That's The Night The Lights Went Out In Canterlot

The days began to pass and eventually spread into weeks, with one of the princesses’ friends frequently stopping by to check on how Reggie was doing. As well as frequently having to ward off Pinkie Pie from approaching him, although it was Pinkie who often surprised him with another practical offering to him in lieu of her apology—the next time he met her, she presented him a collapsible blind-man’s cane.

“How did you guys even make this?” he had to ask. He was about to inquire about getting a simple stick that he could use, but this utterly shocked him. The collection of thin metal tubes and bungie cords has to require more than two honking big fingernails to enable it to be constructed.

“Oh, it was easy,” was as much as he could pull out of her.

And it did speed up his progress in learning how to get around.

Twilight Sparkle soon returned his medallion, apparently disappointed that she couldn't identify whatever it was she had suspected about it. But what was so mysterious about a hunk of rock that had fallen out of the sky back on Earth? It was just a bit of olivine mineral from some pallasites that had been reworked by a local jeweler.

Prior to her visit, Celestia warned him to not mention his song or the gathering the elder princess was planning. She wished to not alert Twilight as to the nature of the surprise that was coming. Apparently, there was some issue about being able to gather the other two princesses together that involved greater preparations or diplomacy than just sending out an invite. Reggie couldn't figure out the dynamics and didn't try to follow. If it kept him from singing something that might involve getting his head chopped off, he certainly didn't feel like rushing things.

On the other hand, Twilight did stop by rather frequently, trying to glean as much info about his world as she could in an effort to locate his home in relation to a place she claims to have visited. So far, though, his impression was that she was frustrated by her inability to find his Granville, Kansas in relation to her Canterlot High School, city unknown, state unknown, and quite possibly country unknown, too?

Rarity periodically came by to ask to design more outfits for him. Evidently, the pony found his body-shape an especially radical fashion challenge. Not that she didn’t still do outfits for her native species.

But one that had escaped Reggie's notice was, despite the fact that the princesses' acceptance of his explanation that the parody he had developed had not intended cause anyone harm, Fluttershy seemed to still not forgiven him. He apologized to her and she supposedly accepted it. Of course, she always had to complicate matters by instantly asking if he was ready to forgive her pink friend. However, he still wasn’t ready for that yet. And so, after that, the quiet pegasus began to shy away from him bit by bit. He hadn’t noticed she stopped coming by at all until after the fifth week or so. But the slack certainly seemed to be taken up by visits from the others.

But whenever there was a lack of Fluttershy’s friends coming by, he would strike up conversations with his guards, Ralf and Sam, or the set of daytime guards Celestia had assigned him, Mike and Scully, or even one of the princesses would wander by and talk for a bit.

Ironically, the one that visited him the least, aside from his later realization of Fluttershy’s absences, Applejack was the closest thing to someone from his home. Her accent certainly placed her as a country gal, if the creature had been human. But she only visited if she had a shipment to deliver from her farm to the castle. And from the times he was able to talk with her, he learned of several of her hobbies; chief of which, surprisingly, was rodeo!

Come on! Rodeo? They’re all already horses! What did they do? Ride one another in the competitions? He was sorely tempted to ask her about it, but he wasn’t THAT stupid! In this world, those were the sorts of questions that would no doubt quickly have him arranged with an appointment to see the vivisectionists!

And then there was Rainbow Dash.

“Heh! Yeah, Applejack’s pretty good competition,” Rainbow agreed. “She’s pert near as fast as I am, at least on the ground, an’ I’m pert near as strong as she is.”

“So I hear,” Reggie replied. “I wish I could see you guys compete. Sorry. Unfortunately, I’m afraid I’m not going to be able to be a good audience for you.”

“Cheer up! The doc says there’s a chance your sight will return someday,” the pegasus said, setting down on the bed long enough to drape a foreleg over his shoulder for a moment. Then she was back to hovering in the air in front of him.

“Yeah, I can only hope it will,” Reggie agreed.

He eagerly left the suite with her to walk the gardens as she would take that time to play up in the air. Even though he couldn’t accompany her up there, there was just something about being with the brash pegasus that appealed to him and made it worth the effort to go out and just hang around with her.

As she zoomed somewhere up there in the sky, leaving him to bask in the sunlight, Reggie finally got to thinking about why he was out there.

It was slow and subtle, but over the weeks, he began to really enjoy her company more than the others. This one could really make him laugh with the crazy shit and pranks she'd do, and he could tell that while she wasn’t quite intelligent in the way that Twilight was, Rainbow certainly was very smart. Plus, she had a down-to-earth wisdom in which she unwittingly rivaled Applejack in yet another field. Furthermore, Rainbow seemed to have a level of compassion about her, even though she tried to hide it with occasional jokes or a brashness that bordered on rudeness. But it all seemed to click with Reggie in the end.

And that’s when he realized with a start that he had begun to really appreciate this one, even as much as he had to rely on Luna as his substitute eyes at night.

But then, that brought up some disturbing considerations. Could he, or even should he, develop any sort of attachment to these creatures? They called themselves "ponies", which should put them off-limits due to the bestiality factor. However, he could tell just from feel that they weren't anything like small horses from Earth. Add to the fact they were intelligent, which counted toward the idea of having something to do with them. Then, there was his blindness, and whatever unknown amount of time that it might take to heal—lonely people sometimes start doing—stupid shit—when they get too lonely. Intelligent or not, he wasn't sure if that—he might, some day, do something rather stupid.

But what if there was nothing wrong with it? he began to consider. What if it was okay to have a relationship with one of these creatures? What then? Could I even attract someone as wonderful as Rainbow Dash? After all, she's got her own future to look forward to, her own relationships to develop.

That brought him to the final disturbing concern: even if he could build a relationship with her, didn't he have an obligation to ask the other pegasus about what she thought? After all, it was Fluttershy who invested her time and care to break through his panic and outrage when he woke up in the hospital.

That's when it dawned on him Fluttershy hadn't been coming by lately.

Was it because she was too busy to see him? Or was she still mad at him over that stupid song?

But then he realized, that if he asked her, he might have to explain why he was asking. He wasn't sure he was ready to go there just yet—doing so would mean he was really interested in that wonderfully crazy athletic pegasus mare.

But—wasn't he?