Not In Kansas Anymore

Chapter Five

Beep……beep…….beep…

I awaken to the sound of constant beeping in my ears. My eyes struggle to get open, pain when the lights from the ceiling hit them. My mouth is incredibly dry and I have aches all over. I pretty much feel like crap. I might as well have slept on a rock. I bet even my arms and legs are aslee-

Wait a minute.

I look around. The bed I’m in is actually long enough for my legs to be supported on. This isn’t that spare room that I was sleeping in. The walls and ceiling are all white. I finally find the source of the beeping noise: there’s an EKG to my left, keeping track of my heartbeat. I’m also wearing a very thin hospital gown.

…why am I in a hospital?

If that wasn’t strange enough, my right ankle is completely fine now. Heck, any bandages on my legs are on my left one, mostly around the arch of my foot. I try to sit up, but a sharp pain shoots through my chest. I look down towards my chest and notice my entire ribcage is wrapped up in bandages. I can see traces of burn marks on the outermost edges of the tape around me.

What the heck is happening!?

The door to the room opens, and a doctor comes in. A human doctor. A human doctor! I’m back! Oh thank heavens, I’ve somehow gotten back! Oh man, I bet I was freaking the doctor out with how happy I was getting. He just adjusted the glasses on his face and said, “Oh good, you’re awake. You know, you gave us quite a scare earlier. You’re lucky to be alive, son.”

My celebration was instantly derailed, “What…do you mean by that?”

“I mean you just survived a nearly-fatal lightning strike! It’s very lucky that someone found you when they did and got you here, or else we wouldn’t be having this conversation!”

Lightning strike? Since when was I ever struck by lightning? “Um, where did this happen exactly?”

“Just outside of the college campus. You attend there, right? The people who found you said that you were about eight blocks from the start of the campus buildings. Hm, are you experiencing any memory loss? We can always do some test to see if you sustained brain injury from the accident.”

I quickly snapped to and shook my head. “No, no, doc. I’m just a little out of it, that’s all. Thanks, though.”

“No problem at all. Well, seeing as you seem to be fine so far, I’ll leave you to rest. A nurse should be checking in occasionally to make sure your condition is stable.”

“Sure thing,” and at that, he left.

Which left me to my thoughts. Since when did I get struck by lightning right outside of college? I can’t remember any time I was really ever caught out-

Wait.

That storm! The one I tried to outrun when I was running to my car! It must’ve happened then. But, that’s the same storm that hit the ground in front of me, and transported me to…Equestria.

And yet I’m here. In the human world. With humans. So, was that whole world of talking ponies a dream? The last thing I did was fall asleep in that small bed. Maybe that was the end of the dream and now I’m awake here? But…there was that whole part where the ground split under my feet when the lightning hit. I couldn’t have just made that up. Or could I have? Maybe my mind is just trying to fill in the blanks or maybe that was just part of the dream too.

All I know is I couldn’t be happier to be in a hospital than I was right then.

I laid back and watched some of the television that hospitals always have attached to the walls, and I basically did just that for about an hour, maybe two. I was interrupted when the doctor came in again and announced that I had visitors. I perked up at that and looked at the door, awaiting whoever was going to come out.

The first person who walked through the door was a woman with red hair like mine, but with blue eyes, and glasses in front of those. Both of our faces lit up when we recognized each other. She came running up to my side and wrapped me up in a tight embrace.

“Oh, Vince, I’m so glad you’re okay!”

“I’m fine, mom. The doctors took good care of me” I fought for control over the tears in my eyes, as I returned her hug. She had no idea how much I missed her.

The rest of my family came in. I saw my dad. He’s the brunette with green eyes and a full goatee and slightly graying hair on the sides. Then my two siblings came in behind him. There was my younger brother Matt, a blonde with blue eyes, and my youngest sister, Liz, a brunette with blue eyes. All three of them joined my mother at the side of my hospital bed.

“When we got the call from the hospital that you had been hurt, your mother just about died of fright. We picked up your brother and sister from school and rushed over as fast as we could.”

My mother held me tighter, “We’re just glad that you’re alive. When we got the call, they told us you were struck by…lightning! We feared the worst!”

“Like I said, I’m fine. You don’t have to worry anymore, mom.” I thought now was a good time to return the hug.

My brother and sister walked up now. “Hey, squirts, did you miss your bro?”

“A little,” my sister teased. My brother, however, wasn’t as calm. He climbed up and gave me a hug.

“Yes,” he said loudly. I smiled at that, messing up his hair. I moved over a bit on my bed.

"I missed you guys too. You wouldn't believe the crazy dream I had while I was out. I was somewhere far away, and I thought I wouldn't see you all again." I patted beside me. “You can sit here if you want, bro. You too, sis.” His smile got even bigger, and then he climbed up. I looked at my sister .She nodded and got up on the bed as well.

And then we all just sat like that: me, with my brother and sister sitting by me. My dad even walked over to my other side and gave me hug. Normally this much family sappiness would have my siblings gagging. Me? I was just happy to be alive, and most importantly, with my family.

The doctor’s voice came from outside the room’s door, “Mr. Martin? You have another visitor.”

“Another visitor?” I looked at my family, and they just shrugged, “Um…send them in, I guess.”

The room suddenly dimmed a bit. I looked about to see what happened to the lights. I looked at my parents at my sides and by siblings on the bed, and they weren’t moving. As in, they were grayscale like the room was becoming, and they were as still as stone, like an old-timey photo. I tried to shake one of them awake, and nothing was happening.

And then the door opened, and my eyes opened up wide at who I saw. Rainbow hair, wings, and blue fur. Rainbow Dash.

“So this is where you want to be, hm?” She asked in a condescending tone.

“Rainbow Dash!? What the heck’s happening? How are you even here?”

She completely ignored me. “You’ll never see them again, by the way.” She pointed towards my family.

“What are even talking about, they’re right he-“ I looked to my sides, and my brother and sister weren't there. Instead, they were standing on either side of the bed, alongside each of my parents. The room started to stretch out into all directions from where I was, and my family was drifting even further and further from me.

“How are you doing this?! Give me my family back!”

She lifted herself into the air with her wings and landed on the foot of my bed. She walked up towards me as I was propped up against the wall. “Don’t you see? They were never even here! You’re never gonna see them again!” The room became even darker still, until it was only myself and Dash whom I could see. “You’ll never make it outside of your own world.”

“You mean Equestria? I can survive long enough to get home. I’ve got those kind ponies to help me.”

“And what if you never find a way home? You gonna live in their world? You know I don’t trust you. Sure, those acquaintances of yours may trust you, but on the whole grand scale of things, do you think more will trust you than mistrust you? You wouldn’t even last a week!”

“As long as I have one pony to help me, I can make it.” I tried convincing myself with that line. It didn't seem to help much. The darkness shifted away, revealing a forest. The Everfree Forest.

Dash just smiled, but her lips parted to reveal a row of sharp teeth. “Just stop fooling yourself. Nopony will truly be your ally in this world. You’re too different. You’re going to die in this world, alone, never seeing your family ever again.”

I shut my eyes closed as I yelled at the top of my lungs, “No!! I won’t believe that! I trust them! Even though I’ve only known them for the shortest of times, I trust them!” I opened my eyes and in place of Dash was a timber-wolf. I screamed in fear and tried to escape, but I backed into a tree. The wolf came closer and spoke in Dash’s voice, but it sounded heavily distorted. Its breath stunk as it exhaled in my face.

“Fine, then die in that misplaced trust.” The wolf lunged at me, teeth bared, ready to snuff out my life. All I could think of was:

“I’m so sorry, mom and dad.”

“Ahh!” I yelled as I jolted from my slumber. My eyes quickly looked about. I was back where I was before. Thank goodness that was all a nightmare. I looked at my limbs and noticed the bandages were in the right places. Never in my life have I been so happy to see an injured ankle before. I sighed in relief and my eyes drifted over to the left taking in my surroundings, anchoring me back into reality. Let’s see, there’s a few boxes, some science-y equipment (most likely Twilight’s), and a rather large, winged, purple lizard.

My mind blanked at that last revelation, and what followed was that I yelled again, which seemed to surprise the lizard, making it yell as well. I instinctively kicked at it, but was stupid enough to use the right leg. When foot landed on scale, I grunted with pain, pulling my leg back to me in reflex. I have to stop things like this, or I’m gonna lose that foot for sure.

“Whoa, you alright man?” The lizard asked. That’s it, this is definitely some twisted fairy tale and I’m stuck in the middle of it. The door at the top of the stairs opened.

“Spike?” I could recognize Twilight’s voice. “Are you and Vince alright? I thought I heard yelling.”

“We’re alright, Twilight. He must’ve just gotten a scare…from him kicking me, I figure it was because of me.”

“He’s probably never seen anything like you before. You probably scared him,” Twilight said as she descended the stairs.

“More like he was intimidated by my awesomeness.”

“Keep telling yourself that, Spike.” Spike just kept his grin.

The name finally clicked in my head. “So, you’re Spike? Twilight, I thought you said he was your brother.”

“He is. At least, my adopted one.”

“Oh,” I finished lamely and then looked at Spike, “um, sorry for kicking you. I didn't hurt you, did I?”

He just laughed, “Nope! Thick scales. Didn’t feel a thing!” He hit his knuckles on his scales to demonstrate. “So, you’re Vince, huh? Nice to meet you,” and he held out a clawed hand to me. I gladly shook it, somewhat happy to have an actual other hand to shake, scaly as it is. “Anyway, I came down here to bring you food when I heard you talking. You hungry?”

“You bet, I am!” Spike handed me a tray holding quite a few different foods and started to wolf down the contents, starting with some toast, then moving on some fruit. Twilight seemed to be put off by my eating, but Spike seemed amused. I didn’t really care at the moment, I hadn’t eaten in around two days.

I washed down the full mouth of food I had at the moment with some water. After I calmed down and belched silently into my fist (see? I still have some manners), I asked, “You said you heard me talking? When was that?”

“Oh, you were apparently talking in your sleep,” Twilight responded. “Spike told me he heard you from the ground floor and was going to get some food and bring it down to you, since he thought you were awake.”

“You were talking pretty loud. Something about wanting somepony to come back, and you ended with ‘I’m sorry’, right as you woke up. Sounded like a pretty bad dream. You alright, dude?”

I looked up at Spike and then looked back to the floor. That dream. It was pretty jarring, I have to admit. I know none of it was real, but it’s the idea behind it that was sticking with me. What if I never got home? What if no one here will trust me? Sure, even if I got Rainbow Dash on my side, and the rest of Applejack’s friends, that’s still like…seven? that trust me. Would that be enough? I just sighed and said, “Yeah, I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?” Twilight asked.

“Yes!” I snapped. Twilight seemed taken aback from my sudden volume increase. “…Sorry. It’s just something that I’ve been thinking about ever since I woke up. I’d rather not talk about it.”

“Well alright then. I won’t pry.”

“Thanks,” I said as I took my last bite of food. I started to get up. “I’ll just put this tray up.”

“No, that’s alright. Allow me,” Twilight’s horn started to glow a pink hue, and then the tray in my hand did the same.

“Ah!” I let go of the tray in surprise, but it didn’t fall down. Instead, it proceeded to float towards Twilight. “What the heck? How are you doing that?”

She looked at me with a perplexed expression, like I had just asked an obvious question. “It’s just magic. All unicorns can use it.”

I shook my head and just pretended like nothing happened. “Sure. Magic. How silly of me,” I deadpanned. Twilight just looked at me strangely again and then resigned to walking up the stairs to the kitchen, tray in tow.

“Well that’s just great. I feel like I’m going insane.”

“What’s the problem?” Spike asked.

“Oh, you know, just the fact that creatures similar to ones in my world talk in this one, creatures I believed to only be myth or legend exist, and I learned just now that magic is real too. Other than that, I feel like I’m just fine! It would be funny, if it weren’t for the fact that I’m not waking up from a crazy dream right about now.”

“I take it your world is very different than ours.”

I let out a short sarcastic huff, “Heh, that’s about the understatement of the year. Thing is, I don’t know what will happen now that I’m here. Will most accept me as I am here? Or will I eventually get run out of town like a freak? I hate to be the pessimist in a situation, but that whole thing with Dash makes me afraid that I’m not going to fit in as long as I’m here.”

“What happened with Dash?”

“She told me she doesn’t trust me, and she’s keeping an eye on me to make sure I don’t do anything to her friends.”

“I’m sure she’s just being cautious. For as long as Twilight and I have known her, she’s not quite that trusting right away, but those she does trust, she’d do anything for them.”

“While that may be true for her, but that doesn’t amount to much when you account for the rest of the ponies in town, let alone all of Equestria.”

“Well, I’m not a pony either, and everypony seems to accept me. Don’t sweat it. As long as you treat everypony nice, they’ll see you’re not a bad guy and will accept you too.”

“Thanks for the encouragement. I’m pretty sure I’ve been told that stuff before, but hearing it again makes me feel better anyway.”

“No problem! Just happy to help.”

I gave a genuine smile, which disappeared when I had a thought. “Where’s Twilight? I didn’t think putting up dishes took this long.”

“Hmmm…Twilight!” He called up the stairs, “Whatcha’ up to?”

“Coming!” I heard he yell. She appeared at the doorway. “Sorry I took so long. I put up the dishes, but then I saw some books on the floor and went to reorganize the whole shelf. You know me,” she finished with an embarrassed smile…or was it guilt?

I’m going with embarrassment.

“So, since you’ve gotten your food, how about we all go outside? There’s still about two hours of daylight left.”

“Sounds like a plan to me! Just go on ahead, I’ll need to get ready. I’ll catch up eventually.”

“Alright,” she finished with another smile and walked briskly up the steps. Spike was just about to leave after her before I got his attention.

“Spike?”

“Hm?”

“Can we keep my whole ‘fear of rejection’ discussion between us? I’d rather not have others worrying too much about how I’m feeling.”

“Sure, but then why did you tell me?”

“Heh, I really don’t know. I guess I felt the need to tell someone, and you happened to be it, I guess. Feels great to get it off my chest, though.”

“Should I feel honored?” He questioned with a smug grin.

I countered with a grin of my own. “Whatever floats your boat, I guess. Come on, let’s get going.” I got out of the bed and grabbed the crutch back into my grasp, then proceeded to hobble back up the steps, but much quicker than usual. The nap and food really did wonders on how I felt, I guess. If it weren’t for my injuries, this would be a slightly not-sucky day.

Spike got up the stairs first, obviously, with me tailing behind. Once I finally got back to the main floor, I got outside and met Twilight out there. She suggested just a nice stroll through town. She thought it was a good way to get my legs working again, and a quick way for most of the townsponies to be aware of my presence, maybe meet a few. I felt that a little unnecessary, since my arrival earlier probably got most of everyone’s attention already, and the ones who didn’t see me probably heard about me from the ones that did. But despite my desire just to go back inside, I relented to what Twilight had planned.

So there we were, walking around town, and drawing as many eyes as possible upon me. Again. I felt like this was a bad idea, and now I was mentally kicking myself for going along with it. Even with that, I still managed to act nice and wave to anyone who stopped to stare, or stare as they walked past.

There was one pony, though, who wasn’t as freaked out as the others. A grey pegasus with blonde hair was flying past, when she stopped and looked at me. But it wasn’t a scared look, but more of a curious look. The first thing I noticed was that her eyes, which were gold, were crossed. I waved to her like all the others, but the main difference here was, she waved back. And smiled, just before she took off again, her blue backpacks in tow. That actually made me happy, happier than I had been all day.

It gave me hope that this wasn’t a lost cause after all. Maybe I can get along with these ponies, and with their help, find a way back home.

With that as the highlight of my day, we just continued on a route that went in a circle around town, until we finally made it back to the library. The sun was getting ever closer to its setting time, so we decided to retire for the day.

We spent the rest of the night just having pleasant conversation, Twilight, Spike, and I. Twilight asked me if I could tell her about what my kind are like, so I tried to give a brief overview of humans. It’s hard, you know? Talking about your own species to someone else who doesn’t really know anything about them. It’s not like talking to another human, because they have a good idea already seeing as they are human themselves. There’s things you never have to explain. Here? It’s like you have to start at a kindergarten level again. I didn’t even know where to start.

I gave as good as a description as I thought possible at the time, minus the fact that I neglected to mention humans were omnivores. I figured, ponies being vegetarian and all, I didn’t want to mention that quite yet. I had no idea how Twilight would react, despite being the more sensible kind that I assume she is, but I still didn’t like taking a leap of faith for others. Not yet.

In exchange, via our little deal earlier this afternoon, Twilight told me a little bit about pony culture, so I wouldn’t seem as quite as out-of-the-loop as I was now. I learned a bit about ponies, and how they all have magic, although the unicorns are the only ones that can use spells. Pegasi and earth ponies have magic in their bodies that allowed them to do other things, which were more subtle than what unicorns could do.

She also told me about the two princesses of Equestria, Princess Celestia and Princess Luna, and how they controlled the heavens to bring about day and night. My mind was reeling after that piece of information.

“So let me get this straight. Princess Celestia controls the sun?”

“Yes.”

“And Luna controls the moon.”

“Yep! By themselves, too. In the time before Equestria, the unicorns controlled day and night, and it took a sizeable group of them to bring both day or night about.”

“That’s impressive, I have to say. I mean, the energy required to rotate and move a planet or the moon is something I never imagined anyone ever accomplishing.”

“Well, how do humans do that?”

“We don’t. Day and night happen on their own.”

“What? Really?” She seemed genuinely surprised, like I was when I learned magic was real earlier.

“Really.” I started to explain to her the mechanics of how my world worked, and how day and night cycled where I came from. I told her all about the elliptical orbits of the sun, moon, and earth, and how the rotation of all of them during all this is what made night and day happen.

It’s funny, I never expected that some stuff I learned in junior high and high school could captivate someone who is (and by that I mean acts. I didn’t know how old Twilight is yet) as old as I am. She sure seemed interested in learning about stuff from my world, but I guess anyone would be curious about stuff like that. Besides, I felt the same way when learning about Equestria. I guess unfamiliarity with something usually makes it seem interesting.

As fun as it all was, getting to know someone new, I regrettably had to go to sleep, seeing as it was getting late despite the fact that I had that nap. The others probably were even more tired than I am. So for their sake, and mine, we all retired to our beds. I went back downstairs again and laid in the bed, attempting to get to sleep. This time it was harder to do than when I was dead tired before my earlier nap, but again, I finally gave into the fits of slumber. Besides…

I’ve got a party to attend tomorrow.