“This will be the most relaxing weekend ever.”
The week is over, is Saturday morning, and I’m home.
We all know what it means: brand new episode of My Little Pony and without any exhausting human relation for the next 48 hours, excluding obviously my fellows bronies on the Internet with whom discuss another epic half hour of my favorite show.
This is life.
I wake up with a smile on my mouth, for the first time since the last week.
Should I wear something different of my pajama?
Yeah, sure.
Just the time to recoil my hairs in the usual horsetail, grab the biggest bag of chocolate cookies I have at home and I’m in front of the computer.
Yes, I follow streams on internet because I don’t have Hub.
Fuck: I need the bath.
Well, There are still a couple of minutes before the airing,
Let’s get this over with.
I stand up lazily from my hand chair and walk as fast as I can to the toilet. I grab the doorknob and pull the door open, walking in with my eyes still almost closed, not completely used to the morning light coming from the windowless room.
Wait.
“Hi Richard!” Twilight waves in my direction.
Really.
Again.
I sigh.
“Twilight, please.. can’t you warn me the next time you decide to transform the door of my bathroom in an inter-dimensional portal?” I say making a couple of steps inside the Ponyville library.
“Eh, sorry about that. We are still working on the communication part.” She blushes a bit.
“Oh, hi Spike”
“Sup.” The little dragon answers to me, carrying his usual huge pile of books to the first floor, leaving us alone.
Silence.
“Umm, Twilight?”
“Yes?”
“Did you realize that there was a motive for me to use the bath, right?”
“Oh, yeah..” her blush deepens while the mare points to a little door at the opposite side of the room.
“Thank you.” I say before disappearing behind it.
A couple of minutes passes.
“Much better now..” I admit with relief, then I turn to her “..So, explain me why I’m stuck again here, with the risk of missing the new episode that involves Applebloom’s cousin. Do you remember what Celestia ordered after she knew what happened between me and Pinkie, right?” I remember to her sitting on the chair nearer to me.
“Oh, those things happened just month ago! Babs Seed-“
“No spoilers!” I interrupt her.
“Oh, okay. Anyway I can send you back at the exact moment you entered the portal.”
She pauses for a second. “I remember what the Princess told us about humans and ponies doing.. things, but this is a case of scientific interest.”
I should expect this.
I look at her waiting for some explications.
She clears her voice and begins the introduction.
“Did you ever desire to be a pony?”
I give her a very eloquent glance: she perfectly knows the answer.
“Well, as it can seems strange and shocking, there are also some ponies that want to become human for a day at least.”
“I think this can be a little offensive towards the human race.”
“Oh, I didn’t men to be rough: it’s just… unusual, that’s it.”
I wave an arm. “No problem, we deserve it.”
She looks at me interrogatively.
“The next time I will bring an History book.”
“Okay, thanks.”
“So, where were we?”
“Oh, yes: there is an unicorn that seems obsessed by that absolutely normal dream.”
I roll my eyes.
“Her name is Lyra Heartstings.”
“Why am I not surprised?”
“Do you know her?”
I stare.
“Right: the brony thing. Are you really so into us to know every pony’s name?”
“You have no idea, and you don’t want to know.”
She gulps.
“Remember. In this very moment, at least a dozen of social retarded humans are observing us.”
She looks at me a little scared.
I nod.
“…Can we return to the main matter?” I ask a little annoyed.
“Sure: I recently found a spell that allows to exchange the minds of two beings for an indefinite amount of time, obviously is a
reversible enchantment. I’m sure you know where this is going.”
“Pretty much.”
“Any questions?”
“Yes.” I think for a moment.
“Would it be painful?”
“Not likely”
“How much can I stay ponified without any danger of being stuck in an unicorn?”
“As long as you two want to. But you have to wait at least one week before come back, on order to avoid any risk of brain damaging.”
“Not a problem. Will I be able to use magic?”
“I think yes, but it will need a lot of practice.”
“..So, I will be a mare and she will be a man?”
“Yes, clearly, at least physically.”
I grin.
“Can I remember to you that anything you do with her body, she can do the same with yours.”
“Oh.. right..”
“So do you agree?”
“One last thing: will she be sent in my body back on Earth?”
“Nope: she is way too much obsessed with humans, and if she goes onto your universe, we can’t control her. This test is about the implications of the influence that the body can have on a completely different mind respects its original one.”
“Then I’m in.”
“Good. We can reach her house right now.” She says trotting to the exit, me following her closely.
“Did you never considered a spell that simply transforms a pony in an human and vice versa?”
Twilight giggles. “Such a thing exists only in fantastic novels. Is not a thing the real magic can do.”
“If you say so..” I mutter.
I will never understand magic logic.
__
“Here we are!” The unicorn stops in front of a house, similar to all the others that composed the little town, pretty simple, for pony esthetic tastes. She knocks at the door. Just few seconds pass before it opens slowly with an acute noise. I notice the presence of a golden eye observing us from the half opened entrance, an aqua strip of mane surrounding a horn of the same color.
“Hello Lyra, it’ me, Twilight and this ismy friend- Oh my gosh Richard!”
Before I can process anything, a mint coated filly smashes me on the ground, locking me with her magic aura, a meter taking the measures of my arms legs and back.
“Right arm: 80 inches length, few muscles. Legs: almost 100 inches, muscular mass considerably increased..” she says to herself writing the data on a little block notes.
As my sudden headache quiets down, I can her Twilight screaming at her and counter her force field.
“Are you okay?” The purple pony asks looking at my Derpy eyes that are returning slowly at their normal positions.
“Yes.. I think, but I’m not sure that I will let her use my body if she’s always so.. energetic.” I say massaging the back of my head.
“Well, usually she is a little more mannered, and her behavior is surely explicable with her excitement for the new situation, right Lyra?” she turns to the green pony now enveloped in an isolation magical sphere.
“Erm.. sure!” She says with a nervous smile.
“I think we didn’t presented yet: I’m Richard the Human, charmed.” I give her a hand, gesturing to Twilight to set her free.
The unicorn looks at me, her eyes wide, glistening in enthusiasm and amazement as she slowly nears her fore hoof, trembling, to my hand. After a little hesitation, I decide to grab it gently and shake it a little.
Oh God, please don’t freak out.
After some instants of silence my eyes return on her muzzle: she’s crying.
Time to panic?
I look for a moment to Twilight, that simply shrugs, then at the musician again.
Nah.
“Hey, everything’s alright?” I dare to ask.
“I’m just thinking that you are the best thing that happened in my life.”
Who knew that Lyra’s life sucked so much?
A nervous laugh escape my mouth.
“Well thanks. This is a great experience for me too..” She smiles sincerely at me, and I can’t help but do the same thing a little commoved by her words.
Twilight alternate her glance between us, not sure what to do.
“Can we get in?”
She agrees and we enter the little house. The inside is pretty much of what can be defined usual or even boring: the decors all made in wood, pretty poor of mannerisms. Just a thing creeps me out: Human posters. The walls are completely covered by images of beings that are supposed to belong to my same specie, but reveal themselves as nothing more of what ponies believed a human could look like, reading all the legends about their existence. Those paintings remember me of something I already saw on Earth.
The aliens of Roswell.
Seems that contacting other universes, at least in the long past of Equestria, was very popular.
“Lyra?” I broke the ice a little embarrassed.
“Yes?”
“Don’t you think that now you know how we are really, you can get rid of these.. things?” I ask pointing at them. She immediately shakes her head.
“No! They are the characters of my favorite stories, and they are beautiful in their exotic aspect! Just like you!”
Someone please just tell me if I must feel offended or fluttered by that.
I decide to don’t say anything, until we reach the living room. The aqua filly invites us to sit on the sofa, almost immediately trotting in the kitchen and returning with three cups of tea and a plate of cookies.
You know what? Dimensional travel is not a good excuse to miss breakfast.
“Dig in everypo- I mean everybody!” She cheers to us making the levitating objects land softly on the coffee table in front of us. Without doubt, I take a biscuit and wet it in the little cup, consuming it in a couple of bites, intercalated with sips of the warm drink. Pony cousine is best cousine.
“Delicious.” I say, my attention sliding from my hunger to the other ponies in the room.
I almost jump on my seat when I notice that a couple of yellow eyes are just a couple of inches from my nose.
“EEK!” I squeak.
When making Sweetie Belle imitation will become a cool thing, I will be full of girls.
The green filly backs her head, a little scared too by my reaction.
Twilight observes me a little perplex, like to say ‘really?’. I try to relax a little.
Thanks to a merciful divinity, I was the only human ever reached Equestria: no social standards to be compared to.
“S-sorry! I just saw you HOLD the cup with your FINGERS and BITE the cookie with your CANINES..”
Ok, this is weird even for a brony that bucked Pinkie Pie. The librarian seems pretty shocked.
“Seems that some pony studied pretty well the book about Human anatomy I brought here the last time, right?” I blink to her, who hides her head between the shoulders.
Yep, just trying to ease the tension.
“Tee hee! Oh thanks!” she whines turning completely red.
“Just remember one thing: Humans don’t like to be observed so close and need personal space. We are individuals like ponies, not animals.” And here it goes the strangest sentence of the month.
“So, there are some doubts of our nature that I can dissipate?”
Oh, I can become such a good speaker when some.. living thing, give me enough ambiguous compliments.
Yes, I’m a narcissistic bitch.
Lyra takes out of nowhere an endless scroll.
A stupid narcissistic bitch.
__
That was the Longest afternoon of my life.
I never expected I had so much to say to anybody in row about.. well, everything of my universe.
And I never Expected to be so ignorant about my own world. Aside of embarrassing questions like ‘Why do your race is so uselessly violent?’ or ‘If you are omnivores, why don’t you choose vegetarianism?’ or again ‘How can you sure that planet turns around the sun and not the contrary if you never saw it by outside?’
That was a good one.
After lot of mumbling and reflecting, I tried to take what I thought to be the ‘easy way’ centering the discussion on my life and personal story.
Huge, enormous, mistake.
‘How much friends do you have?’
‘Why don’t you have any friend?’
‘Surely at least you have a wife, right?’
‘A girlfriend?’
‘A.. boyfriend?’
‘Why are you so alone?’
At the end of this torture here I am, tired -and deeply depressed-, Twilight finishing to write any work I say.
I hope that nobody will ever read that.
“Well, that was.. interesting…” The purple unicorn sighs standing up
.
At least she had the sensibility to not evidence the reality.
“.. and pretty sad.”
Twilight is worst pony.
“So can we do this and make you shut up?” I ask sarcastically a little roughly.
“Sure, sure, calm down..” She waves at me. “Just position yourselves in front of each other and concentrate.
“About what?” I ask.
She grunts “I..” suppressing the rage “.. don’t know, cupcakes?”
I shrug “’Kay.. egghead..” I whisper.
“Fine.. freak..” she responds.
Lyra just remains in front of me, a evidently uncomfortable with the little battle.
“Okay every.. being.” The librarian declares “Don’t move, it will end soon..” She says closing her eyes , her horn glowing more brightly by any second, creating gradually an aura that envelops us all.
I shut my eyes.
Don’t panic.. think cupcakes.
Cupcakes..
Yep.
Sweet sweet cupcakes.
__
‘Why ponies kill ducks to do couches but can’t accept that the humans feed with them?’
The fact that this ridiculously interesting question was the first thing that came to my mind after waking up just confirmed me that I was in a new brain right now.
Pushing away those silly thoughts, I concentrate on any feeling that can come from my new living shell.
It seems pretty normal.
Why does it fells so normal?
Oh God what went wrong.
I don’t dare to lift my new eyelids.
“Is anybody there?” A familiar voice asks, probably in my direction.
I just nod.
“He can hear me.. good.”
“Do you think he’s right?” another voice attire my attention.
Where did I heard that one?
Oh yeah: that’s mine. It’ a little deeper than I expected, or are the mew ears that I have to give me this impression. Nevermind.
Okay world, brace yourself: Richard the unicorn is coming.
There I am: a not balanced on two legs version on me, smiling widely and welcoming me agitating .. my left hand.
I already know that this is gonna be so much weird.
“..Aand he’s gone.” Twilight says observing my eyes rolling back an my head landing on the pillow.
__
“Rise and shine sleepy head!”
“Fluttershy, is that you?”
“No, just a sarcastic Twilight, we are in the library, we brought you back.” The purple unicorn responded.
I open my eyes again, the light of the morning a little uncomfortable. This huge ponies eyes seems very sensible. I blink a couple of times trying to adapt my sigh to the luminosity of the room, immediately distinguishing the violet silhouette of the Element of magic, who just looks at me with a little smile.
She’s hiding something, that little braniac.
I’ll discover it.
Later.
Not giving to much attention to it, I clear my dried throat and stretch a little my fore hooves, that suddenly come in my view: the two aqua appendages are in front of me now, moving on my command without any effort. I can fell the muscles warming up and waking inside them. I scratch them my head, my new short hair -or mane- smooth under my touch.
Hey, ponies have touch senses under the hooves.
I look at my new arm for a moment, just waving it a little, still trying to process that it belongs to me now. I thought that after reaching Equestria just trying to go to the bathroom, I became used to these situations.
How I was wrong.
I was actually amazed.
A rush of euphoria slowly begins to flow in my chest, mi body trembling a little, feeling an huge grin forming under my nose realizing effectively what just happened.
I am a pony.
I am a living magic little –female, who cares- speaking horse.
My wildest dreams now seems just silly.
For a moment I forget of the librarian who merely stares at me, and observe nearly mi light green coat, that results incredibly soft, the my long straight tail, swishing a unwillingly by excitement.
I’m hyperventilating.
“Well? How do you feel?” Twilight asks to me levitating a little block notes and a pen on her side, ready to register my first impressions as a new being.
“I.. oh my God..” I almost don’t recognize the voice that comes out of my mouth. I begin to laugh, at first just giggling, that transforms gradually in a loud hysteric sound, the filly right next to me backing her head and lift an eyebrow.
“Funny.”
I try to calm myself a little. “W- what do you mean?” I ask, holding my belly and still snickering.
“Lyra –you had the same reaction.” She begins to write notes almost instantaneously.
I look at her.
“Yes, we decided a method to call you two without misunderstandings.” She declared. “You are Richard-Lyra and she is Lyra-Richard, we consider you still a male, she can be considered a female.”
“Seems reasonable.”
“Obviously it is, I decided it.”
I roll my eyes.
“When she woke up?”
“She didn’t. She never fainted like you: seems that a mare have a stronger mind than you, mister.”
Don’t give her satisfaction. Just Breathe.
“So where is she?”
“Right in the library, still trying to figure out how to walk on two legs.” She giggles at the thought.
“I can’t miss this!” I say jumping out of the bed and planting my muzzle in the ground, fact that remembers me I need some practice too.
Pony noses are damn sensible.
Twilight looks at me.
“Don’t even think about laugh.” I mutter, lifting my upper body on the anterior legs and massaging my muzzle.
Here comes the hard part.
I point as stably as I can my posterior legs on the ground, then pulling up. Oddly, I found myself standing up on four appendages quite easily. A little smirk evidence my proudness to the purple unicorn.
“Congratulations! You have the same coordination of a newborn foal!” She compliments clapping the hooves slowly.
Here it goes my self-esteem.
“Shut up.” I say trying to do a couple of steps to the door, in order to reach the main room, my legs trembling a little, still finding some difficulties in balancing my big head, as the mare follows me, still chuckling.
Oh no, stairs.
I turn back: she’s observing me, still grinning.
“You know what? This is not my body ad I don’t care.” I make a couple of steps back, ready to charge towards the ramp and jumping on its edge, with painful consequences at the end of my first little experience as a Pegasus. I close my eyes and then move rapidly against it.
I really hope that ponies are tougher than humans.
As I find myself in mid- air, ready to feel the corners of stairs smashing my bones, I fell something stopping my fly.
I lift my eyelids and see that a purple levitation aura is enveloping me, making me land delicately at the inferior floor.
“What the heck was you trying to do?!” she shouts, teleporting just a couple of inches from me. “This is not your body and you don’t care?! How can you be so irresponsible?!” she shrieks, gritting her teeth.
“Twilight.. cool down.” I say nonchantly.
“What?! Were you really trying to hurt yourself just to avoid a little enforce of doing a dozen of stairs?!”
“No.”
“Then what?!”
“I actually avoided that fatigue exploiting your care for Lyra’s body.”
She is boiling. Some ponies just can’t accept to lose.
“I.. You..” She grunts, her mane almost becoming fire.
“Do you want to hurt me? Go ahead.” I say turning my head and showing her my cheek.
It’s incredible how these creatures are good in suppressing anger.
Stupid peaceful horses.
“You are.. a horrible being.” She alliterate to me, breathing slowly.
“No, I’m just a human.”
“You are a horrible race then.”
“Pretty much”.
“Hey guys!” a cheerful manly voice concludes our discussion. A human figure sitting at the big circular table in the center of the library.
I missed the show.
“Hey Lyra-me. How are you- What the fuck have you done to my body?!” I squeal, my eyes almost bulging out of my head.
In front of me there is a 20 years old man dressed with black jacket and pants, a white casing under it and a tie perfectly bowed around her neck. Not a trace of my usual unkept short beard on the face.
All those things seems acceptable, even if did not matched my tastes: the hair. My long fluent blonde –sometimes greasy- human mane was been turned to a white and aqua short haircut, accurately brushed on a side forming a line on her head, not a single hair out of its position.
I try to hold tears.
“I just washed up a little and fixed your style.”
I stare, needing some more informations.
“Once I found myself in there, you know, just tried to get comfortable. So Twilight help me to take a shower and called Rarity to design this fantastic suit! Isn’t this amazing?” she said standing up, holding the table to be sure to not fall.
Well, she fell, on MY face, my poor beautiful human face.
Ouch.
“Okay.. I need a moment.” I sigh, facehoofing “You, without my authorization, erased from my head three years of scrupulous cares, just.. to be comfortable..” she opened her mouth to say something, but I continued. “And, worst of all, you made my body seen naked to some ponyelse?” I blushed furiously, not daring to look at Twilight. “I have no words to describe how I fell violated by your actions.” I mutter maybe a little too much dramatically.
“Some pony have a very short memory..” The purple filly whisper to me.
So you were hiding this, uh?
I won this time, nerd.
“Ugh.. Weren’t you supposed to be the good race?” I ask.
“We are, in fact we improved your outfit. Now you are..”
Please don’t.
“..20% cooler!” she says with a false enthusiastic tone, that sounds more cruel than fun.
“It seems that you have a short memory too.”
“Mmh?”
“I told you to shut your mouth.”
__
“Lunch is ready!” Spike exclaimed serving three dishes at the table we are sitting around, occupying the three virtual angles of the square inscripted on its rounded form, the baby dragon on the fourth.
I look down at my plate: a huge salad and some hayfires, a cup of apple juice to gulp it down.
I sigh deeply, then scan how the others are doing: Spike, sat on my left, is devouring his normal portion of assorted gems with hunger, not giving any attention to us; evidently, living every day with a magician, makes look things like body exchange ordinary business.
Twilight more than eating, is observing both me and Lyra, the feather that she used as pen writing furiously, even if I wasn’t doing anything.
Lyra-me was manipulating the fork with her new fingers, her eyes glistening with joy.
Awkward silence.
“So.. I was trying to ask before: how do you fit in my body?” I tried to broke the ice. The human looks up at me, the metallic object still in her palm.
“Oh, there is no way to describe the sensation of absolute and complete happiness you gave me allowing this experiment. I want just to thank you for this..” she paused “.. and I’m deeply sorry to, well, change your body.” She lowers her gaze on the other salad in front of her.
Now I’m the one that feels guilt.
“Oh, no reason to be. A little shower surely can’t be that bad, and my hairs hopefully will grow back soon or after.” I try to sot show the deep pain that provokes to me the mental image of my mane laying, cut of, on the floor. “Just, the next time, when you wash, please assure a little more privacy.” I try to say as politely as I can.
She smiles a little, her cheeks turning red.
I didn’t know that my ex-face could blush.
“I will, promise.” She guarantees. “..But Twilight insisted so much in her necessity of studying human anatomy directly.” She says.
I turn to the unicorn. She is smiling nervousl
y.
“Interested in the merch?” I ask to her.
“Oh, please. Just scientific interest.” she waves at me trying to hide her embarrassment.
Then I finally notice it.
Technically, I am naked.
Ok. There is no need to worry. I have coat and tail right? And Every pony else is in this state too. So there is no need to feel ashamed.
Ok it’s not working, just close my legs and act cool and for any reason do not concentrate your attention at the sensation of being exposed.
Oh God I’m completely nude.
Don’t move. They don’t seems to notice your embarrassment.
“As I was saying: this is absolutely the best thing ever and II will eternal grateful to you for this. Anyway, are you good too?”
I cringe.
“Well, yeah. It’s still kinda weird, but I think with time I can get used to this.” I merely respond, leaving the little conversation die and trying to figure how to use the tail to hide myself.
__
The meal finished pretty uneventfully, with me just eating half of my portion and excluding the hayfries.
I don’t like to experiment new foods, only new bodies.
“Are you two ready for the first test?” Twilight asks to us taking a big book with her magic and opening it on the table.
We both nod.
Well, at least I have something to concentrate to and not my naked rump.
“We will begin with a psychological interrogatory.” The unicorn opens the huge volume, scanning the pages in research of some initial question.
I gulp, having no idea what to expect and adjust my posture in the chair.
Do NOT give attention at the wood scratching on you.
I squeak a little, Lyra giving me a weird look as I put on what I hope is a good poker face.
“Let’s see.. I think that checking out emotional control in this particular and almost shocking situation can be fruitful.” The student considered.
“What do you mean?”
“You are fat.” She says without any particular tone.
__
“Richard! Get out of the Bathroom! I didn’t really meant that!” The purple filly knocks at the bath door.
“I AM NOT FAT!” I scream with my acute voice, between the sobs, sat on the toilet, my muzzle buried by hooves.
Surely all this care about my weight is caused by this new filly brain. After all, I’m an adult man that don’t give any attention at silly insults like that.
Yep, totally.
“Obviously you aren’t! It was just part of the test!” she responds a little worried.
“I JUSTWANTED TO BEA PONY LIKE YOU! WHY ARE YOU SO MEAN TO ME?!
”
Ok, maybe the ’fat‘ part was actually me, but this drama doesn’t comes from me, at least directly. Freaking out for something this irrelevant is not mine: usually the only times I have hysteric breakdowns is because of important things, like when the stream crashes during a new episode.
“Please Richard, We know you are very stressed by this conjuncture and you are a little overreacting. Please come out.”
“WHY NO PONY ADVISED ME THAT I WAS GOING TO LIVE IN EMOTIONALLY UNSTABLE BODY LIKE THIS! WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME?! I HATE YOU ALL!”
This is bad. Whatever is happening to my unconscious, is not right.
After some seconds of silence, I fell some whispers between Lyra and Twilight.
They seems nervous and agitated.
My ears automatically turns to the locked entrance, trying to understand something of the conversation, without success.
Finally, Twilight speaks again to me.
“Um.. Richard. I’m very very sorry for telling you those things, but please, open the door, we need to talk.”
Her tone of voice now is incredibly calm, maybe too much.
“About What?”
“We have to explain it to you when you come out. Please..”
I sigh and decide to stand up and walk to the door, unlocking it and after opening, finding Twilight and Lyra looking very concerned at me. For some reasons, the human don’t seem to handle my gaze, or is just avoiding it.
I sniff, waiting for clarification, drying my cheeks.
“Richard.. I don’t know how to say this.” The element of Magic push down her ears and put an hoof on my shoulder.
I look at her clueless.
“There is something important Lyra didn’t tell me before the exchange. And almost surely is the reason of your.. irritability.”
I nod, a little scared.
Both of them take a long breath.
“Richard.. we think.. that you are entering the heat.”
