Cruising Into the Unknown

Chapters

Chapter 1 (All Characters): The Last Day
Chapter 2 (All Characters): Shock
Chapter 3 (All Characters): Recovering
Chapter 4 (Molly and Isabelle): Settling In
Chapter 5: (Sam and Ashley) Coping

Chapter 1 (All Characters): The Last Day

It was May 23rd, 2015, the MS Anthem of the Seas was traveling on its route through the Mediterranean Sea as it steamed towards its next destination in Greece. The passengers were all in a good mood on this particular afternoon as the ship continued its voyage.

Or at least most of them were, seated at one of the bars aboard the ship was a young woman with short red hair and dressed in a low cut top and long skirt. She sighed a little as she took a long drink from her glass and looked over at the bartender.

"Another," she said as she put the glass down and the bartender just shook his head as he poured another drink.

"What's got a pretty lady like you sad, your boyfriend break up with you or something?" He asked as he moved the drink over in front of her.

"Not exactly, more mourning over unrequited love," the woman said as she downed another drink. "I came on this cruise to get away from it I guess."

"Let me guess, you booked the cruise so you could confess your love to them and it didn't work out," the bartender said and she nodded softly. "Bummer, I've been there a few times myself."

"Yeah, she ran off with some guy she met on the first day, I haven't even seen her since, but its a big ship," the woman said with a shake of her head as the bartender raised an eyebrow.

"Oh, I didn't take you for being into women," he commented which just made the woman shrug. "Well, I hope you figure something out, there's still plenty of fish in the sea you know."

"Yeah, I know, its just I always really kind of had a thing for her and she was always nice, I guess I just hoped that she would feel the same way," the woman said with a sigh as she shook her head. "Honestly I don't know what I'm going to do, its just not been easy since we're on the ship together."

"Well, here, have one on the house," the bartender said as he poured another drink before he went to serve another passenger.

The woman sighed and looked at her drink, she had taken this vacation to try and relax, but so far it hadn't exactly been that relaxing with her lack of luck with love. She downed the drink again and was a bit surprised when someone sat down next to her and ordered a drink of her own.

"So what's your story?" She asked as she looked over and saw a woman with long blonde hair and dressed in a t-shirt and jeans who gave her a shrug.

"What makes you think I have one?"

"Because you're sitting at a bar when its barely even noon," the first woman said and looked at the newcomer for a long moment. "I'll go first if you want. I came on this trip with my best friend who I've always had a crush on and wanted to come clean to her, but she ran off with a man on the first day of the voyage."

"Geez, that's harsh," the newcomer said with a slight British accent and shook her head. "I'm just, its a long story, but I don't really want to talk about it that much."

The first woman nodded and shrugged, she understood that not everyone would want to talk about it. She probably wouldn't have even bothered but it felt like the alcohol was starting to loosen her tongue a little. She offered a hand to the other passenger and gave her a smile.

"I'm Molly Turner."

"Isabelle Baker, everyone calls me Izzy," Isabelle said with a smile as she shook the other woman's hand before downing her drink. "I'm just, its a long story really, lets just say that my parents aren't exactly fond of some of my life choices."

"Don't worry about it, we're here to get away from all of those troubles," Molly said with a nod as she looked at Izzy, she blushed a little when she realized she was staring at the woman's chest and tried to look away. "It took my family a little while to come around to me being a lesbian when I came out of the closet a few years back, but they came around eventually."

Izzy looked at her and smiled a little, maybe it wasn't going to be that bad at least, but she didn't want to try and do anything crazy at least not yet. "So, what brings you aboard the Anthem?"

"Just on vacation now I guess, its pretty nice, I've never been on a cruise before," Molly said with a smile as she gave the blonde woman a nod. "I've just been kind of stressed out ever since the first day though, things are not exactly going as I had hoped."

"Yeah, well I can't blame you for that," Izzy said as she put her hand on Molly's gently. "So where are you from?"

"Boston, I saved up for months to pay for this trip, and I'm just glad I'm here," Molly said as she blushed a little at the contact from the other woman, she didn't want to try and think about it though as she gave her a nod. "What about you, where are you from?"

"Oh, a little town in England, you've probably never heard of it," Izzy said with a shrug as she looked her over. "My family is here on a vacation, but I'm not exactly looking forward to meeting up with them for lunch given everything that's been going on."

"Don't worry about it, if you want you can always hang out with me," Molly said with a smile as she gave the woman a nod. "I've got nothing but time right now, actually I was thinking about checking out the observation tower, would you like to join me? I've heard its the tallest observation tower on any cruise ship."

Izzy looked at her surprised for a moment and smiled a little at the other woman's suggestion, she hadn't really expected her to suggest that kind of thing but it might at least take her mind off of her family for a little while. "Sure, I'd like that a lot."

"Come on, lets go then," Molly said with a smile as she took the woman's hand and they headed off towards the observation crane tower

00000

In one of the restaurants a pair of couples were seated at a table talking, a woman checked her watch as she looked around a little worriedly. She had long brown hair and was dressed in a simple dress as she looked at her watch again.

"Where is Isabelle, she said she'd meet us here for lunch," she said worriedly as she looked around. "Where do you think she is, Richard?"

"Don't worry Sharon, I'm sure she's fine," Richard Baker reassured his wife, in truth he was glad she hadn't shown up after the incident the other night when she had come out of the closet to her parents in the middle of dinner. "Besides, we're supposed to be on vacation, I think we should let her do her own thing for awhile, and we can just sit here and talk with... what did you say your names were again?"

"Mitchell and Donna Marlowe," the other man who was dressed in a neatly pressed suit and had short black hair said with a nod.

"Yes, with the Marlowes, we don't have to worry about what Isabelle is doing right now at least," Richard said as he turned to look at the couple again. "Sorry about my wife, she's just been a bit worried lately about Isabelle."

"Of course, we understand," Donna said as she looked over at Sharon. "I'm sure that she'll be okay, lets just enjoy lunch for now."

Mitchell and Donna Marlowe were a wealthy couple from the United States that were on vacation together aboard the Anthem of the Seas. They had come from old money and were here to take a trip away from the country for awhile, and had been on the cruise since the last stop.

"So what about you two, have you thought about having children of your own?" Sharon asked as she looked between Donna and Mitchell.

"We've tried but we haven't really had any luck," Donna said with a shrug as she took a bite of her food. "Really we haven't had that much interest in raising a child right now, but our families have been very, insistent at times."

"Of course, well Isabelle at times has been, a challenge," Sharon said with a shake of her head. "Especially recently, we had hoped that this cruise would give her a chance to relax but its not exactly going according to plan. I'm worried about what she might do."

"I think she's overreacting personally, Isabelle is a smart girl, I don't think she's going to do anything reckless," Richard said with a shake of his head. "We're still a bit surprised about what she told us the other day to be honest, and that has admittedly made things hard on all of us."

"Well, that's her business," Mitchell said with a shake of his head. "What are you going to do?"

"We're, still deciding to be honest," Richard said with a shake of his head. "She's a good girl really, but we don't really know how we're going to deal with this. Maybe we can deal with this when we get back to England, we're on vacation right now, as long as she doesn't do anything too crazy like run off with some girl on the ship that she'll never see again."

"Right, we'll make sure that everything is okay with her, I hope," Sharon said as she took a deep breath. "So, what do you two do, any hobbies?"

"Well, I collect old cars mostly," Mitchell said with a shrug as he took a bite of his food. "Its something that keeps me occupied at least. This ship has been an, interesting experience to say the least."

Sharon nodded and sighed a little, she was still a bit worried about Isabelle but she didn't want to focus on it for much longer. The cruise wasn't going to last forever after all and a vacation was not the time to worry about their daughter's personal life.

For now they would just enjoy their meal and hope that everything would be okay.

00000

"Is everything still running smoothly?" A woman in a neatly pressed suit and tie asked as she made her way around the hotel section of the Anthem.

"Yes Ms. Thompson, everything is in place as you told us to do," another woman said as she looked over the checklist. "We've got everything ready for our next stop from shore excursions to Athens and everything should be in place once we arrive."

"Good, make sure housekeeping is getting everything ready to clean the cabins, I don't want anything to be out of place when the guests return," Naudia Thompson, the hotel manager aboard the ship said as she looked at the checklist. "Have there been any incidents aboard?"

"Nope, everything seems to be going normally," the woman said. "Why, do you think something is going to happen while we're out here?"

"Its just a feeling, I can't explain it," Naudia said with a shake of her head, the Anthem's voyage so far had been without any real problems outside of the usual. "What about Doctor Sawyer, is she reporting anything unusual going around the ship?"

"Just your usual really, I don't think we have anything to worry about on that front at least," the woman said with a shake of her head. "I think you're just worried, I'm sure we'll make it to Greece without any problems, don't worry about it."

Naudia nodded as they headed up a set of stairs and into the main part of the ship where people were walking along the corridors and talking. Naudia smiled a little as two children ran past them in swim wear with their parents trying to catch up to them as they headed up to one of the pools on the upper decks.

"So, what brought this on anyway?" The woman asked as she looked at her boss.

"Honestly, I don't know, it just sometimes feels like this is going a little too smoothly as if its all building up to something, it may just be my imagination," Naudia said with a shake of her head. "I've always had feelings like that before something happened, but I honestly could never really explain it. Maybe its nothing, maybe its something, right now I just want the passengers to enjoy their vacation."

She smiled a little as she watched a red haired woman pulling a blonde woman into one of the cabins on the deck. Maybe there was something to be said for young love on trips like this. She thought back to her boyfriend back home, it had been awhile since she had last seen him and she had some time off coming up once the ship docked in New Jersey, but for now she just wanted to do her job to the best of her ability.

"Alright, well let me know if anything else happens I guess," she said as they continued to head through the ship towards the main deck.

00000

"You're going to be fine Miss. Beretta," a woman with long black hair tied into a ponytail and dressed in a doctor's scrubs said as she finished examining a younger woman with shoulder length dirty blonde hair who was dressed in a button up shirt and long skirt. "How long have you been feeling this pain?"

"Just a few days now," Claudia Beretta said, she was a singer aboard the Anthem that would entertain the guests most evenings and she had come to Doctor Sawyer to see about some abdominal pains. "Do you think I'll be able to keep singing?"

"Honestly, I think you should rest for at least a day, I'm sure the cruise director can think of something," Doctor Samantha Sawyer said as she gave the singer a smile. "You're going to be just fine, I'll give you some Aspirin for the pain, but if you keep having these problems come let me know okay?"

"Alright," Claudia said as she headed back out of the ship and passed a woman who was coming in with a young girl who was holding her arm at a funny angle.

"Hey there, how can I help you?" Doctor Sawyer asked as she looked at the little girl with a smile.

"She banged her arm up pretty badly, can you take a look at it?" Her mom asked as she looked at the doctor worriedly.

"Of course," she said with a smile as the little girl took a seat on the table and she started to check the arm out. "What's your name?"

"Emily," the little girl said nervously and flinched a little as the doctor touched the arm and started checking it out.

"Okay Emily, my name is Samantha, but everyone calls me Sam," she said with a smile as she checked the arm more. "So what happened here, were you playing around or something?"

"Yeah, with my brother, I accidentally fell on it," she said with a shrug. "Am I going to be okay Sam?"

"Yeah, don't worry about it, young bones heal fast and I don't think you broke it, just let me set it in something," Dr. Sawyer said as she took out some items and set about getting the arm all set. "Don't worry, you'll be just fine in a day or two."

"Thanks!" Emily said as the doctor finished and she got off the table and headed back to where her mom was waiting.

"Just try not to roughhouse with your brother too much okay?" Dr. Sawyer said with a light chuckle as she looked at the girl's mother. "Don't worry, she's going to be just fine."

"Good, thank you Doctor," the mom said with a smile as she headed out with her daughter.

Samantha took a seat in her chair and leaned back, that had been the worst she had to deal with other than the occasional bout of seasickness since the ship had arrived. She had taken the job with Royal Caribbean because she had hoped it would be a chance to work in the sun and sea air and it was pretty nice at least, it just took a little getting used to when she occasionally suffered from seasickness herself, not something you wanted to admit to your patients.

She looked at her watch, her shift in the medical center was going to be up in a few hours and she was looking forward to spending some time next to the pool in her bikini. It would be nice to try and get a tan, and if that wound up being the worst things she had to deal with that day then everything would be just fine.

She sighed and leaned back in her chair and played some music, letting the soft sounds relax her.

00000

"Are you sure about this Molly?" Izzy asked as Molly pulled her into a passionate kiss and started to run her hands along the blonde girl's back slowly. "I mean we just met and I think you're a little drunk."

"Mmm, maybe, but I don't care," Molly said as she shut the door to her cabin and started pulling the other woman's shirt off slowly. "Come on, live a little we're on vacation, we're two hot young women who want something more out of life. Lets just have a little fun, its not like you have to worry about getting pregnant or something."

"I know, but what about..." Izzy started to say but she was silenced by another kiss from Molly before she pulled the woman's shirt off and she blushed a little as she stood there in just her bra and blue jeans. "I've never really done this before..."

"Don't worry, we'll learn together," Molly said as she tossed the shirt to the side and pulled Izzy over to the bed. "Don't worry about your parents, just have some fun!"

Maybe it was the alcohol she had consumed but Izzy was actually tempted to do just that as she laid out on the bed and looked up at Molly who was pulling off her top to reveal only bare skin underneath.

"You only live once, and what's the harm?" Molly asked with a smile as she leaned down and kissed Izzy on the lips, their bodies pressing against each other as Molly unhooked the other girl's bra.

Izzy kept thinking about what her parents would think if they found out she had slept with another girl she had just met that day and would probably never see again. Right now though she didn't care about that kind of thing as she felt a growing arousal between her legs, she just wanted Molly and nothing else.

"Alright, lets do it," she said with a smile as she leaned up and kissed Molly, and started running her hands along the woman's bare back gently before resting them on her butt.

It was going to be a day to remember for both of them.

00000

Captain Charles Smith looked out at the ocean from his vantage point outside the ship's bridge and took a deep breath of sea air. He had been a veteran captain for the Royal Caribbean line for awhile and was close to retirement, with his time aboard the Anthem to be his last job as Captain for the remainder of the year while his replacement got used to the ship and its systems.

"Sir, what brings you out here?" His first mate, a young man dressed in a similar uniform asked as he moved up next to him and looked out at the ocean that surrounded the ship.

"Just enjoying the view right now," Charles said with a sigh as he looked at the sea. "Its hard to believe that after so long I'm already this close to retirement."

"Well, you've done a fine job running this ship sir if I do say so myself," the first mate said as he looked out at the sea. "Have you decided what you're going to do next?"

"Honestly, I don't know, me and the wife are probably going to move to Florida or something and spend the rest of my days relaxing on the beach or a golf course," Charles said with a shrug as he looked at the sea for a long moment. "I've had a good run, I just don't know what's left for me after all of this is over."

"You'll figure something out, we all will," the first mate said with a nod as he looked out at the sea. "The ship's not going to be the same without you if I may say so, you're the only Captain most of us have even known."

"Well, you're all going to do fine without me around, don't worry about it," Charles said as he leaned over the railing and looked out at the ocean. "I guess I'm going to miss this life a little, its weird to think that I'll be leaving it behind in just a few months."

"Don't worry, everything will be fine," the first mate said and Charles nodded as they headed back into the bridge.

The ship steamed on normally for awhile longer as life aboard passed normally. The passengers and crew went about their daily lives as the ship steamed towards its next destination.

But on that day, along with billions of people worldwide, the Anthem of the Seas vanished into thin air, and would not return for a long time.

Chapter 2 (All Characters): Shock

Molly blinked as her vision was suddenly filled with green fur and the haze of alcohol vanished from her brain. There was a scream from above her and she backed off shocked at what was going on.

Laying on the bed in front of her with a terrified look on her (Molly had gotten a close enough look at her to see that she was indeed female) face was a green horse like creature with outstretched bat wings that just stared at Molly in shock as she tried to back away from her.

"Wh-what are you?" She asked scared as she tried to cover herself up with the sheets of the bed and kept staring at Molly in shock.

"What do you mean, I'm a human, you're the..." Molly started to say as she raised a hand, but when she raised it in front of her face she saw that it was a yellow hoof. "What the..."

The bat horse creature just looked at her strangely before she looked down at herself and screamed again when she saw what she had turned into. Once the shock wore off Molly recognized the voice as belonging to Izzy, the woman she had brought back to her cabin, but now she was some sort of weird, bat-like horse creature, what was going on?

That's when she saw her own reflection in the mirror, looking back at her was a yellow coated horse creature with a short blue mane and a horn pointing out of her forehead. Her eyes went wide in shock when she saw herself and she looked over at Izzy who was starting to calm down a little.

"What happened to us?" She asked as she struggled to get to her hooves only to fall flat on her face because she wasn't used to walking on four legs.

"I... I don't know," Izzy said as she tried to calm down from the ordeal and looked at her body again, her breathing was starting to slow down a little. "This isn't even possible, how could we be turned into... what even are we?"

"I don't know, some sort of horses I think... and it looks like I'm a Unicorn," Molly said as she poked her horn a little with her hoof, yeah it was real alright.

"What are my parents going to say, they were already freaked out enough when I told them I was a lesbian, now they're going to think I'm some sort of freak!" Izzy said as she started to cry, her breathing was turning heavy again.

Molly managed to balance herself enough to crawl over to where the other mare was laying in the bed and pulled her in close. The last few hours were still a little hazy to her, but she remembered distinctly meeting this woman, when she wasn't a horse at least, and she wasn't going to leave her hanging like this.

"Shhh... its okay, we're going to figure this out together," she said softly, maybe it was something they had drank, but they hadn't even shared the same kind of drink, what was going on? "And hey, if your parents freak out, then you'll still have me, okay? I'm not going to let you go off on your own."

"Do you mean that?" Izzy asked as she started to dry her tears a little as she looked at the yellow Unicorn worriedly. "You wouldn't leave me like this?"

"Hey, if you're a freak then so am I, at least you have those cool wings, I just have this horn and I don't even know if it does anything," Molly said as she cradled the bat mare gently. "Don't worry about it Izzy, I'm not going to let you go, I promise."

Izzy looked at Molly for a long moment, she had to admit that it was hard to understand what was going on and what had happened to them, but it was actually nice to know that she had someone there who was willing to help her out. She smiled a little and hugged her back, and the two mares just held that for awhile as they tried to figure out what they were going to do next.

"So, what's the plan?" Izzy finally asked as they looked over at the door to the cabin. "Umm, how are we going to get in and out of this place if we don't have fingers?"

"That, is a very good question," Molly said as she looked at the door for a long moment, maybe there would be some way to work around it, they would just have to figure it out. "Well, there's not much point in dwelling on it while we're laying in bed right? Lets see if we can't figure this out."

Izzy nodded and the two got to their hooves, Izzy stumbled a little but Molly helped her walk as they got down off the bed and started looking around for anything that might give them a clue as to what happened or what to do next.

00000

Up on the top decks of the ship things weren't going much better, people were starting to become more and more aware of exactly what had happened to them and they were beginning to freak out over it. The ship's crew tried to maintain order, but it wasn't going well at all.

In the midst of it, two horse creatures, one brown with no extra appendages and a winged one with a grey coat and red mane and tail were frantically looking around. They were trying to find their children who had been somewhere on the deck when, whatever had happened happened.

"Emily, Ben, where are you!" The stallion called out over the sound of the worried passengers as he looked around for his children. "Please, answer me!"

There was a moment where the only sound that could be heard was the sound of hooves and the occasional claw moving along the ship's deck as the passengers and crew tried to figure out what was going on. He was half afraid that something had happened to them in the panic and he felt a hoof resting on his shoulder.

"Abe, they'll be okay, don't worry," his wife Janet said reassuringly but he wasn't sure if he had the same confidence she had, he couldn't imagine something happening to his children and was terrified that they could be lost or worse.

Finally he heard the sound of a familiar voice crying out, it was his son's voice and he sounded like he was close. "Daddy, Mommy, come quick, something's wrong with Emily!"

The two parents pushed through the crowd as they frantically searched for the source of the voice. They found a small Unicorn with blue fur and a darker blue mane who was crouched over a purple, creature, it looked like half of a pony that had a fish tail and it was breathing heavily as if it was stuck out of water.

"Ben is that you, where's Emily?" Janet asked as the colt looked up at his parents with a worried look on his face.

"That's her, I swear, I don't know what happened to her!" Ben said as he gestured towards the strange sea creature that had once been his little sister. "What happened to any of us?"

"I, don't know," Abraham answered but he ran over to the flailing creature and cradled her gently in his forelegs, he didn't care that they were in new bodies right now, his daughter was in trouble. "Shh, Emily, calm down, its me."

"Daddy?" The filly asked as she looked up at him trying not to freak out. "Why can't I feel my legs?"

Abraham's heart fell at that as the filly flipped her tail, she couldn't feel her legs because they had been replaced with a tail and that scared him. What was going to happen to her? Could she even survive out of water in this body?

Her breathing became a little more erratic as she looked up at the sky. "Daddy... what's wrong with me?"

"Nothing's wrong with you, you're going to be just fine," Abe said as he looked around and he finally rested his eyes on the swimming pool that was at the center of the deck, that was going to have to do for now. "Clear the way!"

He carefully picked his daughter up and placed her on his back and rushed forward as she held on as best she could. The crowd realized that something was going on and parted to allow the father and daughter to get through as he rushed for the pool and deposited his daughter in it carefully.

He watched the filly for a moment worriedly, what was going to happen? Was she going to be okay or had he been too late? Emily flicked her tail and dove into the water more on instinct than anything else before coming back up, her breathing seemed to be back to normal, but she looked afraid.

"Daddy, what am I?" she asked as she looked up at him with big eyes that broke the stallion's heart.

"I don't know Emily," he admitted with a sigh as he knelt down next to the pool and hugged his daughter gently, neither of them had any real answers as to what was going on but at the moment they were just glad to have each other, answers would hopefully come soon.

"Emily, are you alright?" Janet asked as she ran over to the poolside with Ben. "What happened?"

"I don't know,' Emily said as she looked at her mom, she was starting to feel a little less scared right now that she had her family nearby, but she still had no idea what was going on. "Am I going to be okay?"

Abe and Janet exchanged a long look, neither of them really knew how to answer that question. They had all seemingly turned from humans into some sort of weird horse creatures, and none of it made any sense to them.

What had happened? Why them? Was this only limited to the Anthem or was something else going on that none of them understood?

00000

When Sam became aware of her body once more the first thing she felt was a strange sensation between her legs like nothing she had ever experienced before. She looked at herself in a mirror that had been set up in the Doctor's office and gasped in shock.

Staring back at her was a Zebra, not like one of the Zebras she had seen at the zoo, this one was smaller and had a slicked back mane with strange colors to their stripes that didn't feel like they would be natural for Zebras, even if they were black and grey, something about the colors felt weird to her.

She kept feeling that strange sensation and couldn't imagine what it might be. Her new body was weird to her, maybe that was something normal for Zebras? Of course she had no frame of reference for what might be normal for Zebras, she wasn't even sure what she was given that everything felt so weird to her.

"Okay Sam, you're going to be just fine, its just a dream or something and you probably fell asleep because you've been staying up too late, yeah, that makes sense," she said to herself, but her voice didn't sound familiar to her, it sounded almost deeper somehow.

Finally fed up with the mystery she laid back on the ground so she could get a better look at herself and she froze. Between her legs was something that hadn't been there before, it took her a moment to realize that it was a horse sheath. What had happened to her? Why did she suddenly have a penis?

She let out a scream of fear and rolled over onto her, or now his front, what had happened to him? This made even less sense than the whole Zebra thing, he had gone from a woman to a man and that didn't make any sense, but what about any of this made sense anymore?

He sighed a little and stared at himself in the mirror again, the Zebra stallion in the mirror stared back at him with green eyes that were filled with fear and worry. She didn't blame him one bit and that was certainly how she felt about this situation, but nothing made sense.

Sam was a doctor, she was someone who had always had an idea of exactly how biology worked and one thing that she was definitely sure of was that people didn't just randomly change species or genders! Something about this was weird, what had happened to him and what was going to happen to the rest of the people on the ship?

He sighed a little and looked at himself in the mirror again, this was going to take a lot of getting used to, but he had a duty to try and help the passengers aboard the Anthem no matter what species or gender he was. He sighed as he checked his clothes, there wasn't really going to be anything that would fit him without some modifications so for now he had to go naked.

After a little bit of doing he managed to get the door to the medical center open and headed out once he made sure his key was secured around his neck. It was now just a matter of hoping that everything would be okay and maybe this was just limited to him.

At least he could hope, he didn't know the first thing about treating anything equine.

00000

In the Windjammer Cafe, Mitchell Marlowe was in a similar situation to Sam's when he realized that a long golden hair was in front of his eyes. He brushed them aside, that was odd, his hair wasn't that color and it hadn't been that long, what was going on?

He was about to turn and look at his wife and say something when he realized that she wasn't sitting next to him. Instead in her place was a horse creature with a pink coat and purple mane that was tied into the same braid that his wife usually wore her hair in.

"Who are you?" He asked and put his hand over his mouth when he realized his voice was a lot more high pitched than it should've been, and that his hand didn't feel like a hand anymore.

"Who are you?" The pink horse creature said in his wife's voice. "What have you done with my Husband?"

"What are you talking about? I am your husband," Mitchell said as he looked at his hoof again, it was a silver color and strangely he could feel some new appendages growing out of his back and he turned to see a pair of wings that were the same color as his hoof. "What happened to us?"

"Prove it, you don't look or sound anything like Mitchell!" Donna demanded of the strange horse creature sitting next to her. "How do I know you're not some impostor?"

"Donna, its me, you have to believe me," he said and then sighed. "Do you remember what happened on our Honeymoon? We went out on a Yacht and you got seasick, you nearly fell overboard, who else would know that?"

Donna just stared at the strange silver and gold pony more, she was still trying to process exactly what had happened but no one else had even known about that. Mitchell had fished her out of the water and they had a good laugh at it, how did this strange horse creature even know that, unless it was Mitchell.

"Mitchell, is it really you?" She asked as she stared at the horse thing in astonishment. "How..."

"I don't know, but the same thing happened to you," Mitchell said with a sigh as he looked around, there were others like them who looked just as afraid or confused. One thing looked kind of like a Griffon, but with brown and red colors and was looking around confused.

"Come on, lets get out to the main deck, maybe we can find some answers there," Mitchell said as he got to his hooves and looked towards the door, at least everything seemed to be untouched, and their clothes were, mostly intact but felt a little too big for them.

"Why do you sound so..." Donna started to say as she tried to think of the best way to put it. "Feminine."

Mitchell stopped in mid stride as he looked back at his wife, he had admittedly been wondering the same thing but he had figured it was all in his imagination. Why would he suddenly sound so feminine? That was something that really didn't make a whole lot of sense unless...

"Give me a moment," he said as he ducked into one of the bathrooms off the ship, he didn't want to imagine what the answer could possibly be but he was terrified that there was only one explanation, and it was one that didn't make a whole lot of sense right now.

Thankfully the bathroom was empty as he ducked into a stall and let the loose pants he had been stuck in fall down as he looked at his lower body and froze. Now everything was starting to make sense, the voice, the hair, and just the strange nagging filling that something was wrong.

Whatever had turned him into a horse creature had also swapped his, or more specifically her gender. She let out a scream that echoed through the bathroom and pulled the pants back up, she wasn't going to let Donna see her like this, not until she was ready at least.

She headed back outside and Donna looked at her with a concerned look on her face. "What's wrong Mitchell?"

"Nothing's wrong, nothing," he said with a forced smile as she offered her wife a hoof. "Come on, lets go see if we can't figure out what's going on, shall we?"

She nodded and the couple walked along the deck, there was so many questions and not a lot of answers, and both of them just wanted to figure out what was going on.

00000

Naudia rubbed her forehead as she managed to reorient herself, she froze when she felt her hoof brushing against something on her forehead and as she felt around she realized what it was. It was a horn, there was an actual horn growing out of her forehead.

"Ugh, what happened?" A feminine voice said from next to her and she looked over to where her assistant had been walking and in her place was a strange half bird half lion like creature that looked around confused. "I feel like I just went through the longest bender of my life."

"Sophia, is that you?" Naudia asked as she looked at the Griffon with a shocked look on her face. "What happened to us? What's going on?"

"I don't know Ms. Thompson," Sophia said as she looked at Naudia and her eyes went wide at the sight of the green and blue Unicorn standing there in a suit that looked like it was too big for her. "Ms. Thompson you're a..."

"Yeah, I know, I'm a Unicorn," she said with a groan as she looked down at her new hooves. "And you're some sort of Griffon I think."

"So, what do we do now?" Sophia asked as she looked around, they were still a few decks below the main deck and there wasn't a lot of signs of life right now, the hall had been empty last time they remembered, and it was still pretty empty, so everyone had to be elsewhere in the ship right now.

"I don't know, we need to get up top, maybe the Captain will..." Naudia started to say when they heard a banging on one of the doors and muffled cries for help. "What's that?"

"Passengers maybe, lets check it out," Sophia said as they walked over to the door.

"Can you hear us?" Naudia asked into the door and waited a moment for a response.

"Yes, we got turned into some sort of, weird horse creatures and we're trying to figure out how to get out of here," the female voice said on the other side of the door. "Can you help us?"

"Maybe," Naudia said and fumbled around in her pockets for her master key to the various staterooms but when she found it it just slipped out of her new hooves and she cursed. "Darn it, hooves aren't built for holding these things..."

"Here, I've got it," Sophia said as she picked the key card up in her talon and used it to unlock the door, inside another Unicorn with a yellow coat and a blue mane was standing next to a green creature that looked like a small horse with a pair of bat wings growing out of her back.

"Oh thank goodness, I was afraid we'd be stuck in there forever," the Unicorn said as she hugged the Griffon and Naudia, catching both off guard but they just smiled a little. "What happened, did this happen to everyone on the ship?"

"We don't know, you're the first two we've seen," Sophia said with a sigh as the Unicorn returned to her place next to the Bat horse creature. "What do you two remember?"

"We were..." The bat horse said and her face turned red, it was surprising that it actually showed through her fur. "Occupied and then one moment we were like this, that's all we really remember."

Naudia smirked a little, she didn't need much of a hint to know what these two women were up to in the cabin when whatever had happened to them happened, but this wasn't the time for that. "Alright, we're heading up to the main deck,
I'm sure the Captain will want to say something to the passengers."

"Okay," the yellow mare said as they followed the others towards the center of the ship and to the stairs. "Can't we just take the elevator?"

"Well we could, but we don't know what's going on, so we need to take the stairs," Naudia said as she looked back at the two. "What are your names?"

"Molly."

"Isabelle."

"Well its nice to meet you both, I'm Naudia and this is Sophia," she said with a reassuring smile as she started leading the two scared women up the stairs, she was just as afraid as they probably felt but she wasn't going to show it.

If there was going to be any chance of making it through this ordeal they were going to need to figure out what was going on and stay calm above all else. This wasn't going to be easy to say the least, none of them really knew anything about these new bodies, but they were going to make it through this somehow.

At least, she hoped that they would, this was all new for her too.

00000

Captain Charles Smith groaned as he looked at his reflection, he had been turned into a white horse like creature that had a short green mane and strangely enough a green beard. This was not something he had really expected, but it was the situation he found himself in.

"Sir, the passengers are panicking, they want to know what's going on," a Unicorn said as he walked in with a worried look on his face. "What do we tell them?"

"How many of them have been transformed into something?" Charles said as he put his hat on his head.

"All of them that we've been able to find sir," the first mate said with a shake of his head. "The crew is all accounted for and we're sending people to search the ship to make sure that all the passengers are here. Its going to take awhile though, there are a lot of people out there."

"Of course," Charles said with a sigh, there went his quiet retirement. "What about Christine, do you know where she is?"

"She's down in your cabin still I think, she should be fine," the first mate said with a nod and looked at the Captain. "What are your order sir?"

"Make sure everyone is on board and get in contact with Doctor Sawyer, she might be able to give us some sort of answers on what's going on," Charles said with a sigh as he struggled to pull up the GPS but found it blank. "That figures, the GPS is out."

"What does that mean sir?" The First Mate asked and Charles just shook his head.

"It means we're without our primary navigation tool and we're stuck in the middle of the Mediterranean without it," he said with a sigh. "What about engineering?"

"Uh, it seems there was something of an accident that cost the life of the Chief Engineer, his assistant is taking over the job and says the engines seem to be working but she's not sure how she's going to work them with hooves," the first made said with a shake of his head.

"Looks like we're all going to have to learn how to operate with hooves," Charles said with a sigh as he stroked his beard. "Okay, send out a distress call on all frequencies, maybe there's someone else out there who can help us."

"Yes sir, and what are you going to do?"

Charles paused a long moment and looked at himself again, this was not something that he had ever expected to happen, no one ever really would. If they couldn't get in contact with anyone outside the ship then they were going to have to figure something out on their own.

Was there even anyone out there who could answer their call? Was this just limited to being aboard the ship or was it everywhere? That was not a thought he wanted to consider right now especially since they weren't even human anymore.

"I'm going to do what I have to do, I'm going to address the passengers," he said with a sigh as he looked out the window again. "Is there anything that I should know about what's going on?"

"Well, most of the passengers and crew have turned into some sort of horse creatures, and the rest seem to be an odd mix, we've got a few people who are sort of... half horse half fish, they're being confined to the pool areas for now," the First Mate said with a sigh as he shook his head. "The weirdest one is Claudia Beretta, she's a dragon."

"A dragon, you're kidding me right, like large fire breathing dragon?" Charles asked, that was the last thing they needed aboard a cruise ship right now.

"Well, no, she doesn't seem to be breathing fire yet, so I don't know what she is really," the First Mate said with a shrug

"Alright, get on that distress call and patch me into the PA system," Charles said with a sigh and after a bit of work they got the PA system's microphone working. "This is Captain Charles Smith, I'm speaking to all of you right now from the bridge of the Anthem. I know that we've all found ourselves in this, bizarre situation and none of us really know what's going on right now. I'm here to tell all of you that none of you are alone, things aren't going to be easy sure, but we're not going to just let whatever this is beat us."

He paused for a long moment, he wasn't sure exactly what he was going to say and he didn't know how many people might even listen to him. Right now he just wanted to take the time to try and reassure them and hope that they'd all be okay.

"Things aren't going to be easy, and we're going to keep trying to make contact with someone in the outside world, hopefully this was just isolated to our ship but in the event that it wasn't we have to be ready for anything. Until we can get the ship running again we'll remain adrift in this part of the ocean. In the event that we're stuck out here for awhile, I would like everyone aboard to report to the crew and give them whatever information on yourselves that we may find useful, we still have a long way to go before we're really sure what's going on, and we need to work together to survive."

He paused again, he wasn't sure what all might come in handy, maybe if there was someone on board who knew something about equine physiology that would help at least. This wasn't something that worried him, the ship's Doctor probably didn't know anything about it, so maybe if there was a vet that would help at least.

At least he hoped so, now it was just a matter of seeing what all they had aboard.

"If we have anyone aboard that has veterinary training, in particular with horses or other equines that would be useful as well. Since most of the population of the Anthem seems to have been transformed into equines, we need to know everything we can about them in the event that there is a medical emergency. I just hope that we will have this all figured out soon and it won't be necessary, but if you do have any training please report to Doctor Sawyer in the medical center as soon as possible."

He sighed a little and turned off the PA system, he looked out at the ocean ahead of them and hoped that everything was going to be okay. Even if they were stuck as whatever they had been turned into, there was a chance that they could all make it through this alive.

He hoped so at least.

Chapter 3 (All Characters): Recovering

Molly sighed a little as she looked over the edge of the Anthem and down at the water below. She was still getting used to the idea of being a pony to be honest and she had no idea where Izzy had gone off to.

After the Captain's speech Izzy had said something about feeling tired and left for her Cabin. Molly was honestly a bit worried about what she might find there if Izzy's parents were nearby. She had no idea what she was going to say to them or if they would even understand what was going on.

She hadn't thought that much about her relationship with Izzy before this. She had been drunk to say the least and had just needed to be able to blow off some steam. It was hard to believe that everything had happened like this.

"What are you going to do with yourself Molly?" She asked herself as she looked out at the water. "What could've happened that turned so many people into... well, this."

She sighed a little and brushed her new blue hair out of her eyes. It was weird to Think of herself like this, she couldn't even wear clothes. It was weird to walk around naked where anyone could see her body, but there wasn't much point in dwelling on it.

She thought about her parents, they were probably worried sick about her at this point. Was this just limited to the ship or was there something else going on entirely? Maybe if they could figure that out they could get back to something resembling a normal life at least.

Whatever normal was when you're a talking horse creature with a horn sticking out of her forehead.

"Do you mind if I join you?" A voice said from behind her and she turned to see another Unicorn standing there. This one was rust colored with a long dark red mane who gave her a weak smile.

"Hello Sherry," Molly said with a sigh, she recognized the voice as belonging to her friend who had come along with her on the trip. "What do you want?"

"I just want to talk," Sherry said as she moved up next to Molly and leaned on the railing. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have run off like that. I know I must not seem very grateful given everything you did to set this up for me."

"Yeah, I know, I just..." Molly started to say and sighed a little. "I wanted this to be perfect, and you ran off before I could actually do anything I really wanted to do. So where is your boyfriend anyway?"

"He, freaked out after we woke up as horses and threw me out of the cabin," Sherry said with a shake of her head. "It wasn't easy to figure out which one was you, but I wanted to find you and say I'm sorry for everything."

Molly looked at the other Unicorn for a long moment. She honestly wasn't sure what she was going to do at this point. Sure she still felt something for Sherry, though it was weird to try and work that out in these new bodies, but she wasn't sure what it was anymore.

"You know, I invited you along because I had feelings for you this whole time," Molly said with a sigh as she looked down at the water for a long moment. "I realized I was a lesbian because of the feelings I had for you, so when you ran off..."

"You felt betrayed, oh dear god I'm sorry," Sherry said as she facehooved at that. "Look Molly, I'm sorry that I... well did that to you. I wish I could say I felt the same way and I'm sorry but I'm just not into girls, or mares I guess. I'm sorry Molly, maybe if it had come up some other time..."

Molly sighed a little at that, she hadn't been that surprised given everything that had happened but she had still held out some hope.

"Its okay, thanks for understanding," she said with a slightly forced smiled that she didn't really feel like giving the mare. "I guess there's still plenty of fish in the sea so to speak."

"Yeah, there is," Sherry said with a sigh as she looked over at Molly. "I'm sure you'll find a nice girl out there who will love you for who you are. Are we still friends?"

Molly smiled a little and gave her a quick hug as best she could with these new limbs. "Of course we are, I didn't want that to change."

Sherry nodded smiled a little. "So, do you have your eye on anyone?"

Molly blushed a little and looked away. "Well, there is this one girl, but I kind of, returned with my face buried in a very, intimate area."

This got a laugh out of Sherry as she put her foreleg around Molly gently. "Well, it seems it didn't take you that long to get over me."

"Well, I was drunk at the time," Molly said with a blush.

"Still, do you feel anything for her?"

"Maybe," Molly said with a sigh as she looked away from her. "It was supposed to be a sort of vacation fling to blow off steam, but now we don't even really know if we'll ever get off this ship or anything."

"Yeah, I get what you mean," Sherry said and sighed a little. "Come on, lets get something to eat, I heard they're starting to get the restaurants back up and running again so we can at least eat while we're stuck out here in the middle of the ocean."

Molly smiled a little and followed Sherry down the stairs towards the restaurants on the decks below."

00000

Sam sighed a little as he looked at his reflection in the mirror again. It was weird enough that he had been turned into a Zebra, but now he had a whole new gender to get used to. He hadn't really talked with any others other than the Zebra that had visited earlier since it happened, and it had taken all of his willpower to not stare at her.

He sighed a little and brushed his mane back as he looked at the stripes. It was weird but they were actually in two different shades of grey, not at all like he had seen Zebra stripes before. They weren't actually that weird, but it was going to take some getting used to anyway.

"Excuse me, are you the ship's doctor?" A female voice with a slight southern accent asked from the door and he sighed a little.

"Yeah, I'm Dr. Sawyer," he said and turned with a smile. Standing there was a purple colored horse creature with a purple mane tied into a ponytail. "I'm sorry but I can't currently help you with any medical issues, I don't know the first thing about equine physiology."

"Oh, don't worry, that's what I'm here for," the mare said with a smile. "Dr. Ashley Richards, I'm a veterinarian from Virginia and the Captain asked me to come help you out as best I can."

Sam smiled a little and blushed as he found himself looking at the mare's flanks a little. She was rather cute, you know, for a horse creature. He shook his head and offered a hoof to shake. "Well I could use all the help I can get, I don't know anything about these new bodies."

"Don't worry about it, I know enough to get us through this," she said with a smile as she looked at him for a long moment. "Though, I have to say I don't know a lot about Zebras, do you mind if I..."

Sam blushed heavily as he removed his lab coat. He hadn't ever been uncomfortable with being undressed around a doctor before, but this was a new experience and one that he wasn't sure he liked.

Ashley looked him over as best she could. She tilted her head in curiosity when he flinched a little when she tried to check his underside. "Umm, are you okay Doctor?"

"Its, complicated," he said with a blush. "I don't know what happened, but I was, uh..."

"You can talk to me about it, I may be a vet but I can keep a secret," Ashley said and looked at him with a worried look. "Is it your new body? Are you not used to being a Zebra?"

"Uh... actually, I wasn't... male before this happened," Sam said as his faced turned even redder. "I don't know why it happened but, I was a woman before I got turned into a Zebra."

Ashley blinked a little at that bit of information, she honestly had no idea what to make of it. Though it at least made sense as to why he was so uncomfortable, he was still getting used to being a stallion, not just getting used to being a Zebra.

"Don't worry about it, I'm not going to judge you or something," Ashley said with a smile as she looked him over. "Well, as far as I can tell you seem healthy. Though I don't know what could've caused you to switch genders like that, that's not normal."

"What's normal about any of this?" Sam pointed out and Ashley laughed at that.

"Good point," she said with a smile. "Well, like I said I'm here to help you out as best I can. I know enough about equine physiology, even if some of us have gotten some extra appendages."

"Yeah, like your wings, I have to say I wasn't expecting that..." Sam said and looked at the Pegasus. "What do you know about this?"

"Well, based on the way we look I'd say we're actually ponies as opposed to full sized horses," she said with a sigh. "And there's a strange variety to them that are here. There are some people who were, well, half fish instead of normal ponies in addition to Pegasi and Unicorns."

"Wait, half fish?" Sam asked in surprise. "How is that even possible?"

"I honestly have no idea, none of this makes sense," Ashley said with a sigh as Sam put his lab coat back on as best he could. "Why would we suddenly appear as ponies like this? What's with the variety of species? Honestly I don't even know how much good I'm going to be given that I don't know how to treat some of the species that appeared at all."

"I see, well we're going to figure this out," Sam said with a sigh. "We have to really, we're the best chance if something goes wrong. Its not going to be easy, but if you're willing to help me, we'll figure something out, okay?"

Ashley smiled and nodded a little before she hugged Sam. "Thanks, that means a lot," she said.

Sam smiled and hugged back. This was going to be a challenge for him to say the least, but he was going to figure something out.

"I think you're going to need a new name if you're not the same gender," Ashley pointed out with a chuckle. "What was your name before?"

"Uh, Samantha," Sam said with a shrug. "Everyone called me Sam though, I liked it better than my full name so at least that's more gender neutral."

"Yes, though maybe you should go by Samuel, I mean its a nice name," Ashley said with a smile.

"Okay, Samuel Sawyer it is then," Sam said with a smile. "Now come on, lets get everything ready. I just hope that you'll be able to help me learn what I need to know."

"Don't worry, you'll be fine," Ashley said and they started talking again about what was going to happen next.

00000

"Mitchell, you've been acting weird ever since you came out of the bathroom," Donna commented as the couple moved into their elaborately designed cabin. "Is everything okay?"

"Uh, yes, everything is fine," Mitchell said with a smile that just got an incredulous look from her wife. "I'm just still getting used to this body you know?"

"Yes, it is quite unexpected," Donna said with a shake of her head. "But I'm sure once we get back to the mainland and get in contact with our families we can get it all worked out. Perhaps there's some way to reverse the process if we throw enough money at it. I don't like the idea of being an animal like this."

"Yeah, well, we'll figure something out," Mitchell said with a shrug. "Maybe we should try using the ship to shore system and get in contact with someone back home. I'm sure we can get information on it as soon as possible."

"Ah, yes, that would be a good idea," Donna said and after a bit of trying she managed to get the phone to work and called her father's phone number. The line was dead however, there was no dial tone, no recorded message, it was just dead. "That's odd."

"He didn't answer?" Mitchell asked as she looked at her wife.

"No, the call didn't go through at all, I don't know why that would've happened," Donna said with a sigh. She looked over at Mitchell and smiled a little. "You know, I wonder if what they say about horses is true..."

Mitchell gulped and backed away for a moment, she didn't want to explain to her wife that she wasn't even male anymore, how was she going to take that? She was having a hard enough time explaining it to herself and none of it even made sense!

"Uh Donna, I don't know, we're still new to these bodies and we really should make sure that we won't be turned back..." he started to say as Donna moved in closer and placed her hooves on the Pegasus mare's waist. "Come on, we don't want to risk getting pregnant, what if that's what traps you in this form or something?"

"Mmm, well maybe we won't ever get changed back anyway, what's the harm?" Donna asked and pulled off her "husband's" pants. "Come on now, there's nothing to be ashamed of, its not like you..."

She stopped when she saw what was between Mitchell's legs, instead of the equipment she had expected there was a pair of teats leading to a mare's vagina. She gasped and fell back in shock as she looked at Mitchell who just looked embarrassed. "But, that's not possible. you're... not a woman, how did..."

"I have no idea," Mitchell admitted with a shake of his head. "That's what I found when I went to the bathroom. I don't know how this happened, let alone what I'm going to do."

Donna just stared at the mare that had been her husband in shock. She had no idea what she was going to say to be
honest, Mitchell had been a marriage of convenience and money more than anything else and she wasn't sure how she felt about this.

"You're..." she tried to say, she was still trying to figure out how to put this into words. "But... I don't... you're..."

Mitchell sighed and went out through the door that lead to the balcony outside of their room and looked out at the sea. She didn't blame Donna for freaking out over this, she was still freaking out a little even if she didn't want to show it to her wife. This had been completely unexpected for both of them, and being a horse creature was bad enough, but being a mare? That was impossible to wrap her mind around.

What was this going to mean? Was she going to still be attracted to women or was she going to be attracted to stallions now? Would she have to worry about going into heat and getting pregnant? What was going to happen now? Would Donna even want to stay with her anymore?

She sighed and looked back into the room where Donna was sitting on the couch and trying to figure out what she was going to do now. Being a horse creature was weird enough, but now she had to figure out what she was going to do about her husband's transformation on top of everything else.

Donna sighed and looked out at the mare that was standing there. There was no doubt that she was her husband, but what had happened to him? Why did this change happen in addition to everything else? It felt kind of, weird, like the universe was playing a practical joke on them.

She sighed and thought about the phone call. Why hadn't it gone through? Something about that was bugging her, if it was the same day that they had been on before then there was no reason why it shouldn't have worked and gone through to her father.

Now everything was getting weirder and weirder, what was really going on around here and was it only on the ship? Maybe there was some sort of answers out there, at least that's what she hoped, for now she was going to have to figure this out.

But would she be able to figure it out on her own or would her new wife be able to help her? There was so many questions that were going through her mind right now, and she still had no idea what she was going to do as she headed back outside to talk to Mitchell.

"Mitchell, I honestly have no idea what we're going to do," she said with a sigh as they leaned over the balcony together. "I'm not into women and I don't even know if I'd be into mares. Lets just try and get in contact with home, maybe there's someone out there who can help us out, right?"

"I hope so," Mitchell said with a sigh as she looked out at the water. "Because the alternative is that we're the only sentient beings left on the planet. I don't really want to explore that possibility, being a horse creature is weird enough."

"Yeah, I know," Donna said with a sigh as she looked down at herself. "Everyone on the ship is like this too. What are we going to do now?"

"Hope that whoever is out there knows a lot more about it than we do I guess," Mitchell said with a sigh. "I just hope that whatever the answer is is one that we're going to like."

00000

Claudia Beretta was in a weird position. She had been taking a nap in her cabin when she woke up and found herself changed. She was now a blue dragon with horns pointing out of her head and a long tail.

As if that wasn't weird enough she found herself on a ship filled with other strange creatures. She hadn't seen any other dragons yet, but it had its fair share of oddities. She sighed a little and looked at herself in the mirror in her compact, being a dragon was a strange sensation, but what was weirder was that she didn't feel like there was some sort of fire or heat.

What did that mean? Was she not a fire breathing dragon or something? She remembered reading stories about dragons that had other traits, but she had never thought much about them. She sighed and looked out over the railing down at the pool to where everyone else was still trying to figure everything out.

"So, you're one of the odd ones out too huh?" A voice said from next to her.

"Yeah, I..." she started to say and blinked when she turned to see what looked like a strange mix of a horse and an insect. She had long light blue hair with a scythe-like horn sticking out of her head. "What are you?"

"I have no idea, and no one else seems to really like being around me," the strange insect creature commented as she looked down at the group of ponies. "Not that I ever really needed their company, but they seem afraid of me for some reason."

"Weird, I'm not getting anything like that," Claudia said with a shrug as she offered a claw to the strange creature. "Claudia Beretta, I'm a singer here aboard the ship."

"Elizabeth Fischer," the insect horse said with a nod. "So you're a dragon huh? What can you do, breathe fire or something?"

"Not yet," Claudia said with a laugh as she shook her head. "Not that I've really tried that hard, its not the kind of thing you want to try on a ship like this."

"Fair enough," Elizabeth said with a shrug. "I don't know what to make of this to be honest, my body feels, weird. I can't explain it but something just feels off."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," Claudia said with a shrug. "I can't imagine its any easier for them, I don't really know what to make of all of this either. Its like like magic or something, but that doesn't make any sense, does it?"

"No, it does not," Elizabeth said thoughtfully. "And I don't like it, maybe there was something planted on the ship that caused this."

"Like what, a biological weapon? That sounds a little paranoid," Claudia commented.

"Trust me, in this kind of situation you have to think of all the possibilities," Elizabeth said with a shrug. "I don't like not knowing what's going on. I'm going to start searching the ship to see if there's any signs of tampering that could've caused this."

"Are you sure that's wise?" Claudia asked as she looked at her new companion strangely. "I mean, if nopony trusts you then how are you going to convince them that you're trying to help?"

"I don't know yet," Elizabeth admitted as she looked back at Claudia. "But I get the feeling that someone aboard this ship knows what happened. If they caused it or not, I'm going to find out."

"If they caused it, why would they still be here?" Claudia pointed out. "Wouldn't they have been caught up in the same thing we were?"

Elizabeth paused a moment and shrugged. "Perhaps, or perhaps they didn't care. I'll consider that possibility as well, I'll see you around Claudia."

Claudia nodded and watched the strange creature walk away. There was something weird about that woman but she couldn't put her claw on it. She was starting to get the feeling that something was going on aboard the Anthem, and she wasn't sure she wanted to know what it was.

She sighed and looked at herself again. The scaled tail flicked a little behind her and she closed her eyes, she was going to figure this out one way or another.

00000

"Honey, are you okay?" Janet asked as she looked at her husband who was watching Emily swimming in the pool.

"Yeah, I'm fine," I said with a sigh as he looked over at Janet with a soft smile. "I'm just trying to figure out what's going on, you know? I'm worried about Emily."

"Yeah, I'm worried too," Janet said with a sigh as she looked at her daughter. "Are you sure she's going to be safe in there? I mean, what about chlorine, that might hurt or even kill her."

"I asked a crew member, they said that the pool used salt water pumped from the ocean instead of chlorinated water," Abraham said with a shake of his head. "Apparently its cheaper, who knew that cost cutting would actually save a life."

"Yeah, well I'm still a little worried about her," Janet said with a sigh. "And about Ben, do you think they're going to be okay, with everything that happened I mean?"

"Honestly, I still don't know if we're going to be okay," Abraham said as he looked down at himself. "Its a weird feeling, you know? I'm not sure what to make of this whole thing, it feels weird to be a whatever we are now."

"Yeah, I know," Janet said and leaned in and kissed him softly on the lips. "But I love you anyway Abe, that's not going to change just because our bodies are different. We'll make it through this as a family, I promise."

Abraham smiled and kissed her back as he pulled her in close. "So, what are we going to do about the kids?"

"Well, one of us should be poolside at all times to keep an eye on Emily, and the other can watch Ben," Janet said with a nod. "Though I wish Emily could move out of the pool, have you tried?"

"Not yet, we don't even know how long she can last out of the water," Abe said with a sigh as he looked over at his daughter. "I don't like the idea of her spending the rest of her life like that. There's the wheelchair I saw before, but I don't know how much help that's going to be unless we modify it."

"We'll figure something out," Janet said with a sigh.

"Hey Emily," Ben said as he trotted over to where his little sister was swimming in the pool. "How's the water?"

"Its okay I guess," Emily said with a shrug. "Its relaxing, but I just wish that there was some way that I could spend more time out of the water. Oh well, I guess its not that bad."

"Mom and dad sure seem worried about it," Ben said as they looked back towards their parents before he looked back at her and chuckled. "Well, you always did swim like a fish anyway. You're like a little dolphin already."

"Real funny Ben," Emily said with a roll of her eyes and flicked her tail as she splashed Ben before diving back underwater before Ben could retaliate.

"No fair!" Ben said with a laugh as his sister just waved at him. "You're having way too much fun, you know that?"

"There's no such thing," Emily said with a giggle. "Besides, I might as well have some fun while I get the chance. You can't get me you silly boy!"

Ben just shook his head and laughed as their parents watched with a smile. Things were starting to calm down a bit with everything that was going on.

"I think they're going to be just fine," Abe said as he leaned over and kissed his wife gently. "I love you Janet."

"I love you too Abraham," Janet said with a smile as she nuzzled her husband gently.

The couple leaned back and watched their two foals talking and playing in the pool. Their world may have changed, but they weren't going to let it change their lives together.

00000

"Alright, so what's the latest status of the ship?" Charles asked. His crew were all here:Sam, Naudia, and an orange Unicorn mare they had brought.

"Well, I've done the best I can to see what we're all dealing with here," Naudia said. "We've mostly got horse creatures..."

"Ponies," Sam said and spoke up.

"Right, ponies," she said with a nod. "We've also got a few Zebras such as the Doctor here, a dragon, some sort of large dog creature, and I don't even know how to describe a few passengers. We lost some passengers who were turned into creatures similar to the Prince girl but couldn't make it to water in time."

"We'll hold a ceremony for them when we can," Charles said. "Have you had any progress getting someone to help with the medical situation."

"Yes sir, a veterinarian happened to be aboard and came to my office earlier," Sam answered. "We've been working together since then, but we don't really have any concrete information about what's happened either."

"And we've had no answer on the radio," Charles said. He looked to the unicorn mare then--was she his new engineer? "What's the latest on the engine situation?"

"Well, they're working, but we're dead in the water until we can figure out how to work the ship with hooves. I'm not sure what to do honestly, I just wish I knew how these things worked."

"Well, I'm sure we can figure something out, keep working on it and report back to me as soon as you know something," Charles said. "You're all dismissed."

He sighed as they left the bridge and he looked out at the ocean. We just have to get the Anthem running again. Once we get to land hopefully we can find some answers.

"Captain, you have two people here who want to talk to you," a voice said from the door to the bridge.

He turned to see his first mate standing there with a Zebra and what looked to be a normal horse creature without a horn or wings.

"Can I help you?"

"We, may have an idea of what happened," the Zebra said, shaking his head. "You see, my colleague here and I are from the government. We're here on vacation because, well..."

"We thought the world was going to end," his companion said. "We belong to a group called the Human Preservation Initiative. Given the situation, we felt it would be prudent to tell you everything we know right now."

Charles narrowed his eyes and took a seat. "Tell me everything."

Author's Note

The last scene edited by the always awesome Starscribe, thank you.

Chapter 4 (Molly and Isabelle): Settling In

"You're telling me, that there's some sort of, radiation blanketing the galaxy?" Captain Smith asked as he looked between the two of them. "And that's, somehow tied into what happened to us?"

"Most likely yes," The Zebra said with a shake of his head. "Some time ago the government was contacted by the inhabitants of a different reality called Equestria. They warned us of what was coming, but there wasn't much that could be done about it at the time."

“Which would be why the HPI was formed,” the normal looking pony said with a shake of his head. “We didn’t have a lot of alternatives given the potential danger to humanity. We honestly didn’t expect anything like this to happen.”

Captain Smith paused a moment as he looked between the two. The story about a world inhabited by ponies and similar creatures seemed unlikely, but then again the Anthem had returned inhabited by these same creatures. If anyone had told him that would happen he’d have thought they were crazy.

So, what was that going to mean for the ship now? Were they going to be able to make contact with this HPI or were they all on their own?

“So, is this, HPI still around?” He finally asked.

“That, we don’t know,” the Zebra admitted as he frowned a little. “We’re not even sure how long it’s been since everything happened. Anything could’ve happened in the time since we were gone.”

“Of course,” Captain Smith said with a sigh.

“We’ve been attempting to get in contact with the Initiative, but without much luck,” the normal pony said with a sigh. “I felt you should be informed, Captain. The truth of the matter is that there is a good chance that we are on our own out here, at least for the time being.”

“That’s what I was afraid of, but thank you,” Captain Smith said with a sigh. “It’s all pretty hard to believe, but I don’t think we have much of a choice. Should I tell the passengers?”

“At this point, it might be best to tell them part of it at least,” the Zebra said with a nod. “You’re going to have to figure out what to tell them, but they’ll have to find out eventually. We’ll let you know if we ever get in touch with the HPI.”

“Alright, thank you for telling me,” The captain said as the two headed back out of the bridge. He sighed a little bit as he watched them go and went back to staring out at the ocean.

This really was going to take a lot of getting used to wasn’t it? If the alternative had been death, maybe it wasn’t so bad at least. But still, the idea of all of this made him uncomfortable, and he had a lot left to figure out.

He just had to put on a strong face for the crew and passengers. It was now just a matter of figuring out how and what to tell them.

00000

"Get out, I don't care what's going on... just, get out!" A male voice said as Molly made her way down the hallway towards Izzy's cabin when the door was thrown out and the green bat pony was pushed out.

"But dad..." Izzy started to say but was cut off when the door slammed in front of her. "Great..."

"Izzy, are you okay?" Molly asked as she galloped over to the mare and helped her to her hooves as best she could. "What happened?"

"Well, my parents were going to wait until we got home to deal with me coming out of the closet, but, well..." Izzy said and brushed her mane back a little.

"But we don't even know if we're going back home at this point?" Molly asked and Izzy nodded. "I'm sorry Izzy, I wish I could do something to help you."

"It's fine... I'll, just go find a deck chair to sleep on or something," Izzy said with a shake of her head. "Well, at least I don't have to worry about wearing clothes right now so I don't need my suitcase."

Molly looked at her for a long moment and sighed. She had no idea what she was going to do, it didn't really help that she felt alone on the ship. The only people she knew were Izzy and her friend, and neither of them was in the best of positions right now.

She sighed as she watched Izzy start to walk away and her eyes fell on the mare's flanks. She blushed a little, this was not the time to be checking out her butt. Why was she even doing that? Was she starting to be attracted to a pony? This was getting weirder and weirder as everything progressed.

She finally made a decision and ran over to the mare. "Hey Izzy, wait."

"What?" Izzy asked as she looked at Molly curiously.

"Well, I was thinking, I mean if you wanted..." Molly said and shook her head. "I've got a lot of room in my cabin, you could, you know, stay with me until you can figure something out."

"Really?" Izzy asked and looked at Molly surprised. "You don't mind?"

"Yeah, I'm fine with it, I'd love to have you there," Molly said and gave her a smile.

Izzy looked thoughtful for a long moment before smiling. "Okay, just until I can figure everything out," she said and let out a light yawn. "Wow, I'm getting tired already... what time is it?"

Molly blinked a little and looked around, there wasn't anything that showed the time though last time she had looked outside it was still daylight. That was weird, but maybe it was a bat pony creature thing, maybe they were nocturnal or something, that would explain it.

"Here, come on, let’s get to my cabin," she said with a smile as the two walked off towards the stairs to take them down to the deck her cabin was on.

00000

So, one thing that the people turned ponies on the Anthem was quickly learning is that hooves are not built for putting in card keys that had been put in lanyards around their necks. It took them a few minutes to figure it out, but Molly finally managed by putting it in her mouth and sliding it into the slot and back out as the door unlocked and they managed to open it.

"Well, that was certainly easier this time around," Izzy said with a chuckle as they looked around at Molly's cabin. "This is pretty nice, very cozy."

"Yeah, I couldn't really afford a bigger cabin," Molly said. "There should be a second key around here somewhere, it was my friend's but she's got something else worked out for where she's staying. So, uh, I guess make yourself comfortable, I know its not much."

"I think its lovely," Izzy said and gave Molly a smile. "Thank you, Molly, you don't know what this means to me."

"I think I have some idea, I've had to crash on a few couches in my day," Molly said with a laugh and blushed as Izzy leaned in and gave the Unicorn a kiss on the cheek. "What was that for?"

"For being such a good friend," Izzy said with a smile. "Look, I know we got off to a really weird start..."

"By jumping into bed with each other while we were drunk," Molly said with a chuckle.

"Yeah, by doing that," Izzy said with a laugh. "But you're a good person... err, Pony Molly. I don't know what I feel about you right now with everything that's going on, but I want you to know that I do consider you a friend... maybe something more when we've gotten this all figured out."

Molly smiled as she gave Izzy a hug before heading back out of the cabin. She smiled as she took one last look at the Bat Pony who had set out some blankets on the couch and snuggled up under them, yawning a little as she closed her eyes.

Hopefully, everything was going to be okay, they just had to figure out what to do now.

As Molly headed out of the cabin she was surprised to run into a familiar mare, the same pony that had helped them out of their cabin before. Rather literally ran into the other Unicorn actually which sent the papers she was carrying flying.

"Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to..." she said and looked up at Naudia as they struggled to get the papers together.

"Its okay, I'm sure you're busy with something," Naudia said as she frowned and looked down at the papers. "I swear, I'm never going to get used to these hooves."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," Molly said as she managed to pile some of them together. "Would be nice if there was some easier way to carry things around, you know?"

"Yeah, but it's not like we have magic or something," Naudia said with a shake of her head. "Being turned into small horses is weird enough to not have to worry about figuring out magic."

"I didn't catch your name before," Molly said.

"Naudia Thompson," Naudia said with a smile as Molly gave her what papers she had managed to gather up. "I run the hotel section of the ship here. It's not a glamorous job, but someone has to do it, and I am very good at it too."

"That's good," Molly said. "Oh, I'm Molly Tucker, I was just helping a friend to my cabin."

"Are you two settling in okay?" Naudia asked. "I know it can't be easy, I'm still getting settled in myself, this body is really weird."

"Yeah, I know," Molly said with a sigh as she looked back at her cabin for a moment. "Izzy got kicked out by her parents, so I'm just trying to give her a place to stay right now."

"You're a good friend, I've heard a few stories around the ship of people who have been kicked out of their cabins for one reason or another," Naudia said with a shake of her head. "So we've had to set up places for them to sleep wherever we can that doesn't get in the way. And that's not even going into the issues of the half fish ones... we basically have to improvise a lot here."

"And the engines and radio are still not working?"

"Look, I shouldn't tell you this, but the radio's working fine," Naudia said with a shake of her head. "All the systems are working, we just, haven't really figured out how to run the ship. It's not helped that, well, there hasn't been any responses on the radio to our distress call."

"So, its possible there's no one out there?" Molly asked and flinched a little at the thought of that. If they couldn't get in contact with the shore or any other ships then could it mean that they were the only ones left? "Is it possible that there's anyone out there?"

"Honestly, at this point, we don't know," Naudia said with a shake of her head. "If there is anyone then they're nowhere near where we are now."

Molly sighed a little as she looked back down the hallway towards where Izzy was sleeping. She sighed and brushed her mane back, she was still kind of hoping that this was all a bad dream but for now she had to figure out what to do.

Being stuck on this ship for the rest of her life was a weird prospect. This was a vacation that had gotten really weird, and she just hoped that they were going to be able to figure something out.

"Thank you anyway," she said with a sigh when her stomach suddenly growled. "Heh, guess that means I'm hungry."

"Go up to the Windjammer, right now that's where we're putting all the food," Naudia said and nodded down the hall towards where the stairs and the lifts were. "Is your friend okay?"

"Yeah, she's just really tired," I said with a sigh and shook my head a little. "I don't know, maybe its because she's a bat, horse, pony thing or whatever. I mean, maybe she's nocturnal now or something."

"Maybe, we're still figuring everything out honestly," Naudia said with a shake of her head. "We're looking into everything we can, for now just get some food and maybe bring some back for her."

"Yeah, that sounds good," Molly said with a smile as she headed towards the stairs, she still wasn't sure whether or not to take the lifts so she started the long walk upstairs towards the deck the Windjammer was on.

Naudia sighed a little as she watched the other Unicorn walk away. As part of the crew she needed to put on a brave face for the passengers but she was just as nervous as the rest of the people on board when it came to what was going on.

She sighed a little and headed off, she had a few things to do right now and she didn't want to worry any of the other passengers.

She just hoped that everything was going to be okay.

00000

Molly sighed a little as she entered the Windjammer which was already filled with ponies and other, things around that she only had a vague idea of. She even saw some weird insect-like creatures that she was a bit confused by, what were those?

"Can I help you?" A large Griffon with red and brown feathers asked from behind the counter. He had just finished giving some food to a grey Pegasus with a red mane and a younger light blue unicorn with a short blue mane as he gave Molly a smile.

"Uh sure," she said with a blink of surprise, she hadn't expected to see a Griffon here but then again there was a lot she had to get used to right now. "Do we have enough food for everyone?"

"Yeah, no problem we have enough to last awhile as long as we ration it," the chef said with a sigh as he gave her the food. Molly struggled to hold it for a moment before she gave him a nod.

"Thank you, I know this can't be easy for you and your staff," she said.

"At least I have something like fingers," the Griffon chef said with a laugh as he waved his claw a little. "Don't worry about it, we're going to be just fine."

"Thanks," Molly said with a smile as she walked over to a table next to the window and started eating it as best she could.

She sighed as she looked out the window at the Mediterranean beyond. There was nothing out there but water for as far as she could see.

So what was she going to do now? Her parents were probably wondering what happened to her if they were even still alive, or human for that matter. This was a strange, unfamiliar body to her that she didn't quite understand. She had to wonder what else there might be out there that they didn't know about.

"Do you mind if I sit here?" A female voice said and she looked up to see a silver and gold Pegasus standing there. "Sorry, all the other tables are taken and I don't really feel like going outside right now."

"No, of course not, go ahead," Molly said with a smile as she gestured to the other chair and the Pegasus sat down and started to eat. "This is pretty crazy huh? Nothing about this stuff makes sense."

"Yeah, I know what you mean," the Pegasus mare said with a shake of her head. "I'm still kind of getting used to this body, especially given that... never mind."

Molly raised an eyebrow curiously for a moment but shrugged it off. Clearly, the other mare didn't want to talk about whatever it was so she wasn't going to bother her.

"Its hard to believe that the entire ship is like this," Molly said with a sigh and then smiled and offered a hoof to her dinner companion. "Molly Tucker."

"Mit... Michelle Marlowe," the Pegasus said with a smile as she gave Molly a nod.

Molly was a bit confused by that, she had seemed like she was about to say something else before she corrected herself. She sighed a little and shook her head before she went back to eating.

"How are you settling into this?" Michelle asked. "You haven't noticed anything, uh, weird have you?"

"Other than being a talking pony with a horn sticking out of her head?" Molly asked with a chuckle. "No, nothing weird about that at all."

"Seriously, were you, different in any way before this happened?" Michelle asked. "I mean, other than your species of course."

"Nope, other than species I'm pretty much the same, still a woman, still me mentally," Molly said with a shrug. "Sorry if that's not the answer you were looking for. Other than the obvious I haven't really noticed any changes to me or Izzy, so I'm not really sure what you mean."

"Its nothing," Michelle said with a sigh. She was still getting used to the whole thing, and Donna had kicked her out of their cabin so she had no idea what she was going to do now. She didn't want to tell this mare everything, so she decided to give a more vague version of it. "My significant other, kind of kicked me out while they figured this whole thing out."

"Oh, yeah that happened to my best friend too when she woke up a pony," Molly said with a sigh. "This whole thing is weird, especially I woke up like this in the middle of..."

She blushed and shook her head when she realized she had almost said that out loud. There was something about it that still made her a bit uncomfortable, kind of funny actually given that most of them seemed to be fine with going around naked now.

"In the middle of what?" Michelle asked and looked at her curiously.

"In the middle of... eating, yeah, that's it," Molly said and blushed a little at the strange turn of phrase. "With a girl, I met on the ship right before it happened."

"Ah, I see," Michelle said with a chuckle. She didn't have to be an expert on relationships to tell what the Unicorn really meant, but she wasn't going to pry. "It’s been crazy ever since it happened though. Do you think there is a way to undo it or will we be stuck like this forever?"

"Honestly, I don't know," Molly admitted. "I'm just a normal girl from Boston, so I'm not exactly the best judge of the situation right now. I wish I knew what was going on, its like there's something about this that keeps nagging at the back of my mind."

"I know what you mean," Michelle said with a sigh as she took another bite. "I don't like it, do you think anyone knows for sure what happened? And why haven't we been able to contact the mainland?"

"I don't know," Molly said. "Who knows at this point, its hard to tell if there's even anything out there to answer our calls. It’s like the whole world has fallen silent and can't reply."

"Yeah, well I don't like it," Michelle said with a shake of her head. "We need to get back to land and try and get our old lives back. We aren't going to let this, thing put us down right?"

"Right," Molly said with a nod. "We have to figure out exactly what happened, but I don't know how we're going to do that."

"Yes, well I'm sure if we can get in contact with the government we'll be able to piece things together," Michelle said with a smile. "I'm sure this was an isolated incident and once everything is calmed down we will be able to return to our normal lives as best we can."

"And what do we do if there's nothing they can do and we're stuck like this for the rest of our lives?" Molly pointed out and Michelle paused a little at that. "I mean, we don't know anything about what happened to us. This may be permanent, we may have to live the rest of our lives as ponies and I don't even know how long that would be."

"Well I'm sure that's not the case," Michelle said with a shake of her head. "I just want to get back home and put this whole thing behind me. That would be the best for all of us I think, we shouldn't focus on what we're going to do with these bodies if we're just going to be cured of it."

"Maybe," Molly said with a shake of her head as she looked at Michelle for a moment.

She wondered if maybe she was right, maybe there was a way to reverse this. But at the same time, she kept thinking back to what Naudia had told her about the radio messages not being responded to.

What had happened out there? She sighed and looked back out the window as if hoping that the ocean would give her some sort of answers.

She went back to eating and hoping that somehow this would all work out in the end.

00000

Isabelle yawned a little as she found herself awake that night and still laying in the bed. She smiled a little when she saw Molly laying on the couch fast asleep. There was also a tray of food on the table nearby and she sat down to eat and sighed a little as she brushed her mane back.

It was a weird feeling being like this, being a pony was weird enough but these wings they felt, odd to her. Like they made her different somehow, and she wasn't really sure how to feel about that. Despite the fact that it was now the middle of the night, she also felt wide awake.

She sighed as she looked at herself in the mirror and at her wings. She was some sort of bat creature now, maybe that was why she was probably nocturnal but this whole thing felt weird to her like things didn't feel right because they were so different than her old life.

So what was she going to do now that she was like this? She sighed and finished eating as she looked back at Molly, the Unicorn had a smile on her face, she probably was having a pleasant dream.

She sighed a little and went to the porthole and looked out at the black sea beyond, trying to figure out what she was going to do.

Molly yawned a little as she rolled over and looked over at the green bat pony. "Oh hey, you're up," she said sleepily as she pushed her blanket off and smiled. "How are you feeling?"

"Pretty well rested actually," Isabelle said with a smile as she looked back at the Unicorn who turned the light on. She blinked a little and shook her head, she was a bit surprised to go from darkness to the light, was probably because of whatever this had done to her. "Its weird, but I guess I'll have to get used to this."

"Yeah, we all have a lot to get used to," Molly said as she rubbed her horn a little. "I'm really not sure what to think of this still. I mean, we're ponies now right? How much are we going to be like horses? I mean, you definitely, uh..."

"Have the right anatomy?" Isabelle asked with a chuckle as she flicked her tail a little. "You certainly got a good look at it..."

Molly blushed deeply which just made Isabelle laugh a little. She was surprised that she could actually make out her blush through the fur, these bodies were weird.

"How cute, you're blushing through a face full of fur," Isabelle said with a laugh.

"I'm going back to sleep," Molly said as she rolled back over on her back. "You can do whatever if you're going to be like that."

"Oh fine," Isabelle said as she figured out how to put her card key necklace on. "I'll be back in a bit, sleep well."

"Okay," Molly said with a yawn as she pulled the blanket over her again. "Have a good evening Izzy."

Isabelle nodded as she headed to the door and opened it up after a few tries as she headed out into the hallway.

00000

Isabelle took a deep breath of the sea air as she stepped out onto deck 14 near the outdoor pool. She liked the smell of the sea air, it at least gave her a chance to calm down and try not to think about everything that was going on. Right now, she just wanted to relax by the poolside.

She was a bit surprised to see that there were other guests out on the pool deck. Some of them were bat creatures like her, but others were like the other species she had seen around. It was a strange mix, but she figured it was nice to at least see that they were getting used to their strange new bodies.

She sighed and took a seat on one of the beach chairs that were along the edge of the pool. She was a bit surprised to see a young looking pony sleeping in the pool. Though what was weird was that she had a fish-like tail, that was something she hadn't expected to see at all.

"Okay, this is just getting weirder and weirder..." Isabelle said with a shake of her head as she shifted her bat wings a little. This whole thing was weird and the small fish pony would probably think that she looked pretty weird too.

She sighed and leaned back in her chair and stared up at the stars and moon above. There was something relaxing about this, it was almost like the night made her feel alive like she could take off and fly up into the sky. There was something liberating about that thought as if she belonged in the night.

"So what happened, you get kicked out?" A mare's voice said and she looked over curiously to see a grey Pegasus mare with a red mane. "Sorry, I just wanted someone to talk to while Emily slept."

"Oh, is that your daughter?" Isabelle asked curiously as she nodded out to the pony out in the pool. "Is she stuck in the pool or something?"

"Yeah, we're hoping we can figure out some way for her to move outside of the pool," the Pegasus said with a shake of her head before she smiled and offered a hoof. "I'm Janet Prince."

"Isabelle Baker," Isabelle said with a smile as she shook hooves with the other mare. "So, do you stay out here all the time?"

"Me and my Husband take turns actually," Janet said with a sigh as she laid back on the deck chair. "It’s been a bizarre experience, but I'm just glad our kids are okay. Right now, that's really all we can ask for isn't it?"

"Yeah," Isabelle said with a sigh. "I wish my parents felt the same way."

"What did they do?"

"They threw me out," Isabelle said with a sigh and a shake of her head. "They were already thinking about it after I came out of the closet to them before we left on the cruise and, well with everything that's happened they actually did it."

"Wow, that sucks," Janet said with a shake of her head. "I'm sorry Isabelle, I wish there was more I could do or say but we've all got a lot on our minds right now. Maybe they'll come around eventually."

"Yeah, maybe," Isabelle said with a sigh as she looked up at the stars for a long moment. "I don't know really, maybe it's because of everything that's happened, its, kind of nice to be free from their expectations finally. Maybe, this is sort of a new start for me, you know?"

"Yeah, maybe," Janet said with a sigh as she looked back out at her daughter. "We've all got our own challenges though, there's so much to take in and figure out. I just hope that Emily will be okay and, preferably not stuck in the water for the rest of her life."

"I'm sure everything will be okay," Isabelle said with a nod as she reached over and placed a hoof on the Pegasus' shoulder gently. "You and your family are going to be just fine, I'm sure of it. Just take care of them and love them no matter what species they are now."

"Yeah, I know," Janet said with a soft smile. "So, where are you staying now that your folks threw you out?"

"With a girl, I, kind of hooked up with before all this happened," Isabelle said with a blush as Janet laughed a little. "What's so funny?"

"Oh, that just sounds a lot like how me and Abraham got together is all," Janet said with a chuckle. "I wound up pregnant with our son and moved in with him after my parents kicked me out. You never know, it might lead to something good, is she nice?"

"Yeah, she's a nice girl... pony, thing, I mean she let me stay in her cabin when I needed it," Isabelle said with a shake of her head. "But that doesn't make me any less worried really. What if she kicks me out too? I won't have anywhere to go."

"If she's as nice as you said, I'm sure everything will be okay," Janet said with a smile. "Come on, let's just relax and enjoy the night air, what do you think?"

"Yeah, sounds good," Isabelle said with a sigh of relief as she laid back on the chair and closed her eyes. It was good to just be able to relax for once.

00000

Molly sighed as she rolled over in her bed and looked at the wall on the other side of the room. She couldn't get back to sleep, she was too busy worrying about what might've happened to her parents back in Boston. No matter what she felt like she couldn't get back to sleep right now.

Her parents, if they were even still around they were probably freaking out. She had been on the other side of the Atlantic when whatever this was had happened. They were probably as worried about her as she was about them, and she didn't like that.

She sighed and sat up in her bed and took a moment to turn the lights on as best she could. She couldn't sleep and she wasn't really sure what she was going to do now.

She sighed as she rummaged through her bags before she took out a picture of her with an older couple. She smiled a little, it had been taken not long after she had come out of the closet, they had been such a happy family back then, but now she didn't think she'd ever see them again.

So what was she going to do now? She sighed a little and set it down as she looked back out the window. She could see nothing more than darkness out there, it was kind of strangely calming but unsettling at the same time.

"I'm sorry I can't be wherever you are," Molly said with a sigh as she thought about her parents for a long moment. "I promise if there's any way I'll see you again. Even if I'm not human anymore, you're still my parents."

She sighed a little and turned off the lights and laid back on the couch again as she looked down at her body. There was something weird about all of this, her body felt so, alien to her even if she was getting used to it. She pulled her blanket over her body as she closed her eyes and tried to drift off back to sleep.

"What kind of force could possibly do this kind of thing to us..." she muttered softly as she rolled over to face the side of the couch. "It doesn't seem physically possible to change our forms like this..."

She paused a moment as if hoping that there would be some sort of answer in the darkness, but nothing came. There was only silence, she sighed and just tried to get back to sleep.

00000

Molly sighed as she woke up the next morning as Izzy came back in with a yawn. The green bat pony creature smiled a little when she saw that Molly was awake and sat down on the couch next to her.

“Hey, how was your evening?” Molly asked as she stretched out a little and gave her new roommate a smile.

“It was nice actually, it got kind of quiet when it got late,” Izzy said with a shrug. “I met this one lady by the pool because her daughter became some sort of, half fish thing. I honestly have no idea what to make of that.”

“Well, this whole thing is weird,” Molly said with a chuckle as she pointed at Izzy’s bat wings and then her own horn. “We’re a ship filled with talking horses and god knows what else. I think that’s the least of our problems really.”

“Fair enough,” Izzy said as she yawned a little and nuzzled Molly gently. “I wanted to thank you again for helping me out. I don’t know what I would do if I didn’t have you.”

“I’m glad to help,” Molly said as she nuzzled back. She was a bit surprised by the sudden show of affection but it wasn’t completely unwelcome. “I couldn’t just leave you alone you know? We don’t know how long we’re going to be stuck here, and I’d like to make more friends.”

“Of course, kind of annoying that we can’t seem to stay awake at the same time,” Izzy said with a chuckle. “Who knows, maybe you can figure something out. I’d rather not spend all our time together in the morning or evening.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Molly said and stretched out a little. “I’m going to see if I can figure out…”

Before she could finish that sentence, they heard the sound of the ship’s PA system activating. After a moment the sound of the Captain’s voice came over the PA, they both perked up a little. Maybe this was good news, maybe this was good news, maybe they had found other people or something.

That hope was soon dashed when the Captain began to speak.

“I’m sorry that I don’t have better news to tell all of you,” the Captain said over the PA system. “We’re still trying to figure out everything that happened, but what I can tell you is that it seems this may have been, of all things, an attempt to save humanity from a danger we couldn’t defend ourselves from by beings from another world. We don’t know if there are any humans out there still, but we’re starting to piece together the truth more and more. Everyone, hang in there and figure out what you’re going to do now. Until we can reach land, we’re on our own, and I hope that we can all make it through this. We will let you know what we find out if anything, good luck, and be careful.”

Molly and Izzy sighed a little as the announcement ended. Izzy got up and laid back on the bed, spreading her wings out a little.

“What do you think about that?” Izzy finally asked. “I mean, other worlds? That seems kind of strange and even unlikely to me.”

“As unlikely as being turned into a horse with bat wings?” Molly said and Izzy chuckled a little at that.

“You’ve got me there… I’m going to get some sleep,” she said as she swished her tail a little and gave her a smile. “Let me know if you want to join me over here.”

Molly blushed a little, she had to admit that she was tempted to do that, but she wasn’t sure about that just yet. She got the door to the bathroom open and entered it as she opened the glass door to the shower.

It took her a moment to figure out how to turn the water on, but when it did she felt the water running along her body. There was a lot she still needed to figure out, especially in this strange new world that she would have to figure out.

But at least she wouldn’t have to figure it out alone. She had Izzy and everyone else that was on the ship were in the same boat. She closed her eyes as she enjoyed the feeling of the water running across her fur covered body.

She just hoped that somehow everything was going to be okay.

Chapter 5: (Sam and Ashley) Coping

“Open your mouth please,” Ashley told Emily as she examined the young pony by the poolside. It had taken a bit of doing to figure it out as she wasn’t used to working with hooves, or with half pony, half fish creatures. “Are you having any problems with the water?”

“Nope,” Emily replied with a shake of her head. “Can I leave the pool yet?”

“I don’t think that would be a good idea,” Ashley admitted as she shook her head a little. She put in a stethoscope and used it to listen to the filly’s breathing. “We don’t know what kind of effects that might have on you. It would be better if you stayed in the pool, at least for now.”

“You could’ve said that a bit more nicely,” Abe commented as he rolled his eyes a little.

“Sorry, I’m still kind of getting used to not working with animals…” Ashley said as she rubbed the back of her head a little. “But she’s going to be fine at least. For now, keep her in the pool, hopefully we’ll get some sort of contact with the outside world soon.”

“Ben, can you stay with your sister a moment?” Abe asked as he turned to the Unicorn colt. “I need to talk to the Doctor alone for a moment.”

“Okay Dad,” Ben said as he went to go talk with his sister while Ashley and Abe went to talk together off to the side.

“Look, I know you’re still getting used to all of this,” Ashley said as she looked back at the pool. “But I was telling the truth back there. I think she’s going to be okay.”

“Yeah, I know, but I don’t know if you should be getting her hopes up about making contact with anyone outside of the ship,” Abe sighed. “If we were going to find anyone, wouldn’t we have made contact with them by now? It’s been a couple of days since this happened.”

“Maybe, but we’re still doing what we can, I’m not the one sending out the messages anyway, and they don’t have all the information,” Ashley admitted. “Look, I’m not really an expert on this kind of thing, but maybe there’s some way to help her. If we could rig up a system or something to get water over her gills…”

“She’d still be unable to walk,” Abe pointed out. “But we did get that wheelchair…”

“Your daughter is going to be okay,” Ashley reassured him. “I’m not going to say this is will be easy mind you. She’s probably got it the worst of any of us, but we will figure this out. I promise, me and Dr. Sawyer are going to work on this together with anyone we can find on the ship.”

“So, what should we do?” Abe asked.

“Just keep doing what you’re doing here, there’s not much else we can do right now,” Ashley said as she got her equipment back together. She smiled back at Emily and Ben who were playing in the water. “Take good care of your family Mr. Prince, right now they’re all we’ve got until we figure out what happened.”

“Okay Doctor Richards,” Abe replied as he trotted back towards his children.

Ashley smiled a little as she watched the three ponies talking and laughing. She sighed a little as she turned and walked off towards the stairs to the top deck of the Anthem. She leaned on the railing as she looked out at the ocean for a long moment, flapping her wings gently as she thought about everything that had happened.

Back home she had just been a normal veterinarian who had been lucky enough to get a ticket on the Anthem. Here she was probably the best chance they had in the event of a medical emergency.

So, exactly what was she going to do now? There was no way she could actually do all of this on her own with the amount of passengers and crew aboard the Anthem. Not to mention there were entire species that she wasn’t even familiar with.

She sighed a little as she adjusted her bag for a moment. She still had a few more patients to check out before meeting with Sam again. She started across the deck towards the far side of the stern deck.

This was going to be a long day.

00000

Sam sighed a little as he took a seat at the Windjammer Cafe as he looked down at the plate of food in front of him. He honestly wasn’t feeling very hungry right now as he poked lightly at his food for a moment.

Being in a Zebra body was weird enough, he was still having a hard time getting used to his new gender. Ever since they had been turned into ponies and were unable to contact anyone on the mainland.

“Hey Doc,” Ashley said, which made him look up at her. The purple Pegasus was smiling as she pulled out the chair across from the Zebra and took a seat and set her food down. “How’s everything going?”

“Oh, you know, getting used to my new body, feeling useless because I don’t know how to treat ponies… the usual at this point,” Sam groaned as he ran his hoof through his mane a little. “How about you? Are you having any problems with the passengers?”

“No, they’re all pretty much cooperative,” Ashley replied as she took a bite of her food. “I think they’re hoping that we can cure whatever caused this though.”

“Yeah… we don’t even know what caused it,” Sam sighed as he poked at his food for a moment. “Or if it's even going to be reversible. I guess until then we just have to figure out how we’re going to proceed.”

“Yeah, I’m willing to help you learn more about how to treat equines,” Ashley offered. “Though we’re going to have to learn a lot of things on our own. Sam, I know this isn’t easy on you, but I’m going to be with you if you need me, I promise.”

“Thanks,” Sam said softly. He took a deep breath and then finally started to eat his food. He smiled a little as he looked in Ashley’s eyes. The purple Pegasus smiled back as she brushed her mane out of her eyes and took another bite. “Maybe you should ask around. Statistically you can’t be the only one who had this happen to you.”

“Yeah, maybe,” Sam agreed as he stretched out a little. “But I’m not sure to be honest. I’m not comfortable with talking with anyone about this just yet. And I doubt that anyone else around here who had the same thing happen to them would want to talk about it either.”

“Yeah, probably not…” Ashley sighed. She reached across the table and placed her hoof on the Zebra’s. “But I’m still willing to help you out. We need to work together after all, and live together on this ship. Sam, I know you’re not ready for all of this, but you don’t have to do it alone.”

Sam looked at her for a long moment and then smiled lightly. “Thanks Ashley. I’ve never had much of anyone, especially on this ship. I guess none of us will see our families on the mainland again, will we?”

“You never know what fate might have in store for us,” Sam said with a soft smile. “But we’re all going to have to become each other’s new friends… and families. You don’t know how much this means to me.”

“I think I have an idea,” Ashley replied as she smiled a little bit. “Things aren’t going to be easy on any of us. But because we’re the Doctors here, they’re going to be looking to us to help them, both the passengers and the crew. So, what do you say we stick together?”

Sam smiled a little as he looked into Ashley’s eyes for a long moment. The Pegasus mare had a shine in her eyes that he couldn’t help but admire. She was still having a hard time getting used to it, something that Sam could understand. Their new bodies were weird enough, and while he had it worse, Ashley and everyone else were faced with the same problems.

“I’d be happy to,” Sam finally said as he placed his hooves on her’s. “Ashley… do you really think we’re going to be okay?”

“I think we’ve got a lot of things that we’re going to have to get used to before we’re really going to be okay,” Ashley answered. “I honestly don’t think we have a chance of getting our old lives back, or at least our old bodies. We’re going to have to get used to this, at least for now. So, do I think we’re going to be okay? Give it enough time and sure, we’ll be okay. We just need to get settled in and figure out what we’re going to do with our lives moving forward.”

“Easier said than done,” Sam commented and Ashley nodded in agreement. “Do you have any family out there that might be waiting for you?”

“Sure, parents, a couple of siblings, but I don’t know what happened to them, pretty much like everyone else,” Ashley replied as she brushed her mane back. “My parents always found it weird that I wanted to go into animal medicine instead of being a Doctor, but they supported me still. Guess the joke’s on them now. What about you?”

“Yeah…” Sam agreed. “As for me, well I’ve got my family, I’m an only child and my parents are back home. I think they were always a bit jealous that I’ve been working on a cruise ship, though. I’m not even sure what they would think if they could see me now.”

“Who knows, maybe we’ll find out someday,” Ashley replied with a shrug. “I really hope that our families are still out there somewhere. So, what are we going to do now?”

“I don’t know yet,” Sam shrugged. “What do you think we should do?”

“I honestly have no idea,” Ashley said as she thought about it for a long moment. “I think we should just take it one day at a time, at least for now. Our families might still be out there somewhere, but for now we have no choice but to make it through this, together.”

Sam smiled a little as he took another bite of his food and smiled a little. “For what it’s worth I’m glad you’re here with me. I doubt I’d be able to handle this on my own. Having you here is a life saver.”

“Same here,” Ashley said as they finished eating and got up, walking out of the cafe together. She yawned a little as she stretched out. “I’ve been on my feet… err, hooves since early this morning, I’m going to go lay down for a bit before I have to do some more rounds. Are you going to be okay?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Sam said as he gave her a nod. “I’m going back to the med center, at least for now. I need to get a few things done right now, and after that it sounds good to get some sleep at this point.”

“Okay, I’ll talk to you later,” Ashley said as she leaned over and kissed Sam gently on the cheek. “Take care Sam!”

Sam blushed a little as he placed his hoof on his cheek where she had kissed him. He hadn’t expected that at all, his grey fur turning red as he shook his head and started walking back towards the med center.

Why had she kissed him like that? He was still trying to process his new body and emotions, could he even be attracted to mares? He shook his head and just kept walking. He’d worry about that later.

Just one day at a time just like Ashley had said.

00000

Sam sighed a little as he leaned back in his chair. He had finished the paperwork that he had to work on, and there was nothing left he had to do, at least for now.

He looked down at himself for a moment. This body was so weird to him, changing species and genders were both incredibly weird. He kept thinking back to the moment where Ashley had kissed her cheek. She was pretty cute, but Sam had never considered himself attracted to women, at least not back when he was human. What kind of changes was he going to expect?

He sighed a little as he closed his eyes and crossed his forelegs over his chest. He was going to have to manage, at least until they could figure out exactly how to reverse this. If that was possible at all, just like she said, one day at a time.

He nearly jumped out of his chair when there was a knock at the door. He straightened himself out and cleared his throat. “Come in.”

A silver colored mare with a golden mane came into the room looking a little nervous. She looked around as if trying to make sure that no one else was around before finally speaking up and looking at Sam. “Uh, are you the Doctor here?”

“Yeah, I’m the Doctor, though the veterinarian isn’t here if you’re here about that,” Sam said as he sighed a little. “I can help you with broken bones or something like that, anything related to your new body you’re going to need to talk to the vet.”

“No, no, I just… I needed to talk about something that happened when we all became, well, you know, like this,” the mare said and Sam looked at him confused. “Look, Doctor…”

“Sawyer, Sam Sawyer,” Sam replied. “What can I do to help you?”

“This is going to sound crazy,” the mare said as she shook her head a little. “My name is Mitchel Marlowe. I was hoping that maybe you could help me figure out why this didn’t keep me male… I know it sounds crazy…”

“No, it doesn’t sound crazy at all,” Sam replied. Suddenly everything made more sense, this mare was just like him, only with the genders reversed obviously. So what was he supposed to do now? How was he supposed to tell her that even he wasn’t sure what to do? “Look, Mitchell… I honestly don’t know how I can help you. If there’s some way to reverse this or change genders, we just don’t know about them.”

“Are you sure?” Mitchell asked. “You’re not going to lie to me about this are you?”

“Trust me, if I knew how to reverse it, I would do it,” Sam said as he looked down at his hooves a moment. “I’m sorry, given we don’t even know what caused this, we can’t really reverse it. And…”

He paused a moment as he looked away from Mitchel and shook his head. They were so similar, but he wasn’t sure how he could talk to her about this. Then again, maybe she was one of the few people, or ponies, who could understand what he was going through.

“The same thing happened to me, when all this happened,” he admitted with a shake of his head. “I don’t know how many people it happened to, but I guess there are at least two of us. I wish I could reverse it, but I guess for now we’re stuck like this.”

“Yeah…” Mitchel said and sighed a little. “My wife is taking it the hardest right now. I guess I was kind of hoping that there would be some way around this.”

“If we ever find something, I promise I’ll let you know,” Sam sighed as he gave the mare a slight nod. “In the meantime, we all really need to work together on this and take it one day at a time. Maybe there are others here and we can all face it together if we have the chance. What do you say?”

“I’ll think about it,” Mitchel replied. “This whole thing has just been, weird to be honest. I don’t know how I’m going to manage.”

“Look, I’m not an expert on this kind of thing, I don’t think anyone is anymore,” Sam replied as he shook his head. “For now we don’t really have anything else we can do. If there’s anything else, you can talk to me.”

“Okay,” Mitchel said as he got up for a moment and took a deep breath. “I’ll think about what you said. Just, one day at a time, right?”

“Right,” Sam said as Mitchel headed out of the room.

Sam sighed a little and leaned back. At least now he knew that he wasn’t the only one aboard that had their gender swapped. Still, with everything that had happened, he wasn’t sure how they were all going to handle it. Their lives had just become more complicated than anything else, and they were going to have to make a lot of hard decisions.

And he had Ashley by his side. He just had to hope that everyone aboard was going to be able to do this, even if they would never change back. He leaned back and closed his eyes once more.

For now, all he could do is wait to see if something happened. Maybe, just maybe this would all turn out to be some sort of terrible dream, but he doubted it.

Hopefully, everything would turn out okay.

00000

That evening Ashley was on her way out of her quarters as she made her way down the hallway stretching out a little. She had a lot on her mind right now, especially being worried about Sam and his own problems. She sighed a little as she stepped out into the stairwell and started down the stairs, right now she had a few more things to take care of.

Which at the moment meant going to one of the quarters on a normal check-up. She had gotten a message from the Captain about them wanting to meet with a veterinarian aboard the Anthem for some reason. She just had to hope that it wasn’t going to be a waste of time. With all the ponies aboard she was afraid that they were going to be overwhelmed.

She stopped two decks down and headed down one of the hallways before stopping in front of a door and knocked on it. After a few moments a Unicorn mare with a white coat and a grey mane answered the door. “Are you the Doctor?”

“Yeah, I’m Ashley Richards,” Ashley said as she adjusted herself a little. “The Captain said that you needed medical assistance?”

“Uh, yeah, my wife she injured herself earlier today,” the Unicorn said as she nodded back into the room behind her. “She came back as a Pegasus so she was trying to, you know, fly. It didn’t exactly go well.”

“Of course it didn’t,” Ashley sighed as she brushed her mane back for a moment. She checked her medical equipment, as long as she wasn’t too badly injured, this should be okay. “Alright, show me to the patient. I should be able to help her out, I just need to get a look at her to see what’s wrong.”

The mare nodded as she opened the door up fully and lead Ashley inside. Lying on the bed was a Pegasus mare with a red coat and darker red mane. One of her hind legs was all crooked and looked like it was broken.

“Hey, I’m Ashley, what happened to your leg?” Ashley asked as she started taking out her equipment.

“Well, like Diamond said I was trying to fly, and, yeah I kinda crashed, guess we’re not ready for that yet,” the Pegasus commented as Ashley started to work on her leg. “I would’ve thought that we’d be flying as soon as possible, you know?”

Ashley smiled weakly a little as she looked back at her own wings. She honestly hadn’t even considered flying yet as she was focused more on helping others. The other pegasus kind of had a point though, if they had wings shouldn’t they be able to fly?

She shook her head at that thought. Horses weren’t exactly built for flying anyway, so how were they even supposed to fly? she just shrugged a little at that, not really sure exactly what to think of all of this. Then again they were clearly not normal horses, so maybe they could fly, who knows at this point.

“What’s your name?” Ashley asked curiously as she worked on setting the leg.

“Scarlet,” the mare replied with a flinch as ashley kept working. “Am I going to be okay? Should I take any medication or anything?”

“Well, given we’re not sure what medicine will work on these new bodies just yet or safe dosages, I’m not sure,” Ashley admitted. It was something that they were likely going to have to experiment with, and was probably going to be one of the bigger problems they faced, as they only had so much medication on board. “For now you just need to stay off your leg while we do what we can, okay?”

“Okay,” Scarlet replied as Diamond came over and placed her hoof gently on her wife’s. “How are you handling your new life?”

“I wouldn’t exactly call it a new life,” Ashley commented. She knew the chances of what she was going to say were slim, but she wanted to keep the passengers reassured. “There’s always a chance that we’ll figure out how to reverse this. For now, I like to think of it more as we’re being temporarily inconvenienced.”

“I don’t think so,” Diamond replied. “A lot of power would be needed, if not outright magic, in order to do this. There has to be some reason or power behind it, and I doubt it’ll reverse it on a whim.”

Ashley looked between the two of them for a moment. Why were these two mares so willing to just give up and accept their new bodies. Most of the people she had talked to aboard the ship seemed more interested in getting their old lives back, so something about this felt weird.

“I’d rather be human again,” Ashley commented. “This whole situation has too many problems. We’re going to run out of food eventually and this ship isn’t going to last forever. We’re kind of stuck here unless they figure out how to get the ship running again.”

“I’m sure they will, we can adapt easily enough,” Scarlet said as Ashley finished. “But would it be so bad if we never returned to our old lives? This is a chance to start over and create whole new lives for us.”

Ashley paused a little at that and thought about it. She was right of course, this was the same kind of argument she herself had made earlier. But that didn’t mean they should stop looking for a way to reverse this. She just shook her head and sighed a little.

“No, even if we never go back to our old lives, we shouldn’t give up on it,” she said. “These aren’t our bodies, this isn’t our life. We shouldn’t resign ourselves to these bodies, okay? If we do and tomorrow everything can be returned to normal, there won’t be any point.”

“If you say so, Doctor,” Diamond said as she looked at Scarlet for a moment. “But at the same time false hope isn’t going to help matters either. If everyone thinks that we could be turned back into our old forms then it’ll just be a disappointment when we never do. We’re approaching it more realistically by accepting our new forms than you are by holding on to that hope.”

“Maybe, but the rest of the passengers would be better off having that hope than without it,” Ashley reminded her. “Anyway, you’re looking fine. Just stay off that leg and you’ll be fine, okay?”

“Okay,” Scarlet told her. “But think about what we talked about at least, okay? Maybe you’re right, but deep down you know we’re right. These are our bodies now, maybe this was how it was always meant to be.”

Ashley frowned a little at that. Now this was just sounding crazier and crazier, so she gathered up her supplies and started back for the door. “I’ll check on you again tomorrow to see how the leg is healing, okay?”

“Okay,” Scarlet said as Ashley pushed the door back open and headed out. Scarlet frowned and turned back to Diamond. “She’s going to be hard to convince.”

“Perhaps, but she’ll come around to our way of thinking eventually,” Diamond said with a shake of her head. “They all will once they realize that there really is no way back.”

“And what if she’s right and there is a way to return to our old forms?” Scarlet asked. “What if we’re just lying to ourselves about this just like the rest of them?”

“No, returning is impossible, not if we’re right about there being a greater purpose,” Diamond said with a shake of her head. “Humanity had its chance to rule the world for thousands of years. Now we’re going to have to build a new world. And you and I are going to be among the mothers of that new world, we just need to make sure that we’re ready for it.”

She smiled as she leaned in and kissed Scarlet on the lips. “We just need to find the rest of them if we’re going to succeed.”

Scarlet smiled as she kissed back. “You’re right of course, so where do we start?”

“Well, there are around 5000 other ponies on this ship,” Diamond pointed out with a chuckle. “I’m sure there are others who feel the same way we do. And others who can be convinced to join us. All we have to do is start looking.”

00000

“And there we go, we have power again,” the first mate said as Captain Smith let out a sigh of relief as they felt the engines start up again. “Chief Hampton says that everything should be in order, though she doesn’t know how long the engines are going to last without maintenance though.”

“Right, so we’re going to need to find a port to reach eventually,” Captain Smith said as he looked at the map of the world. The ship was in the middle of the Mediterranean fairly far away from the coast. “If we make our way back to Italy that might be our best chance right now.”

“Yeah, maybe,” the first officer agreed. “So, what are we going to do now? The crew and passengers deserve to know about this.”

“Agreed,” the Captain said as he picked up the PA system. “This is the Captain speaking, I know all of you have felt that the engines are starting to run again by now. While we are still unsure of exactly what we’re going to do next or if there is anyone out there, this is at least a start. Hopefully moving forward we can find more people out there, but I won’t lie and say this isn’t going to be easy. We’re going to continue to try and find a way to communicate with the mainland. I’ll let you know more as we figure out how to move forward from here, good luck to all of us. We’re going to make sure of that, if there is anything that any of you can do to help, please inform the crew. We’ll be back underway shortly as soon as we figure out our new course.”

He deactivated the PA and called down to the engine room. “Chief, what’s the current status of the engines?”

“They’re running perfectly, we should have enough fuel for a week or two, but after that we’re going to have to find more fuel or port,” a woman’s voice answered on the other end. “We should be ready to go, I’ve run as many tests as I possibly can on this thing. The systems are working fine we just needed to figure out how to work them with these hooves. How are things topside?”

“We’re going to figure out a course from here and run some extra tests up here,” the Captain answered. “Thank you for all your hard work, Chief.”

“Of course Captain, I’ll let you know if anything else happens,” the Chief said as the system shut off again.

He leaned back in his chair and looked out the bridge window at the ocean beyond. There were a lot of unanswered questions about what had happened to the ship. So for now they just had to try and figure out if there was any sign of life out there in the world. There was still no sign of life out there or some sort of answer on the radio.

He flipped through the channels of the radio on the bridge. Most of the time there was just static like before until suddenly a voice came through the static on the emergency channel.

“Aiuto, la mia barca è stata catturata da una tempesta e sto prendendo acqua. Per favore, se qualcuno può sentirlo, la mia posizione è…” The voice said in italian. It took a moment for the Captain to realize what it was saying.

It was a call for help.

00000

“Sounds like we’ll be underway again soon,” Ashley commented as she headed into the medical center. “Anything new going on here?”

“No, not really, no new patients tonight,” Sam answered as he looked up from the book he had been reading. “What about you? How did things go with that patient you went to see?”

“Pretty routine really, just a broken leg, I was more weirded out by the way she and her wife were talking,” Ashley answered as she shivered a little. “It’s hard to explain, but it felt like they were a bit too accepting of everything that’s happened to us.”

“Weird,” Sam agreed as he set his book down. “I thought everyone aboard would want to go back to our old selves. I guess people deal with this kind of situation in different ways, right?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Ashley agreed though she was still not sure about this. “I agree with you though, I guess we all have to deal with it in our own way. So what about you, did anything interesting happen today?”

“Well, you were right about one thing, I’m not the only one who got my gender swapped by this whole thing,” Sam commented. “A woman, or I guess mare stopped by earlier to ask more about it and she said she used to be a man. So, yeah, there is that at least, I just don’t know what to actually do with this information.”

“Well, we know a little more about what happened at least then,” Ashley replied as she took a deep breath. “So, what do we do with this information?”

“I don’t know yet,” Sam admitted. “There’s a lot of things we could do admittedly. At least with the ship moving again we might get to some form of civilization soon. It’s at least some sort of answer to what’s going on, right?”

“Unless they don’t know anything either,” Ashley pointed out and Sam just shrugged. “But yeah it’s at least a good chance. At least let’s give it a try, at the very least it’ll be a good way to get more resources.”

“Yeah,” Sam agreed. He yawned a little as he checked the time, it was getting late and there wasn’t much reason to stay up any later. “Well, I’m going to call it a night and head back to my quarters.”

“Look, uh…” Ashley said as she rubbed the back of her head a little. “Do you mind if I join you? I don’t know if I want to be alone tonight. I can sleep on the couch if you don’t mind…”

“Okay, that would be… nice,” Sam replied as he gave the purple Pegasus a gentle smile. “I don’t mind at all. I mean, I’m not sure I want to stay alone either. Just let me call up to get someone to watch down here overnight in case we’re needed.”

He picked up the phone and after a few minutes of testing managed to make a call to get them to send someone down to the medical center. He nodded as he offered a hoof to Ashley and hung up. “So, shall we milady?”

Ashley smiled a little as the two of them headed out of the medical center together. “Let’s go.”

00000

Sam took a minute to get his key to work before he finally managed to get the door open and lead Ashley inside. There wasn’t much to look at in the room as it was just crew’s quarters for the ship’s doctor, but it was homey enough.

“I know it’s not exactly the luxury suite, but its home,” Sam said as Ashley took a seat on a couch and Sam sat down next to her. “I’m not sure if this is a good idea… I mean I’m still kind of getting used to this body and… yeah.”

“Don’t worry about it, we’re not going to do anything, right?” Ashley said with a chuckle. “Unless you want to…”

“No, no, I’m not ready for that by a long shot,” Sam said as he blushed a little.

“Thank you Sam,” Ashley said as she leaned over and rested her head on Sam’s shoulder.

“For what?”

“For everything,” she replied with a smile. “I mean, I honestly don’t know what I’d do if I was alone in this.”

“Yeah, me neither,” Sam agreed. He nuzzled Ashley gently and placed his hoof on her’s.

Maybe this wasn’t so bad. If he had friends like Ashley, he didn’t have a lot to worry about going forward. Now he just had to figure out what he was going to do now with his new life. But at least he didn’t have to do it alone.