The Bjorn Identity

“Water is a giver, and what it gives is wet.”

~ Ditzy Doo

There it was again. That voice.

I was only vaguely aware that I was even moving my arms, because from where I was laying, there was nothing to see, yet every time I moved, I heard the same voice.

“Now, now, you mustn’t move so much, you’re in no condition to exert yourself . . . poor creature.”

Poor creature?

When I thought about it though, I did feel pretty poorly. Everything was black, like the lights were turned off, and all I knew was the sound of the voice, which scolded me every time I made a move. Jeez, what was so bad about wanting to scratch an itch. Of course, there was nothing like laying in complete and total darkness, and feeling like you’re about to fall off of a really high perch or, high place, or something high . . . I was having a hard time putting together coherent words.

It didn’t take long before I found the effort of thinking to be too taxing, and I drifted off to sleep, right about the time, I heard a second voice waft through the darkness.

“Hello, can you hear me yet?”

I wanted to say, “Yes, loud and clear.” But I had already drifted too far off.

~   ~   ~

I woke up the next morning, with a firm monotonous poking on my shoulder, and because it was dark, or rather, because I could feel that my entire head was wrapped in something, I had no clue what the poking was, or where it was coming from, or if maybe I was imagining everything, and it was really my body somehow dying on me, and it was all starting as some sort of strange rhythmic spasm in left shoulder. But that was probably not the case.

    The poking continued for a while, and eventually I decided that it was time I put an end to it, and moved my hand to swat it away, only to find my hands had been restrained by something. Well this was way out of line. I was in no mood to be toyed with, and it was now time to be vocal.

    “Oh my,” came the soothing drifty and far away voice from before, that is, before I conked out before. “I see someone is awake.”

    I was trying to move my mouth to form the words I wanted to speak, but as soon as I thought of what I wanted to say, the poking resumed again, and this time it was focused on my head. Well, there went any hopes of me trying to actually put together something sage-like and profound, so it ended up being an unintelligible muffled gibberish. Which was probably due to the fact that my mouth was wrapped as tight as the rest of my face.

    “Oh, stop that!” the soothing voice said, and instantly the poking ceased. God bless you soothing voice. You were my new hero.

    “Don’t you have work dear?” the voice said, and I realized that it was speaking to someone else, which meant that if two plus two equals four then that meant that the poking was actually someone else poking me. Why of all the deliberately strange things to do, and for some reason, I thought of ways to get even, with who or what was doing that cursed poking.

    “I wanted to see how he was doing.” It sounded like the voice from before, the other voice from before. So that meant that three plus three was, oh who cared.

    “Well, alright dear, but you’ll have to stand back.”

    Stand back? What was going to happen? Was I about to do something?

    “Can you hear me?”

    This was my chance, I just knew it. I mumbled a few things, through the wrappings over my face, then waited.

    “I see. Alright, I’m about to remove the bandages a little bit.”

    I could feel things pulling on my arms, and then suddenly they were free. Though the truth be told, I was too terrified of what was coming next to try and struggle much. I figured the best thing I could do was to sit there and take what was coming, even if I had no idea what I was about to do. I was obviously a mystery.

    The next part took me by complete shock, when the voice told me, “Now I have to tell you dear, you’ve been in a terrible accident, and it was thanks to pure luck that you were rescued when you were, or else the damage would have been much more extensive.”

    Accident? Oh man, I hated this news.

    There were things pulling on my head, and I could feel fabric being removed from my face, then as suddenly as sudden things can happen, there was a sharp piercing light in both of my eyes, and I instinctively brought my arms up to shield my face.

    “Now it’s alright,” I heard the voice say. “There is nothing to be afraid of.”

    That’s easy for you to say.

    “Easy does it.” There was more wrappings being removed, and as the last of them were brought away, I slowly opened my eyes. before me I saw, well, I saw two smiling faces. One of them was bright white, and wore a strange cap on her head, and just behind her, I had to assume it was a her anyway, was another face, all gray with bright blond hair.

    “Where am I?” It sort of shocked me, hearing my own voice. I guess I expected it to sound deeper or something. “Who are you?”

    “Yay!” I looked past the white faced lady and saw the gray faced lady clapping her, well it was hard to describe, but hooves would be the best word I can use. She was definitely clapping her hooves.

    “My name is Nurse Redheart, and you’re in the Ponyville hospital.”

    “What’s wrong with me?”

    “First, try and tell us what you remember last,” she said. “What was the last thing you did, or were doing?”

    Hmm, that was a toughie. I wasn’t really sure on that one. I told her that I remembered being in some sort of water; to which the gray faced lady started spinning about, and clapping more.

    “Yay! Do you remember me picking you up from the water?” she said to me, leaning in close to the doctor.

    “As a matter of fact . . . no.” Her face drooped a little.

    “What’s your name dear?” Redheart asked, as she pressed her hoof gently on my forehead, making a face of concern.

    “Oh that’s easy,” I told her. “I don’t remember.” Damn, no name. I knew I had one, but for some reason it was as blank as the face of the nurse. That is, white, no, blank was right the first time.

    “Ooh, I know,” said the gray faced lady behind Redheart. “We can call him Bjorn.”

    “What?” Redheart asked. I could tell she thought it was a ridiculous suggestion, but only because her face seemed to say it.

    “Yeah, it’s perfect. We can call you Mason Bjorn, it’s the name of my favorite hero in my all-time favorite spy novels!”

    “Actually, that’s not too bad,” I said, considering it could have been something like Brittany or Justin.

    “Are you telling me you don’t remember your name, or what you were doing?” Nurse Redheart was checking my arms and legs as she asked me this, and I know that it must have been difficult for her to understand, but it was the honest truth.

    “Oh dear,” she said. “I’m afraid it’s worse than we thought.”

    Worse, what was so wrong with me before?

    “I’m afraid you have amnesia.”

    Suddenly the gray lady jumped between me and Nurse Redheart, and brought her face as close to mine as she could, smiling broadly. “Hi Bjorn, I’m Ditzy! I found you in the water!” Her face was not right, that is to say, it was different than the nurse’s. Aside from being gray, she had eyes that seemed to look in different directions; golden honey colored eyes that radiated electric excitement.

    “Hi Ditzy,” I said waving at her. “So is this amnesia a bad thing?”

    “Yes,” Redheart said. “It means that you have no memory.”

    “Well, that doesn’t sound all that horrible. But what was I wrapped up in bandages for?”

    Suddenly both Ditzy and Nurse Redheart looked somewhat uncomfortable, and Nurse Redheart reached beside her and brought up a hand mirror in her hooves.

    “I’m afraid the accident has left you rather disfigured Mister Bjorn.”

    “What?”

    “We did the best we could, but the healing magic from the doctors just wasn’t enough to bring your fur back, to say nothing of your face.” holding up the hand mirror for me to get a look at myself, I held my breath and beheld my face, or what was left of it anyway.

    “Oh God no!” I shouted reaching for the mirror. “Oh no, I’m hideous!”

    Honestly, there wasn’t really anything wrong with my face. I just assumed that I’d look something like them, but then, considering my trauma, I guess a little panic was in order, seeing as how I was actually a human, and they were ponies. Yeah, that’s right, ponies. The animal kind, and had I not had some sort of brain trauma, I’d have easily remembered that ponies were not supposed to talk, or walk, or hand me mirrors.

    “I think you look cute!” said Ditzy, as she bounded over to me, and looked into the mirror with me. “Like a little tiny cuddly kitten.” Boy was she ever hitting for center field, and striking out.

    “Will my face grow back?” I asked, in a panic, and at the verge of tears.

    “It’s hard to say my dear. For now you need to focus on getting better. You need to rest, and see if any of your memory comes back.”

    “Oh shoot!” Ditzy said, as she noticed the clock on the wall. “I have my routes.”

    “Routes?” I asked, not understanding.

    “I’m a mail-mare,” she said striking a pose, and saluting. “From Canterlot to Trottingham, and Cloudsdale to Ponyville; no rain shall win, or wind prevail, to keep the ponies from their mail!”

    “Oh wow.” I said, clearly impressed, but mostly from the chant. “Well best of luck on your routes Miss Ditzy.”

    Then as if a thought only just occurred to her, she moved over close, and whispered in my ear, “If anyone brings up Derpy, just ignore it.”

    “What’s a Derpy? Is it bad?”

    “Yes,” she said, in a serious tone. “Make sure you have nothing to do with it.”

    “Absolutely not, you have my word.” Though really, I was not exactly sure what I was giving my word for, it seemed best to err on the side of caution.

    “Gotta go,” she said, and trotted out of the room.

    “She’s a nice lady.”

    “Well, she certainly is an interesting pony,” said Nurse Redheart, “I’ll give her that.”

    What a strange day this was turning out to be. I guess, I should have been more panicky than I was, but for some reason, I hadn’t a care in the world, except for thinking that my face was horribly disfigured in an accident, and that I had no memory of who or where I was, or what I was doing. All in all, not a bad day.

    “Now, you get some rest, I’ll check back in on you in an hour or so.’ Suddenly her face took on a more serious expression, with the next part. “There were some things in your possession, when you were brought in, and well . . . some of them were quite unsettling Mister Bjorn.”

    She left the hospital room, and I suddenly felt a chill of unease. It was that last part that had me. What could I have had? But then, what was I doing in the water in the first place?

    One thing was for sure, I had questions, and when i got back on my feet, and out of this hospital, I intended to find some answers.