“Hey, motherfucker, this is your wake-up call!”

I jerk awake beneath a mountain of borrowed linens in Sunset’s living room. From beneath a comforter far too small for my new futon, I reach out one hand and grab the disposable cell phone I picked up at the bodega down the street. Before the phone can shout out my recorded alarm message again, I slip into the settings and turn off the alarm.

Why was Sunset so surprised that I needed to crash for a few hours; never heard of jet lag? I wonder as I push off the covers. She needed to attend school anyway, and she can’t do that if she’s watching me. Besides, it’s weird enough that I’m bunking with a teenage girl without her trying to babysit me, too.

The clock in the top corner of my screen says it’s quarter to four in the afternoon, and I remember that Sunset will be back in around an hour. It’s probably as good a time as any to freshen up; Luna knows I probably need it. You can’t do push-ups, crunches and leg lifts in a new body without working up a bit of a sweat. That reminds me, I need to get some clothes to last my stay here. No way in hell am I doing the foul bachelor method of living.

A grumble from my stomach alerts me to another problem, as well. I haven’t eaten anything more substantial than chicken jerky in more than half a day, and if my bad heart carried over through the portal, I’ll definitely start getting dizzy soon. Not the kind of person to raid another’s fridge, my eyes instead drift to a well-read looking pizza menu stuck to said fridge with a magnet.

Casually walking over, I pull the menu free and look it over. It has your standard prices, as well as several familiar specialty pizzas. I’m genuinely stuck between ordering one that offers chicken and heat in the form of hot sauce of some sort, but on the other hand, goddamn meat lover’s pizza sounds heavenly right now. Place even seems nearby, though I don’t exactly have a key to lock up. Somehow, I doubt she’d be pleased if she got robbed ‘cause I wanted a meat murder pizza. They do delivery though...

That’s when I notice a stack of bills on the counter beside the fridge, all of them addressed to Sunset Shimmer. Smiling, I ring up the pizzeria and place an order for not one, but two large pizzas. One of them is of course the long coveted meat lover’s pizza, but the other is a vegetarian pizza that I figure she’d prefer to my carnivore’s delight. Almost as an afterthought, I add in a small garlic bread pizza and a bottle of ginger beer. The guy on the other end knows exactly which apartment I mean, and gives me half an hour before the pizzas will be here.

Without further ado, I strut into the bathroom and begin taking off my clothes. Again, I’m reminded that had this been decades earlier, I’d be most eager to check out my new feminine body, while also giving myself a strip show. Now, though, I just shuck my jacket, skirt, pantyhose and shoes—yes, I fell asleep wearing shoes; sue me—onto the bathroom vanity before finally looking at myself. It’s kinda strange seeing myself in plain white panties and a low cut tank top; almost reminds me of Alien, and how Ellen Ripley spent part of the movie in a similar state of undress.

Almost immediately, my eyes are drawn to the wide scar across my abdomen, roughly where my cesarean would have been on my pony body. Funny how that one is still there, but my hands are practically flawless, I muse, pulling the tank top and bra off. Expecting to see my scars from the glass the day I depetrified Pound Cake and promptly collapsed into some broken glass, I am only more perplexed when, aside from a bit of lingering fat from my pregnancy all that time ago, I don’t even find so much as a freckle.

Without the bra or tank top, the bathroom mirror does give me an unobscured view of my new human tits. Again, not huge, but fairly large, especially in comparison to Sunset; just enough to spill over when I cross my arms. They just sit there like two pale, squishy globes, capped with large gray nipples that definitely make me think human, rather than horse.

This time, I can’t resist giving a little squeeze. It’s a lot different than when I’ve played with my teats as a pony. Regardless of their size or state, mine have never been particularly sensitive; I’ve known mares who get off just fine from stimulation of their teats, and even treated a few whose were too sensitive. Going from zero to “This is amazing!” Definitely gives me new respect to the mares who had to deal with the oversensitivity.

Knowing that I’ll just end up with my hand stuffed in my muff until the pizza guy shows up if I give into curiosity and my budding arousal, I drop my panties and step into the walk-in shower stall. On second thought... I duck back out of the shower and begin rooting through drawers, looking for bar-soap a different color than what is already sitting in the soap nook. Call it weird, but I personally don’t wanna groom myself with a bar of soap that might have been used on someone else’s arse. Plus, Sunset would probably appreciate not having to use the same bar of soap as me.

A near indeterminate amount of time later, I step out of the shower, dripping wet and plenty refreshed—face to face with Sunset Shimmer, who is standing in the bathroom door. “Where’s your money? I need to pay the pizza guy.”

I don’t really do anything to cover my modesty as I gesture back out the door toward my bedding. “Under the futon, there should be a few fifties,” I respond, reaching for a towel before casually drying myself in front of her as I meet her gaze with both eyes. It’s not like she wouldn’t see anything different in her locker room. “Unless maybe you want me to see if I can flash him for free pizza.”

“N-no!” she stammers and averts her eyes. “I want to be able to look him in the eye in the future.” She stops just inside the door and grabs the knob, pulling it shut as she goes. “Please close the bathroom door next time.”

I just grin and pull on my panties, tank top sans bra, and shoes and skirt. The jacket, bra, and pantyhose are simply draped over my arm as I step out after her. Just in time to hear the pizza guy saying he doesn’t have change for a fifty, I call out, “Oh let the guy keep the change, Sunset.” The guy’s eyes flick over to me, and I realize that my top is probably showing a bit more now that I don’t have a bra on, but I just give him a knowing smile and a wink as I pull my eyepatch on.

While Sunset trades two of the fifties for the two pizzas, the garlic fingers, and the soda, I set about putting away my bed—into the bag, of course. Then, it’s just a matter of moving my new cellphone and the rest of the loose money into a cheap purse I picked up. Once that’s out of the way with, I pull the coffee table back in front of the couch. I have just enough time to don my bag when Sunset drops the pizza boxes on the table.

“I was going to ask earlier about that jerky,” she says, pushing my meat lover’s towards me as she takes the vegetarian for herself. “Are you a griffon? I mean, you have some pony-like mannerisms, but you use your hands like it’s second nature to you.”

I pause even as I open my pizza box. “Now there’s an interesting question,” I say. “Ponies certainly thought I thought I was in my first year at the university in Canterlot. Hell, I even tried to give myself griffon claws, one time. That was messy. Nah, I’m just a simple pegasus mare who’s been through a lot.”

Her eyes widen, and she nearly drops her first slice of pizza. “How can you eat meat like that, then!?” she asks, growing even more aghast as I dig into my first slice with almost religious bliss on my face. “Wh—”

Despite the near spiritual experience I’m having eating this greasy pizza blessed with processed meats and cheeses, which you just can’t get in Equestria, I pause my feast. “Relax, I’ll tell you everything you need to know. My hands are second nature to me because they’re actually first nature; I was born a human male.”

If her jaw could drop any further, the neighbor downstairs would have an unexpected visitor. At first, she only listens in disbelief as I tell her about this other human world, about the show, and the life I left behind. She gets a bit confused when I start talking about perpendicular dimensions, so I get off on a tangent on that.

In the end, I end up holding up the lid of my pizza box and drawing a triad of circles. “Each of these dots represent a parallel world.” I point to one, stating, “Equestria,” then another, “An alternate Equestria where Celestia was evil,” and then, “Whatever this world is called. As it stands, none of these worlds naturally come into contact on their own.” I draw dotted lines between the central one and the two lower ones. “It isn’t until you get ponies like Starswirl the Bearded building bridges between the worlds that they ever actually touch.”

I push the pencil through space in between the three points, smiling as the pencil grazes all three circles. “With this perpendicular world, you have a mostly different world. Different cultures, different culturally significant naming conventions, different religions. The whole shebang.” I shrug. “You might see similarities between this parallel world,” I say, pointing to where the pencil is touching human-Equestria, “and the perpendicular one, or you might have Equestria bleed through in the form of inspiration for a cartoon.”

“Uh-huh,” is all she says, as I move back into my tale.

This time, I don’t stop. Not when I get to where I nearly murdered Twilight, not when I start my feud with house Blueblood. Not even when Aqua Regia raped me and murdered Ice Blossom right in front of me. It’s only when I get to when I finally broke and had myself committed to the mental hospital in Ponyville that I finally stop. Even then, it’s only because my voice is trembling, and tears are streaming down my cheeks.

Sunset looks mortified by what she’s heard, and almost afraid to speak. “I never did like the Bluebloods,” she finally manages. “There was always something off about them, but my parents liked them. Nobility always stuck together...”

My eyes widen in sudden realization when she says her parents liked the Bluebloods. “You were the missing daughter of House Shimmer,” I whisper drily. “Your parents were the ones that had a blood feud with the Bluebloods after your disappearance... the ones that tried to fake my death and have me locked away almost twenty years ago.” I blink and then look away, my cheeks burning. “Holy fuck, what kind of astronomical odds would have us meet after all these years?”

Sunset pulls out her phone and looks at the time. “Oh crap, I gotta go,” she says, her hand shaking as she tries to dab away tears starting to form. “I was supposed to meet the girls twenty minutes ago. Are you gonna be alright here by yourself?”

I nod, glancing at the laptop charging in the corner. “I’m sure I could find something to do.”

~ 03 ~

When Sunset finally arrived in the little cafe her friends always gathered at, she was treated to several concerned looks. In return, she gave them a tired look of their own that pretty much said she’d tell them just as soon as she got something to drink. In the meantime, she walked up to the counter to address the shop’s owner, Mr. Cake.

“Good afternoon, Sunset,” he said in a cheerful tone as he rinsed and wiped a coffee cup. Upon noting the distraction on her face, he quickly asked, “Need a pick-me-up?

“Yeah,” she answered, barely noticing. Her mind was caught on what the human-turned-pony-turned-human crashing on her living room floor had said. All of it. “Hot chocolate, please. Largest you got.”

“Sure thing,” he replied, grabbing a tall paper cup and moving over to one of his serving machines. “Go on and join your friends. It’s pretty empty for a change, so I’ll bring it over.”

Paying the man, Sunset made her way over to the booth her friends were all at. Rarity was already speaking by the time she slumped into the spot her friends always left her. “Sunset, darling, are you alright?” she asked with obvious concern. “Forgive me for saying this, but you look terrible.”

Rainbow Dash was next. “Yeah, Sunset,” she added in quickly. “You get us all worked up with that text message this morning, then show up in school and won’t say anything, and now you’re coming in here looking like someone ran over your dog. What gives?”

Sunset folded her hands on the table and just stared at them, unable to look at her friends. “It’s just been a really, really screwed up day,” she answered, after giving her words some thought. “I received a message this morning from the book, but not in the normal way.”

She placed her tome on the center of the table table and opened it for her friends to read. “I didn’t write any of that, or at least, I haven’t written it yet,” she said, watching her friends poring over the entry. “At some point this morning, the portal was open for a brief time, and that message appeared in the book. It’s not the only one, though.”

She turned the page and watched her friends struggling to read it. “It’s Equestrian mouth cursive written by hand,” she explained upon seeing their perplexed expressions. “Long and short of it is this: we’re in some sort of time loop, and a pony came through to help in the last iteration, even if they came unprepared.”

“I don’t much know about this time travel hooey,” Applejack added. “Help’s a good thing, though, ain’t it?”

Sunset bit her lip, and held her tongue as Mr. Cake gave her the hot chocolate that she’d ordered. “Normally, yeah,” she admitted, taking a big sip of scalding chocolatey goodness. “But if even half of what she’s said is true, things are far too complicated for me to think about without getting a migraine.”

“Wow, Sunny, it must be real hard if it makes your head hurt!” Pinkie exclaimed, bouncing in her seat. “You’re like the smartest person I know, next to Twilight, and if it makes your head hurt, it’s probably going to make her head hurt, so if you explain it to us, we’re all just going to be head hurty.”

Shaking her head, Twilight reached her hand across the table to close the book. “I don’t think it’s that kind of problem, Pinkie,” she said in a calming voice. “She hasn’t explained everything yet, but I imagine that it has more to do with the pony than what brings the pony here, right?”

There was nothing that really needed to be said on that; Twilight had hit the nail right on the head. She nodded before summarizing everything that Silver had told her, emphasizing that she pretty sure hadn’t heard everything she had to say, that supposedly around 20 years had passed from Princess Twilight’s perspective, and that this pony had apparently been through a lot. She did make sure to leave out the level of graphic detail that Silver’s recollection had.

“Um, if you think she’s supposed to be helping us, why did you leave her all alone in your apartment instead of bringing her with you?” Fluttershy asked, peering worriedly from beneath her curtain of pink hair. “I mean, why not bring her to the school with you, if you don’t mind telling...”

Sunset looked up at the ceiling, suddenly unsure of herself. It occurred to her that sharing that sort of thing must not have been all that easy, and that leaving her there might have been taken as some sort of rejection. “I honestly don’t know what to think about her,” she admitted, turning her hot chocolate in her hands as she thought. “On the one hand, she seems incredibly erratic, and I’m talking in comparison to Pinkie—”

“Aww, Shimmy, I’m flattered, but I don’t swing that way...”

“Pinkie, that’s erotic, not erratic,” Fluttershy whispered a little loudly into Pinkie’s ear, her face scarlet with embarrassment. “Erratic means unpredictable.”

“Anyway, that aside, I can’t exactly bring her to school, because unlike when Twilight came through the portal, this Silver Script came out looking old enough to be your mom if she had you when she was a teen.” She glanced out the window. “Also, I don’t know how to deal with her claims that she used to be a human guy. I mean, if it weren’t for the fact that she’s uncannily familiar with the technology here as well as knowing too much information about Equestria, I’d have thought that she was an escapee from Helping Hooves Clinic for the Criminally Insane.”

“The insane asylum?” Rainbow Dash asked with a start. “Do you think she’s dangerous?”

Sunset shook her head. “Everyone has the capacity to be dangerous, Rainbow Dash. Just look at us.” She gestured at herself and Twilight. “I don’t think she’d intentionally hurt anyone if she could help it, but again, if her story’s true, she’d probably set fire to half the city to protect anyone she was loyal to.”

~ 03 ~

So, it’s just like I figured: a woman by the name of Silver Script matching my general appearance doesn’t have a digital footprint in this world. Believe me, I checked. Public birth records, obituaries, and social media, local and international, all come up zero. Not even altering search parameters to search for a man matching my coloring yields anything, which means that I never existed in this reality or Equestria.

Not even my daughters exist here, which is kind of a bummer, but that’s how it goes, isn’t it? They don’t exist due to my lack of existence here. I bet they’d be pretty though.

Conversely, people that I know or knew in Equestria, are very much present here. A lot of them are even students at Canterlot High or at a school called Crystal Prep Academy. Even Ice Blossom is alive and attending the latter school. That’s something a whole nest of trouble I’m not going to get involved in. Just the fact that she’s alive and not murdered implies that her counterpart’s life is better here without me in it. Same can probably be said for her sister and my griffon friends, too.

Plus, there’s the whole “I’m old enough to be her mom,” thing going now, I remind myself. Let’s not get ourselves on a sex offender registry for crushing on a minor.

If there’s one plus to all of this, I’m highly unlikely to run into Aqua Regia’s counterpart. Much like my friends, I was curious as to whether or not she was still alive or in prison or something, so of course I looked her up. She’s attending Crystal Prep in the upper part of the city, making any sort of encounter highly unlikely. Honestly, I don’t know what I’d do if we ever met.

But enough about all that. The computer’s boring me right now, mostly because all of the digital media of this world is largely unfamiliar to me. Besides, I don’t know what kind of data cap Sunset’s WiFi has, so it’s not like I’m about to check out the Daring Do or Harry Trotter film adaptations. What to do, then? I ask myself as I put my unfinished slice of pizza back in the box.

Falling back into the surprisingly cushy couch, I ponder the situation at hand. Sunset and the counterparts of the Elements of Harmony are all capable of expressing Equestrian magic, or ‘Ponying Up’ as Twilight has quoted Sunset. Princess Twilight and the Elements were capable of doing this in a moment of passion or danger, but never at will. The princess said that both Sunset and human Twilight also underwent forcible, if altered, transformations when exposed to large volumes of pure magic.

Princess Twilight and Sunset have the benefit of having been Equestrians, but the others... did they develop wells of magic inside them as a result of exposure to real magic, or is it always present in this world, locked deep inside you by default? Would that mean that a mana potion could trigger a change? I ponder, tapping my chin. Is that why past-future me wanted me to bring mana potions and those?

Shaking my head, I reach over and shut off the lamp, plunging the room into darkness. Once that is done, I pull my legs up underneath me in an imitation of a pose I’ve only taken a handful of times as a pony: full lotus. I refuse to believe that there are only two options to, chance or outside influence. Like a unicorn learning spells, an earth pony learning their own strength, or a pegasus learning flight, it’s just got to be a matter of the mind coming into harmony with the body.

Like I did in a prison cell so many years ago, I shut my eyes and begin to envision a small candle flame stirring gently before me with my every breath. There’s nothing else to think about, just the flame. There’s no thought, no movement, and no sense of touch... There’s not even a Silver Script; only the flame remains.

A familiar sense of warm numbness floods my being after seconds or hours of my pulse growing slow. Time has no meaning, so for all I know, I might be sitting here for days. All I do know is that my awareness of my body and surroundings grows lesser with every breath. The candle is my reality now. Now this is familiar.

When I open my eyes, I decide, in spite of reality, I will be not in Sunset’s living room, but in the bridge between mind, body, and magic.

My eyes open, and I find myself in an obsidian black chamber, its walls lined with knowledge filled, flame blackened book shelves. In the center of the room stands a narrow waist high pillar that, even at this angle, I know to be triangular in shape. Atop it is an odd seed-shaped object, balanced precariously on one point. The entire room brings back some bad memories, but at least there is no book of pain nor a face in the wall.

Moving forward is an interesting experience, to say the least. Every step forward is one that I experience not only as a human, but as a pony as well. I’d almost go so far as to say that I am both in this mental construct, which honestly wouldn’t be too surprising. Given that I did not envision form, it’s probably a mental disconnect; body is human, mind is still geared to pony.

The balanced seed visibly shivers at my approach. If this is all inside my mind, and I desired to be at the bridge of mind, body, and magic, then this construct must be linked to it, but how does it work? I walk around the odd little pillar, examining both it and the seed for any sort of clue as to how they work. After all, my mind wouldn’t have conjured this without purpose; it simply wouldn’t.

Upon closer inspection, the top two thirds of the seed almost look as though they detach or open by some unseen mechanism. Maybe if I just... My finger traces along the tip of the device, and I leap back as a precaution. I can only watch in interest as top sinks into the bottom slightly, before folding open into a tilted triquetra-like flower with only three petals.

Almost immediately, I note that each ‘petal’ bears a symbol. The one raised the most resembles an open wound with three drops of blood, color and all. One of the two at the bottom two has a vaguely familiar, almost ethereal looking teal circle with three swirled tails. The last one looks like a dark magenta heart split in two, one half being hollow.

I frown, uncertain at what it is I am seeing. What do the symbols mean? Is this some sort of mechanism that will allow access to my magic? This seems incredibly asinine, but at the same time, it’s not like I expected it to be like flicking a switch. Maybe... if the properties I specified are body, mind, and magic, one of these symbols would ideally represent each of them.

A smile creases my face as I begin to puzzle it out. The wound seems like the most likely to represent the body, I decide, having bled enough in my past to not question it. The mind isn’t something you can really quantify into any sort of tangible image, so an abstract would be most likely... meaning the circle with the tails, right? I rub my chin and stare at the last symbol. This one honestly brings to mind the heart and soul idiom... yet I can’t shake the feeling that magic is the core—the heart and soul—of all Equestrian beings.

None of the petals budge to the touch when I try to close the seed, but strangely, the base upon which they are attached has some give. With great caution, I rotate it as I would a door knob or a tap, bringing heart and blood up to equal height with a resounding click. Almost without delay, I have results; a nostalgic warmth—one that I hadn’t realized I was missing—flows through my veins. Some of my magic has returned to me, and...

I jerk out of my meditative state, my chest and head aching. What in the blazes!? There’s no doubt I’ve changed position during my introspection. Instead of on the couch, I’m on the floor beside the coffee table, and Sunset Shimmer is there, crouched over me. At least, I think it is. She’s the only one who can really get into this apartment, but I can’t really tell; they’re shining a light in my eye.

Fingers fumble at the edge of my eye patch, and the light strays from my uncovered eye. Just as Sunset’s fingers find purchase and begin to pull at the eye patch, I grab her wrist and grunt. “I don’t think you wanna do that right now,” I wheeze, clutching my chest with my free hand. “At least, not without polarized lenses shielding your eyes.”

“What was that just now?” she asks, backing off to allow me to get up. “You were just sitting there, ramrod still, when I came in. Didn’t even respond when I said hi.” She kindly offers me a hand getting up when she sees I’m struggling to get to my feet. “All of a sudden, you just seize up and fall off the couch.”

I rub my head in search of bumps or bruises. Finding none, I lift my eyepatch just enough to be able to see light in my lower peripheral. Sure enough, it’s blood red like it normally is. “I was meditating on something,” I reply with a hoarse laugh. Heaving myself onto the couch, I grab the unopened bottle of ginger ale from the table. “I was puzzling over how you and the others ‘Pony Up’.”

She goggles at me, as if I’m suddenly in possession of nine heads or something. “How does meditation do that?” she says in obvious reference to whatever put me on the floor. “Meditation is supposed to be peaceful, isn’t it?”

Taking a swig of soda straight from the bottle, I shrug. “I have a pretty weak heart from repeated and intense alchemical poisoning,” I nonchalantly tell the young woman as I spot the time on a wall clock. Much later in the evening than I’d have thought. “Either I was deep enough that I stopped my heartbeat, or when I manipulated the way my body, mind, and magic interacted, my body went into shock.”

Her left eyebrow rises as she looks me over. “Well, I can tell you that you haven’t Ponied Up.” She walks away, toward her room, grabbing a slice of pizza from her box. “Your ears are still normal, and your hair isn’t long, nor do you have wings.” Sunset pauses in the doorway to her bedroom and looks back at me. “I’m going to finish up some homework and turn in for the night. Are you planning on doing anything tomorrow?”

“Depends; what day is it?” I ask, rising shakily to my feet and making room for my bedding again.

“Tomorrow’s Saturday, so I don’t have school,” she replies, nibbling her vegetarian pizza as she leans against the doorjamb. “I figured if you’re here to work with us, you might as well get to meet the girls sooner rather than later.”

“If that means I have an opportunity to go get some clothes, sure.” I shut off the light and flop onto my new futon. “I’m not going to be borrowing your stuff, no offense. Besides the fact that your bras might be too tight, I ain’t sharing panties with nobody, no how.”

From the doorway, I hear a snort of laughter and what might have been an, “Ew!” as if the idea repulses her, too. “Alright, see you in the morning.”

When the hallway light turns off and I hear her door close, I can’t quite stifle a little yawn. I’m really glad you didn’t pull off my eye patch, I muse as I do just that. In spite of the darkness in the room, I can see my hands as I hold them up in front of my face. Wreathed in a light blue glow, there’s no mistaking that yes, some of my magic has returned. I wonder if other me went through this same day. Did she end up accidentally petrifying Sunset? Or did she not come nearly as prepared and informed as I did, and fail to think about manipulating her spirit through meditation?

Author's Note

Yes! Delicious meat lover's/murder pizza! So good you gotta murder plenty of animals for it!

I hope you enjoyed this. Next chapter, so many panties, and someone plays the hero and makes a friend.