Chapter 1: Ponyville Hospitality
Ponyville General wasn’t the largest hospital. Still, for a town like Ponyville with a few thousand residents, they needed somewhere for emergencies. Doctor Horse had seen a lot of them in his long life - all sorts of nasty diseases, infections both viral and bacterial, and injuries.
He sighed, staring out at Ponyville from the second floor break room’s full-length window, the latches to open it unlocked. He liked it up here; the colours were less sterile, and there were a few plants in the room too. Not the type for snacks, but they were good looking enough. His horn lit up and picked up the tea cup in front of him with a light blue glow, and he brought it up to his muzzle, about to take a sip-
THOOM.
The sound was loud enough that Horse lost his grip on his magic, the teacup slipping from his grip and shattering on the floor.
Horse didn’t care. He just stared at the massive white portal that had appeared directly outside of the hospital, his mouth hanging open.
The swirling rainbow void inside of it was almost mesmerising, but Horse could swear there was a shape in there, getting larger and larger. It looked like…
His eyes widened in horror. “There’s somepony falling down from there,” he said, almost at a whisper.
At that point, time almost seemed to go in slow motion. Horse stood up from the chair, ignoring the shattered pieces of ceramic on the floor, and his horn lit up again, flinging the window open.
He dashed to the window madly, focusing hard. As soon as the pony who was there fell through the portal, which slammed shut the instant they did with far less noise, he encased them - her? - with his magic, aiming to at least slow the fall, if not stop it entirely.
After all, ponies were hardy as creatures went, but even they would die if they hit the ground at terminal velocity.
The mare slowed down a considerable amount, enough for him to see that she seemed hurt already, but even just doing this was straining Horse to his limits. He couldn’t lift her, just stop her from falling; he wasn’t a magic talent, after all, as much as his parents had wanted him to be one.
His talents lay in medicine - emergency and acute care medicine, mostly, but he knew a little bit of everything.
Regardless, as the mare finally reached the ground, her helpless descent having slowed to an almost graceful float, Doctor Horse’s horn sparked a few times before sputtering out, and he took big, gasping breaths. He’d taken a risk by saving that mare - he knew better than anypony the results of magical overuse in a unicorn without a magic talent - but he couldn’t let somepony just die like that.
Turning away from the window, he stumbled over to the break room intercom, legs heavy and the only thing stopping him from falling his tail. He wiped the sweat off his brow with the back of his hoof.
Holding his hoof out and touching the intercom with it, he continued to gasp, the force of his will the only thing that could keep him from collapsing, but tried his best to get out his message all the same. “Emergency! Emergency! Somepony, hah, fell in front, hah, of the hospital! They appear unconscious and, hf, injured!”
When he heard the sounds of his voice echoing throughout the building, he relaxed, taking a deep breath in, and collapsed onto the ground, his back to the wall. His colleagues would doubtlessly have heard him, and they’d be able to save that poor mare.
His breathing slowed until he finally felt stable. He hoped that mare would be okay.
He took a glance out the window, noting the mare surrounded by some local Ponyville residents - he could even see the local dressmaker there. No doubt drawn in by the sound of the portal splitting open the sky.
Even still, he wondered where the mare came from. After all, as a more rural town, a golden coat and a red and gold mane weren’t the most common things in Ponyville.
Have you ever woken up after you were sure you died?
I have.
I was in a dreamless sleep until the moment I woke up. The first thing that came back was my hearing.
“…we sure Miss Doe here will be alright? It’s been at least a week since she, well…” The voice, a man probably a few years older than me, said. In the background, I could hear the beeping of machines and the buzzing of harsh electric lights.
The second thing that came back was my sense of touch. It felt as if there was a blanket over the top of me, but on my stomach I couldn’t feel it totally, though I could feel some kind of cold plastic, and it did ache a little. I also couldn’t feel my fingers, but… oddly enough, that didn’t really bother me? The position I was in was a bit uncomfortable though, and my arms felt like they were locked up in something and wrapped in place, as did my neck. I could also feel some electrodes on my body and a cannula in the crook of my elbow - judging from how it felt, it was pumping in saline solution.
I groaned, shifting around a little bit. I wasn’t sure where I was, or why I was here. A few hazy memories floated through my mind, but as I tried to grab at them, they floated away like dandelion puffs.
Another voice spoke up, this time sounding like someone in his 40s. “I’m certain she’ll be okay; she’s made a remarkable recovery in the… wait. Did you see that?”
I had no clue who they were talking about; for a second I thought it might be me, but even though I was a woman… well. Let’s just say I wasn’t your typical one.
So, in order to check, I cracked an eye open.
I immediately slammed that eye closed. The bright, cool light above me was almost blinding to see.
“See what?” the first voice asked, curious all of a sudden.
“There! Did you see? She opened her eye!”
Really? But that’s weird; I just opened my eye. Surely they couldn’t be talking about…
“My goodness, you’re right!” the first man exclaimed. “Let’s go check on her, doctor!”
…me?
I heard the sound of shoes - probably hard ones, given the sound they made - hitting the floor as the two(?) men came towards me. Soon, the sound stopped, but I felt the wind that their movement created on my skin.
“Excuse me, miss?” I heard one of the men say. “Can you hear us?”
“Yes… where am I…?”
The first words out of my mouth since I had woken up were hoarse, but more importantly saying them felt… strange. Not wrong, per se. But definitely strange. For some reason, I could have sworn they sounded off as well, but I couldn’t put my finger in it.
“You’re at the hospital. Do you remember what happened to you last?”
A hospital? Why would I need to be- That was when I remembered.
I’d been hit by a car, then blacked out. I’d thought I was done for.
“Yes, I do,” I said. My voice felt slightly less hoarse, my memories becoming clearer by the second. “I… got hit by, a- a car.”
“A car?” The man’s voice sounded thoughtful. “Hm… Tell me, what’s your name?”
I opened my mouth, ready to say it-
But nothing came out.
I knew my name. It was Marissa (though I had offhand thought about changing it recently to something inspired by Twilight Sparkle, one of my favourite characters in fiction). It should have been easy to just say it, to just… let the words come out of my mouth.
But for some reason, I just couldn’t form the word.
Something inside me - something weird, different, primal - told me that it wasn’t brain damage. Despite my doubts, I decided almost glumly to believe that instinct.
“I… can’t say,” I admitted.
“You don’t know?” the other doctor’s voice mused. “Perhaps some form of brain injury?”
I felt my lips turn downwards. “I didn’t say that. I do know my name. I just, can’t say it.” The hoarse feeling in my throat was almost gone now, and I was starting to notice that there was definitely something off about my voice. It was… well, different was the only real way to describe it. Lighter, maybe?
“And that, Nurse, is why you don’t assume what a patient is going to say,” the doctor said, snorting. Oh, so one of them was a Nurse? Interesting…
“…you’re right, Doctor. Excuse me.” The nurse cleared his throat.
“Anyways,” the doctor continued, “can you open your eyes for me?”
“I don’t know… it’s very bright.” I screwed my eyes up tight. I didn’t want to get blinded again, after all.
I heard the doctor hum to himself again. “Well, if it is that bright, the nurse here can turn the lights off. Nurse?”
“Yes, Doctor,” the nurse said. There was an odd tingling noise, and after a second I heard the telltale click of the light going off, the light coming through my eyelids disappearing.
“That’s good,” the doctor said, some pride in his voice. “Now that the lights are off; can you open your eyes? Don’t worry, there should still be enough light for you to see.”
After a couple of seconds, I gave a hesitant nod - I could do that much, even with a mostly locked in place neck. Then, I slowly cracked open one eye.
Two fuzzy blobs were standing in front of me, but more importantly, the light wasn’t so bright that it was searing my eyes anymore. Giving an internal sigh of relief, I opened both eyes, this time to their normal size.
Then they widened, and my jaw dropped.
“There, that’s good!” said the yellowish-brown unicorn - talking unicorn - in the voice I’d heard from the doctor before, his huge blue forward-facing eyes sparkling happily. “Now, just stay still while I examine your eyes…”
The other unicorn, a dark green one with light pink eyes(?!), glanced at the talking one and also talked. “Doctor, are you sure this is okay? Your magic-”
Magic?
“It’s fine, nurse,” the doctor interrupted, smiling. “You know this spell takes less magic than telekinesis, though… you’ll have to make sure her vision is okay.”
If my brain almost shut down in shock when they had started talking, then it actually did when the doctor unicorn’s horn glowed. Like, a blue, shimmering aura appeared around it glowed.
“Now, keep your eyes open please, miss,” he said, and the glow solidified into a bright light at the very end of his horn.
After a couple of seconds, the light puttered out, and the doctor hummed. “Pupil dilation seems normal…” he said, seeming to take a mental note. “Nurse, cast the vision diagnostic spell.
The nurse nodded, his horn lighting up a pale pink, and a second later there was a pink flash. It wasn’t bright enough that it burnt an afterimage into my eyes, though.
“How are they looking?” the doctor asked, his voice no-nonsense.
“Normal; no neurological issues, thankfully. Though, she doesneed some glasses.”
“Hmm, I see. Well, you can fetch some after the initial examination,” the doctor mused, his huge, weird eyes that didn’t look like they should belong on a horse narrowing. “For now, turn the lights on?”
The nurse nodded, his horn lighting up again and the lights turning on.
“Thank you.” The doctor’s eyes flicked towards me, and he blinked. “Miss, are you okay?”
That question was apparently the straw that broke the camel’s back for me, because after he asked that question, I exploded into a rant.
“Am I okay? Am I okay?” My voice was almost hysterical, my eye twitching. “Of course I’m okay! Well, if you count okay as being hit by a car, getting knocked out, then waking up in a hospital when I’m being cared for by TWO TALKING HORSES!” My shouting punctuated the end of the sentence, and I wondered internally if this was a death dream telling me I had watched too much My Little Pony.
After my shouting, which left me a huffing mess, the nurse seemed to wince, though the doctor actually gave off a grin. “That’s my name, don’t wear it out,” he said.
The nurse, meanwhile, narrowed his eyes. “…Miss, we’re not horses. We’re ponies. Besides, have you looked in a mirror ever in your life?”
The doctor’s face hardened into a scowl, and he looked over at the nurse. “Nurse, please don’t talk like that to the patient. You know she’s just woken up; she’s probably still disoriented from the accident.”
The nurse’s ears (pony ears) flattened. “I… yes, you’re right. I’m sorry.”
With that, the doctor turned his head back towards me. “Sorry, miss. My colleague here was a bit blunt, but, well… he’s not wrong. You’re a pony too, just like the two of us. I understand you’ve just come out of a coma, though, which I understand can be… disorienting.”
I was barely listening though, my brain simply trying to process that whole bombshell that had just been dropped on me. “…I need a mirror,” I whispered under my breath. Oddly enough, it felt like there was some sort of thrill in me at the news, even though that made no sense.
The doctor apparently heard me, because he gave me a patient smile. “Alright, miss. Nurse, if you would?”
The nurse gave a nod, before turning around and trotting out of my sight; a quick glance showed he was moving towards a set of cabinets in the wall, and also that his underside was… let’s just say, oddly absent of any sensitive parts.
The doctor cleared his throat.
I started, turning my head towards him. “Ah! Sorry,” I said, a nervous grin on my face. “What is it?”
“Well, you see, I still have a few more questions to ask about you before we can consider you lucid. You do seem to be mostly fine, so this won’t take very long, but again, that’s just for confirmation.” He gave me a smile.
Let me tell you, a smile on a pony’s face? Looks surprisingly natural. Also, pretty contagious, actually! I felt myself smiling back at him then, my nerves almost forgotten. “…Okay. I think I can do this, then, Doctor,” I said.
The doctor’s smile grew. “Alright then. So, since you‘ve already answered about your name-”
I suppressed a wince.
“-we can go onto the next few questions. What is your Cutie Mark? …miss?”
And that was when my brain short-circuited again.
“Doctor? I have the mirror for the patient.”
Cutie Mark? Those two words on their own might seem innocuous, but together they implied one very specific thing.
“Ah, thank you! Now, just put it down over there; I’m just asking the patient a few questions. Now, miss? …are you alright?”
‘Cutie Mark’ is a term used in the My Little Pony franchise - or at least My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic; I’m not sure about any of the other generations. Well, aside from Generation 5, I guess, but isn’t that a sequel to Friendship is Magic anyway?
“Miss? Hello?”
Regardless, the doctor’s words definitely implied something that was patently absurd, even if I was in a land of talking unicorns - more specifically, they implied I was in a land of fictional talking unicorns-
“Miss!” BANG.
The sound of a hoof banging on the floor almost made me jump. “Ah! Um… sorry. Just got caught in my thoughts, is all.” I tried to give my best smile, but got a sigh from the doctor.
“That’s okay; you can wait just a bit longer to daydream, alright?”
I nodded my head up and down.
“Alright.” The doctor gave a patient smile, while the nurse tried to make himself look scarce. “So, as I was saying, what is your Cutie Mark?”
I smiled again, a rather nervous look on my face as I stuffed away that existential crisis for later. “Uhhh… I don’t have one?” I hazarded. It wasn’t like I had exactly figured out my purpose in life, after all. Actually, with that thought, I nodded my head, my smile growing more confident. “Yeah. None.”
Surprisingly, the doctor nodded back. “Good. It was a bit surprising when we first saw you, but it’s not actually that rare. I’ve met some ponies in their 50s without cutie marks looking for specialists.”
I blinked, tilting my head. “…huh.” I supposed that made sense. After all, if there were adult ponies who didn’t know their special talents, why not adult ponies who hadn’t even found theirs yet?
“It’s not something anypony likes to talk about, but it does happen,” the doctor said, nodding almost solemnly. “Now, the next question: what’s your date and year of birth?”
“Uh, 29th of July, 1998-“ I started, almost on instinct, before my mouth snapped shut. I didn’t know if ponies even had the same calendar as humans.
The doctor nodded. “Hmm, I see… so about 20, then? That matches up with the estimate.”
I blinked. But I was 24, wasn’t I? …wait a second. “What year is it, again?”
The doctor raised an eyebrow. “Why don’t I ask you that question?”
I could actually feel my ears folding back against my head. “…I don’t know what year it is,” I admitted. “20 years after 1998? …is it 2018?”
The doctor blinked, seemingly a little surprised, but nodded. “…yes, that’s right,” he said. “So you’re lucid enough to do simple addition at least. Now, can you tell me where we are?”
I took a deep breath. This was the time where I would either confirm my theory or deny it - and if I did confirm it? Well, I could save that existential crisis for another time.
After all, I had the existential crisis of being a pony (I felt an odd thrill in my chest) to deal with already, after the doctor left me to do my own business.
“…in a hospital somewhere in Equestria?” I said. It was more uncertain than anything else.
After a couple of seconds, the doctor- smiled?
“Alright. I suppose that’s the best we can get, considering, well, the way you actually arrived here.” He looked up at the roof, almost reminiscing, but in a solemn way.
“…Doctor? Sir? Are you okay?” Concern creeped into my voice.
The doctor blinked, then shook his head at that. “Ah! I’m fine, sorry. Just… remembering something, that’s all. Anyways, this is a hospital in Equestria, like you said, but more specifically this is Ponyville General.”
…PONYVILLE?!
As my eye began to twitch, the doctor cleared his throat. “At any rate, I’m done with the questions for now. If you want, you could take a look in that mirror you asked for.”
…right. That mirror. I tried to focus on the fact that you’re in Ponyville later; first things first, I was going to take a look in that mirror. “Um… yes, please,” I said. How bad could it be, after all?
“Alright. Nurse?” The doctor looked over to his… assistant nurse?
The nurse nodded back. His horn began to glow a light pink - the same pink as his eyes, actually - and from below the bed a circular mirror rose up.
When I caught the reflection in it, all I could do was stare, the name of the pony whose body mine looked like ringing in my mind.
Red and mustard yellow hair curling around itself, wide cyan eyes, and an open yellow snout stared back at me, a sharp yet shiny horn poking up out of the center of the face’s forehead. The face in the mirror looked almost like one of the faces from the Generation 5 3D movies.
“…Sunset Shimmer...”
“Oh? Is that your name, miss?” The doctor had a slight expression of surprise on his face, but I could also tell he was somewhat pleased.
Also, it made me realise that I had said that out loud, instead of thinking it, which was what I was supposed to be doing.
I winced at the question, though. “Um… not r… I mean, I guess.”
After all, it wasn’t like there was a Sunset Shimmer in Equestria who was actually using the name. Regardless of the fact that it made me feel guilty to use it.
But still, looking in the mirror and seeing essentially what looked like a realistic clone of the unicorn mare staring back at me, red and yellow hair, big furry ears, light green eyes and yellow coat, following my every action… it felt kind of surreal.
And weirdly enough, it made me feel happy.
Upon having that realisation, I quickly shoved away that feeling down with all the other existential crises I was already preventing myself from having - or at least, I tried to.
Still, I couldn’t stop myself from smiling.
“Alright. So, we have a name. Sunset Shimmer, huh?” The doctor rubbed his chin, while the nurse lowered the mirror. “Well then, after taking care of you for the past week or so, it’s nice to finally meet you, Miss Shimmer.”
Almost instantly, my cheeks felt like they were as hot as the surface of the sun. For some reason? Being called Sunset felt good. “Ah-um- thank-thank you, Doctor; it’s nice to meet you too,” I said, trying my best to keep the weird giddiness out of my voice. “And you too, Nurse.”
The nurse gave a curt nod. “I’ll be off for now, I think,” he said. “Got to get those glasses.”
The doctor smiled. “I won’t need you for this next part, so feel free.” As the nurse trotted off, the doctor turned his head back to me. “So, Miss Shimmer, given that you do seem to be entirely lucid, I suppose the next thing we can do is discuss your care and recovery plan.”
“…right. That.”
I prepared myself mentally for what would probably be a very boring talk.
“And that’s all we need to cover today. Do you understand, Miss Shimmer?”
I nodded my head up and down as much as I could. “Yes, I do.”
The doctor smiled. “That’s good. I hope your glasses are working well for you?”
I perked up. “Yes, actually!” I’d needed glasses for a while, and this pair was great! They were the big nerdy type of glasses, the ones with the thick rims. They weren’t the first pair I’d owned, but the pair I had owned back before… you know, made me feel lightheaded when I wore them. Oh, and they were also half-chewed by-
No. Don’t think about it. Save it until later.
The doctor’s smile grew, oblivious as he was to my mental turmoil. “Alright. If you do need to get them updated, or if they go out of date, remember that you can come back here at any time to do so, okay? Completely free of charge.”
I nodded again, mentally praising Equestrian healthcare to get my mind off of the problem I’d found myself going through. Free glasses? That was really good.
“Now, it should be tomorrow before we’ll be all ready to transfer you out of the ICU into one of the general wards, but until then, you’ll still be monitored by doctors to make sure you’re improving and don’t deteriorate. We’ll also keep your feeding tube in until then. Do you understand?”
The feeding tube was something I’d learned about that day. Turns out? Apparently, being in a coma or unconscious isn’t all pretty; if you can’t eat? They have to put a feeding tube in you. Great. “Yes, doctor.” Still, the feeding tube was the last thing I was thinking about at that moment; instead, it was an ache, one of missing everything and everyone I knew.
I tried to stuff the pangs of homesickness that were wafting up into me away again. I… wasn’t very successful. So I piped up instead of remaining silent. “Though… do you have anything I can do while I’m waiting to pass the time?”
“Hmm?” The doctor tilted his head. “Like what?”
I was about to open my mouth and ask if they had TV, but then thought better of it. This was Equestria, not Earth. Or, well, not my Earth; Equestria seemed to be a continent on a slightly different version of Earth. And Equestria, as far as I knew, had no home TVs.
There were no phones, either, other than presumably primitive early 90s phones and actual landline phones, though even those phones I wasn’t sure existed. Computers and the World Wide Web? Those were probably right out.
Mentally, I resolved to look that up in a book…
‘Wait. A book?’
I felt a smile slowly growing on my face. There were none of those here in Equestria (to my knowledge), but there were books! That meant that I would be able to read books to my heart’s content!
“Do you have any books here?” I almost blurted out. “Fiction, I mean.”
The doctor blinked, before he sighed. “…no, unfortunately. Not at the moment, at least; we were looking to get some soon, but even if we did have them, generally we don’t allow anything too potentially hazardous in the ICU.”
I almost wilted - I probably would have, had it not been for the restrictive probable bandages on my arms (forelegs?) and neck. It had been ages since I’d been able to read a proper book. The last time I’d been able to do so had been… a year ago? Two? I didn’t remember.
That was the point that I realised I probably couldn’t read a book even if I wanted to. My forelegs were wrapped up in bandages, after all, and despite that big pointy magical focus in the center of my forehead, I couldn’t exactly use magic - I’d been human before, after all, and deep down I probably was still human.
I tried to ignore the strange pang of sadness that thought brought me, and focused back on the doctor.
“So I’ll just be stuck here with nothing to do?” I asked, feeling my lips turn downwards.
“Well… if you want, you can talk with me.” He gave a bright smile.
I tried not to wince, but I think my ears must have folded back, because I could see his face fall a little. “…thank you for the offer, I guess,” I said. “But… I don’t know what I’d want to even talk about, or where to even start. I… well, have health anxiety, so talking about hospital events will just make me feel worse.”
“…that’s completely understandable,” Doctor Horse said, giving a sad sigh. “I’ve known a few ponies with health anxiety. It, well… let’s just say it’s hard to break.”
“Trust me, I know.” I sighed, thinking back to the last few times I had been to the hospital. During one of them, I’d even had a complication happen where I’d had a… well, let’s just say it wasn’t pretty, but I didn’t lose any limbs or anything.
The room descended into awkward silence, Doctor Horse trying not to meet my eyes.
Then the door cracked open, and I saw the nurse from earlier poke his head in. “Doctor, there’s someone here to see her.”
The doctor perked up almost immediately. “Oh? Really? Who is it?”
“Um, well… you know. That one.”
The doctor seemed to brighten even further at that. “Oh, I see! Let her in. I’ll stay off to the side.”
“Are you sure? Can’t she be a bit…” The nurse almost winced. “Energetic?”
“Well, she’s not nearly as bad as miss Pie. She at least respects ICU rules.”
“…you’re right. Fine… though, miss Shimmer?” The nurse turned his muzzle (not nearly as square as muzzles the stallions in the cartoon had, but still a bit bulkier than mine, which looked pretty close to the animated ones… which was weird to think about) towards me. “Just… be prepared, okay? Some of us Ponyville folk can be a bit… strange.”
I blinked a couple of times as the nurse stepped back from the door. There was a story there almost. But also, if it wasn’t Pinkie who was visiting… then who was?
My question was answered a minute or so later, when the door daintily creaked open, a soft blue aura around it. “…thank you! I swear, I would never find this place without your help; this place is awfully drab, and I can barely imagine what it must be like to work here,” came a voice with a pretty distinct accent - transatlantic, with a light, feminine tone.
I could actually feel my ears perking up. It wasn’t exact, but it sounded like…
A white-furred head poked into the room muzzle-first around the side of the door, a long purple mane and shiny white horn extending from the top. “Oh my stars, it’s true! You’re finally awake, after that dreadful fall!” she said, a large smile on her face that extended into her deep blue eyes - which were perfectly accentuated by the light touch of makeup around them.
I froze. In hindsight, I probably should have seen something like this coming - I mean, I had been transformed into Sunset Shimmer, for goodness’ sakes, and I was in Ponyville, a town that could only be described as chaos capital of Equestria.
The unicorn stepped the whole way into the room, solidifying my assessment of her as I saw her cutie mark - three nicely polished and cut blue gemstones.
“Oh, I’ve yet to introduce myself, haven’t I?” The mare sighed dramatically, her eyes falling. “How rude of me. I come in treating you like a friend, but you don’t even know who I am! Well, that can be pretty easily fixed. More easily as certain fabrics, mind you, but… well, that’s for another time.” She smiled. “Regardless, it’s quite a pleasure to finally meet you! I am Rarity.”
Even if it was gonna happen eventually, I didn’t expect to meet one of the Elements of Harmony right away!
Author's Note
Sooo… here’s an attempt at a new story. I’ve seen a lot of stories transport people into Equestria as many of the Mane Six - some Twilights, some Raritys, even some Pinkies - but I’ve yet to see one where the human becomes Sunset Shimmer.
Here’s hoping it’s okay so far.
