Double Trouble

______________________________________________________________________________

( v-- Dovah's)

You would expect ‘crossing over’ would be painless. That you would see a bright light at the end of the tunnel. You would feel weightless and you found yourself walking to the white light. Well... it was bright and there were lights but that was it. Honestly, I didn’t know where the fuck I was but I can tell you it wasn’t any ‘light at the end of the tunnel’ or wherever the hell you go when you die. All I knew was that it was floating in some sort of limbo with these seizure-inducing flashes of light that no matter what I did, they were always there. All the while, my head, no, my entire being felt like it was being put in in a shredder! My eyes, my lips, my nose, my gums, my nuts! Everything felt like it was being cut into pieces with a Tabasco-dipped knife.

“AAHH!!!” I tried to scream but nothing came out; as if something turned off the sound in this place. It was pointless to do anything at this point; I couldn’t scream in pain, move or shut my eyes against the unrelenting flashes. I was squirming in this joke- this abomination of an afterlife. Was this Hell? Was this my fate, my punishment?, I thought. Out of nowhere, the flashes of light just stopped for a split second, allowing for some minimal rest to my tired, fried eyes, and then exploding into one colossal flash. I put my hands in front of me but it was futile; The light engulfed my body and, once again, I was out like a bulb.

.

.

.

“What is that thing, Twi...”

“...don’t know... hurt...”

“...shy... anything?”

“it... wearing... darling”

“...-pital, quick!”

“... down on... bed... we’ll... care... of it.”

I was going back and forth between consciousness and unconsciousness like some sort of ping-pong ball. Through it all, I kept on hearing these voices buzzing in my head; they sounded feminine. It was a mess but, from what I could gather, they sounded a bit concerned.

I felt myself being poked and prodded as darkness came to and fro. It was so fucking belittling to have my unconscious form being treated like an exhibit. Couldn't complain, though. I was a vegetable right now. I slipped back to unconsciousness, hopefully this time it would be a while before I woke up again.

I woke up, with all control of my body again, to find myself in a hospital room. I looked around to see only a night sky out the window to my right and some monitors to my left. I wiggled my fingers in front of my face to see if I really do have control over myself... I did. Feelings of gratitude showered over me as I came to a miraculous conclusion - I was alive! I leaped out of the bed, breaking some IV lines but completely ignoring them. My senses burst out in tingling joy, the euphoria briefly overtaking me even as some sort of cosplaying nurse came over to me from a distance.

“Whoa there! Calm down before you hurt yourself again.” I did one final, joyous spin in place as I turned to the individual who told me to stop my glorious display of emotion.

“I’m sorry, ma’am but I’m just so...” As I wiped the tears from my eyes, I got a clear, hard look at the source of the sound. I turned and saw a pony... in a nurse’s outfit. I blinked and kept my eyes shut for a few seconds before opening them again - it was still there and now it was giving me a concerned look.

“Sir, is something wrong? Perhaps you should lie down while I get you a syringe.” It talked... It talked... IT FUCKING TALKED! Whatever euphoric sensation that was with me before was gone. Whatever happiness I felt a few moments ago was shattered. I started to hyperventilate - there was no way this was happening. A pony in a nurse’s outfit spoke to me, in plain English, no less. This is a dream, a fucking dream. I put my hands on my face and felt that it was real - one hundred percent real. This was no dream.

“Sir, please get back into-” the nurse-pony began. I replied.

“Holy... mother... of... JESUUUUUUUUUUUUUUS!!!!!” I screamed out of the top of my lungs and darted through the door, ignoring the petrified nurse-pony thing. I ran down the hallway of this... this hospital, sprinting past door after door and hallway after hallway.

“This is not real... This is not real. It’s all just a medication-induced dream. Soon, I’ll wake up in a real hospital, slap the shit out of Andy when I wake up, and we’ll all see “The Avengers” when it comes out on Blu-ray.” I told myself this but it did nothing to help. Finally, after what seemed like hours, I found the doors to my freedom. As I ran through the sliding doors, I was greeted with a confusing sight. A town.

A town that looked nothing like the neighborhood I lived in was the first thing I saw. It looked cartoony, it looked medieval, it looked a little bit like... Ponyville?! Oh fuck! Where the fuck am I?! How the fuck did I-

“Hold him down! Hold down his forelegs, darn it!”

I was now on the ground with a mouthful of dirt and gravel, squirming after something tackled me to the ground. I thrashed and struggled and was able to see the attacker or attackers - it was a pony-doctor and some guards. I continued to thrash around but to no avail. These things were strong in a group.

“Pass me the syringe, now!”

No, No! I felt a sharp pain in the side of my neck. It stung like hell but the pain was replaced with drowsiness. I started feeling woozy. I felt them get off my back.

“back to... bed... tie... secure.”

That was all I heard - the darkness took me once more.

______________________________________________________________________________

( v- Shad's )

I felt reality shifting around me in a dizzy haze of red. It was like being in a tornado, almost, except you didn’t really feel any fear in it. I saw all kinds of scenes shifting around my eyes, but most of them were events in my life - particularly those revolving around my deepest emotions. Though one memory stood out - it wasn’t mine, but it was radiant and shining, unlike my dull past. I felt my inner being crave the incandescence of that reality, and shifted towards it. Something from my past had a phrase for something of this kind, but I couldn’t remember. In fact, it was hard for me to remember my own name at this point.

The light enveloped me, and suddenly it was all dark, and I could feel a softness beneath me. “Wuf da fac?” I grumbled through the familiar white object my face was buried in. I tried to get up, but my body was racked with intense pain the moment I tried, especially in my head.

“Gaddimmit,” my muffled voice tried again. I couldn’t even move my head slightly. But it seemed as if my struggle had attracted some attention; I heard an odd sound moving towards me - almost like clopping from a horse’s hooves. Must be some weird shoes, I thought, and I must be in some sorta hospital. After all, I did get shot in the damn face. While I didn’t remember a lot right now, I could at least remember that! I tried to feel my head, where what felt like heavy bandages and gauze were wrapped around the top. I couldn’t reach it, but my attempts made me feel more alive, at least. I kept wondering how I wasn’t dead.

“Look who’s finally awake!” a pretty female voice sounded, startling me from my subconscious. “Mmmph?” I tried to speak, but I seriously couldn’t make out any words through the damned pillow. “I’ve never seen anything like yourself, but it wasn’t too hard to figure out your anatomy once I got down to it,” the woman commented, “and the thing lodged in your head was off-putting, but I figured it must have been the source of your internal damage.” A needle entered my neck for a few seconds, and I cringed a bit at the sting. However, once the needle had been pulled back, I felt less stiff. I tried to move again, and to my surprise I was able to lift my arm off the soft I laid upon, more than likely a hospital bed.

Even through the agony, my willpower broke through - I was able to roll over, eyes closed and sweating. “Damn, talk about pain,” I growled under my breath. Though my attitude said otherwise, it was actually very relieving that I could still move. If I had been like a vegetable, I would’ve just asked my parents to unplug me. What use is it to live when all you’ve got in front of you is bad? Thankful for a second chance, I opened my eyes and extended my right hand to properly greet one of what I assumed was the nurses saving my life. I was surprised, however, when the nurse I saw wasn’t quite human.

I squinted and slowly brought my hands up to my eyes to rub them for a moment. After I was done rubbing, I stared again at the nurse. Same vision as before. Now I felt a little nervous - perhaps I had actually just gone insane, and the whole situation was some sort of hallucination designed to keep me occupied with my craziness. “I’ll be right back,” she said, “I have to go take care of another patient for a few minutes!” So, with that, she turned her back on me and went elsewhere. I kept looking where she had disappeared to.

The woman had been Nurse Redheart, a pony from ‘My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic’! But that couldn’t be possible, could it? Though, the pink mane in a bun, blue eyes, and white hair had really thrown me for a loop when I had opened my eyes. I resolved to get some eyedrops later. In what was probably a few minutes later, I heard someone shouting about Jesus or something like that. A few seconds later, I saw a silhouette darting through the door on the other side of the room.

After that, the nurse-pony returned to my side, looking a little tired. “Well, one of the patients, who had a very similar anatomy to yours, actually, just escaped the hospital for whatever reason.” Nurse Redheart scrunched up her face for a second, “Why did he leave? We were only attempting to help him out..” With the familiar face, I couldn’t help but smile a little even in my deep-seated pain and confusion. “Eh.. there’s another human here?” I ask, becoming even more puzzled. She replied, “There was! Until now..”

I scrubbed my face with a hand. If all this was really real.. I felt weird and as if I shouldn’t belong here at the moment, but at least I had the comfort in knowing that someone of my kind did exist. Maybe he could even tell me how I got here. I sure hope there’s more than just one other human, I thought. “So, nurse, um.. how did I get to this hospital..?” I asked, hesitantly. Walking around to the side of my bed, she looks at me with concern in her eyes, eyebrows slanted a little. “I’m not certain. All I know is that a few work ponies found you out in the middle of the Sweet Apple Acres with a gaping hole in your head,” Redheart said, “And when we performed surgery on you, there was some sort of oval-ish metal thing inside of your head. I don’t know what it was.”

With this odd turn of events, I didn’t know quite how I was supposed to react. I was feeling kind of tired after this news, although still grateful for the service, even if those who had saved my life had been of a different species. It felt odd, really. I uttered a small word of thanks before I settled the back of my head on the fluffy pillow once more and drifted off to a sleep filled with confusing nightmares of ponies with scalpels.