Second Wind

The falling sensation takes hold of you once more. This time, it's extremely intense. It's elevator snapping it's cables and plummeting from the 100th story of a skyscraper intense. But, just as the last time, it comes just as mysteriously as it goes. Now, you are left with nothing. You remain that way for what seems like several hours. You almost kind of miss the feeling of falling. At least it was SOME form of stimulation. You decide to try to open your eyes. As your eyes slowly open, you immediately begin to panic. It's staying black. You can't see anything. You leap up in your bed, and throw your hands to your face.

Oh Jesus, Mary, and Joseph...

There was just a little bandaging around your eyes. You let your head fall back into the many pillows on your bed. You almost smile from your overreaction, but you are still in an incredible amount of pain. You decide it's best not to remove the bandages from your eyes, because they're probably there for a reason. You choose to use your hands as your new pair of eyes, instead. You gently rub them up and down your body, and touch everything you can around you. You touch your body, and see immediately that they have taken the liberty of removing your shirt. There feels like some seriously heavy bandaging over your shoulder and lower abdomen. At least you aren't bleeding anymore. And your pants are still on, so you still have a LITTLE dignity left. It also feels as if, sure enough, you're in a bed with metal railing around it, cold to the touch.

Hmm...

You feel around your bed. A nightstand, a plate with something on it, a glass of something, a tray of syringes.

Yep. Definitely a hospital.

You place your hand on the arm of a chair. You suppose it was for guests. You run your hand up the wooden arm rests, slowly travelling up. Maybe, you can use this thing for support, and go find the doctor, let him know your awake. You run your hands extremely slowly, so as to make sure you know what your grabbing. You aren't about to fall and hurt yourself more. You are just about to feel the top of the chair, when you run your hand over something furry. In fact, it feels really smooth. One of those really soft towels that really don't dry anything, perhaps? Whatever it is, it's nice. Really nice. It warms your hand from the cold hospital room. You decide to push your hand a little further, find it's source. Your hand travels slowly up the silky material, and then meets a still soft, but more firm fur.

Did someone leave me a teddy bear?

You poke it, but you poke it with extreme caution. It moves.

Whaaaaaaat.

You poke it again. It moves slightly again, and even lets out a content sigh.

Is that your dog? Maybe Mom brought him!

Wait. Do you have a dog? You can't remember.

You slowly start to explore this thing with your hand. You still can't make out anything. It feels like it could be anything from your dog to a woman with long hair. You pray it's not a man with really soft facial hair. You take a deep breath, and decide to try to talk. When you open your mouth, a series of violent coughs comes out, and whatever was in the chair has jumped up. You can't feel it anymore. You decide you may as well talk now.

"H-hello? Who's there?" You ask. You hear an extremely loud gasp, and very frantic clopping from beside your bed and out of the room. They must really polish these floors to make a clop as loud as that.

Good going, jackass. You scared whoever it was off!

"NO, please wait! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to scare you!" You call to them.

"Shiiit..." You smile lazily, and let your head fall back into the warm embrace of your pillows. It really feels comforting to know that someone was in the room with you, albeit asleep. The comfort washes over you, and you begin to feel sleepy once more. While it would be nice to TALK to someone for a change, you decide to sleep. You re-position yourself in your bed, and pull your blankets up to your neck. It feels good to be alive.

_________________________________________________________________________________

Doctor Gauze told you that he probably wouldn't make it. He said he lost entirely too much blood, and, although they mended his wounds, they were still extremely dangerous ones to experience. So, when the thing sits up in the bed, touches you, and blindly fumbles around in the darkness, you're sure Doctor Gauze will understand your surprise. Then, when the creature speaks your language, you're sure he'll understand your fear. You rocketed out of the room, and dash down the corridors of the hospital. You know you're waking many patients, but you're far too gone in your own mind. In a mixture of fear and excitement, you get yourself down the staircase, and to the doctors lounge. You pray Gauze was still here, and had not yet went to bed.

Sure enough, there he is, sipping on his coffee and eating some kind of pastry, while he flips through x-rays of the creature.

"Doctor Gauze, it's awake!" You shout. Gauze looks up lazily at you.

"Hmm? Oh, yes, the primate. He has awoken?" He doesn't look up from his x-rays.

"YES!" You understand that doctors emotionally separate themselves from their patients to avoid any hurt feelings in the event that a patient dies, but his passive behavior is aggravating you.

"Did he attempt to speak to you? Did he climb out of his bed, perhaps?" Gauze asks with a yawn.

"Well, yes, I, he, alright, listen to me! I fell asleep in the chair next to him, and next thing I know, he's touching me! I jump up, and he speaks, and not only does he speak, but he speaks OUR language! I immediately came down here to get you!" A lady isn't supposed to lose her clam demeanor, but you feel justified with your outburst.

"Well, Rarity, I suppose we had better have a look, hmm?" You just stare at him.

"Alright, alright." He scrapes his chair back, puts his mug in his sink, and takes his pastry with him.

"Lets pay our new friend a visit." You follow Doctor Gauze out of the lounge, and feel anxiety building up inside you as you ascend the staircase, nearing the creature once again.

"Doctor, do you know what this thing is? Have you seen anything like it before?" you ask.

"No. But if it's still alive, and apparently doing well, then it's physiology must be somewhat similar to our own." He takes a bite out of his pastry, and a little glob of strawberry filling falls on his lab coat.

"Damn. That's going to leave a stain." He says, looking at the new red spot on his coat. You cannot even begin to fathom why the doctor is taking this all so nonchalantly. A creature, of an unknown variety, randomly shows up in Ponyville, gets mauled by a manticore, and is recovering from what should have been fatal wounds, and here Doctor Gauze seems more interested in his stains. The doctor frowns.

"Rarity, you work with clothes, how does one go about removing a strawberry stain?" Your right eyes twitches. You take a deep breath, to avoid yelling. Anger isn't very ladylike.

"Good doctor..." you start.

"Make this creature well again, and I will see to it that you receive several new lab coats."

The doctor smiles. You both slowly approach the room, the white linoleum floors making your hooves echo in the halls. You walk over to the doorway. Still open. You let Doctor Gauze walk in before you.

What are you so nervous about? Pull it together, Rarity!

You trail directly behind Doctor Gauze, and attempt to stay that way. He notices this, and laughs quietly.

"Rarity, if he didn't attempt to rip your flesh off at first, he probably won't now. relax." he whispers.

It wasn't that you were scared of him hurting you. In fact, it's hard to explain why you were so nervous. You didn't understand it much, yourself. The doctor trotted over to patient, and gently tapped him with a hoof.

"Son. Son, wake up. Rarity here tells me you're quite the chatterbox." The creature stirs, and slowly sits up. He stretches his forelegs into the air, and with a large yawn, falls back into a normal sitting position.

"I'm assuming your my doctor?" He asks.

"Yes, my name is Doctor Gauze. Your friend here brought you here to me after your run in with the manticore."

"Man-tee-core?"

"Man-TI-core, son. You're lucky to be alive." The creature rubs his foreleg over his chest, using his individual digits to prod at the heavy linen bandaging over his chest.

"What happened to me? What's the damage?" It asks while it rubs the bandages.

"Well." Gauze takes a deep breath.

"5 broken ribs, a punctured lung, broken foreleg, severe internal bleeding, and your carotid artery was completely severed. To be completely honest, I pegged you as a goner."

"Gee, thanks Doc. So, I'm still alive. I'm assuming that I'm getting better?" Gauze looks down at his clipboard.

"Hmm...actually, I dare say that you should make a full recovery. Nurse Redheart will have to give you one more treatment of medicinal magic, and you may be able to leave here. I mean, you'll have to EXTREMELY careful for a few days, but as long as you don't go manticore wrestling again, I foresee no problems with releasing you." The creature perks up. He removes his blanket, and looks over at that doctor and yourself. He smiles a white smile, but is made eerie by the fact that he has bandaging over his eyes.

"Here, son, lets get those bandages off of your eyes." The doctor says.

"Just promise you'll stay calm with what you see. It may shock you." The creature nods his head. Gauze clops over to him, and starts to slowly unwind the long bandage wrapped around his eyes. You pray the creature will remain calm. He seems so kindhearted, so polite. Hopefully, he truly is so. Gauze continues unwrapping, and then backs away when there looks to be just one layer left.

"Remove the last bandage when you are ready. And go slow. Don't want you hurting yourself." The doctor says carefully.

Oh, so NOW he's cautious!

_________________________________________________________________________________

You put your hands up to your face, and put your fingers under the bandages. You gently pry away the medical tape lovingly put right on your hair.

"Ow..." you quietly say.

"Gauze, why did you tape it onto his mane?" You hear a feminine voice ask. The doctor doesn't respond.

Mane?

You remove the last strand with your eyes closed. You put the final strand over on the table next to you, and open your eyes slowly. Very slowly. At first, it's extremely blurry. But with each blink, things are coming into focus. Finally, you can make out the entirety of your room. You feel a smile creep over your face. You are overjoyed that you can still see.

"Oh man, Doctor, thank you so much, I feel so go-" You look down at the doctor.

That's a fucking horse. In a fucking labcoat.

You swallow hard, your smile quickly disappearing.

"Good." you finish.

The bright white horse smiles, and points his hoof at himself, and the horse behind him.

"Relax son. Yes, we are ponies. I assumed by you not knowing what a manticore was that you wouldn't have guessed that we're ponies. I'm glad to see you're taking it so well."

To be completely honest, the only reason you haven't flipped your shit, is because of the pony behind the doctor. It's the one with those amazing azure eyes you saw before you went unconscious. It relaxes you beyond comprehension.

"Well." you start.

"When you get impaled and mutilated by a half-lion, half-dragon, half-scorpion monster, you're ready for just about anything." Gauze's bright red eyes light up.

"Excellent! I figured you'd attempt to kill us. Well, I suppose now it's time for some explanations. On both ends. You're currently in Ponyville. This lovely pony behind me, that's Rarity. She brought you here personally, and has stayed with you as much as she could. In fact, I believe she even read to you on several occasions." You look back at the pony behind the doctor. Rarity. A light crimson blush comes to her cheeks, and she holds a hoof to her face, looking away.

"We have all of your belongings over there, in the corner." You look over and see your backpack, briefcase, and smartphone, all next to each other. You also notice your suit, looking really clean and not ripped. Someone must have fixed it for you.

"But, now, I need to hear more about you. What are you? What's your name? Where are you from? Where did you come from?"

You rub your chin.

"Doctor, I'm going to be completely honest with you. I don't know. All I remember is just kind of, appearing, in a field. I walked through a forest, a very spooky one. About halfway through, that thing, the Mantee-"

"Manitcore." The Doctor interjected.

"That thing, yeah. It just jumped out at me, and attempted to grab me. So, I ran. And it followed. The chase took me here, and, well, that's all I know. I don't know my name. Or where I'm from. Or how I got here." The doctor looked intently at you. He seemed legitimately interested.

"Quite the tale. Well, we have to call you something! And surely you know WHAT you are!"

"Well, I know I'm a human. I know that I come from Earth, and there are billions of other humans. But that's all I can really recall. I'm sorry doctor." You feel kind of sad, now that you really think about it.

"No worries, son. Don't strain yourself. Here, look through this." He slings your wallet over to your hospital bed.

"Find something we can call you."

You flip through the wallet. There is money in the pocket. Probably useless here. Several credit cards, and a driver license.

Wait. Drivers License?

You look at it intently. It has a picture of you smiling, and underneath, it says, "Aaden Locke". It also says that you are from the state of New York. You feel your eyes widen.

Memories come flooding back to you. Not all of them, no where near all of them, but you begin to remember a small chunk of your life before appearing here. You have 4 sisters and a single brother. You have a Mom and Dad. You had a single dog, but he was pretty big, so it was okay. You no longer live with your parents, and have moved out on your own. Where, or with you, you aren't sure. You aren't able to recall their faces, or their names, or anything else other than the fact that you have a family and are a grown adult. You decide to withhold this information from the doctor. It didn't seem very important to you.

"Aaden. My name is Aaden, Doctor Gauze." You say.

"Great! I'm assuming you found something with your name on it! Now, we need to find you some food. I'll be right back with Nurse Redheart, as well. See if we can't get you out of here soon." Gauze turns around, and clops out of the room, leaving you and the other pony, Rarity, alone. You take your license, and slide it back into your wallet. You can feel Rarity staring at you. You take your wallet, and go to put it on the night stand, but jerk your arm back in pain. You drop it on the floor. Rarity immediately notices your pain.

"Oh, darling, are you alright?" she asks. She looks really concerned.

"Yeah, yeah, I guess I can't stretch that far yet." You smile, to show that you really are okay.

"Here, let me get that for you." Her horn glows faintly. You watch as your wallet faintly glows the same color, and lifts up off of the ground, your cards and money being slowly put back in place. The wallet folds itself back up, and places itself on the nightstand.

Magic. Why the hell not?

"Thanks, Rarity." You look down at your wounds.

"I just want to say, thank you. You brought me here, saw that I got help. You saved me. I owe you. I owe you my life." Rarity blushes pretty hard.

"Think nothing of it, darling." She says bashfully.

"Think nothing of it? Rarity, you really have do-" you look up from your wounds and back into her eyes. My God, they're even more amazing now that you can see completely. You notice her eyes going over to your suit. She's the only pony that seems to have checked up on you while you were injured. You put the pieces together.

"Rarity. Did you fix my suit?" You ask. She immediately perks up.

"I did, I did! It was a mess, shredded and ripped in many places, so I took it back to my shop, and did everything I could! I do hope it looks well!"

"Are you kidding me? It looks great! Rarity, it looks as good as when I first appeared in the field!" She blushes.

"You're just saying that..." She blushes again. You slowly hop off of the hospital bed, and back onto your feet.

No pain. Alright!

You walk over to your suit, and slide on your white undershirt shirt with care, and then slide your arms through the sleeves of your dress shirt. You button your shirt up, and snag your tie. As you go to tie the tie, you raise you arm too far, and wince in pain.

Guess i can't move my arm that high yet.

Rarity walks over to you.

"Darling, you really should be more careful." She hops back on her hind legs, and leans on you with her forelegs.

"Let me get that for you." She works her hooves in a fashion that you don't quite understand, but, she ties your tie for you. She finishes, and leaning on you, she looks up into your eyes. You share the moment in silence, looking in each others eyes.

"AHEM!" You hear from behind you. Doctor Gauze has returned with Nurse Redheart. Rarity hops down, and blushes again.

"I'm glad to see you two are becoming... acquainted. But Nurse Redheart here says you may not need to stay another moment, she feels like you may be ready to go, even without a final treatment." The Nurse steps forward.

"Do you feel any sharp pain when you move? In your joints?" She asks.

"Nah. Actually, it only hurts when I raise my arm so high." The nurse smiles.

"Good, good! If that's it, then you're ready roll. The pain in your arm will subside very soon. I'd say you're free to go, let me and the doctor get your paperwork together, and you'll be out of here in time for breakfast! Just please be careful. We wouldn't want to see you in here later today." The doctor and the nurse both walk back down the hall, discussing what to classify you as on your paperwork. Rarity looks back to you.

"Perhaps I'm being a little too forward, and if you are if at all uncomfortable with this, let me know, but, would you like to get some breakfast with me? I know you're hungry, and I know I'm hungry, and I really sho-" You smile.

"Absolutely." You cut her off, but she doesn't seem to mind it. Those eyes of hers light up.

"Wonderful! We'll go back to the Carousel Boutique!" You sit down, and tie your shoes, and pull on your blazer.

Carousel Boutique, huh? Must be the building you were almost slaughtered in front of.