Shiera awoke with a start. It was still dark outside. She could still feel dried tears on her cheeks, though she was not crying anymore. "That was a weird dream..." she mumbled to herself. She couldn't remember the first half of it, but she did remember dreaming about that Princess....what was her name? Luna. Yes. She had a dream about her for some odd reason, which didn't make any sense to Shiera. Not only that, she remembered feeling....happy for some odd reason, which also made no sense, as she literally went to bed crying, and she could not for the life of her remember what she was happy about. Shiera sighed and looked down at her hooves. She frowned. Part of her had hoped that all of that had been a dream as well, but it wasn't. She really was a unicorn now in weird bizarre world that she somehow arrived at after dying...

She wished she could at least remember how she got here, but sadly she had no memory between dying and the falling sensation she felt as she apparently fell from the sky and crashed here on this world. There was also still that feeling that something was missing, but she put that aside for now. For now, she was awake.

She thought about falling back to sleep, considering it was still very much dark outside, but part of her didn't feel eager to fall back to sleep at the moment. Then an idea occurred to her and she slowly and quietly opened the bedroom door and peered out into the empty hallway. No one seemed to be awake. As quietly as she could in her new unicorn body, she stealthily made her way to the stairs, and ever so slowly stepped down a step at a time as to not wake the others. One step made a rather large creaking noise, and she paused and stared back up the stairway, carefully watching to see if anyone had awoken.

No one came. So Shiera quietly managed to make it to the bottom of the stairs, and quietly opened the door leading outside and closed it as quietly as possible. She stared at the quiet, sleeping town of Ponyville. The quietness was...peaceful. A small smile came to Shiera's lips, it had been such a long time since she had seen a people so at peace.

Then she remembered what she came out to do, and so she made her way behind the giant tree that Twilight had made her home in. There was a lot of open space here, and it was just outside of town, so perhaps she wouldn't wake anyone while she was out here. She didn't expect to be making any loud noises anyways, so she should be fine.

She took a deep breath, "Okay, time to see what this body can do..." First she did some basic stretching exercises, testing limits of what her body could do. It wasn't too bad, though the difference in bone structure would need some getting used to. She then picked up two reasonably long sticks off of the ground, wielding one in each forehoof. Now to test the basics....

It took her fifteen minutes before she figured out the right balance needed to keep herself on her two back hooves. Once she was reasonably sure she could keep her balance, she began taking small steps, seeing how far she could walk before losing balance. She only got three the first time, Seven the second time, and twelve the third. While learning to walk on two legs again was a frustrating concept, she kept her cool, taking deep breaths, determined to see this done.

It took a full hour before she was able to keep her balance long enough to walk a hundred steps. Another hour to walk two hundred. And then forty minutes to learn how to run on two legs, at which she fell on her face numerous times. But every time she picked herself up and tried again. She was a soldier, practice made perfect, no matter how difficult the task at hand...

Shiera paused to look at the night sky. the moon still looked like it still had a good bit of night left, which was good, it meant she still had time. She took a deep breath to calm her breathing, closing her eyes to focus. She once more stood on her hind two legs, with sticks held in each forehoof. She took a battle stance. It was tricky at first, but she was getting used to the odd balance of her body, and quickly adjusted her weight to the new position. With another breath she opened her eyes and began her assault on an imaginary enemy. She slashed, twirled and stabbed, testing the balance of her new body. She danced around her imaginary foe, bobbing and weaving, dodging imaginary attacks. She tripped and lost her balance a few times, but she kept at it. She was determined to master this new body so that she could fight at peak efficiency. Even if it came to be that she never needed to fight here in this world, it didn't hurt to be prepared, just in case.

She kept switching between stretching, walking, running, and fighting every thirty minutes, making sure she learned every nuiance of movement with her new body. Before she new it, the moon began to set and the sun began to rise, though she did note that they rose and set much faster than in her world, though it made sense if what Twilight said about the princesses were true.

Shiera kept with her routine, lost in her focus of training that she did not even notice when Twilight and Spike had came outside to watch. Finally, when she felt herself tiring, she decided to stop, panting from the exertion.

"That was pretty cool," Spike said, startling Shiera as she now took notice of Spike and Twilight watching her. "Ahh! Um...thanks....how long were you two watching?" Shiera asked out of curiosity.

"Oh, we woke up about an hour ago, and we heard noises outside and came out to see you...training behind the treehouse," Twilight explained. "Yeah, you move quite gracefully, especially when your doing all those swinging attacks with those sticks! It was awesome! Eeeven if you did fall over a few times...." Spike chimed in, smiling.

Shiera chuckled, "Training is never perfect, but it does lead to it."

"You look tired, how long were you out here for?" Twilight asked.

Shiera thought about it for a moment. "Seven and half hours, give or take?"

"Whoa! Didn't you sleep at all last night?" Spike asked.

"Well, yes. I just woke early is all, and thought i would do some practice while i was at it."

"Well, surely you must hungry from all that work. Why don't you come inside, and Spike will make us some breakfast?"

Shiera nodded, "Sound good," though she did note that she didn't actually feel all that hungry, or even thirsty for that matter, which was strange, usually a workout like that normally worked up quite a thirst, but she felt fine. Her limbs were a bit tired, but even then, she had a feeling that they weren't as tired and heavy as they should have been from such a workout. Maybe she was just imagining things, after all, she was tired, and breakfast did sound like an appealing offer, even if she wasn't all that hungry.

Twenty minutes later, breakfast was finally served. "Haycakes and blueberry syrup, my treat!" Spike said as he sat a plate in front of Shiera and Twilight, each stacked with three of these 'Haycakes'. He then grabbed a bowl of gems for himself and began eating them. To which Shiera watched in interest before turning back to her own plate.

"Why are they called Haycakes?" Shiera asked out of curiosity, watching Twilight pour the syrup on top of her own plate of Haycakes, and then mimicking the action for herself. "Well, they are made from freshly grown hay, and mixed with eggs, milk and--"

Shiera's mouth hung open in disgust at the mention of it being made of hay. A memory flashed in her head of a time when bullies threw her into a haystack and some of it went into her mouth. It took hours to wash that taste out of her mouth. "Yuck..." she said in disdain.

"What, you don't like Haycakes?" Twilight asked.

Shiera frowned. Hay was something normally fed to horses and pigs....but....considering she was a horse, of sorts, now maybe it would be different.

She took a bite.

No, it definitely tasted like hay, except....it didn't seem to taste as bad as she remembered. Perhaps that was simply because she had unicorn tastebuds now, but overall it was bland at best. However the syrup was a different story, it was quite delicious! And when it seeped in with the Haycakes, it definitely tasted better.

"Huh. It seems i do now..." she said, taking another bite.

"Do they not have haycakes where you are from?" Twilight asked.

"No....not really...Hay is normally fed to farm animals. It is not something people normally eat..." Shiera explained.

"Oh....how weird...."Twilight remarked, taking another bite of her breakfast.

"I think you and i have different definitions of weird," Shiera said dryly.

Author's Note

Yep, dreams are weird, and almost never make sense. easy things can be overcomplicated, and complicated things can simplistically easy and absolutely weird and bonkers things can seem completely normal to you, until you wake up that is, lol.

Shiera's dreams just happen to be a little wierder than most....

Hope you enjoy!