Chapter 1
Misplaced Ambitions
The project was nearing completion. Eddies of magic could be felt swirling around the basement below the unicorns temporary lodging, and probably on the street above. He could almost taste the rewards the princesses would bestow upon him for providing the realm a powerful ally in the war that seemed to be looming ahead, after a suitable punishment for dabbling in strictly forbidden dark magic.
He allowed himself a smile as he devoted his attentions to the magical inscriptions engraved in the floor. Each one lit up with a dark gray glow that matched his coat and horn, signaling the final process of the ritual which would require his own participation.
As he started the final stage he felt the spell grab a-hold of his magic as if it had a mind of its own, the spell had worked! Seconds later however; the basement door burst open to reveal a squad strength of equestrian guard standing in the hall beyond. The unicorn merely grinned and said with a halfhearted sigh,
“well done Captain Fleethoof, although you were a little too slow to stop me”
The captain merely walked forward hovering a horn inhibitor before replying,
“you got one chance gray mane, stop the magic and come quietly or things get nasty”
“you see the problem there is, I can't”
Without bothering to continue the conversation forward any further, the newcomer firmly clamped the shackle-like inhibitor on Gray Mane's forehead. But not before a small flash of light emitted from his horn, followed by a tiny dart of magic firing off and fly through an equally small portal that had just formed below the ceiling.
I was drunk, well maybe not all the way drunk but definitely getting there. The night was still young in Spokane and it was my first night cutting loose since leaving the navy. I had been staying with my parents and was none too successfully trying to find a place on my own that I liked. It was about a month after returning home that I felt a sudden push to go out an hit some of the local dives, which was odd in itself in that I was not usually a social drinker.
I had just left a little pub with a typical Irish sounding name -something like Mc Pattersons- and was heading to a Russian vodka joint, when I stumbled into the street. Laughing it off I said to myself,”ok maybe I have had a little too mush”. Giggling at my own little mess up I didn't even notice the bright headlights bearing down on me, or the roar of an engine for that matter. All I heard before I got hit was the screech of breaking tires and a sharper, but more subtle snap of failing breaks.
Needless to say it wasn't pretty, and the last thing I could remember my alcohol addled brain doing before darkness closed in around me, was noticing the emasculating pastel blue color of the offending vehicle and a rainbow decal in the bottom left corner of the rear windshield before grabbing the paramedic trying to get me stable and saying,
“TELL ME DOC, TELL ME IT WASN'T A PRIUS!”
yeah...... great last impression......
I guess they never did get around to fixing those breaks.
Afterwords I could only register the sensation of light and weightlessness for less than a second, then I was jerked into a deeper darkness by a gray light, and started speeding towards a dimly glowing hole........ wow that sounds bad.
Captain Fleethoof was the first to register that something was coming back through and immediately ordered his squad to form a semicircle around the slowly widening portal, leaving a trooper to guard the suspect. His eyes narrowed as he caught something rapidly moving to the portal, and all of a sudden a brown furry object shot through with an audible slam as he hit the ground with the portal snapping shut right behind him.
He could tell that the furry object was definitely appeared to be a male stallion as it clambered to its hooves and glanced around the dimly lit basement, and more importantly at the seven heavily armored unicorns that had him surrounded. The captain thought he heard the creature mumble ,”colorful little ponies, wonderful”. Before it glanced down at itself and passed out without a word.
Fleethoof couldn't suppress the disappointment that he had been a few seconds too late, and it showed when he issued orders to gather up the brown stallion on the floor a little more harshly than he would have otherwise. The smug look on Gray Mane's face didn't really help in that regard so he couldn't help but give one last parting blow to the ecstatic unicorn by saying,
“we caught you in the act this time doctor, and the inquiry is probably going to turn up all of your source material. I don't think you are going to get the academic fame you're hoping for in a dungeon deep below the castle. Hope it was worth it.”
Gray Mane wore an unreadable look as he made his reply,
“maybe so captain, maybe so....”
When I came to, my first thought was, “ouch, being awake hurts” as a sharp pain spiked across my rear end. I could see a dim light shining on me through my eyelids, the air was cold and felt a little damp and I thought I could smell a little mold. It was like S.E.R.E. all over again, well except for the lack of Navy instructors yelling in my ear, “WHERE ARE THE REST OF YOUR COMRADES!”
The first thing I noticed was that the room, more like cell, was only lit by a single candle lamp above me. The slate colored stone block wall was poorly mortared, and in some places had numeric symbols scratched into the sides of the blocks. Oh and that I was sharing a cell with a horse, well pony to be specific. It had a gray coat, mane, for some odd reason gray hooves, and brown eyes. Plopping my head back into my cot -it felt like a straw mattress- I wondered aloud,
”what kind of crazy terrorist group tosses their hostages in captivity with animals?”
I heard someone harrumph loudly before replying,
“Animal? Do they have no class in whatever barbaric world you come from?”
I opened an eye to look at whoever had just spoke, preparing a properly witty comment of course, but it was intercepted by a something I hadn't noticed while getting a view of my surroundings. My shoulder was brown and covered in fur, which I followed down to my arm , which I followed down to my hand. Forgetting everything about the fur, my shock addled brain focused on only one thing. My hands were gone.
Raising the brown, furry, and densely ended appendage before doing the only thing I could really think to do at that second. I hyperventilated and then screamed at the top of my lungs.
Princess Celestia glanced up from the game of chess she was having with one of the nobles, destroying him at it of course, when she heard a small shout and saw the carved crystal wine glass beside the decadently inlaid chessboard shake. She merely glanced at the noble and stated,
“apologies Blueblood, but I must prepare for a hearing with a more or less unwelcome guest.”
Blueblood glanced down at the board one last time before replying,
“oh well, checkmate in three turns”
“checkmate in one”
As Blueblood left the room the princess allowed herself a second to reflect on how much the stallion had changed since a cake bath at the last gala. Then focused on the problem at hoof, namely the brown alien that had literally fallen into her kingdom, and the unicorn that had summoned the problem.
I was still hyperventilating over my new body when I saw the gray pony in the other corner of the cell walk over to me and put a hoof on my shoulder before saying,
“calm down, its not that bad”
“calm down, CALM DOWN! I AM A FUCKING HORSE!”
“pony, and at least you aren't dead.... again, yet”
“yet, what do you mean YET!” I said with an accusing glance.
The gray pony turned to the opposite wall and sighed, he seemed to have a heavy burden on his shoulders. Not that I was in the state to give a shit.
"Your new body might not react well to equestria, you might get sick and die from the red mold fermenting over in the corner there, your old immune system's programming might not like the new body. Who knows what might happen."
“ah”
I looked around the room searching for anything to keep the conversation alive, since it was the only thing keeping me from freaking out about my new body.....again. So I started with the standard prison question...
“So.... what'd they put you in here for, and wait, how'd you know I wasn't from...... around here?”
“I summoned you”
My eye twitched and a red haze slowly started to encroach on my peripherals.
“so you're the reason I'm here?”
“um.....yes?”
“and why did you do this?”
“would you be angry at me if I said it was for wealth and academic glory?”
His attempt at a disarming smile turned to a look of horror as I threw myself out of the cot and jumped on top of him and used his head as a mallet on the floor.... or at least that's how it played out in my head. What really happened was less.... elegant.
I hopped out of the bed at the sight of the cheesy smile he was trying to calm me down with, and face-planted when I landed on my arms (forelegs?). Picking myself up off the floor I managed to stumble a couple steps further before tripping over myself, and once again getting face time with the stone floor. I glanced over at the Gray pony and noticed the shit eating grin that was practically plastered all over his face. With my anger quickly cooling I decided to try a different tactic I absentmindedly decided to call it,
“learn how to walk, then use head as mace”
The pony glanced up at me before asking,”come again? I didn't quite hear you”
“nothing..nothing”
I spent the next thirty minutes walking from corner to corner, stumbling, cussing, and face-planting the entire time. I was remarkably pleased with myself when, after the thirty minutes were up, bowled the pony over and leaped atop of him with a furious battle-cry. Which is how the guard caught me straddling the gray, with my left front hoof placed on the ground for balance and the right cocked back in the air preparing for my next punch and with a black eye, and him laying on the ground in a tiny pool of blood from his battered nose.
The guard merely shook his head and unlocked the iron cell door before stating in a gravelly voice,
“creature, doctor, the princesses wish to speak with you immediately. You will not disappoint them.”
The gray pony instantly got up (sending me sprawling to the ground) and dusted himself off, before asking gravely,
“creature whats your name?”
“why?”
“because you and I might end up dead by sunrise tomorrow, I want to know the name of the creature that I gave my life for”
“Justin, Justin Chamberson.”
“Gray Mane”
The trip out of the dungeons was much of the same thing, when we exited the cell we were boxed in by three more guards, I only remembered the face of the lead pony from when I had first arrived. Evidently Grey Mane knew the lead pony personally. Because when the Gray unicorn spied him he put on a cheeky smile and said,
“so now that you have finally caught me, you have the honor of displaying your trophy to the princesses, Fleethoof?”
“no, I was requested by Princess Celestia personally, I couldn't really give a damn what the Princesses do to you two. Now get moving and keep quiet.”
As we passed by numerous empty prison cells, I couldn't help but ask Gray Mane,
“so what do you think they are going to do to us if they judge us wanting?”
Casting a furtive glance at the pony in front of us, he replied,
“well the oldest reports of Princess Luna's particular brand of justice describes criminals spontaneously turning themselves inside out, though these were only produced after her banishment to the moon and must be called into question. The most recent execution that Princess Celestia has presided over, she just told the poor soul to be at peace, and he died.”
At this point Fleethoof turned his head and directed a withering glare at the both of us before saying,
“I said no talking, next one of you talks is gonna regret it”
Gray Mane couldn't resist one last comment with the same cheeky grin plastered all over his face saying,
“yes boss, righty'o boss!”
Which is when Fleethoof delivered an almost careless swipe to the side of the gray pony's muzzle.
After around ten or so minutes (I wasn't quite in the mind to count) the semi-dreary layout of prison holding cells changed dramatically to what I could only describe as what the inside of a German Gothic style church would look like if it were brighter and happier looking (no seriously those old cathedrals just shriek REPENT! Or is it more like GOD IS WATCHING in the 1984 sense). Stained glass windows dominated the walls every so often, some depicting what I could only guess were the two rulers of wherever I was.
As I passed by one I couldn't help but notice six pony figures blasting what I could only describe as some kind of mutant. I briefly wondered if I had just dropped into some pony version of the Imperium from Warhammer 40k. Shuddering briefly after contemplating the implications of that train of thought I tried to put put it out of my mind.
The rest of the trip was spent much the same, the two of us prisoners walking in silence over bright pink-purple rugs, white-ish pink stone walls and buttresses, and yards upon yards of stained glass windows. We eventually ended up before two dark wood doors, with a quintuplet of guards standing at attention on each side. They were intimidating enough for ponies dressed up in heavy metal armor.
Fleethoof left us behind momentarily with a quick warning to stay put. He conversed with the head guard pony, who kicked the door. Moments later the doors swung open to admit us.
