
  915. “Uhh...”
  916. >You started..?
  917. >What the fuck?
  918. >You thought you’d gotten over these small fry issues by now, it had been so long since she’d become a pony after all.
  919. >Your gaze swapped left, but your field of view was still so big you could see Anonymous’ stare starting to trend towards discerning your thoughts.
  920. “...Well we’re gonna fix all this anyway, soon...”
  921. >You deflected, lamely.
  922. >Stupid fucking answer, should have just said it looked nice, you’d never gotten tripped up like that in forever.
  923. >To keep busy, you kept working your talons over her mane like a comb, avoiding her eyes.
  924. >Anonymous still eyed you up though, looking bemused.
  925. >But in the end she seemed to be more preoccupied with getting the rest of her fur down, so the thread of conversation was dropped.
  926.  
  927. >Letting out a breath you didn’t realize you were holding, you finished the last bit of her hair and stepped back to appreciate it.
  928. >Looked a lot cleaner than the first day you met her.
  929. >Anonymous checked herself over, and her mane tumbled round her head like a billowing flag.
  930. >Her fur was a splendid white again, with that broken keyboard mark standing out as a proud crest on her flank.
  931. >Each little hoof clopped in turn, and her tail flicked from side to side.
  932. >Yeah, Anonymous was cute.
  933. >Though those wings and that horn still just didn’t sit right with you.
  934. >She flexed the new appendages on her back slowly, and mouthed a few stray feathers into place while you watched.
  935. >There were more white than black feathers in them now, though the black ones seemed to be persistent around the edges of her wings.
  936. >Her horn caught the light, and there was a subtle spiral of white in it that you hadn’t noticed earlier.
  937. >So they were changing color too, probably because of some gnomish nonsense you’d have to read twenty books not even about gnomes to understand.
  938. >You frowned a little.
  939. >All this extra shit just reinforced the fact that they were too fantastical, and more suited to someone like Aisling, the Anonymous you knew was more humble than that.
  940. >As a man he’d had the mind of a scholar and the wisdom of a carpenter.
  941. >As a girl you’d say something like; the manners of a milkmaid and the features of a secretary?
  942. >But these new features were sort of... rich?
  943. >You were swinging well out of reach of the limit of your vocabulary at this point, and using a lot of borrowed words you’d heard Anonymous say first, so you cut that train of thought.
  944. >Setting a claw under your beak, you narrowed your eyes and muttered, just loud enough for Anonymous to hear,
  945. “Like painting a crown into a pastoral...”
  946. >Her ears perked, and her cheeks puffed up again like an angry fish.
  947. >Anonymous really was your friend because she could catch on as quick as that.
  948. >In a curt tone she rebuffed you,
  949. >”Shut up sperg.”
  950. >Then she started batting you around the head with her piano wings.
  951. >With each swing came a word.
  952. >“Since. When. Did. You. Appreciate. Art. Enough. To. Make. A. Reference. Like. That?”
  953. >You smiled and enjoyed the feeling, answering simply,
  954. “Had to take a bird course on classical poetry.”
  955. >Eventually she was smiling too, so the beating stopped.
  956. >With an honest look on her face, Anonymous stretched out one of her wings and stared at it and you curiously, asking,
  957. >”You’re really not a fan of them?”
  958. >You sat back on your haunches and nodded, already ready with a trimmed, honest answer from your thinking about it earlier.
  959. “Yeah it’s cramping your style, maybe just the horn would work. I mean magic is pretty nice... But I dunno, your appeal is simple cuteness, this over-complicates things.”
  960. >The regret for being even a little honest struck you with every word you spoke.
  961. >Anon’s eyes narrowed in response, and her smile became more foxy than frank.
  962.  
  963. >She sat down too, mirroring your posture.
  964. >Then with the sort of precision that was reserved for ballistics, she selected and fired a penetrating remark, straight at your heart.
  965. >”You’ve really thought about this huh?”
  966. >It was impossible to stop your wings ruffling on reflex, but you cleared your throat and puffed out the feathers on your chest to distract her with exaggerated bravado.
  967. >Quickly, you answered,
  968. “Sure. Aesthetic taste is the mark of the quintessential Western man.”
  969. >Anonymous stifled a giggle and held her response for a few seconds, letting you simmer there.
  970. >Your heart was beating faster, but you managed to keep your tail still at least.
  971. >You met her gaze easily.
  972. >...Her heart-rate was frighteningly placid.
  973. >But eventually Anonymous just let loose with a free and easy laugh.
  974. >She pulled her wing back in, before poking you in the chest with a hoof and whispering up at your face,
  975. >”Bird brain.”
  976. >Then, beaming brightly, she suddenly asked,
  977. >”So what’s the plan?”
  978.  
  979. ##Semantics
  980.  
  981. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqFpbo_K2Eg
  982. Raflum - 林泉吟​/​Melodies Of Forest And Springs
  983. >Your chest deflated and you regained your bearings.
  984. >With a nostalgic ‘standard ops’ bent to your voice, you laid it all out for your friend while walking back to the couch with her.
  985. “Once Aisling gets out of the shower, we’re going to the neighbour’s place to get guns. Then I’ll be scouting out the woods while you two get geared up. After that we break for lunch and we’ll attack the gnomes by 1500.”
  986. >Anonymous nodded, totally resolute, and performed a salute with her right wing that you instantly emulated.
  987. >”Hoorah.”
  988. “Hoorah.”
  989. >As soon as the salute was over, her steadfast expression transformed into an exasperated frown, and while her eyes searched your hawkish face, she inquired,
  990. >”As if. Attack? What the hell are we actually gonna do?”
  991. >You grinned and laid an arm around her withers.
  992. “Kill Clapperleg.”
  993. >Anonymous’ long face peered peevishly up at you still, her muzzle scrunching as she pressed,
  994. >”Why? I mean I get ‘why’, but how is that going to fix anything?”
  995. >Free and easy, you explained Aisling’s theory to Anon, still in high morale.
  996. >But her expression was only ever quizzical at best.
  997. >By the time you had finished, she had turned her face away from you and her eyes were lidded in deep thought.
  998. >Your tail curled around and softly batted against the sofa, just once, as you let the little pony slip naturally away from your grasp.
  999. >A sigh escaped your beak.
  1000. >You weren’t liking the way this was going.
  1001. >Things would be so much better if all it took was military action.
  1002. >At the back of your mind though, a venomous little thought spat back at you: Just one more regretful slaughterhouse scene right?
  1003. >”I don’t think it’s going to be that easy.”
  1004. >Anonymous answered softly.
  1005. >You sighed again and slouched into the cushions, eyeing her thoughtful face sidelong.
  1006. >She stared at you straight and continued,
  1007. >”Aisling is probably right about them all disappearing whenever Cichol is killed, but I don’t think that will actually fix the pony problem.”
  1008. “Why?”
  1009. >You prompted, already feeling resigned.
  1010. >”Partoloin and his people all died of a plague shortly after defeating the Fomorians.”
  1011. >The picture was pretty clear to you just from that statement alone, but Anonymous kept going.
  1012. >”Cichol was probably the cause of that, having met him in person it would make total sense for that demon to have contingency plans. I don’t think the Fomorians were making PON-E themselves this whole time, my best guess is they formulated it with magic, then made a deal to get humans to produce it for them. That way, even if PON-E is magic, it’s so abstracted from them at this point that killing Cichol won’t change everyone back.”
  1013. >Anonymous appeared completely certain of what she was saying, but it sounded like she was apologizing to you.
  1014. >She was even stroking your back with her hoof.
  1015. >You nodded regretfully at her, staring down at your clasped claws.
  1016.  
  1017. >Maybe the reason you’d latched onto getting a gun and killing Clapperleg so quickly was because you were feeling out of loop from all this mythical theory crafting.
  1018. >Your talons clenched as if around a trigger.
  1019. >You could do with the familiar feeling of a bolt action slide, and the nostalgic kick of a rifle butt against your shoulder.
  1020. >”I thought so too.”
  1021. >A gentle contralto emanated from across the room.
  1022. >Aisling stood there, her mane and tail silently flowing beside her.
  1023. >Her fur looked blacker than black, darker than night, even in a setting as mundane as this.
  1024. >The night mare’s silver mane looked positively celestial, undulating like it was caught in an electromagnetic pulse, glistening with pearls of water that were here this moment and gone the next.
  1025. >Unicorns must have been real, you suddenly thought, a sight like this didn’t just arise from some coincidence of drugs and a time in history.
  1026. >Anonymous’ eyes narrowed at her, probably because of the spell, which was clearly a refined version of her own botched drying magic from earlier, rather than at the statement Aisling had made.
  1027. >The dusky unicorn continued,
  1028. >”But it still remains true that their dominion vanishes with them whenever Cichol is killed, and magic is typically counted as part of that ‘rule’ in most accounts of it.”
  1029. >Ahhhhhh... Moooooorrrrre myyyyyyth...
  1030. >You shut your eyes and promptly melted into the couch, trying to suppress your pent up feelings from all the inaction.
  1031. >Both unicorns delved into a swift back and forth, dropping names and dates and titles and you could have sworn a flat out homebrewed DnD ruleset at one point, as they established the information they were dredging from.
  1032. >They were better to be around than fluoridated sportsballers sure, but how either of these two had found the time to go outside and make other friends besides you, between stuffing their heads into books, you didn’t know anymore.
  1033. >Once both bookworms had established they were speaking from similar sources, your long time friend cut ahead in the conversation, as she was often wont to, flatly saying,
  1034. >”So you’re talking about how Cichol was the one who cast the spell that reversed the effects of PON-E, since I couldn’t cast it myself.”
  1035. >Aisling didn’t answer right away, you could just hear the soft rustling of her mane against her neck, and her hooves clopping closer.
  1036. >There came the sound of wood creaking as she hopped up on the divan besides you, and then her voice again,
  1037. >”No, I know that’s a dead end. Changing the effects is what made people turn into ponies after all, not the spell itself. I’m talking about the spell they cast to make PON-E work in the first place.”
  1038. >You heard a sharp intake of breath from Anonymous, and took that as your cue to get interested in the conversation again.
  1039.  
  1040. >Opening your eyes, you sat up, leaned over the table with your claws interlaced, and intoned, without looking at either pony,
  1041. “So it’s like when rabbis mumble some words over a vat of Coca-Cola and it’s suddenly all kosher?”
  1042. >Immediately after speaking, you laughed, not at your lame joke, but at the contrast of your clunky, deep voice against the two mares’ dulcet tones.
  1043. >Anonymous and Aisling both looked thoroughly un-amused with you.
  1044. >Their ears were pinned back, and their eyes gleamed down their muzzles at you with unrequited violence.
  1045. >You just threw up your claws apologetically and went back to lying down.
  1046. >The white unicorn pointed her gaze at the black one and picked up the conversation again.
  1047. >”Being the product of a spell they cast, the implication is that PON-E and its magically induced effects will disappear with them.”
  1048. >Aisling nodded.
  1049. >”Exactly.”
  1050. >But Anonymous still looked as unconvinced as before.
  1051. >As she responded, she tapped the end of her hoof against the coffee table for emphasis.
  1052. >”No, I don’t agree. I don’t think it will work retroactively that way. I think the magic is in the drug coming into existence, not the drug working.”
  1053. >Alright you had to add SOMETHING.
  1054. “Isn’t this just semantics though?”
  1055. >You proposed, watching both of the girls’ expressions.
  1056. >The two mares looked you straight in the face, un-phased, and without missing a beat:
  1057. >”Yes. That’s the kind of nonsense we’re dealing with.”
  1058. >”Yes. That’s exactly how this bullshit all works.”
  1059. >Once again, you threw up your scaly hands in mock surrender.
  1060. >But this time you leaped out of your seat and said,
  1061. “Then fuck it, let’s go get guns and shoot all the stupid gnomes first. Then you two, fresh air avoiding, grass not touching, nerds can debate all you want about it later.”
  1062. >Without waiting for an answer, you walked over to the front door and swung it open, then looked back.
  1063. >Aisling smiled despite herself, and, daintily, she began to follow after you.
  1064. >Anonymous laughed and jumped off the side of the couch, bumping her side against yours.
  1065. >”Fine. Stupid catbird. Now teach me how to fly.”
  1066. >The three of you all filed outside onto the front yard, blinking and dazzled by the bright midday sun.
  1067. >Birds of all feathers were darting around, exciting that tight bundle of predators’ synapses in your head.
  1068. >The sun had melted the snow down a couple inches by now, and here and there in the yard there were patches of bare grass where Aisling had scuffed up the snow before.
  1069. >One long stretch of it was also totally exposed from your own antics last night.
  1070. >You sucked down air and puffed all your feathers up, while you stretched your wings and marched in a little circle in the snow to stretch your legs.
  1071. >It felt like you were finally waking up after all that snoozy lounging around.
  1072. >Somehow it must have looked really funny to Aisling and Anonymous though, they had to hang on to each other to stop themselves from falling on the ground laughing.
  1073.  
  1074. >Eventually Aisling broke away, and struck out for the neighbour’s place early, saying,
  1075. >”We can meet up there, I’d rather go on a nice walk than-”
  1076. >Here her gaze honed in on you, and her smile became ironic as she finished,
  1077. >”-ride along.”
  1078. >With that she left across the yard and up the neighbour’s driveway, her silver tail bobbing along behind her.
  1079. >Anonymous popped her grinning face up right in front of yours, obscuring your view of the black pony.
  1080. >With honest excitement she asked,
  1081. >”So how do we start? How should I flap my wings?”
  1082. >Her joy was infectious, especially since it hadn’t even been a day yet since you first flew.
  1083. >That spark from last night flared in your belly again.
  1084. >Grinning, you stepped back from Anonymous and spread your wings as wide as they went with a sonorous sound like a sail taking wind.
  1085. >She mirrored you, and her span was maybe three quarters the length of yours.
  1086. >A sudden gust swirled by, as if to celebrate the moment, ruffling the feathers on your chest and sending her mane aflutter around her head.
  1087. >You locked eyes with Anonymous, then slowly, and carefully, you began to beat your wings with that freshly imprinted form.
  1088. >Her eyes glimmered and narrowed, watching every little motion.
  1089. >Once you had completed a couple cycles she started flapping her little wings too, and it drew a chuckle from you seeing her so focused.
  1090. >You watched her form, and saw a whole lot of errors, though you couldn’t be sure they were all mistakes since her wings were different than yours.
  1091. >Hers were not as broad, and the way her primary feathers were placed were different.
  1092. >Breaking off from your demonstration, you motioned her to continue, and walked up beside her.
  1093. >Hm...
  1094. >You eyed Anonymous up carefully, then looked around at all the birds, trying to find a closer comparison to make against her shape.
  1095. >After picking through chickadees, blue jays, a cardinal, and an eagle soaring above, you settled on the wings of a crow.
  1096. >They seemed to be a perfect match.
  1097. “You’re just flapping up and down, you have to really push the air, scoop it out and send it past.”
  1098. >You remarked.
  1099. >Anonymous nodded, and modified her beating, but it still wasn’t quite right.
  1100. >So you shook your head and asked,
  1101. “Just a second, hold them out?”
  1102. >And she acquiesced, watching as you sat before her and reached out with both of your hands.
  1103. >Gently, you grasped the tip and the base of her wing with a set of claws apiece, then you began to move her appendage yourself to mimic the scooping motion you were talking about.
  1104. >Anonymous’ feathers were so pleasantly soft it gave you pause.
  1105. >Man if this was it, and you were stuck like this, your kid was going to hate flying lessons because half of it would just become wing squeezing.
  1106. “See it’s the way you rotate this joint that-”
  1107. >As best you could, you proceeded to explain the principles you had instinctively grasped already.
  1108. >The little pony listened intently, and with every word, her smile slowly crept up and up.
  1109.  
  1110. #Eyes Up
  1111.  
  1112. [jpjrr/SAsLCZNunpFnccg0hWQ9Rn4PEc4M5yGHLFEol48AJvnibdyk5vG93F/iYdJPlKCyop/4PeRlFBZB7dHw==]
  1113. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YwHDMYq0S3g
  1114. >Once you had finished, Anonymous nodded just once, shivering with excitement.
  1115. >You smiled, regretfully let go of those downy wings, and padded your way back a few steps to watch her first attempt.
  1116. >She pointed her muzzle up at the sky and shut her eyes, feeling out the wind.
  1117. >Her wings were lifted at her sides, the tips bending with the breeze.
  1118. >Then, still feeling out the air, Anonymous positioned herself contrary to its flow, one little hoofstep at a time.
  1119. >She froze as soon as she had it full in the face, waiting...
  1120. >...For a gust that picked up her mane and threw it flapping behind her head.
  1121. >Right away, Anonymous began to flap.
  1122. >The first five were poorly done, rushed, and didn’t get her aloft, but on the sixth, into the eighth wingbeat, her hooves finally left the earth.
  1123. >Those pearly wings fell into a steadier rhythm, palpitated only by their owner’s self awareness.
  1124. >Anonymous hovered, her eyes wide and her head all darting around in disbelief.
  1125. >Yes, she was flying.
  1126. >You pumped your balled fist of talons, then she gaped at you, and you shot her a thumbs up, grinning.
  1127. >Immediately she laughed, her blue eyes gleaming bright, and just as immediately as she laughed, she fell.
  1128. >Gasping desperately, a graceless,
  1129. >”Oofffuck..!”
  1130. >Escaped her mouth as her hooves slipped out from under her and her barrel piled into the snow.
  1131. >You cringed at the sound, but knew at a glance that it wasn’t anything major.
  1132. >Anonymous had her eyes pinned on you through her tousled bangs, blushing furiously and obviously expecting you to laugh as she scampered back up onto all fours.
  1133. >But you could relate all too well.
  1134. >Instead of mocking her outright, you nodded your head knowingly, pressing a talon under your beak the way you’d hold your chin as a human, and wistfully quoted,
  1135. “That’s the way she goes.”
  1136. >Anonymous rolled her eyes and blew her mane away from her face, then she tromped past you, giving you a quick smack on the flank with her wing as she went.
  1137. >”Shaddap.”
  1138. >Was all you heard before she took off.
  1139. >The launch was clean.
  1140. >With just one well timed flap, Anonymous had already climbed double the height she’d been hovering at previously.
  1141. >After that her technique was not so swell, but it got the job done.
  1142. >You watched her rise, looking like a little white kite, laughing and whooping until she reached her zenith maybe two electrical poles up, where she began to circle in the air.
  1143. >”Come on!!”
  1144. >Anonymous hollered down.
  1145. >From here, you could count each tooth in the big smile on her face.
  1146. >But you could see the tensed muscles in her withers too, and her nervously darting eyes.
  1147. >She wasn’t used to the height, probably she hadn’t been given the kind of instincts you had.
  1148. >You stuck your tongue out of the side of your beak and spread your wings behind you, feeling the thrill from last night all over again.
  1149.  
  1150. >Your tail twirled around as you took up a wider stance, pushing your paws back into the ice and forcing your head up to point like an arrow at the little pony in the sky.
  1151. >With one wing beat, not nearly as strong as you could manage, you were at your pony friend’s altitude.
  1152. >With the second you soared past her, cackling and flipping her the bird.
  1153. >”Fucker!”
  1154. >But you were gone, jetting past in a vast arc as you took in the landscape.
  1155. >Your confidence was triple what it had been last night.
  1156. >The air streamed across your beak like a wake from a boat’s prow, and you could feel it tracing along your wings in a perfectly aerodynamic harmony.
  1157. >Here, now, in the light of the sun, there was nothing that could hide from you.
  1158. >The clouds ran from your sight in long feathery lines across the pale blue sky, back towards the sun to escape.
  1159. >Below, the patches of forest, field, home and rock expanded, all dusted in shimmering snowfall and cut across by a sable river of pavement, the highway.
  1160. >Your eyes counted ten coneys within a mile, too many birds to bother counting, and... yes, three gnome tracks in the snow.
  1161. >A sordid grin twisted your face; they were traps, obviously.
  1162. >They were even laid where the gnomes must have figured your group was certain to find them, at the spot where it had all happened last night.
  1163. >You stopped your soaring and hovered, taking in the details.
  1164. >The bodies were gone but the bloodstains remained.
  1165. >...And your knife was there, with the blade buried in the ice.
  1166. >It hadn’t even crossed your mind that you had left it behind.
  1167. >You clicked your beak when you noticed the faintest shimmering line coming from its hilt, so faint even you had to screw your eyes up to keep track of it.
  1168. >Must be some dew blessed gossamer thrice weaved by a... whatever.
  1169. >Squinting, you followed the path of the wire trap, hovering a little to the right to get it all in view.
  1170. >It went up to a gnarly looking widowmaker; the dead top of a birch that probably blended well with the tree cover when you looked at it from below.
  1171. >You just shook your head and smiled.
  1172. >The fact that they had lain traps gave away the whole game.
  1173. >It meant the gnomes were still in the forest, and that they knew it was possible to track them.
  1174. “They’re here, they’re not so hidden, and I can find them...”
  1175. >Most of the worst case scenarios were officially off the table.
  1176. >You felt lighter than air.
  1177. >You spun around and pelted yourself back at Anonymous with an almost lazy whip of your wings, feeling positively smug.
  1178. >The little white kite was on a shaky looking glide towards the neighbour’s farmhouse.
  1179. >She was gaping all around, trying to catch sight of you again, but you were right inside her blind spot.
  1180. >There was half a niggling thought at the back of your head to dive at Anon and give her a spook, but you thought better of it.
  1181. >With careful wing control, you brought your speed down and let loose a low toned call to catch the pony’s attention as you pulled up beside her.
  1182.  
  1183. >Her little ears tracked you before her eyes could.
  1184. >Exasperation crossed her face for second, but first flier’s glee melted it away.
  1185. >”Watch.”
  1186. >She confidently commanded.
  1187. >You smiled and kept an even keel.
  1188. >With newfound avian grace, Anonymous flapped her wings once, well and low.
  1189. >The beat wafted her up in an arc above you, and halfway across she flapped just her left wing, spinning herself like a drill as she completed the maneuver to settle into a glide again at your right side.
  1190. >Anonymous raised her head almost haughtily, smiling as wide as could be.
  1191. >You were honestly impressed.
  1192. >It had hardly been ten minutes and she was this maneuverable?
  1193. >Also, you had seen exactly that same bit of acrobatics before, it was a common trick crows used when harrying eagles.
  1194. >Of course she’d do it to you.
  1195. >You nodded approvingly, and clapped your claws as you asked,
  1196. “Watched the crows?”
  1197. >”Mm-hmm.”
  1198. >She hummed, before breaking into giggles.
  1199. >Her bright blues stared into the horizon blissfully as she glided along beside you.
  1200. >Thoughtfully, Anonymous said,
  1201. >”This is beautiful.”
  1202. “Yeah.”
  1203. >But still not right, a thought chimed in at the back of your mind.
  1204.  
  1205. ////
  1206.  
  1207. >This was so right, you thought, breathing deep.
  1208. >The air was flowing in streams across and under your wings, buoying you.
  1209. >Every feeling, of the wind passing across your feathers, of it threading through your mane, and of it scoring across your fur, was an exhilaration so potent you had felt a little dazed at first.
  1210. >Now the whole world reamed out before you, and you knew that the best thing you could possibly be doing right now was flying over it with your best friend.
  1211. >Really, nothing better.
  1212. >You turned your head and smiled at Chad again, though his eyes were pointed elsewhere.
  1213. >Somehow he still saw, and smiled back re-assuredly.
  1214. >Chad’s wings were shifting the currents beside you.
  1215. >He was like a wall you were sidling up against, he kept the rogue winds that would shoot up at bay, and made it much easier for you to glide so high like this.
  1216. >Without you really noticing, the both of you had climbed maybe double what you thought had been your maximum earlier.
  1217. >Really, Chad’s body was incredible.
  1218. >Seeing him actually move, and not just laze around Aisling’s house, had made you realize just how strong he was.
  1219. >You had barely been able to follow that big arcing soar earlier.
  1220. >But you didn’t feel jealous, even as a joke.
  1221. >Playfully, you dipped the ends of your left lead feathers and tipped up the ends on your right wing.
  1222. >The motion sent you spinning on yourself faster and faster as you hugged your wings closer to your body.
  1223. >You plummeted, and you directed the fall, passing underneath Chad.
  1224. >You caught his eye, glinting dangerously, though his smile was friendly as ever.
  1225. >Probably, he had already realized what you were up to, though it was too little too late to stop you.
  1226. >Laughing, you felt out the thermal coming up from below and caught it, spreading your wings wide.
  1227.  
  1228. >The burst of thrust brought you more than level with Chad again, now at his left side.
  1229. >Right now you loved your wings much more than his.
  1230. >You smiled at Chad’s steadily descending, unreadable face, while he pointed out the obvious,
  1231. >”You cut my air.”
  1232. >Pitilessly, you stared down your muzzle at him and replied,
  1233. “Yup.”
  1234. >To lay in the salt, you conjured up a hand on your hoof and flipped the bird, at the bird.
  1235. >Chad chuckled, shaking his head on his slow descent.
  1236. >He flapped just once to regain his altitude, and you giggled wildly as the force sent you tumbling away in the sky, head over hooves, like a child being thrown into a pool.
  1237. >The both of you locked eyes when you stopped yourself midair.
  1238. >A moment’s surprise flitted across Chad’s face, before he smirked, and flapped again when you tried to approach.
  1239. >And again you were sent tumbling, but this time you took advantage of the turbulence, and sent yourself wheeling into the air above your overlarge flying friend.
  1240. >There was never a better time to be up to no good, you thought.
  1241. >First you blinded him, sweeping your tail over his face, then you cartwheeled across Chad’s back.
  1242. >”Cocky little...”
  1243. >His big golden eye was squinted at you sidelong, and his tail swung around restlessly, but he still smirked as if the ace was in his claws.
  1244. >You knew better though, there was no way he could use those massive wings to maneuver the way you could.
  1245. >So you prepared for another big flap, picturing a new trick to play on the big dumb hawkcat.
  1246. >But Chad did the opposite, and suddenly clapped his wings flat against himself instead, catching you off guard.
  1247. >The expression on his beak was concealed, and there was a twinkle in his eyes as he dipped away, promptly vanishing behind you.
  1248. >You whipped your head around to try to follow, but you only caught the shaking of his tail before he vanished again.
  1249. >The ominous sounding clap of a wing and a lingering rust speckled feather left in the griffon’s wake were your only clues.
  1250. >You gaped around worriedly into the empty blue for few seconds before regaining your presence of mind.
  1251. >Ears, your hearing was your best bet against that bird brain’s likely ludicrous field of vision.
  1252. >So you honed your ears against your surroundings, trying to pick up even the faintest trace of wings, while you did your best to scan visually as well.
  1253. >But all you saw was the open sky above and the open field below.
  1254. >At some point in the middle of playing, the two of you had gotten pretty far off track from the neighbour’s farmhouse.
  1255. >Not that it mattered right now.
  1256. >Your ears caught and locked on to the distinct whistle of Chad’s wings cutting the air, up and left.
  1257. >Your eyes follo-
  1258. >Eye.
  1259. >You saw nothing but a piercing yellow eye, before it disappeared.
  1260. >Though, your ears couldn’t have failed to hear the thunderous, the calamitous threat of Chad’s dive, as he tore through the sky on your left side.
  1261. >The turbulence hit you half a second later, and sent you down in an uncontrolled spin.
  1262.  
  1263. >Your heart remembered to beat about the same time you remembered how to flap your wings, some twenty feet from the snowy ground.
  1264. “Fuck!”
  1265. >You hollered to no one, kicking your hooves all around restlessly as you slowly regained altitude.
  1266. >Your heart was pounding, your adrenaline was giving you the shakes, but you were grinning too.
  1267. >Chad was FAST.
  1268.  
  1269. #Pinion
  1270.  
  1271. >Fast like jet at an airshow fast.
  1272. >Already, he was nowhere you could see anymore, likely soaring at several times your height, just watching you.
  1273. >But your ears were honed to him now, right away you caught the whistling wind over his feathers, straight up.
  1274. >You tossed your head and looked, spotting the faintest outline of Chad, God knows how high above.
  1275. >As soon as you did, he cut around in a borderline supernatural looking arc, wheeling through the air at such a ridiculous speed it was a wonder his head stayed attached to his neck.
  1276. >Chad passed into your blind spot and then vanished in a different direction.
  1277. >You laughed at that and licked your lips in anticipation of getting one over him this time.
  1278. >Probably he wouldn’t do it again exactly like how he did before, but there was one guarantee: Chad was going to dive at you, probably even closer than earlier.
  1279. >He was literally too fast for your eyes, so you gave up on looking, and focused on listening.
  1280. >You stopped flapping, and caught a strong updraft to glide upon, reducing the ambient noise down to just the wind rolling over your ears while you stared straight ahead.
  1281. >Wind.
  1282. >Wind.
  1283. >Wind.
  1284. >Piercing whistle, left again.
  1285. >There was no time to think or look, you just cast a hand and flicked its finger to where you expected Chad’s head would be.
  1286. >Your eyes caught the very moment of your success; Chad was slicing down through the sky on your left side with one of his clawed hands extended towards your head.
  1287. >The floating black light hand you’d summoned flicked him right between his wide, crossed, yellow eyes, and this time you heard a surprised squawk accompany that tumult of noise that came with Chad’s dive.
  1288. >Even as you tumbled in the riptide of wind that followed, you giggled and spluttered.
  1289. >Finally you spread your wings again, and leveled out just a foot from the earth.
  1290. >Grinning madly, you pulled up in a swoop, back to higher altitude.
  1291. >Man, this was so right.
  1292. >You watched your griffon friend approach fast on your right, and smirked, as he smirked right along at you.
  1293. >The two of you clasped, hoof to talons, and laughed.
  1294. >Then Chad bumped your shoulder with a balled fist and noted,
  1295. >”Had to cheat and use magic huh?”
  1296. >You rolled your eyes and smiled sidelong at him, replying as you flapped once,
  1297. “As if anything you can do is fair.”
  1298. >Then you suddenly remembered that moment of the last dive, Chad had reached out with his claws...
  1299. “Wha-”
  1300. >Chad laughed as you reached up to your ear with a hoof, and beat you there with his talons, plucking out... One of his own feathers.
  1301. >You puffed up your cheeks, as he smiled slyly and stuck it back behind your ear.
  1302. >He was doing that thing again, where he put his scaly hand under his beak, like he still had a chin or something.
  1303. >There was an appraising glint in his eyes as he said,
  1304. >”That’s better. The feather and your mane blowing in the wind gives you back that ‘natural’ look.”
  1305.  
  1306. >Something fluttered in your heart at Chad’s remark, so you shot it down, and piled a hoof into his ribs, snorting.
  1307. “Sperg.”
  1308. >...You didn’t take the feather out though.
  1309. >The both of you turned back toward the neighbour’s place, and glided on, mostly in satisfied silence.
  1310. >All the while, for the second time since your shower earlier, you thought about how Chad had been acting differently today.
  1311. >It was hard to place the difference, but there was one for sure.
  1312. >You breathed deep, your eyes tracing his twirling lion’s tail as you pondered the aspect of what this difference was.
  1313. >At first it seemed like he was more distant in some ways... But taken as a whole, this past day stuck out as a time when you felt the closest to him.
  1314. >You looked sidelong at Chad’s face, taking in the cool collected smile on the edge of his beak as he stared ahead at the destination.
  1315. >Even here in this simple expression you could see there was something different: he was wistful.
  1316. >He cut a more thoughtful figure than usual, and it made you suspect he was undergoing a similar or even greater amount of reflection than you were right now.
  1317. >Considering he had just been transformed, that wasn’t really a surprise though.
  1318. >You sighed to yourself and looked away, ruminating.
  1319. >Was it you?
  1320. >Was it that your perception of Chad had changed?
  1321. >Or was he really behaving differently?
  1322. >You bit your lip, feeling like it may be impossible to tell.
  1323. >That flutter in your heart earlier, when he stuck his feather behind your ear, hadn’t been the first of today, there had been other times, like...
  1324. >When he laid his head in front of yours.
  1325. >Ranted about reptilians and fake space.
  1326. >Said you should keep your mane.
  1327. >Said you had ‘simple cuteness’.
  1328. >Touched your wings.
  1329. >Your eyes narrowed and your heart pumped a beat as a common connection of a word tumbled out of all this: Girl.
  1330. >He was treating you like a girl.
  1331. >Above all the other things you listed, Chad always sperged out about conspiracies around girls, it was why he still didn’t have a girlfriend yet after all.
  1332. >Your train of thought raced ahead for a moment, before crashing as you remembered that he gushed about conspiracies to you all the time anyway, human or not.
  1333. >So...
  1334. >You languished anxiously.
  1335. >Was Chad treating you like a girl?
  1336. >Your cheeks flushed.
  1337. >Or were you just acting like a girl?
  1338. >Your tail whipped behind you, and you glanced to your right at Chad again, only to meet his gaze headlong.
  1339. >He blinked at you, looking a little bemused, as he asked,
  1340. >”You getting cold? Your cheeks are all red.”
  1341. “Nu-OH!”
  1342. >You answered too quickly, your voice cracking as you shook your head and sent your mane fluttering about your face.
  1343. >”Cool.”
  1344. >Chad replied before turning his head away from you.
  1345. >With a quiet sigh, you pressed a hoof to your chest and calmed yourself, thinking how fortunate it was that he could be so dense at times.
  1346.  
  1347. >The neighbour’s farmhouse was right below now.
  1348. >Your eyes narrowed and you licked your lips, as you pointed your wings down and began to glide in a descending curve alongside Chad.
  1349. >Some sneaky little part of you wanted to spring the ‘girl’ question on him at the best/worst time.
  1350. >Teasing him earlier about his comments on your wings and horn had been fun after all.
  1351. >So for now you pushed it to the back of your mind and took in the view.
  1352. >Aisling’s neighbour really had it good, with an idyllic looking, white two story home built on a rolling hill, surrounded by their fields of wheat, corn and carrots.
  1353. >They had two barns, and three silos with red tops, all set up behind their house.
  1354. >Idly, you could hear the sounds of mechanical work going on in one of the barns.
  1355. >Down in the snow, you saw Aisling already talking to the pony you assumed was the neighbour.
  1356. >There was a pair of ‘something’s tumbling in the yard too...
  1357. >”Kids.”
  1358. >Chad quietly said, as if to fill in the blank.
  1359. >You blinked and looked at his unreadable expression.
  1360. >”The kids got transformed too.”
  1361. >He shook his head.
  1362. >”I really don’t know what to think about that.”
  1363. “Yeah.”
  1364. >You agreed simply.
  1365. >Your features grew a little stonier as your glide brought you lower and closer and you saw the kids for yourself.
  1366. >Two colts horsing around and laughing in the snow, both just plain ponies with no wings or horns.
  1367. >One with a brown coat and the other with a black one.
  1368. >You touched ground about ten feet from Aisling and the father, at a cantering pace, while Chad slid cleanly alongside you.
  1369. >Aisling’s gleaming eye caught yours, and you smiled, waving your wing at her.
  1370.  
  1371. ////
  1372.  
  1373. “That’s them.”
  1374. >You intoned to Frederick, your neighbour, while pointing out Chad and Anonymous with your black foreleg as they descended towards you both.
  1375. >”Hm. So that’s a griffon.”
  1376. >Frederick commented, sounding almost bored as he said it.
  1377. >He had never been an over-complicated man, and transforming into a pony had not changed that.
  1378. >As a stallion, he stood a few inches taller than you, with a much bulkier frame, covered in hazelnut brown fur splotched with off-white patches.
  1379. >Frederick’s mark was a yoke, plain and simple.
  1380. >There was something a little uncanny about his eyes, as he met yours easily.
  1381. >They were the same blue as before, framed with a sandy blonde mane that was just the same tone as his human hair had been.
  1382. >It made you wonder if the mass transformation had different properties than the individual drug induced ones.
  1383. >”It’s not just anypony that can come here and borrow my gun you know. I mean don’t get me wrong Aisling, if I couldn’t trust you then it would have to be the end of the world. But...”
  1384. >Frederick started, as he watched Chad touch down and slide along the snowy yard.
  1385.  
  1386. #Aisling Again
  1387.  
  1388. >The look on the griffon’s face was particularly insolent, and you couldn’t help but giggle, having seen a couple of his antics with Anon earlier.
  1389. >Frederick turned his sharp blue eyes on you, as if to ask: ‘Really? Him?’
  1390. >You nodded in reply, your eyes half lidded in amusement as you brushed your mane to the side, before you caught Anon’s pretty bright blues instead.
  1391. >She waved a wing at you, all white, and you waved a hoof back, tipped with silver.
  1392. >Your gaze flicked to the feather behind her ear, with a familiar rusty speck on it.
  1393. >An almost conspiratorial smile spread across your muzzle, knowing where it must have come from.
  1394. >With her mane all wind tossed, and that addition, she looked positively carefree.
  1395. >It was a welcome total bounce back from her condition this morning, and you found yourself laughing just at the warm sight of it.
  1396. >As soon as Anon’s eyes left your face, you caught Chad’s gaze and winked, mouthing the words: ‘Good job.’
  1397. >He nodded back, hardly letting on, right as they both came to a stop before you and Frederick.
  1398. >Frederick’s sons both trotted up, looking at Anonymous some, but at Chad especially, with wide and curious stares.
  1399. >The griffon stuck his tongue out briefly at them in reply, flexing his talons, while Anon quietly said,
  1400. >”Hello.”
  1401. >The colts both waved little hooves back at her, before the one with the black fur blew a raspberry at Chad, and then suddenly the younger brother tackled his elder, laughing.
  1402. >There were smiles and laughs all around as the two brothers split off from the group to go play again.
  1403. >Frederick was softly smiling at the sight, and though there was nothing but innocence about it, your heart still ached watching them tumble.
  1404. >They were only five and six years old, they had hardly experienced their real bodies before having this thrust upon them.
  1405. >The thought of how unfair that was nearly spoiled your mood.
  1406. >You yearned to see the gnomes flee before you, and thought maybe it wasn’t so weird you had hugged Chad soon after he’d torn three of them apart.
  1407. >Your wandering gaze caught the quizzical look on Anon’s face, and you realized your emotions must be showing.
  1408. “Just... gnomes.”
  1409. >You said, to clear things up, as you felt your tail flick behind you.
  1410. >She nodded, her eyes lingering wistfully on the two boys playing.
  1411. >Chad barreled over the tension, and stuck out his clawed hand to the stallion of the house, with that natural smirk playing on his beak as he introduced himself,
  1412. >”I’m Chad. Known Aisling for a bit, known Anonymous for longer.”
  1413. >Frederick set his hoof in Chad’s grasp and shook, snorting as he met the griffon’s piercing stare with his own and replied,
  1414. >”Frederick. Known Aisling since she was just a filly. Heard tell of Anonymous once.”
  1415. >Anonymous laughed and stuck her hoof out to bump Frederick’s next, and added, keeping with the trend,
  1416. >”Anonymous, known Aisling since senior year of high school. Never met myself yet.”
  1417.  
  1418. >Chad playfully shoved Anonymous down into the snow for her lame joke, and Frederick noticeably softened at her words.
  1419. >There was just the slightest smile on the stallion’s face now, though his eyes narrowed a moment as he took in Chad some more, paying special attention to his claws.
  1420. >”So you’ll be the one shooting then.”
  1421. >Frederick said, finally.
  1422. >Then before Chad could answer, he trotted past him and towards the house, beckoning the griffon to follow as he continued,
  1423. >”Show me you know how to use it safely first. I don’t want to just hoof it over to somegriffon who might plant one in Aisling’s back.”
  1424. >Smiling, but holding his tongue, Chad followed confidently, waving to you and Anonymous as he passed the front door.
  1425. >His leonine tail curled and waved behind him, before slipping out of sight as the door shut, leaving you alone out in the yard with Anon and the two boys who were still horsing around.
  1426. >Anonymous turned to you first, smiling a little wanly as she sat in the snow,
  1427. >”Frederick is speaking in ‘horsetalk’, huh?”
  1428. >Your lips pressed together, forming a thin line across your muzzle.
  1429. >You nodded, and replied,
  1430. “Yes. But...”
  1431. >”He’s still the same?”
  1432. >Anon finished hopefully.
  1433. >Sweeping your silvery mane aside, you answered,
  1434. “Definitely.”
  1435. >There was no doubt in your mind.
  1436. >So much so, that Anonymous seemed to understand right away, and she nodded, looking chipper again.
  1437. >For a moment, you lifted your head up, shut your eyes, and just breathed in the cool air, feeling the midday sun’s warmth casting down on your black fur.
  1438. >Then you opened them once more, and you had to blink a little from the glare coming off the snow as you explained,
  1439. “I told him about what happened last night. So he knows about the ‘gnomes’ along with what we’re planning on doing.”
  1440. >Anonymous chuckled and lobbed you an easy joke,
  1441. >”And he just accepted that?”
  1442. >You smiled, and shrewdly remarked to her,
  1443. “He woke up in bed with a pegasus this morning. If anything he expected gnomes by lunch.”
  1444. >Your friend grinned a bit sheepishly, her blonde tail tossing around as she laughed.
  1445. >Laughing at the joke, feeling guilty about the circumstances, you thought.
  1446. >That conflict in her eyes was what made you laugh a little dryly back.
  1447. >When the both of you had settled into quietude again, Anonymous tilted her head.
  1448. >Her furry ears were twitching at some sound, which you honed in on a moment later.
  1449. >It was all the mechanical banging and clanging coming from one of Frederick’s barns.
  1450. >You started,
  1451. “The barn, right?”
  1452. >Anonymous nodded back, blinking.
  1453. “I never asked Frederick about it.”
  1454. >You finished as you stood up.
  1455. >Then you motioned your muzzle in the barn’s direction, saying,
  1456. “It will probably be a while before Chad and him are done anyway.”
  1457. >With that, you and Anonymous both set off through the ice.
  1458. >Here, where all the tractors and other machinery had to pass, the ground was pretty thoroughly plowed, leaving a thinner, harder layer of snow.
  1459.  
  1460. >The first barn loomed over the two of you, seemingly empty.
  1461. >Then the second, where all the racket was coming from.
  1462. >It sounded like steel was being dumped flat on concrete, and when you cast a spell to open the side door and take a look, you realized it was exactly that.
  1463. >You and Anonymous both stepped inside the warm, loud barn with your ears flat to your heads, watching the odd spectacle taking place in the expansive main room.
  1464. >Ten ponies, all stallions, were dismantling the tractors and all their attachments, along with any other machinery in sight.
  1465. >In the corner furthest from you, there was a dusky purple unicorn hard at work at a well crafted forge that you knew but hardly believed must have been put together just this morning.
  1466. >The nine other ponies were all taking the metal pieces to him to melt down.
  1467. >And with all that metal, he was making a slew of farming equipment from just before the cusp of the industrial revolution.
  1468. >Iron plows, yokes, a horse drawn reaper, hoes.
  1469. >Immediately you had a million well formed ideas about all of this, but first you had to ask questions.
  1470. >So you trotted up to the blacksmith unicorn, with Anonymous in tow, and you were about to speak when the unicorn met your eyes.
  1471. >Your voice caught in your throat, and you blinked.
  1472. >Finally you managed to ask,
  1473. “Dakota?”
  1474. >The unicorn sighed, his hazel eyes flickering with recognition for a moment before locking back to the horseshoe he was banging into shape.
  1475. >”Aisling.”
  1476. >He replied simply.
  1477. >Your eyes went wide for a moment before you recovered, taking a deep breath.
  1478. “I’m such a fool...”
  1479. >You chided yourself.
  1480. >Of course everyone was affected, you had accepted that.
  1481. >But, you had clung to the tempting illusion of familiarity.
  1482. >That thought earlier when you had seen the familiar parts to Frederick’s new body, and supposed maybe the mass transformation was different from the norm...
  1483. >That had been a whisper of wishful thinking.
  1484. >Dakota smiled thinly, answering,
  1485. >”If you’re a fool then what does that make the rest of us?”
  1486. >You smiled back,
  1487. “Don’t feed my ego any. This is Anonymous, by the way. My pen pal?”
  1488. >Setting the completed horseshoe aside with his magic, Dakota reached a hoof out to the still confused looking Anon, who received it in a shake, as the stallion laconically greeted,
  1489. >”Sup. I used to be the mechanic around here.”
  1490. >Then he looked ruefully down at his anvil, and around at all the decidedly un-mechanical equipment he had made so far.
  1491. >”Now I guess I’m the opposite.”
  1492. >Now he looked down at his decidedly masculine body.
  1493. >”In just about every way.”
  1494. >You were about to clarify who Dakota was, when you saw the realization dawn on Anonymous, who sympathized immediately.
  1495. >Her lips pressed thin into a grim but understanding expression as she replied,
  1496. >”Hey, same here.”
  1497. >Dakota nodded back.
  1498. >”It’s all like some insane dream, every time I look at myself I swear I’m going to just wake up, but it never happens.”
  1499.  
  1500. #Ripples
  1501.  
  1502. >Hearing that drew a pang of guilt from your heart.
  1503. >It made you think shamefully about how you had spent most of last night frolicking around.
  1504. >But...
  1505. >You shook your head, and the thought, off.
  1506. >This wasn’t like last night when you first learned Anonymous had been permanently transformed, back then your own transformation was still temporary.
  1507. >Now you were mostly in the same boat as the both of them.
  1508. >While you quietly listened on the side, Anonymous related with Dakota some more.
  1509. >”My Tylenol bottle was spiked, a few days back. Overdosed immediately.”
  1510. >The stallion quietly cursed, offering some condolences before Anon continued,
  1511. >”The worst part is when I remember all the things I can’t do anymore... You know?”
  1512. >Returning a sympathetic look, Dakota replied,
  1513. >”I would kill to grab a wrench again.”
  1514. >You softly exhaled through your nose, and turned your eyes upward to the dusty eaves.
  1515. >What did God think?
  1516. >The sight of both of your friends, switched and swapped so utterly away from their real bodies...
  1517. >Scenes just like this were playing out everywhere, with everyone, right now.
  1518. >It was total befuddlement.
  1519. >Dakota sat there at his anvil, and for all the world he already looked like he had been there for his whole life.
  1520. >Sweating, his fur dusted with ash, his lively face defiant and sardonic.
  1521. >But inside you could tell she was strained to her limits.
  1522. >You had already seen it in Anonymous.
  1523. >For all her gamboling and cute affectations, there remained a man.
  1524. >And Dakota’s symptoms were more apparent, but they were both the victims of the most heinous kind of mental warfare imaginable.
  1525. >It made you wonder, if this kept up, how you might eventually be affected.
  1526. >You tilted your head, thinking intently as you stuck the tip of your tongue out absently.
  1527. >Without a doubt, the Fomorians were ‘not meant to be’.
  1528. >They were not ignorant of their trespasses, and they committed these terrible acts because they knew it would get them results.
  1529. >So it stood to reason that somewhere along the line of their heresy of degenerating humanity, they would get it in their heads to try and attack faith.
  1530. >Your eyes narrowed as you remembered one undeniable fact:
  1531. >The moment you had first had that thought, ‘What did God think?’, while sitting on your front yard...
  1532. >That was when you saw your first gnome.
  1533. >You were certain of it now, that red blur was a perfect match for what you had seen later in the evening.
  1534. >The best cover for a tipping point in any long drawn out scheme was ‘coincidence’.
  1535. >But, you had been removed long enough from what was going on around you.
  1536. >For now you filed away those musings, and tuned back in to the conversation between Anon and Dakota.
  1537. >The latter seemed to have returned to his work, while Anonymous was sitting a little apart, to his side, watching and listening.
  1538. >”It’s so stupid we’re banging out fuckin’ scythes of all things...”
  1539. >Dakota complained, even as he tossed another tractor fender to the forge.
  1540.  
  1541. >Just as you noted the contradiction to yourself, Anonymous furrowed her brow, eyeing Dakota closely as she asked,
  1542. >”So... Why are you doing this then? I get no one has hands anymore but-”
  1543. >”We don’t even remember how to maintain these things.”
  1544. >The stallion grunted back, obviously referring to the tractors they were taking apart, as he slammed his hammer down on a red hot length of iron he had pulled off the fender.
  1545. >His magic held both his implement and the metal he was working firmly in its yellow glow.
  1546. >Dakota began punctuating himself with hammer strikes, and with each one his tone grew more and more charged.
  1547. >”All. My. Learning. Gone.”
  1548. >Dakota’s smile was far too wide,
  1549. >”But! Now I know how to smith!”
  1550. >He laughed and began to beat the iron down and down into a point, using the strikes to emphasize his words.
  1551. >”In FACT I’m JUST fantastic at IT!”
  1552. >You took a step back, recoiling from the flying sparks and the oppressive heat of the forge, as Dakota really began to lay into the iron, coaxing it into another horseshoe despite, no, almost *by* employing his sublimated frustrations.
  1553. >”No PRACTICE, no LESSONS, I just KNOW! BUT I forgot EVERYTHING about ENGINES that MATTERED to ME.”
  1554. >He spat off to the side, and it sizzled against the stone.
  1555. >”Plus, the government is paying for it.”
  1556. >Dakota finished with sarcastic ease, as he tossed aside the completed horseshoe.
  1557. >Finally you spoke back, asking,
  1558. “The government is subsidizing this?”
  1559. >Dakota quenched the iron he was working, and answered,
  1560. >”In spades. I’m an essential worker now, for the ‘change of pace’ as that fucking...”
  1561. >The unicorn seemed to be experiencing an emotion so invective he found himself unable to finish.
  1562. >There must have been more pronouncements from the state on what was to be done, all influenced by the mental shifts, and probably other deals the Fomorians had made with people.
  1563. >It dovetailed perfectly with the wiping of technical knowledge you were witnessing.
  1564. >You chuckled darkly to yourself.
  1565. >You were thinking like Chad now, drawing connections up high, where you couldn’t decisively prove them.
  1566. >But it was hard not to in a time like this, in fact it was probably the safer course of thought to take.
  1567. >Anything less would just get you duped and running in circles.
  1568. >So you asked Dakota more specifically,
  1569. “They’re telling everyone to take apart machines?”
  1570. >Dakota nodded, stoking up his forge as he answered,
  1571. >”Yeah, farmers get a big stipend for switching to more manual stuff like this. They’re also changing up the crops. Going to be a whole lot more wheat and hay.”
  1572. >Anonymous shook her head and sighed,
  1573. >”It’s insane people are just... Going along.”
  1574. >Breathing heavily through his nostrils, as sparks flew around his face, the unicorn smith replied,
  1575. >”I feel like I’m going crazy. I know this just... I dunno...”
  1576. >His brow was knitted and furrowed, as he elucidated the contradiction in his mind.
  1577. >”It’s wrong, we shouldn’t be... Going backwards. But its like... Its all I know.”
  1578.  
  1579. >Finally Dakota wiped a single tear from his eye, and he couldn’t help repeating himself,
  1580. >”It’s all I know.”
  1581. >All three of you fell silent at that, and Dakota just slumped in his seat.
  1582. >Seeing him react that way sapped your confidence.
  1583. >Before you had noticed, your ears were dropping low atop your head.
  1584. >You were not sure now whether to tell him of you and your friends’ plans to try and reverse all this.
  1585. >Frederick had been simple because he had taken the change in stride, but Dakota’s situation was so much more visceral and contrary to his way of life.
  1586. >Memories of her, covered in grease, talking animatedly to you from under her project cars and anything else with an engine, came unbidden to your mind.
  1587. >You had a strange hunch that you shouldn’t tell him, that it wouldn’t be the right thing to do.
  1588. >A look from Anonymous confirmed she was thinking the same.
  1589. >But in willful defiance of it, you pressed on anyway.
  1590. “We’re going to fix this.”
  1591. >You assured Dakota confidently.
  1592. >He blinked up at you, confused, while you explained everything and gave him the same rundown you gave Frederick.
  1593. >By the end, Dakota was frowning doubtfully, but there was a glimmer of hope in his hazel eyes.
  1594. >He half smirked and shook his head.
  1595. >”Sounds stupid. But alright, I can work with that...”
  1596. >Anon and you both watched, wondering what he meant, while he rooted around behind his forge.
  1597. >Eventually Dakota came back, floating over eight pristine steel horseshoes and all the tools to fit them.
  1598. >With his tongue stuck out between his teeth, and a wily looking smile, Dakota brushed aside his violet mane and asked you,
  1599. >”Iron kills ‘em?”
  1600. >Your eyebrows shot up in surprise, then you smiled in return, answering with a crystal clear,
  1601. “Yes.”
  1602. >Anonymous just grinned and clopped her fore hoof down loudly on a nearby wooden stand for Dakota to work on.
  1603. >Which he did, with something not dissimilar from that single minded enthusiasm he reserved for tuned up project cars.
  1604. >First he brought out a hoof knife, and he carefully began to trim the inside of Anon’s hoof.
  1605. >She winced before the first contact of the knife to her frog, holding her eyes shut.
  1606. >”Y-yo wai-”
  1607. >She started to protest, but by the time she had opened her eyes again, Dakota was already done trimming around her sole and had gotten out a rasp to start smoothing out the edges, chuckling all the while.
  1608. >You giggled, seeing Anonymous slowly realize that none of it was going to hurt.
  1609. >It was just like trimming nails after all.
  1610. >The shoe that Dakota was going to fit to her was already on the forge while he went about with rasping.
  1611. >”It’s so weird how this memory stuff works, you know?”
  1612. >Dakota said, idly.
  1613. >You smiled and replied,
  1614. “Yeah?”
  1615. >”I’ve seen farriers do this before, on some other farms I did work for...”
  1616. >The stallion trailed off and paused for a second as he set Anonymous’ hoof down off of the stand, seemingly satisfied with the rasping.
  1617. >While he made his way back over to his anvil, he continued,
  1618. >”But obviously I never touched any of it, just watched. Anyway, I don’t even know why I’m saying this, but...”
  1619. >Dakota laughed as he took the red hot shoe off the fire,
  1620. >”I’m doing it just like this one old man used to, guy called Patrick.”
  1621.  
  1622. ##Coincidences
  1623.  
  1624. >At that, Dakota started artfully hammering away at the horseshoe.
  1625. >His eyes would dart momentarily to Anon’s hoof between every few swings, to gauge the size.
  1626. >Anonymous had this awfully pleased looking smile on her muzzle, and a distant look in her eyes all of a sudden.
  1627. >Something about it brought back your first impression of ponies being these goofy, weird looking things, while she just stood there with one hoof up on the stand, smiling into space.
  1628. >So you approached with your tongue stuck out, and gave her a little poke in the ribs, as you asked,
  1629. “What are you thinking about?”
  1630. >She just turned that smile on you, laughing softly, before she answered,
  1631. >”I met an old security guard called Patrick a few days ago...”
  1632. >Pausing for a moment, the now positively hypnotized looking mare ran her other fore hoof over her head, ponderously rubbing at one of her ears as she reminisced,
  1633. >”Old Scot gave me the best damn petting session I’ve gotten yet. It was borderline magical...”
  1634. >Your eyes went a little wide.
  1635. >At first you were going to laugh at her, but now that Anonymous had mentioned it, you realized for the first time that you hadn’t actually been pet yet.
  1636. >One of the b-rolls on the news that you had seen in the earlier days, before the gnomes, was footage of a little mare on a bus, getting patted by a girl sitting in front of her.
  1637. >The quality of the video had been low, and the angle pretty bad, where you could only really see the pony’s head, but the expression of contentment on her face-
  1638. >You blinked.
  1639. >And looked back at Anon’s contented expression.
  1640. “I saw you on the news.”
  1641. >You stated suddenly.
  1642. >She looked up at you, smiling more normally now, her eyes clear and focused on the present.
  1643. >”Yeah? I did kinda get popular on like 4chan for a little while, before there were way more ponies around.”
  1644. >Dakota’s ears perked up at the conversation, but he was still busy shaping the horseshoe.
  1645. >You sat and thoughtfully pressed a hoof to your chin, prompting,
  1646. “It was a video of you on a bus, with a little girl petting you?”
  1647. >Anonymous grinned.
  1648. >”Yep. I remember that. That felt nice too, but it just wasn’t the same as when Patrick scratched my ears.”
  1649. >Her ears flicked once as if they also remembered, before she added,
  1650. >”Actually, I met Patrick right before that.”
  1651. >So two pats minimum in a single day.
  1652. >Your eyes narrowed slightly in something you weren’t ready to call envy.
  1653. “Hm.”
  1654. >Was all you could say.
  1655. >You had hoped prying further might get her to divulge a little more on what being pet felt like.
  1656. >Because...
  1657. >You thanked nothing in particular right at that moment that your black fur wouldn’t show you blushing.
  1658. >Well it was a little embarrassing to ask.
  1659. >Your lips pressed thin as you reasoned the problem out even further.
  1660. >Chad was probably the only person left now with ‘hands’.
  1661. >In the world.
  1662. >So technically you were incredibly lucky being near him, but asking Chad to pat your head?
  1663.  
  1664. >You sighed and stood up again, stretching your legs as you strutted around in a circle.
  1665. >The mane tousling he had given you earlier didn’t count either, it was obvious from the way you had seen Anon react to having hers mussed up compared to now when she was just THINKING about a time before when she got pet.
  1666. >Dakota suddenly spoke up though, as he laid the shaped hoof back on the fire to get ready for the next step.
  1667. >”The Patrick I knew was Scottish too.”
  1668. >He stared curiously at Anonymous.
  1669. >Who looked a little surprised, but mostly just ambivalent, as she replied,
  1670. >”You seem pretty sure he was a different guy.”
  1671. >The craftspony nodded, his eyes glimmering orange by the forge light as he watched the metal turn red hot again.
  1672. >Sparks fluttered around his face, illuminating the line of his mouth, down his muzzle, and sparkling against the subtle iridescent quality of his purple fur as he said,
  1673. >”The Patrick I met was a farrier his whole life, started by doing the shoes for the family pony, Applejack. He never retired, and passed away while I knew him.”
  1674. >Anon seemed to perk up at the name Applejack, but she held her tongue.
  1675. >There was more energy in Dakota’s voice as he continued, gazing at the flames,
  1676. >”Maybe I’m doing it like him because we’re the same way.”
  1677. >He lifted the scorching horseshoe from the forge with his magic, and began walking up to Anonymous, as you asked,
  1678. “How so?”
  1679. >Then, before the white mare could pull away from fear or even let out a gasp, Dakota grinned and pressed the burning horseshoe to her fresh hoof, answering,
  1680. >”I’m never retiring either.”
  1681. >Anonymous knew better than to buck, but the smith held most of her leg in his magic anyway.
  1682. >She watched the shoe burn on her hoof a second but then winced away at the sight, though there was no pain.
  1683. >It wasn’t so much the look of the burning hot shoe pressed up against her hoof that bothered you, but the keening burning sound it produced that got you to cringe.
  1684. >Your snout scrunched right up, and your eyes darted aside.
  1685. >You felt a shiver run down your black withers, and heard Dakota chuckle when Anonymous asked,
  1686. >”So is this... Required?”
  1687. >The purple unicorn answered casually, grinning at his work,
  1688. >”It’s all a part of the process. Going a lot better than I thought actually.”
  1689. >As smoke billowed still from the burning contact point, Dakota hovered over his hoof knife again, and started to trim flat the last few errant edges in Anon’s sole.
  1690. >It took a minute or so until he seemed satisfied with the result and levitated the shoe away to cool while he started trimming the rest of her hooves.
  1691. >This time you could tell his movements were even more confident than his already brazen first start.
  1692. >By the time the horseshoe was ready to be nailed on, all of Anon’s hooves were trimmed flat, smooth and balanced as they could be.
  1693.  
  1694. >From there Dakota worked quickly, nailing the first shoe on and scraping away the pointed remnants from the other side of Anonymous’ hoof until everything was flush.
  1695. >He finished the other three hooves in practically no time at all compared to the first.
  1696. >Then, chuckling, he clapped a hoof to the last of Anon’s shoes, making it ring out in the barn, loud enough that all the worker stallions looked over and smiled.
  1697. >”This feels so weird... But right?”
  1698. >Anonymous hopped up and down in place with a bemused look on her muzzle, ears twitching every time her horseshoes loudly clicked against the concrete.
  1699. >The shoes glimmered in the light, all fresh and silvery like your own natural hooves.
  1700. >Something about the sight was instantly nostalgic to you, though you had never grown up around horses.
  1701. >As you and Dakota both watched, Anon pranced around in place, giggling a little, then grinning as she held up one shoed forehoof.
  1702. >”Ready to fuck up some gnomes.”
  1703. >You laughed and nodded emphatically, before trotting over to the wooden stand to place your own hoof up on it.
  1704. >But you also gave Anon a sidelong glance with one raised eyebrow as she kept trotting in circles, obviously enraptured with the sound of her own horseshoes clicking.
  1705. >She did not see Chad fight last night, you mused.
  1706. >It seemed very unlikely to you that either of you would really have to chance to deck a gnome in the face with your hooves when that feathered terror was set loose, with a gun no less.
  1707. >But it didn’t hurt to keep stacking cards in your favour either, these horseshoes could easily pay dividends for self defence, and they should make for faster galloping too.
  1708. >Dakota chuckled as he approached with all his tools hovering around him at the ready, but he shook his head a little too, the glint of your silver hooves catching in his eyes as he ponderously said,
  1709. >”Seems almost a shame to even touch these ones.”
  1710. “I don’t plan to keep them anyway.”
  1711. >You replied easily, smiling slyly at the stallion.
  1712. >”Good point.”
  1713. >He replied with a snort of amusement, before fetching up the hoof knife on the inside of your sole.
  1714. >You blinked in slight surprise at the first few cuts, watching that extra keratin be stripped away, dropping to the floor like unto flakes of beaten silver.
  1715. >Then you hmm’d thoughtfully, nodding in sudden comprehension.
  1716. “This is nice.”
  1717. >Dakota just smiled, and kept cutting away, though he didn’t have to cut much at all, since your hooves were so new and fresh.
  1718. >The rasp was hardly used either, which was a shame because you really liked the feel of that too, the nice satisfying pushes and pulls.
  1719. >But the shaping of the horseshoes...
  1720. >”Too... Damn... Thin...”
  1721. >The smith complained between hammer strikes, beating almost endlessly on the red hot steel.
  1722. >For the first shoe, Dakota had to re-heat it thrice, having underestimated just how much working it really needed.
  1723.  
  1724. >He was intent not to have to do the same for the others though, and set the shoes on the flame right away so that they would be hot enough to last all the shaping they would undergo.
  1725. >Now Dakota approached with the burning shoe, holding your fore leg fast with his magic.
  1726. >You couldn’t help the sweat beading your brow, nor the wince as it pressed against your hoof, but halfway through you managed to look down at it.
  1727.  
  1728. #Tangent
  1729.  
  1730.  
  1731. >The glow of the super-heated steel scintillated dazzlingly on the walls of your silver hoof, shooting off glare that made you have to squint and avert your eyes again.
  1732. >It wasn’t so bad, there was no feeling besides the radiating heat and the pressure of the application, but you still found the noise intolerable.
  1733. >Anonymous watched curiously this time, her ears flicking whenever the keening sound of the burning pitched up.
  1734. >Your hooves were so clean, Dakota didn’t even have to rasp them again before nailing the shoe.
  1735. >The same went for all the other shoes, clean and fast.
  1736. “I wish I showed up with dirtier frogs...”
  1737. >You mused regretfully as Dakota cleaned out the last one with a single stroke of the hoof knife.
  1738. >The feeling was satisfying in a way that you couldn’t really compare to anything else, maybe like getting something out from between your teeth?
  1739. >Rolling his eyes, Dakota tapped the side of your hoof with the rasp.
  1740. >”Pretty entitled thing to say when you’re not even paying me for any of this.”
  1741. >Anonymous laughed and contributed,
  1742. >”Hey, we’re an investment, in a more humane future.”
  1743. >You rolled your eyes at the pun.
  1744. >If you weren’t stuck getting your hoof nailed, you would have drawn your first blood with these new shoes on Anonymous...
  1745. >The smith just grinned though, and shook his head.
  1746. >”Yeah, yeah, I’m leaving it all in your capable hooves.”
  1747. >At that, Dakota was finished.
  1748. >All your hooves were flush, and shoed perfectly, the new attachments gleamed brightly at the bases of them, and the metallic sheen of both hoof and shoe were similar to a degree.
  1749. >Smiling excitedly, you clopped down on the concrete floor right away, then pranced in a circle giggling at the distinct noise, like a stock audio effect in a movie.
  1750. >Now you related to how long Anon had spent doing it, as soon as she got her shoes on, even just the sound could easily become addicting.
  1751. “The feel is great...”
  1752. >You commented quietly as you ran a hoof along some stray straw on the ground.
  1753. >Just like you thought, there was more grip, and combined with a harder contact point you could push off with more force.
  1754. >Feeling properly thrilled now, you did a couple test starts and stops, galloping for just a few paces before halting.
  1755. >”Not bad, mmNNggg~”
  1756. >Dakota stretched mid sentence, crackling his joints all along his withers while he did it, before he continued,
  1757. >”Really not bad at all, I thought it was gonna be way harder.”
  1758. >Anonymous interjected slyly, poking his flank with an extended pinion feather,
  1759. >”I mean you kinda cheated didn’t you? You just got all the knowledge from the transformation.”
  1760. >The stallion laughed, and trotted up to bump his barrel against Anon playfully, while replying,
  1761. >”What I had to do was obvious cause of that, sure, but how to really do it all came from memories of seeing Patrick do it.”
  1762. >Dakota popped a grin.
  1763. >”So if you really think I cheated, then that’s the homework I copied from.”
  1764.  
  1765. >Anon just ruffled her wings and laughed, then you heard the door creak open.
  1766. >Your ears turned at the distinctive sound of Chad’s beak clicking together, and you were already smiling before you met his gaze.
  1767. >He looked just about as confident as he’d ever been in his life, standing in the doorway with a rifle strapped to his back.
  1768. >His eyes, soft gold under the fluorescent light, flicked to yours and Anon’s hooves before his smile grew into something like a grin as he said,
  1769. >”Nice, skull bashers.”
  1770. >And strode inside, the light above casting down in bars between the eaves on his gray fur and white feathers.
  1771. >Instantly, your gaze was locked to his talons, so dextrous and perfect for... Petting.
  1772. >You gulped almost audibly, and awkwardly spluttered out,
  1773. “Yeah! I-you’ll-I think.. You will probably kill most of the Fomorians though?”
  1774. >Everyone involved stopped what they were doing the moment you finished speaking, Anon gave you a bemused look, Dakota looked wryly thrilled to see you slip up for once, and Chad just seemed confused.
  1775. >The barn went quiet right then too, the working stallions were taking a break at the most inopportune time, adding to the awkward tension.
  1776. >Sweat beaded your brow as you scrunched your muzzle up in equal parts frustration and embarrassment.
  1777. >Thank God your fuzzy black cheeks wouldn’t show your blush.
  1778. >Anonymous broke the silence for you, walking up to Chad to comment on the gun he’d borrowed,
  1779. >“30-06 huh? Fuck, that’ll blow any one of them away instantly.”
  1780. >And you breathed a hardly concealed sigh of relief, enough to cool at least a couple of your nerves before Dakota walked over and stepped on all of them all over again.
  1781. >”What’s up, you got a crush on birdhead?”
  1782. >Just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse, he leaned in and smugly whispered.
  1783. >”I caught you looking, so don’t even try to hide it.”
  1784. >Your tail flicked in annoyance, batting against Dakota’s barrel as you instantly corrected him and elucidated the real conundrum,
  1785. “Quiet. I just... I want to ask him to pet me. It’s nothing romantic.”
  1786. >All that got you was a sputtering laugh from him, and you almost regretted speaking at all, but it was still better than Dakota being convinced you had a crush on Chad and teasing you about that.
  1787. >In your head all sorts of pleasant mental images played out, of Chad’s scaly digits splayed out atop your head, combing through your mane, reaching behind your ears...
  1788. >But by contrast, your frown only grew deeper, and you hunched up your withers as Dakota leaned up against you, smirking and pulling some more at the open cut you were sporting,
  1789. >”Awww, a stuck up unicorn can’t just go and ask her friend for some petting, woe is her.”
  1790. >This is what losing your composure for more than a second got you, a catch 22 of embarrassment or frustration.
  1791. >You simmered there for a few moments while Dakota just savoured it, then you snorted loudly and said,
  1792. “I’m not stuck up, I just have standards.”
  1793.  
  1794. >Then you stalked away from him, up to Chad instead.
  1795. >You cut right in to the middle of his conversation with Anonymous, with a brusque and straightforward call of,
  1796. “Chad?”
  1797. >He stared down at you, his brows up, and a half smile (like he wasn’t sure just what expression he should be making) playing on his beak.
  1798. >”Aisling.”
  1799. “Chad.”
  1800. >You repeated back instantly, your voice cracking as you stood up a little taller on the tips of your hooves in a nervous tic.
  1801. >There was the barest gleam of a sort of... Recognition in Chad’s eyes as to what was going on, that lasted for a precious few seconds before it was unceremoniously extinguished by his unfathomable social incapacity.
  1802. >”Uh. Sup.”
  1803. >He craned his neck over you as he spoke, his piercing hawk stare boring a hole in your head as he looked at you almost clinically now, probably thinking you had come down with some sudden illness.
  1804. >You couldn’t meet his eyes, you had to cast your look askance as you shuffled weirdly on your hooves.
  1805. “P-pet..”
  1806. >”Pet?”
  1807. >The griffon intoned quietly, his full attentions on you.
  1808. >He seemed to be taking this seriously now, likely having interpreted the whole fiasco as you trying to share some tough to swallow truth with him, not even considering the possibility that you would ever have an awkward fumble.
  1809. >Your muzzle scrunched up yet again, this time at the unfittingly serious and attentive look on his face.
  1810. >This was stupid, you thought.
  1811. >So you breathed deep, and tried to assume your normal poise, getting about halfway there before you finally looking Chad in the eye and asking the one question that had been sticking to your tongue like a burr for the past ten minutes:
  1812. “Can you pet me?”
  1813. >You even brought your nose down and nudged his talons with it, specifying,
  1814. “Don’t just mess up my mane either, I mean actually pet me. Anonymous was talking about being pet earlier and it made me want to know what it feels like.”
  1815. >A deep relief washed over you at having finally requested it, dampened only slightly by Dakota’s smug grin and leavened by Anon’s knowing smile and agreeable nod of the head.
  1816. >Chad for his part just looked ambivalently bemused.
  1817. >”Really?”
  1818. >He scratched the back of his head, and you felt a little surge of gladness at seeing him feel awkward too, to compensate for all your awkwardness, before it was replaced with a slight nagging worry.
  1819. >What if he said no?
  1820. >Your brow knitted together just a centimetre.
  1821. >You genuinely hadn’t even considered that as a possibility.
  1822. >But it would make sense after all, it was weird enough for you asking him, he would probably feel the same-
  1823. “Wuayy?!”
  1824. >You squawked the last word of your thoughts aloud as Chad’s talons closed around your head suddenly.
  1825. >The hawkish face beamed down at you, amusement glimmering in the golden pits of his eyes.
  1826. >”You can be just as dorky as Anonymous, eh? That’s cute.”
  1827. >You wanted to retort, but the subtle touch of one of Chad’s claws reaching behind your ear made you just melt into his grasp.
  1828.  
  1829. >The palm of his hand ran smoothly along the top of your head, flattening out your mane and producing the most soothing feeling imaginable.
  1830. >Between soft strokes like that, he also ran his hand down the sides of your face, rubbing your cheeks.
  1831. >Then he would come back up, and scratch behind your ears gently, gently, so gently.
  1832. >Before you had realized it, you were sitting on your haunches, and practically pressing your head into his hands, hands plural, he’d blessedly gotten the other one involved as well to double the pleasantness.
  1833. >The look on Chad’s face was still amused, but softly so, it reminded you a little of the expression he’d borne earlier, in your living room when he’d motioned to you to draw the curtains shut.
  1834. >You didn’t even know what expressions Anonymous or Dakota had, and you didn’t care, your whole mind was intent on that soft rhythm of petting, rubbing and scratching Chad had sunk you into.
  1835. >Every synapse in your head fired solely for translating something of that transcendental sensation, that your spirit absorbed wholly, to your rational mind.

Nemetona

by meslam

Anu

by meslam