1 month, 3 weeks, 2 days

1 month, 3 weeks, 2 days

"Open mouth, please." the male unicorn asks.

Daniel obediently opens his mouth wide, the male unicorn grasps his head gently and places a tongue depressor on top of his tongue. 'This feels cliché ' he thinks to himself as the grey unicorn examines the inside of his mouth, gently pulling back his head with his grey colored magic as he lies back in a dentist-like chair.

The male unicorn comments, pressing on Daniel's front teeth, "Hmm. Dr. Pharn, do you see what I see? Right here." Another approaches, a blue hued female unicorn with a light silver colored bobbed mane, examining his teeth. She replies to the male unicorn,

"Indeed. Central incisors, similar to the make of some small mammals, though they're more thin and they're not flat like our own. He has canines as well, possibly made for tearing rather than mashing or grinding. Molars in the back, as per usual." She gestures for the male unicorn to step aside, she takes over and gets a better look from his position. She peers, addressing Twilight as she continues to take notes of his teeth, "Miss Sparkle?"

Dr. Pharn pulls back his head unexpectedly, Daniel partially closes his right eye, a little discomforted by the sudden action.

Twilight's attentive as usual, quickly replying to Dr. Pharn, "Hm?" Twilight trots over beside her and observes Daniel's mouth, overlooking his discomfort. Dr. Pharn asks Twilight as she releases Daniel's head from her magical grip,

"Are you aware that he shows signs of being an omnivore?" Twilight looks suspicious at her tone, she answers regardless.

"Yes, but he told me about that ahead of time, a little after he arrived. And before you ask, yes he's been on an all veggie diet since he's been here. I kept it on him a little strictly..minus a few sweets. I couldn't help that." Daniel feels the back of his head, Dr. Pharn may have yanked out a hair or two. Dr. Pharn replies to Twilight in a passive tone

"It shows." Dr. Pharn seems impartial with that answer, she pulls his head back again a little less rashly and examines his canines in particular. Dr. Pharn decides to ask Daniel, "Does your species always eat meat, or do they dabble with vegetables when meat is scarce? Vice versa? What is your intake compared to your species overall?"

'What?' He feels confused at her various questions, it takes a few seconds for him to register what she just asked. He answers her, "I guess we ate both. I don't think we ate one or the other solely, no idea how much I ate in comparison though. I can't remember being with anyone else or eating with anybody else." A depressing thought, but he's mostly gotten over the thought of having no other human contact by now. Dr. Pharn seems to accept that answer, she asks something else,

"And how do you feel, having a solely organic diet?" That seems rather personal, she gets more specific. "Internally I mean."

Daniel glances upward towards the ceiling, answering as she gets ready to write down what he has to say. "I'd say healthier. Can't say I'm used to the idea, but I don't remember how meat tastes like honestly." An odd thought to be reminded of, the majority of what he's eaten so far has been veggie food, the only odd one out being hay burgers which tasted eerily familiar. He explains, "I know beef's a thing, same as chicken and pork."

The doctors seem calm as he explains this, he thinks to himself, 'Guess they want me to be thorough, regardless of what they eat.'

Dr. Pharn inquires, "And did you have anyway of...hunting said animals. Preparation?" Does she think he's primal or something? He's not exactly a predator by any means, if anything he figures himself prey since he got swarmed by timberwolves when he first arrived. He remarks, entertained by the idea,

"Heh. Yeah, I leapt on wild cows and pigs and carried them off into the night, eating them whole and raw in a cave."

Twilight's ears lower, both a little uncomfortable and confused at how he decided to answer that kind of question. Dr. Pharn writes down his ill comment, Daniel notices her write it down and shakes his hands side to side. He tries to explain, "Oh, nonono, I'm kidding! I'm kidding!"

Twilight places her hoof on the bridge of her nose, she says to Daniel upon realizing he's kidding with them, "Dan, please take this seriously." Dr. Pharn simply erases the comment, backing up Twilight's request,

"Yes, this is important. Though I wish we could stay longer, it's important that we can get as much information as possible for future study down the line."

Twilight feels the back of her neck, apologizing for the seventh time in the past hour, "Yeah, sorry about that. I booked the wrong train.."

Dr. Pharn replies, flipping through the previous notes Twilight has gathered over the past few weeks, "It's quite alright Miss Sparkle." She examines a page closely, adding, "This should be more than enough for now, you are much more informative than you've given yourself credit for." She faces Daniel, asking another question as she prepares to write down his reply,

"Daniel, do you have a description for the opposite gender of your species? Any different physiology, features?"

'Huh..' He hasn't seen a woman in who knows how long, but he describes one crudely, "Uhm. Thinner, longer hair." He gestures to the top of his head, he continues, "More curved around the waist, a lighter voice, just like either of yours'. It's not much different than you'd expect."

Dr. Pharn suddenly places a notepad on his chest with a pencil, she requests, "Could you please try to show a representation of a female of your species?" A strange request, but he can't blame them for his crude verbal description not being enough. He sighs, taking the notepad in his hand and the pencil in the other. He sits up and comments,

"Not exactly much of an artist.." He tries to recall a girl's body, starting with a head and working his way down from there. Down to the curve of the shoulders, arms, down the stomach to the curve down the waist. He tries to be precise, but as he says, he's not an artist nor is he good at drawing in his opinion. He erases several incorrectly curved lines, working his way down from the thighs down to the sloppily drawn feet.

'Ugh..'

He's not satisfied with his results, but he hands over the notepad to Dr. Pharn none the less. She examines the crude depiction, glancing several times over at Daniel to compare his physiology to drawing. She holds it up to his face with her magic grip, pointing with the pencil at the lady's chest, asking him, "What is this?"

Daniel chuckles and half smiles, explaining, "Those are breasts. Crudely drawn ones, but breasts none the less.."

The three seem puzzled at his apparent humor regarding it, realizing they don't quite have the understanding of what breasts are in comparison to their biology. Dr. Pharn tries to remedy the confusion, asking,

"Teats?"

Daniel half smiles, "That's..one word for it." He's unsure of how to explain it, he feels a little uncomfortable at their odd reactions with such a significant biological difference. 'Wait, do horses even have breasts?..' He feels weirded out by his looming question in his head, he shuts it out and just tries to forget. Twilight looks especially puzzled, she passively rolls her eyes, correctly assuming it's a male thing their species may share in common with a visual stimulant of some kind.

"I will assume that they provide the same function as teats, albeit they look a little crude for a biped." Dr. Pharn comments on the depiction. He's left wondering if she's talking about the drawing or his depiction. She continues, asking a question. "I will also assume the female of your species has similar genitals, opposite of your own. Would that be correct, could you show a representation of that as well if you can?"

'Bleh..' The thought nauseates him a little, she seems pretty brash to request that. Daniel comments a little nervously, "Yeah, I'd rather not.." He thinks objectively,

'I can barely draw a person and you want me to draw that?..' He feels this has escalated quickly, though it's a physical examination so maybe he shouldn't be surprised at such questions. Dr. Pharn flips a page in her notepad, peering at some underlined quote from Twilight. Dr. Pharn replies,

"Hm. Alright, we can save that for another time." She closes the notepad and requests, "Well, let's get as much underway as possible. Please if you would, take off your shirt." Daniel's eyes widen at those words, but he silently complies, not exactly much to hide. He sits up and pulls at the front of his shirt, lifting the edge over his chin, he wriggles his arms out and pulls off his shirt, setting it aside. He looks down, seeing his fairly average body build and the knife scar strewn across his upper stomach.

"Hm, yes. We heard about your little..incident." Dr. Pharn says as she examines his chest. The male unicorn in the background finally says something after so long of Dr. Pharn taking charge.

"We got some medical notes upon our request from the hospital in Ponyville. From our understanding, you seemed resistant to our medication in general. Even some extreme methods of anesthesia seemed mild in effect, according to their reports of your struggling while on the way to the hospital."

Dr. Pharn starts drawing a very detailed mockup of his chest along a stretch of whiteboard on the wall, taking careful notes on the spot he was stabbed. "Assuming some common physiology between our species, they had some surgery to assess and attempt to sew up any internal injuries you had gotten." she says as she levitates a marker and points along the scar depiction on the whiteboard. "Thankfully, and very fortunately for you, the blade had pierced through some thick muscle and narrowly missed any major organs. It was very close to what we assume to have been your aorta." she explains.

"Er, what's an aorta?" Daniel asks, as he doesn't know what that is.

Twilight uncomfortably answers him before the doctors have a chance to, "Dan, that's an artery in your abdomen. Uh, stomach area. A major one that branches to your legs, arms, and head. It carries all the blood throughout your body, what she's trying to say is that it would have been.." She looks very uncomfortable finishing her explanation,

"It would have been immediately fatal if the blade had pierced your aorta, you would have bled out internally faster than any pony that would have been able to get help.." Daniel feels a sense of dread wash over his body, his arms shake and his skin goes pale as he comes to the realization that he would have died immediately if the blade had gone a little to the left or a little to the right.

"...oh.." he replies sheepishly, thinking to himself, '..fuck..' He's visually disturbed, Twilight notices the dread on his expression and tries to reassure him.

"But you're fine now Dan..you're back on your feet and all well." She places her hoof on his leg and tries to smile, but he seems to be in inner turmoil, coming to terms with his very good fortune. Dr. Pharn interrupts their little moment, professionally.

"We only have an hour, respectively. Daniel, would you mind indulging us?" Daniel snaps out of his train of thought and nods, asking about it.

"Sure..what is it?" Dr. Pharn simply answers,

"The full body examination part of today's session. I advise you to take off your pants, if you would so oblige." She waits for him to reply or at least respond in someway, but he's motionless.

He's speechless. It takes a moment for Twilight to register what that entails, her face goes ablush with light red and she takes her hoof off his leg as she shuffles away from him. She embarrassedly asks Dr. Pharn a question.

"Uh huh..hah..should..should I be there for that?.."

"If you'd like to, Miss Sparkle." she simply answers, the words sound awkward with Daniel's perception. He places his hand over his face, flustered at her question as he thinks objectively against Twilight.

'Twilight, for all that's good and holy, just please stop..' No avoiding the inevitable, he uncovers his head and sits back up, he reaches downward for his zipper. Twilight's eyes widen, she smiles with a shocked expression and she stutters out a funny noise.

"Ahh—Wahaha..!" She makes the funny noise and stands on her hind legs, putting her hooves up in the air; her face ablush with red again. Shuffling away from him and to the door, she makes her way outside the room. Daniel breathes a sigh of relief, he undoes his pants button and fills their request.

45 minutes later

45 minutes later

Daniel steps out of the medical office, he zips up his pants having gotten his clothes back and his business taken care of. Twilight sitting across the hall reading a book.

'Well, typical Twilight.' He walks on over, in some fancy doctor's office waiting room. He half expects to see Lime but she wouldn't be way up here. He waves and informs her of his concluded business.

"Twilight, guess I'm done here." he explains. He reaches into his back pocket, handing her the notepad from earlier. "Er, they wanted me to give you this back."

She grasps it with her magic, inspecting the inside contents, seeing them having highlighted several excerpts and adding some notes. 'Huh, guess they made copies.' she thinks to herself as she looks up at Daniel.

Twilight smiles, she stands up from her waiting room seat and gestures for him to follow. "Dan, remember I said I might have some help for your nightmares?" She looks eager for a response, enough so that she doesn't wait for him to reply. "Come on, I booked you a special room." Sounds vague the way she says it. Daniel looks suspicious, she rolls her eyes happily and insists again, "Just come with me." She trots off to the outside of the building, Daniel thinks to himself, 'Back to hotel rooms?..well at least I'm not paying.' He's surprised he remembered at all, perhaps she did?

It's night in Canterlot, the trip back was short, but it took a while to get everything organized again with those biologists after being a day late. Daniel follows Twilight through alleyways, past a few markets and behind stalls. This feels familiar and he easily finds out why as he thinks,

'Another town, another thing to hide...oi, I doubt they'll get used to me though.'

He doesn't plan on staying long, Canterlot looks nice, but Daniel's eager to head on home after he's done with Twilight's apparent solution to his nightmares. She seems to be implying it will at least. Eventually he follows Twilight to what looks like a castle gate, a couple of royal guards are posted, clad in golden armor and armed with pointed spears. Twilight trots on over, speaking something in a gate guard's ear, surprisingly they open the gate shortly after and she gestures for him to follow as she walks inside.

'..fancy' That's an understatement, the castle looks amazing, if a bit mild in it's color scheme compared to a lot of other things he's seen. The guards seem disciplined to some degree. When they see him alongside Twilight, they don't seem to stare whatsoever; Hard for him to tell if it's politeness or something they're trained to do, watch without watching directly. Several tall corridors and marble-clad hallways later, she stops at a room's door, the frame clad with a brownish-red wood finish. Pinned to the door is some sort of plaque, it says in a fancy font,

'Reserved'

Daniel looks down at Twilight questionably, he gestures over at the door, he looks baffled at what he thinks she's conveying. Her smile dies down, seeing his assumption, she corrects his weird thoughts and loosely explains to him. "I know it sounds weird, but I just need you to go to sleep." Her magic envelopes the doorknob, a gentle twist slowly peeks the door open with a soft click. Daniel still looks at her, confused as whatever she's trying to do. He sees a royal-looking large queen-sized bed, the top frame clad with a thin silk cloth cover.

"So not helping.." he says.

She gets impatient and just decides to push him inside with her magic, he stumbles a little as she stands in the door frame to say, "Please Dan, just go to sleep. I'll come see you in the morning, okay?"

Daniel huffs air through his nose, he puts his hands up in the air, conveying 'whatever!' as he takes a seat on the bed. To end whatever thoughts he might still be having, she promptly leaves and closes the door behind her. She rolls her eyes and starts walking away down the marble hallway, she mutters under her breathe with a sigh, "Ugghh...guys." She dismisses his behavior and decides to take out the notepad the doctors gave back from her saddlebag, she begins skimming through the pages to review the previous entries she's written and the additional notes they've added. She's surprised when she reads an excerpt, written specifically to her from the doctors. She mutters to herself as she reads it,

"Daniel healthy...optimal conditions for study...observation duties given to...me until further notice?"

She blinks, Twilight's surprised that they'd give her that duty to do, but she feels determined as she accepts the challenge. They're not going to be in Canterlot for long, so it's up to her for the rest of the study! At least that's what she takes it as. "Hmph, alright then!" She flips through the next few pages to look for any further instructions from the doctors.

Unfortunately for her, she finds something she didn't expect. She yelps aloud as she sees a drawn depiction of an appendage.

"W-Whaaa—!!" She drops the notepad and steps back, her mind smitten with the image. Her right eye twitches, she sporadically smiles and kids herself with a laugh as she repeats a phrase to herself..

"Ah..haha..I..didn't see that..I-I didn't...see that..." Denial.

Meanwhile, Daniel lies back in bed and follows Twilight's previous suggestion and settles himself in bed. A familiar thought looms in his head, he remembers and says aloud to himself, "...probably should have fucking asked.." He wipes his face, he has the feeling again that he's thinking too much about it. Tucking himself in, he lays his left arm beneath the large pale white pillow, getting comfortable. He just wants this day to end. Thoughts rattle in his mind as things start to fade into black, but none he can seem to put coherent thought into.

Tic.

Tac.

Tic.

Tac.

Tic.

Tac.

'..great, there's a damn clock in here too.' He can't seem to get away from them. Daniel tries to ignore it, he figures he must not have heard it before in the room.

Tic.

Tac.

Tic.

Scrape.

He listens again, anticipating the next tic, but it doesn't come. He thinks objectively, 'That wasn't a clock..'

Scrape.

He's not in bed either. He opens his eyes, back in the void that envelopes his nightmares, on the ground and lain on his left arm. He says aloud, "...fuck." as he realizes he's having a nightmare again. Daniel rolls himself over and stands, trying to observe what the abomination has to offer this time.

Scrape.

He turns around, hearing the scraping noise from behind, he sees nothing but blackness and the rest of the void. He hears a giggle, followed by a familiar voice,

"Nyehehehe, come here~!" It's Pinkie's voice from behind him, but he figures not to trust it, he doesn't like the idea of it warping her out of everyone he knows. He thinks objectively, 'I'm not looking.'

She asks aloud again, expectedly her voices starts to warp into a grotesque lower pitch, "Daaaannyyy~!" She calls out to him from behind again, "But I need you.."

"Fuck you.." he mutters, angry that it's trying to mess with him like this with her. Her voice warps to her usual higher pitch, requesting,

"Danny..I need you to help me with something..." she implores him, her voice sounds like her usual high pitched voice. Daniel resists the urge to look, she pleads again.

"Danny...please?.." She begs again. "Danny?..why are you ignoring me?...don't you want to help me?"

Daniel starts walking away, he doesn't want to be messed with and fooled into a jumpscare by a nightmare, as twisted and sincere as the Pinkie pleading to him sounds. He starts speed walking into the darker part of the void, half expecting for him to be abruptly stopped or jumped at by the monstrous sounding Pinkie from behind. Her voice fades as he walks farther and farther away, he keeps ignoring her repeated pleas to come over and help her. Daniel keeps thinking to himself, even if it sounds obvious when he thinks it.

'That's not Pinkie, that's not Pinkie..'

He stops walking as he sees a familiar yellow hue come into existence, sitting up and faced away, stroking something repeatedly in it's lap. Something else starts to envelope the empty space it's emptily stroking, is a familiar pink. Daniel peers, trying to put it together, he eventually gets drawn in and takes a few steps closer and sees something weird.

'..Fluttershy?' he questions the shape and colors, is definitely them.

Fluttershy's sat down, Pinkie's lying in her lap sideways, Fluttershy seems to be repeatedly stroking her head like she was back on the train with Danny. He expects this to be some weird twisted trick, he turns to look away, but he hears Pinkie's familiar voice again,

"Danny.."

Against his urge to look away, he glances over. Fluttershy still faced away and obscuring his view, though it seems apparently obvious that she's petting her head. Pinkie asks again, her voice sounds emotionally crushed and devoid of emotion.

"...why won't you help me?..."

Scrape. He hears something tear.

Pinkie's body spasms repeatedly, Daniel steps back and hears her choke and gurgle, her hooves continue to twitch for a few moments before she just stops moving. Fluttershy continues to seemingly keep petting her motionless body, he's disturbed by this combination of sound and visual horror, he tries to remember that it's not Pinkie and this isn't real.

Suddenly Fluttershy's ear twitches, she slowly turns and faces him, her face strewn with warped flesh and mass underneath the featureless face and skull. His skin starts to crawl as she strokes Pinkie's head and says in a grotesque pitch with Fluttershy's sincere voice,

"Hush now, you're alright.."

Fluttershy turns her body and faces Daniel with a knife below her hoof, Pinkie's limp body rolls over from the motion, her eyes motionless as Daniel sees the streak of red flesh torn across her neck.

He takes a step back at this grisly display, shaking a little. He stares at the abomination posed as Fluttershy, her warped mouth starts to undulate, repeating her twisted words,

"It's okay...you're alright.." The warped flesh begins to tear across it's mouth, he can hear it rip like a piece of fabric. He takes another step back as her head slowly starts to vibrate from the action, something starts to poke out of the torn flesh where the mouth should be. He quivers at the sight, he knows what it is, he closes his eyes before it jets out of the tear in it's flesh.

"Rebar.."

Tear.

Scrape.

Crick.

Crack.

Snap.

Thud.

He gasps, he's awake, he's back in bed. He feels a pressure beside him, on the bed beside him, something's there. He opens his eyes, seeing a set of green and blue hued eyes staring down at him with a warm smile.

"Are you okay Danny?.." She tilts her head, reassuring him.

"It's okay." She places a hoof on his forehead, her eyes lower and she warmly smiles.

"You're alright.."

Author's Note

And so the obsession begins! Sorta.

This picture seems to come to mind..

https://derpibooru.org/156491?scope=scpe671deece1eb0a3bca0f9922efa405d065f8b18c9

Will probably work on the next chapter later today or tomorrow, gotta sleep for certain raisins (reasons). I also have an idea of what story to do next after this concludes, have had to draw the preview picture myself for reasons (raisins).

I'll double check on the chapter later, give some feedback if you'd like whoever reads this :D Again, thank you to the people who have read thus far. Again thank you KitsuneNoYomeiri for some formatting tips!