Kawa's Attempts at Self Discovery and Squick

Note to self: do not wish upon a falling star while pleasantly drunk.

I’m Kawa. Well, that’s not my real name but frankly my real name... I don’t really like my real name very much. Most of what little friends I have know me by my handle. Now, I wouldn’t say my life is all that bad per se, but it certainly wasn’t up to snuff. Had some vague ideas on why but for some stupid-ass reason my mind just never wants to work with me when I try to figure out what exactly I want in life.

What is your name? Kawa.

What is the air speed velocity of an unladen European swallow? Eleven meters per second.

What is your quest? Fuck me sideways if I know.

So yeah. I’m just sitting there late at night in my... place of residence, reading TV Tropes and shit, having a beer... now, I don’t usually drink beer, but when I do... I realize I haven’t drawn the curtains all this time. Or maybe someone else opened them again when I wasn’t around? Who even knows, right? And just when I look out the window I spot this real nice falling star.

Now, I know they’re not stars. But that’s just what the phenomenom is called, y’know? So I see a falling piece of space rock burning through the upper atmosphere, and I think two things.

Actually more than two because fuck my derailed train of thought! But two things stood out.

“That’s a first.”

“Might as well be a dumbfuck and make a wish.”

And so, as I draw the curtains, I find myself blacking out. That doesn’t happen all too often either. Last time I remember blacking out (is that even a thing?) was when I had my teeth fixed in the hospital. And that was just a general anesthetic. Gotta love those and my tendency to talk through it, only to have my words cut out and then seamlessly continue what could be hours later.

But this was no anesthetic.

If I wasn’t actively blacking my shit out, I’d joke about the brain tumor I don’t actually have.

What could be hours later, I snapped back to consciousness and scrambled to finish a sentence I never started. I realized my stupidity on that part and forced my eyes to open. My first realization was that I was not inside, nor was it the middle of the night. It was what could’ve been early in the day, if my sense of time wasn’t as shot as so many other parts of my mental experience. Speaking of experience, I proceeded to turn myself around so I could get up easier. It was pretty obvious I wasn’t in a bed or anything, so I couldn’t do my usual thing and swing my legs off the side and let kinematics handle the rest. Therefore, plan B came in effect and that’s why I was turning to face down.

It hadn’t really registered until then, but I was apparently lying on grass. It looked like pretty good grass to boot. Not that I’m the kind of guy who’d know one kind of grass from the other – in fact that’s among the last kind of topic I’d know about. But at least it wasn’t sand. Could’ve been itchy if it were and I do so hate being itchy.

My second realization was that, now that I had turned around and was lying flat on my stomach, my testicles hurt. That wasn’t supposed to happen. But if there’s one way to relieve pressure on your nuts when you’re lying on ‘em, it’s to get your fat ass up, and that’s what I was planning to do in the first place.

Something didn’t quite register when I pushed up from the ground. Something important, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. As I stumbled upright, it hit me. My balance was shot and my legs felt colder than usual, and that was, of course, because I was not human any more. How droll.

Carefully, I dropped back onto the ground and stuck my arm out. No hand, as I’d half-expected and I still had my shirt and jacket, which I did not expect at all. That was really all I needed to know. I’d figure out the details later.
I seemed to be a steel blue pony, still a man, and still blonde. It seemed that my tail, which I had turned to in order to find out that color, had taken on my white streak, which made me wonder if the one in my… mane, I guess, still had the original.
More importantly, was I still balding? Nah, just kidding, that’s not the more important thing at all. The more important thing was a matter of mobility, cos I had no experience walking on four legs worth a damn. Still, no better way to figure it out than to practice!

I rolled around on the grass to get my bearings straight – actually all that rolling got my bearings in a bit of a tangle, ow – and see where the nearest civilization’s at. No idea which way’s north, but there was a familiar-looking town in one particular direction. Could it be?

Fuck yeah it could be!

I tried to get up again and found some footing on all four legs. That was the easy part. Balancing was a cinch if I didn’t try to stand upright! But how do you walk on four legs? I ended up staggering my dumb flank (“get with the vernacular, bro!”) towards town, looking like it was anything but an unspecified but non-zero and probably larger than six amount of hours since I had that beer.

By the time I’d reached the edge of town, I just looked kinda stupid, which was a great improvement in its own right. But then, I usually look a little stupid. ‘Derpy’, you might even say. It’s why I keep squinting, or cheating with my hat. Which I had completely forgotten about, so I halted and felt around the top of my head. How that glorious black motherfucker hadn’t fallen off when I was rolling in the grass I would never understand, but hey I still had my fedora. All was good.

And then she came.

My vision turned entirely pink as a certain you-know-damn-well who stood way too close to me and started babbling in my face. I couldn’t make out the words, she was going that fast.

“Pinkeh”, I interjected. Or maybe rather tried to interject. She didn’t catch it, obviously.

“Pinkeh, stahp.”

Now, I’d like to apologize for the obvious meme. I’ve had way too much of those and in fact my best spoken English is built upon a foundation of quotes and Internet memes. Did I forget to mention that back on page one? I’m not a native English speaker; I’m Dutch. Those who know me from the Internet might think I’m pretty good at English but there’s a very important difference between written and spoken language that was about to bite my glorious pony ass.

“And I’ve never ever ever ever seen you before”, Pinkie rambled. Almost automatically, my shit brain connected a few dots that really shouldn’t be, and I sang a subdued line from a game’s copy protection filler.

“Never ever ever eat nectarines washed~”

“What?”

That shut her up. Thank you shit brain! And now that she wasn’t rambling I had an opportunity to process what she had said.

“Wacht ‘ns even”, I mumbled in my native tongue. “Sta jij daar nou een beetje in ‘t Engels te hinneken?”