I was happy to see Shy again, now outside the hospital. I think she was slightly surprised to see me out and about so soon, but smiled all the same when I cantered closer and started walking beside her. She had a pair of connected bags hanging over her back. The bags themselves were at the sides, filled mostly with groceries as far as I could tell. I think I’ve seen other ponies wear similar bags, but I didn’t pay them much attention before.

“Huh, neat. A convenient way to carry your things around.” After having a closer look, I could not miss the design stitched into the bags. “This is the same image that she has on her flank. I’m starting to think that those marks are kind of important.”

We could not exactly have a chat due to my language difficulties, so we just crossed the bridge in silence and continued further towards the edge of the town. There weren’t many houses on that side of the brook, so we soon were walking an open field. A few houses were sparsely dotted there, closer to the forest. We were headed towards the farthest one, which was almost at the edge of the forest, behind a stream. It was a two story cottage, and its green roof made it look like a small and especially high grassy hill, or maybe a tree.

As we were getting closer, I started hearing birds chirping. Lots of them. And the closer we got, the louder was the noise. Then I started hearing the sounds of various small animals scurrying to and fro. By the time we reached a small bridge right in front of the house, I was mesmerized by the sight. Never in my life have I seen that many different critters in one place. Not that I would remember, but you know what I mean.

Not quite unexpectedly, I guess, said critters started crowding around Shy. They were visibly wary of me, though, and I started to lag behind a little to avoid interfering. When Shy was talking to a bird fluttering before her, it almost looked like she was replying to what the bird was saying. Then a rather big bear emerged from around the corner of the house, and it was my turn to be wary. Shy was unaffected, she simply greeted it with a wave. Interestingly, the bear did the same in reply.

As we entered the house, the critters were all over the place there too. Small burrows dotted the walls at floor level, and quite a few birdhouses were hanging from walls and ceiling. “Now that’s definitely taking it too far. She sure does like animals! No wonder she does not even lock the door. The critters definitely like her, and at least the bear seems to be smart enough, so any potential intruder would find themselves in a whole lot of trouble.”

As I was thinking that, Shy dropped off her bags, arranged some bowls on the floor, and filled them with various greenery from the bags. The critters started eating, while I was staring slack jawed at all of that and wondering how exactly could Shy afford to feed all of them. “Well, at least I won’t be too much extra burden for her then. Maybe I could help her take care of the critters as a compensation.”

One white bunny had already finished his carrots, and now was pestering Shy, probably to get more. He was jumping impatiently, patting his belly, and even pretended to drop dead at one point. Shy sighed and gave him another carrot, but he didn’t calm down. When she finally shook her head in refusal, he simply jumped into the bag and took the second carrot himself. Shy was not happy with that, but didn’t try to stop him. “What a spoiled brat, that bunny! I wonder if he can even eat all those carrots at once!”

Shy said something, not sure if it was addressed to me, and went outside, probably to feed the remaining animals. The bunny already finished chomping down his two extra carrots, and took notice of me. He approached me with a frown and defiant attitude, probably wondering who the heck I was. After I snorted in amusement, he jumped right onto my muzzle. Now he was staring me right in the eyes and impatiently beating his right hind leg, which hurt my muzzle quite a bit.

“Who the hell do you think you are?” asked I in frustration as I flopped onto my rump. As I grabbed him with my hooves to take him off, an idea struck me. “Oh, Shy is so not going to like this if she finds out, but this devil bunny deserves it. I hope it works.” Instead of putting him down, I pulled a wicked grin and kept looking at him. His face became slightly less defiant and more confused. I slowly licked my lips, and bared my teeth a little. The bunny started to catch on, it seemed, for now he looked kinda scared and was frantically trying to free himself. I smiled even wider, baring all my teeth and slightly parting my jaws. Now he shut his eyes and his ears were hanging limp. “Ha, it worked! I’m pretty sure ponies are herbivorous, but he actually bought it! Maybe I even overdid it a little...” I put the now trembling bunny onto the floor and lightly patted his head. He cracked one eye, than another, and was looking at my smile in confusion. As I bared my teeth again, he bolted away and hid somewhere. “I’m so glad we found a common language!” I was giggling at that point.

I looked around the room once again. There was a table, a sofa, a couple soft chairs, plus a few smaller soft beds for the critters. There also was a ladder leading upstairs, a bookshelf, a stone stove with various pots and pans on it, a couple cupboards. Oh, and there was a mirror!

“Hmm... Yeah, I think I like how I look!” I came closer. “I definitely prefer my color scheme to the bright and colorful of most ponies. Oh, and I love the horn! It’s all spiraly...” As I was admiring my horn, I noticed how unkempt the hair around it was. “Oh, I so need to wash myself. My mane is in terrible shape, and I must be reeking from spending the past week or more in bandages!”

Without thinking too much, I went outside, down to the stream, and dunked my head into the water. It wasn’t completely clean, but it had to do. The cool water also was quite refreshing after such a warm day. As I stood there and shook excess water out of my mane, I noticed Shy staring at me with a blank expression. When I looked at her, she smiled and waved a hoof for me to follow. Then she turned around and went inside. As I entered after her, she was heading upstairs and to the left. I followed, and found myself in a room with a sink and a somewhat large wooden bath. There also was a mirror over the sink, some bottles on a shelf next to the bath, and towels were hanging on a wall.

“I wonder why I didn’t even think to look for such room, I’m definitely not surprised there is one. Heck, I think I’d be surprised if there wasn’t a bathroom here! Maybe it was the stone stove and overall simple look of the cottage?” I smiled at Shy and nodded, after which she left the room and closed the door.

I definitely knew how to use this room, but it still took me some time to turn the valves with my hooves. There even was hot water! I washed my mane and my tail with contents of one of the bottles, the one that had the weakest flowery smell of them all. I still would smell like dandelions for a while. The most difficult part, as I found out, was to scrub my coat clean with soap. It wasn’t easy to pour some liquid from a bottle onto my mane, and I in fact think I almost shattered that bottle, but at least I could hold it with two hooves. Holding the soap bar with one hoof was pretty much impossible. In the end, I opted to grab it with my mouth. After I washed the taste away and used hooves to spread the soapy foam everywhere I could not reach with my mouth, I washed it all off and shook myself reasonably dry. I wasn’t looking forward to brushing my mane, there was no way I could adequately hold the brush, so I was quite happy to find out that, after washing it, my short mane looked just fine as it was, without any extra effort.

Satisfied with the result, I walked towards the door and pushed it. It did not open. “Huh, weird. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it open outside.” I tried to pull the handle with my hoof, but the door still did not move. I grabbed the handle with my mouth to pull it with more force, and then I noticed that it wiggled a little. “Oh, so this doorknob is rotating, and the door just clicked shut. And it probably opens outside just as I remember.” I turned my head together with the knob and tried to push, but my muzzle was immediately stopped by the door frame. I tried to turn it with my hooves, but it was too slippery. “Oh come on! This is ridiculous. Shy just turned it with a single hoof, without even giving it a second thought!” I tried to grab it with my mouth from the side, but this way I could not rotate it far enough.

“That’s it. Of all places, I’m stuck in a bathroom. No matter how stupid that is, I won’t be able to leave by myself if my life depended on it... Well, maybe I could have bucked the door down if my life really depended on it, but still. Those ponies are way too reliant on their magic. Why would not they be, anyway? It’s too convenient. But I don’t have any right now!” I banged my head against the door in frustration. My currently useless horn was quite sensitive, as I quickly found out, so I winced in pain at the impact. I sat there for a little while, looking at the door with loathing. Then I sighed, stood up, and started banging at the door with my hoof.

“Shy! Let me out! I’m stuck here!” I was already thinking how I would explain why I could not leave the room without outside help. “Ugh. This is so embarrassing.” It wasn’t long before I heard hoofsteps outside that were quickly getting closer.

A scared looking Shy opened the door and asked something in a worried tone. Then she noticed me just sitting there and looking at her, and she became a little confused and slightly frowny. I sighed, stood up, approached the door, put my hoof on the doorknob and demonstrated how I could not rotate or pull it. Shy did not understand what I was doing at first, but then realization and surprise filled her face and she covered her mouth with a hoof. And then she was just sad. She gestured me to follow her and went downstairs.

Turns out she prepared some lunch while I was washing myself. Nothing fancy, just some vegetables and flowers, tea, and a little plate of cookies in the middle of the table. She sighed when I demonstrated being unable to pick up the fork and proceeded to eat right off the plate. When it was time for tea, I managed to drop the teacup, which promptly shattered and almost soaked me with hot tea. While Shy was cleaning up the mess, I just sat there and slowly chewed a cookie.

“Having no magic at all sucks so much more than being unable to properly speak or remember anything past a week ago.”

Author's Note

Sorry for such a long delay on a not quite long chapter!

I got detained at Arstotzka border checkpoint in Grestin, and then I had to stamp various papers for hours and hours upon end! Well, I technically had a choice not to, but, you know, I'd never see the end of it otherwise. Not a single one.

I blame Vannamelon and her "Fluttershy plays" for this.