Fallen

Chapters

An Unexpected Encounter
Memories
Reflections
Meetings
Confrontations
Into the Unknown
Strange Land
Plummet
A Glimmer of Hope
Brief Jubilance
Tables Turned
Consolations
Secure. Contain. Prison.

An Unexpected Encounter

It all started as my friends and I were having a picnic atop a pleasant grassy hill overlooking a lake on the outskirts of Ponyville. I was ecstatic, telling my friends about an exciting new cave I had found in the forest. I was pretty sure no one had ever seen it, and I was excited at the prospect of us being the first to explore it.
My friends, however, were having none of it.
“Pffff. No. I refuse to drag your butt out of another pit of danger like yesterday. After having to drag you out of the mud and carrying you for miles with a ravenous hydra hot on our tails, I think I’ve had enough of your shenanigans for a week.” Adamant said gruffly.
Adamant is an intimidating sorrel earth pony, with white stockings and a white star on his forehead. His cutie mark is a mountain, symbolizing his perseverance. Or, that’s what he says. I say that it means that he’s stubborn as a rock.
“But GUYYYYYYYYS… I just know that this cave must have something interesting inside, like a rare magical artifact, eh, Green?” I pouted.
Green Sigil looked at me and shrugged, then took a bite out of her sandwich. Green is a, well, green unicorn mare, with a blue mane with white highlights. But don’t say that to her face. She always corrects us by saying that her coat is forest green and her mane is cyan. Whatever.
“Sky,” Adamant told me sternly, “all we’ve ever done is get our hooves dirty traipsing around the most backwater places for the darndest reasons. Like last week, when you led us into a Diamond Dog lair to go steal gems. What were you planning to do with those gems, if we had gotten our hooves on them?”
I thought for a bit, then shrugged. “Sell them?”
Adamant face-hoofed and then grumbled, “Who in Equestria¬–”
Then all was silent.
Every bird ceased their song, then flew off in a frenzy of frantic flapping. The other animals fled in a similar way, with horrified expressions on their faces. A wildcat with a brace on its foot limped frantically into the forest from the direction of a cottage on the edge of the forest. A delicate yellow pegasus mare with a pink mane fluttered in pursuit after the cat, looking very harried, until catching sight of us. Then she hid behind her mane shyly, and the frustrated look melted away.
“Oh, I’m sorry for intruding…” Fluttershy mumbled as she flew into the tree line.
“What do you suppose…” Green started, but was interrupted by a black vortex forming near the shore of the lake, looking like a hole in the air had ripped itself open. An ugly scaly claw reached through, followed by a serpentine green body. The creature emerging turned back towards the rend, held up a claw, and it resealed itself.
It looked like one of those dragons that fly above Ponyville during their migration, only it had no wings, and its body resembled more of a snake than a dragon’s. Nonetheless, it floated about a meter above the ground, then rose further into the air. The creature’s scaly maw twisted itself into a mischievous grin, and it folded in its limbs and began propelling itself towards the town.
“Oh no you don’t!” I exclaimed and shot off after it. I didn’t like the look of that grin, and I was sure that this newcomer was up to no good. I’ve seen that look before. I’ve worn it plenty of times, when I tricked Adamant into accompanying me on an adventure he refused to go on. I’ve pulled it off often at first, but unfortunately he’d learned to see right through me as of late.
So I streaked after the creature, ignoring my friend’s receding cries to stop before I do something drastic. I momentarily wondered if I’m being to hasty, but I still had to get to Ponyville before the creature does something drastic, if only to warn everypony.
I caught up with the scaly beast, shouting “Stop! What are you doing?” It merely smirked as its entire body rippled, shifting into the form of a gray pegasus stallion. I gulped as it pointed a hoof at me and the world twisted itself. Disoriented, I lost my balance and toppled onto the ground, which appeared two feet below me. I looked up at the startled faces of my friends, who skidded to a stop to avoid running right into me.
“YIKES!!” I screamed.
“What happened?” Adamant huffed.
“This shady thing seems to have teleported Sky back to us.” Green noted.
“Yes, I see that. I mean, what is this guy up to? He don’t look like he’s up to no good to me.” Adamant said as he looked in the direction of Ponyville. “Well, we’re wasting time talking here. We need to get to the town and keep things from going to hell again.”
We hustled to Ponyville, but… everything was normal, as far as we could see. We saw ponies cantering around, chatting to each other. Salesponies hawked their wares to the shifting crowd, pegasi soared lazily overhead, and everything seemed as it should.
We split up, asking if anypony had seen a strange gray pegasus, and nopony remembered seeing a character like that. Eventually Green found Adamant and I, accompanied by a buckskin pegasus mare with a cutie mark of two black horseshoes lined up to look like two C’s. I remembered her from flight school, but I rarely ever see her around. She told us, “Green Sigil here says you’ve been looking for a strange newcomer. A grey pegasus? Well, I’ve seen one. He’s been wandering around town, mostly looking around.”
Her name was Speed of Heat, and she always tended to be aloof, preferring to soar high above the clouds than to socialize. This was evident in her ability to see details most ponies never see. She, of all ponies, would have seen the gray pegasus, even if nopony else had.
“So how has nopony else seen him?” Adamant wondered.
“I guess he’s got one of those faces that is so average that nopony ever can distinguish him from any other pony, and, as such, nopony actually notices him.” Green Sigil mused.
“That’s right. He’s got this kind of blandness that makes other ponies see his face but not think much of it, so nopony else remembers him. Still, he’s been avoiding Pinkie Pie like the plague.”
At this, the pink pony herself leapt to her feet from behind me, and fumed. “This sneaky-head has the nerve of coming to this town and avoiding me? ME, Pinkie Pie? Oh, that does it. He’s getting a funsy-wunsy welcome party whether he likes it or not!”
She streaked off, leaving Green, Adamant, Speed, and I behind. I turned to Speed.
“Thanks for your help,” I told her. “Do you think you could keep watch from the skies? I know it’s a bother…”
“Oh, no bother. I just like to help.” She took off into the sky.
“She’s a strange one.” Adamant told me in a low voice.
“Yeah, she’s always been aloof like that. No, I don’t know why, either. I think it’s because of her coloration. Don’t you think her darker muzzle kind of looks like… five o’ clock shadow?” I whispered.
“Sky, Adamant! Leave the poor mare alone! She’s obviously had enough of snide remarks like that in her life! No wonder she prefers to be alone. My goodness! You stallions and your callousness.” Green scolded us. We hung our heads in shame. She was right. Speed had just helped us out, and how did we repay her?
“Well, we’re not gonna find this shady shapeshifter by sitting here, will we?” I asked, and we separate again. The entire day passed with neither hide nor hair of the gray pegasus. We met at Sugarcube Corner at sundown and decided that it wouldn’t be worth it to continue searching, so we part ways for the night.
Flying up to my house, I ate a quick dinner, then dropped right off into sleep. I had one heck of a day, and I thought I would be up all night with wonderings and buzzing thoughts about the shape-shifter who had so mysteriously arrived and disappeared so swiftly today. But no longer had I thought of this than I dropped off.
I normally don’t have dreams that I can remember the next day, so I was surprised when I began a dream so vivid I felt as if it were real.
I was flying through a clear blue sky. I closed my eyes in simple bliss as the wind gently caressed my mane and feathers. Pumping my wings in a power stroke, I surged up, up, into the blue world. I rolled over and folded my wings, feeling the exhilaration of a dive.
When suddenly a cloud appeared below me where none had been before. I flared my wings and swerved to avoid it just in time. Circling around, I beheld it from the side, wondering where it had sprung up from. Clouds don’t just move on their own… maybe another pegasus, pulling a prank, pushed it in front of me as I was diving. Probably that rainbow-maned showoff, Rainbow Dash again. But no, there was nopony anywhere near this cloud.
I turned away from the cloud, weirded out, when a strange voice whispered inside my head. It said, “I see you there. It’s alright. I know who you are, and what you always wanted more than anything. I can give it to you, if you come to me. Just come to me…”
I awoke in a cold sweat. I jolted out of bed and shuffled to the window. I gazed at Luna’s beautiful sky. Not many ponies realize this, but the night sky is one of the most wonderful sights in all of Equestria. The brightness of the stars contrast most wonderfully with the velvet black of the sky. But most ponies never get to see it, shunning the darkness for the day. Even after Princess Luna returned, and the threat of Nightmare Moon was abolished, nighttime was the time for cozying up inside your house to go to sleep. At least, for most ponies that is.
I’ve always found the sky calming, especially the night sky. So why did my heart race like I was being chased by dragons again? Man, that afternoon was a blast…
I couldn’t think of a single time I had been as riled up as I was at that moment… since…

Memories

I was just a little colt at the time. I had just gotten my cutie mark: a cloud, symbol of the sky. I was full to the brim with happiness, a feeling foreign to me during that time. See, I was enrolled in Flight School at Cloudsdale, and, being the very last to receive my cutie mark, was the favorite target for the bullies to pick on. Before me, two fillies, the slender yellow Fluttershy and the bold blue Rainbow Dash, were the main targets, and I was the colorless colt the bullies would pick on in between harassing those two.
But, that’s beside the point. Now that I had gotten my cutie mark, I was dead certain that those guys would leave me alone, maybe find some other foal to beat up for once.
Boy, was I wrong.
They snuck up on me as I flapped up to the entrance of Flight School. A burly chestnut grabbed my tail and yanked me into their midst atop a cloud.
“Hey Paste. Where do you think you’re going?” he said. They chuckled as several of them poked at me with their hooves.
“Hey, leave me alone! I have my cutie mark now, leave me alone?” I whimper as they sneer at me.
“Ooooooh, where? I don’t see any cutie mark!” “Nope! He’s lyin’!” “’Course he is! Pasty, pasty, white and stark! Never gonna get his cutie mark!” “Poor blank Pasty! Why don’tcha just go live with the ground dweebs like that wimp Flutterwuss!”
I gaped at them. I looked at my flank. The cloud was there, all right. It just blended in so well with my white coat that it was really difficult to see. “It’s right there, all right?”
“Yeah right. What do you say, boys? I think he’s trying to rise above his place. Should we teach him a lesson?”
I gasped as a rear hoof struck me in the jaw. Fortunately, I was just starting to rear up when it happened, so the worst that happened was a bruise, but I was devastated nonetheless. Here I was, proof of my coming-of-age upon my flank, and yet here these ponies were, bashing me into the cloud, tearing apart the first happiness I had felt since coming here. I tried to look behind the group of bullies for aid, but I only saw colts and fillies averting their gaze and hurrying quickly away.
I knew why. Any time another pegasus sided with one of the bullies’ targets, they were instantly peppered with taunts and given no end of grief. I remembered when Speed of Heat stood up for me once. Before that, she was a cheerful, social filly who loved to talk to other ponies. I remember how the bullies escorted her away…
After returning with a black eye and most of her primaries yanked out, she wasn’t the same pony. After her wings recovered, she would always fly higher than any other pegasus, just to be alone with the sky and the wind. Needless to say, that happened to any pony even seen talking with one of the bullies’ targets.
It sickened me. The fact that some ponies could just turn a blind eye to these things. I needed to get away from them. Here I was, being torn up on the inside and the outside, and nopony dared care about it. I couldn’t stand a second more.
So when one of the bullies kicked my prone form, I rolled with it, right off the edge of the cloud. I spread my wings and flew. I didn’t care where I went, so I found a current and rode it, tears nearly blinding me. I heard the bullies give chase behind me, but of course I could fly farther, being lighter than them. I quickly pulled away from them, and listened to their irritated grunts as they reluctantly swung back around towards the school.
There’s no telling how long I flew, or how far. I just wanted to be away from everything and everypony. I had no idea where I was going, and I couldn’t see through my tears. I only knew that the wind was carrying me along. I didn’t care. I was one with the air, and that helped put my mind at ease a little. But the tears still came.
Eventually my wings were so tired they could support me no more. I glided down into the trees below, landing on a wide branch of a massive tree. It would have been twice my length in diameter, but I didn’t care then. I just sat down and wept. I suffered all these years of abuse from bullies for being the last to get his cutie mark, and when I finally get it, they only harp on me the harder for it. I hated it.
What gave a pony the right to take pleasure from another’s pain? Granted, it hadn’t always been this bad, but that was because, in the past, there were plenty of targets. A dandelion-maned gray mare with a lazy eye, for instance. She eventually moved away from Cloudsdale to Ponyville, but her wall-eyed expression singled her out before then and drew the bullies to her like a magnet.
Then there came Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash, or Rainbow Crash, as they called her. Fluttershy… didn’t fly very well. For a pegasus, who is born to fly, there could be no greater humiliation. It was like… a Diamond Dog with no sense of smell, or a fish that couldn’t swim. It is their nature to be able to do these things, and if they were unable to do them, well. It’s depressing.
But then, after Rainbow Dash stood up to the bullies and performed the first Sonic Rainboom in centuries, Fluttershy the weak flier discovered her true calling on the ground as an animal caretaker and Rainbow Dash became so infamous for the performance that the bullies wouldn’t dare to taunt her anymore.
Which left me as their only option. I’d always been targeted because of my lack of pigment in my fur, as well as my freckles. No other pegasus had a coat completely lacking in color like mine, so the bullies hounded me with their catcalls and the mocking name “Pasty”.
Why would a pony do this? To need to taunt and tease another pony and make his life miserable at the same time? To feel better about themselves? Or is it that they have been at it for so long that they don’t know how to stop?
Why couldn’t we all just be friends? I know it might sound clichéd but, well, why not? For that matter, why couldn’t I have any friends, like Fluttershy had Rainbow Dash, to stick up for me? Why must these ponies insist on making my life a living hell, and everypony else just turn a blind eye and move on?
Did my life mean nothing?
My only solace came from my parents, whom I trusted alone. They were always there for me, but somehow could do nothing for me at Flight School. Everything they tried ended in failure, probably because the pompous parents of the bullies couldn’t believe that their angels could do such wrongs, and therefore it must be my fault as the perpetrator that their foals are getting in fights.
I had lost all faith in ponykind. No people that could commit such wrongs and stand by while others suffer could have any good in them. So it was best that I was alone.
After awhile my tears stopped and I took a look around. Where am I? I was surrounded by jungle as far as the eye could see, and there was not a single sign of pony kind anywhere. I was lost.
But…. I didn’t care. Nopony could find me here, so nopony could make my life miserable, or coldly ignore my grief as I suffered. I was on my own, and I liked it. I glided to the ground on exhausted wings, and trotted through the vibrant trees in search of water.
Never had I seen such things in the sky. I remember Fluttershy telling the rest of us how wonderful it was on the ground, with the air so thick and heady, so even the weakest pegasus could fly with ease down there. I didn’t really care too much; in Cloudsdale, I had the sky, and that was all that mattered at the time.
But this!
Such vibrant colors! The green of the trees and the grass rivaled the hue of emeralds, which I’d only ever seen once, when a griffon salesman came to Cloudsdale to hawk his wares. And the smells! Each step on the ground layer of lush moss brought forth an earthy aroma of life. Stopping to examine a bright purple flower, I discovered a scent so delicious it made me want to sit there, drinking in the smell, all afternoon.
But the flying and crying dehydrated me to the core, and I knew what I needed.
Saddened that I couldn’t stay and appreciate the wonderful flower, I tramped on through the underbrush, marveling at a bush here, a fern there. I even stopped to examine a vibrant orange fungus growing off of a tree.
“So this is why Fluttershy left Cloudsdale…” I murmured as I was pleasantly startled by a huge colorful butterfly lifting off in front of my face. Following my nose, I reached a pool of water, which I blissfully drank from. The flavor was clean and pure. Not as pure as rainwater, though you can’t get much purer than that. But I was refreshed as I drank, remembering not to gulp it down too greedily.
Realizing that I hadn’t eaten since breakfast, my stomach grumbled, and I made short work of the nearby ferns and moss. The moss tasted earthy, fresh from the ground, and the ferns were a delicate tangy treat. Too late I remembered the lesson to not trust strange plants, but fortunately they didn’t come right back up, so I ate ‘til I was full.
With a satisfied tummy, I lay down on the lush grass and closed my eyes. I listened to the sounds of the forest, from the screech of the booted eagle to the calls of small monkeys. I didn’t know what exactly made those noises yet, but I listened nonetheless. These sensations, so foreign to a pony who lived his entire life in the sky, enthralled me.
I hungered for more new discoveries. So after my wings recovered, I gathered myself up and launched myself into the air.
I instantly had to dodge around a wide tree branch to keep from crashing. Immediately after I dived sharply to avoid another limb, and I laughed with the exhilaration. I liked it.
Catching sight of a hanging vine, I swooped to it and grabbed onto it with my hooves. I swung and let go, flipping in midair.
I must have spent hours just playing in this obstacle course of vines and trees, and swinging from vine to vine. I looked up and saw that it was nearly evening, so I broke through the canopy and sailed into the blue sky. I wheeled and circled, surveying the vast emerald wilderness that lay below me, waiting for me to discover more wonders. In the sheer joy of flight, I spun around and dived towards the trees, pulling up in the last seconds. I smiled with glee.
I never felt more free. The wide open frontier, with no pony in sight, called to me. I had no reason to return to the world of bullies and those who would simply ignore me.
But, most of all, I could fly. I could truly appreciate my wings to the fullest here, where there are so many discoveries waiting for me to uncover them. I could catapult through valleys, and ride on the updrafts over mountains, unearthing new and fantastic sights and sounds.
But I remembered. My parents, the only ponies who cared about me. What would they think when I didn’t arrive home on time? Would they be worried?
Of course they would. They would be worried sick about me. I knew that there were at least two who would miss me when I was gone, and because of those two, I circled on an updraft and tried to retrace my flight path.
I might have never found my way back, if not for the search party my parents had sent. I was intercepted by an inky pegasus stallion, who escorted me to the welcoming hooves of my parents, who sobbed with relief.

Reflections

Through that time of abuse and shunning, flight had been my only friend. No matter how hard the bullies hit me, I could always escape my woes in a single minute of feeling the wind through my mane and feathers.
I knew that I was no prodigy. That mare, Rainbow Dash, now she was a prodigy. She was, after all, the only pegasus able to perform a Sonic Rainboom in centuries. But flying was nonetheless my one and only passion, and I knew that I was born to fly.
I had hardened my heart on that day to the abuse of other ponies, so I resolved that I would never again need to be sad, or cry. As long as I could fly and explore exciting new lands, I would never want or need anything else. And I never did, until this night, as I sat by my window.
Opening my window, I launched myself out, falling into the starry abyss for a few seconds of free fall until pulling up in a glorious moment of power with a sweep of my outstretched wings. Moonlight illuminated my white coat, turning me into a glowing silver comet as I danced among the stars.
I should have been happy. I should have felt the familiar rush long ago paired with the glorious freedom of flight, but in the back of my mind, a shadow still lingered. Why? This dream I had held nothing scary, sure, it was weird, but nothing frightening when I thought about it. So why did I wake up in a cold sweat, shivering?
It just felt wrong, on a fundamental level. Like the sound of the word “poison” or “cancer”, it wormed my way into my heart, leaving an icy feeling in its wake. I shivered, realizing that this night flight would not help me this time; it would only freeze me solid.
Gliding around, I surged into my room through my window, folding my wings tightly against me the moment as I entered through the frame. Relying on deeply ingrained muscle memory, I flared my wings before alighting with barely a whisper on the floor. I return to my bed, sure again that I would be awake long into the night. But, to my surprise, I quickly fell into a peaceful sleep.
The next day, I rose out of bed to the sound of my alarm, eat breakfast, and slogged to work. I worked at the cloud factory, transporting ready-made clouds from the factory doors to scheduled destinations around Equestria, where the local weather ponies took them off my hooves. I slipped into my harness, stretched, and loaded up on the clouds, towing them through the air on my daily rounds.
After a long shift, transporting clouds from Canterlot to Las Pegasus, I finally reached my last stop, Ponyville. The local weather pony, Rainbow Dash, waited for me at the edge of town atop a low-hanging cumulus. Looking down, I saw Adamant and Green Sigil waiting for me on the ground. I unloaded my last few clouds, then Rainbow Dash whisked them away with a cheery “Hey, thanks, dude!”
I glided to the ground, and my friends greeted me. “Why don’t we go to Horte’s Café for a bite?” Green suggested, and Adamant and I agreed. I zoomed back to the Cloud Factory to drop off my harness, then caught back up with them.
After a bit of small talk, mostly about each others’ respective work days, (Adamant works in construction and Green uses her skills of perception for her job, dowsing), we arrived at the local eatery, and sat down at a table, next to a harried-looking white unicorn scratching furiously with a quill on a notepad.
“Oh, my word! This week is just a nightmare! It’s truly and exactly the worst thing ever! First the truly exhausting work order from Fluttershy for fifty miniature coats for baby squirrels! I say! Fifty! Why do we ponies even bother waiting on these creatures hoof and foot? They care for themselves alright in the Everfree, the horrid place.
“I say, I simply have had no time for an appointment at the spa all week! A lady has her needs, after all! If I can’t get my hooficures, I think I might… ugh!
“And then the order for twenty custom dresses for Prince Blueblood’s royal ball! I say! If Twilight hadn’t asked so very politely for the order, I would tactily tell him to shove his order up his– oh!”
Rarity paused mid-soliloquy as she beheld the three of us at the next table.
“Oh, I’m terribly sorry, have I disturbed you?” she asked, embarrassed, as she began to blush.
“Oh, no, sorry.” Green replied, “No problem at all.”
“Well, if you excuse me, I must…” and she hurried out awkwardly, clutching her notepad and quill.
“That mare has problems.” Adamant sighed.
She’s so annoying! I thought to myself. I have no idea how anypony can stand her! All she does is go on about fashion, her precious hooficures, and how superior she is! I have no idea how she can be the Element of Generosity, when she’s so self-centered! Seriously–
Green must have seen the disgusted expression on my face. “Adam! Sky! I’m surprised at you two! Can’t you see how swamped she is! She’s being dramatic for a legitimate reason. And that’s just how you see her. She’s actually very nice once you get to know her. She really is generous, just in a way that you can’t really see if you can’t look past… well, she is kind of annoying, but cut her some slack, okay?”
Adamant harrumphed, and I sighed. She was right. Rarity probably was a good pony at heart, even though her prissiness did make it difficult to see.
Or maybe not.
“All drama queens aside,” I said, “I feel so darn tired. I had the weirdest dream last night.”
“Was it scary, but not?” Green inquired, eyes wide.
“Did it give you the willies, but you didn’t know how afterwards?” Adamant asked.
“Well, yeah! Wait a minute… you too?”
“Yes! I dreamed of an eerie eye sigil, like my cutie mark, that appeared before me, and it seemed to insinuate my thoughts as I stood before it.” Green said.
“What? I dreamed that I was atop a mountain where a great plain was spread out below me. I have no idea how that would be scary, yet I woke up in a cold sweat.” Adamant mused.
“I dreamed of a cloud that told me that it knew what I wanted…” I said.
We all sat there thinking, as the waiter took our order and brought us our food. We munched in silence until the sound of the bells at the door interrupted our thoughts. It was the local librarian, the unicorn Twilight Sparkle, and her slave–I mean, assistant, Spike the dragon. They seemed caught in a heated discussion.
“I tell you, Spike. There are too many coincidences. It can’t simply be a fluke. There’s something going on with this town.”
Spike set his mouth in a straight line. “I’m tellin’ ya. It’s just your imagination. You’re getting worked up again. Like the time where you thought you would be sent back to Magic Kindergarten just cuz you couldn’t write a report on friendship for one week. It turned out okay. I’m tellin’ ya again. You’re overreacting.”
“Spike… seriously, listen to yourself. A parasprite invasion coincides with the arrival of Princes Celestia, when parasprites haven’t been sighted in these parts for a thousand years. Zecora said so. Also, remember when that big red dragon took up residence in that nearby mountain? It just suddenly decided to sleep in that mountain, hundreds of miles away from the nearest dragon territory, and it only took a little nudging from Fluttershy to drive it away. From what I know of dragons, they are far too proud to take orders from a mere pegasus.”
“But what about Fluttershy’s Stare? That could have caused it to listen.” Spike replied.
“You’re thinking all dragons are like you. Remember when you decided to tag along with the migration? You discovered that dragonkind was cruel, and took no orders. I’m telling you, Spike. Besides, no dragon ever makes an impulse decision to move like that. And there’s also the fact that the Cutie Mark Crusaders can never seem to see their true talents. I mean, hello? Sweetie Belle, singing. Applebloom, construction. They even acknowledge that they’re good at those things, but they don’t ever seem to make any more of it than that. How can they not see that?”
Spike quieted, thoughtful. “I don’t know, Twilight. Gee, the way you put it… I could almost see your point. I still think you’re overreacting, though.”
Green looked both of us in the eyes. “This is our guy,” she hissed, “he’s causing all this.”
Adamant looked at her warily. “How can you be so sure?”
“Think about it, guys! He can perform magic that we hadn’t even thought possible. You both saw him rip a hole in reality to come here, and saw him shapeshift as well. He might be as powerful as or more powerful than the draconeqqus Discord. So why not time travel as well?”
Adamant just rolled his eyes. “Green, please. You’re just being paranoid. There’s no way this is the same character. Time travel, please.”
“–and then there’s this buckskin pegasus mare who confirms all this.” Twilight said in the background.
Speed of Heat.
“So?” Spike crossed his arms.
“So, I know that we don’t know much about her, but I do know that she seems to see things others miss from where she flies. Granted, she doesn’t talk to other ponies much, so she doesn’t know exactly what’s going on all the time, but when I got Rainbow Dash to track her down, she seemed to know a lot of details. I think we can trust this source.”
“I don’t know…”
“Look, we know what she said, she’s seen a strange gray pegasus stallion in a cloak wandering around, trying his best not to be seen by anypony, for many months before. She’s seen him at the scene of every single one of these events, doing… something.”
Green raised her eyebrows at Adamant and I.
“Well… knowing Speed, I guess…” I mused.
“Exactly! And we know how that crazy stallion the Doctor has been rambling about time travel for all this time, so maybe it might be true?”
“Yeah, well, I’m still not convinced. Maybe, maybe not.” Adamant said.
To myself, I wondered. What if it was true? That we had a shapeshifting, world-travelling, time-travelling sorcerer on our hooves? I shivered, suddenly frightened.

Meetings

We sat in silence, finishing our meal. After we paid the bill and left, we parted ways beneath the setting sun. I took off and lazily floated around. Thinking to myself that there was no hurry to get home, I let my wings wander just for the heck of it. I happily let my mind wander, lost in the bliss of flight once again, free without a heavy harness and clouds to tow around.
So lost was I, in fact, that I didn’t realize where the hay I was for a few seconds when I snapped back into reality. A quick look around told me that I was flying loops around Sweet Apple Acres. Satisfied, I turned my wings in the direction of home, when I heard a scream from below.
Startled, I looked to see an orange earth pony tumble to the ground. Facing her was a tall brooding dark figure. Its shape seemed to writhe when I looked at it, giving it the look of burning black fire. The earth pony, Applejack, leapt to her feet and spun quickly, throwing a powerful kick in its direction. The figure let out a guttural laugh as her rear hooves passed through it like mist, causing her to overbalance and fall to the ground again.
“I see now. I now know enough. I am satisfied. But I am not about to leave empty-handed…” A creaky voice seemed to pierce my mind.
Empty…. handed….? What is that? Wait a minute, WHAT? I saw black tendrils emerge from the black shape and wrap themselves around the defenseless mare. Without thinking I dive-bombed the figure. But, whatever I was thinking, that since it could wrap its tendrils around Applejack it must now be corporeal, was wrong. I passed right through it.
“What is this? Oh, yes. Perfect. You will do perfectly. You never appear, so you won’t be missed. Ah, I see you were one of the three I contacted. Even more perfect.”
I rose to my feet, confused. I glared at the figure, spitting, “What are you talking about?”
The figure suddenly warped, shifting into a familiar gray pegasus. “You!” I shout. This was the one responsible for all this. The shapeshifting dimension-traveller who appeared before me and my friends, who teleported me with a glance, now stood before me.
The pegasus smirked at me, then raised Applejack in the air with tendrils which still emerged from his body. “If you want your beloved Element of Honesty back, you will meet me inside the Everfree forest. You needn’t worry about where. My power will deliver you to me.”
The villain began to dissolve into mist, taking the frightened earth pony with him.
“Hey! You coward! Face me like a stallion! How dare you!” I shouted, but the retreating mist made no reply as it dissipated completely.
“Calm down, Sky.” A voice behind me startled me.
“What do you want, Speed?” I snapped at her.
“I don’t usually associate with other ponies much, but I know an emergency when I see it. I’m not sure what’s going on, but I thought you might use some help. You can’t face this creeper alone.”
I sighed. “And I suppose you’re gonna insist on coming too?”
Speed shook her head. “I know that you barely know me, and it wouldn’t be my place to request that. So…”
She motioned to a nearby bush, where Green and Adamant edged out from behind.
“I know that I might be acting a little presumptuously, but please let me offer my help. I saw you in trouble and knew that there was nothing I could do on my own to help you, so I found your friends and asked them to come help you.”
“There’s actually no option, Sky. We’re coming with you, or tying you down to prevent you from going.” Adamant told me gruffly.
“Indeed.” Green inclined her head slightly.
I just stood there gaping for a few seconds. I couldn’t believe it. There was no way I was going to drag my friends into this kind of trouble. How dare Speed….
But I knew, deep inside, that I had dreaded facing this terror by myself. I needed my friends. I knew that.
“Thank you, Speed. I don’t suppose you would like to help too?” I asked her.
“No, like I said, it wouldn’t be my place. Besides, my time has not yet come. I bid you farewell, and good luck.” She flew off, leaving us confused.
“Now that’s a funny mare.” Adamant observed.
“Adam! She did all this to help us, again, and this is how you repay her?” Green scolded him, and he hung his head.
I smiled, feeling as a weight had been lifted off of my back. Sure, I was a little saddened by the fact that I was dragging them into possible danger, but, then again, I always had, with my adventurous urges. And they had always been there for me, since I first met them…

It was right after I returned from my escapade to the jungle after being bullied. I had found that my parents had, indeed, been distraught at my disappearance. They met me with open arms, overjoyed and crying happy tears. I slept well that night, being very exhausted, and showed up at Flight School, determined that I would no longer be unnerved by any bullying I received.
Imagine my utter bewilderment, then, to find that the same group of bullies that made my life a nightmare were now completely ignoring me. They wouldn’t even look in my direction. They avoided my gaze as they harassed a tiny filly, probably not even a quarter their size.
Confused at this behavior, I was about to draw their attention to myself when the instructors called for order, and they whisked themselves away. I turned away from the filly, who sped away as well, to find Speed of Heat passing by.
“Hey, Speed,” I called to her. She hovered and faced me. “What’s gotten into those guys? They were trying to kill me before, why are they scared of me now?”
“Well…” she said slowly, “I guess your big shocking disappearance yesterday drew attention to them, now the adults are wary of them trying to see you off again. They got reprimanded pretty harshly, for once. I guess it means they’ll leave you alone, though it doesn’t seem to stop them from bullying others.”
I winced. Flight school has some harsh punishments. “Yeah, but… how did the adults find out that they were the ones responsible? I could have just gotten swept away by a gale, or gotten lost again.”
Speed paused for just a split second. “I guess someone told them, didn’t they?” and she flew off.
Hmmm… I wonder if she…? Oh well.
It continued as a regular school day at Flight School, until we broke for lunch. One of the big bullies glided over to me, to my surprise.
“Hey… Sky? Ummmm, me and the guys are, like, really sorry for what we did and, uhhh, we kinda want to apologize for giving you so much trouble. Can you come with me so we can really apologize?” He said shyly.
I looked at him warily, but he seemed sincere enough. He was embarrassed and everything. “Ok,” I said, and followed him as he took off.
But, it turned out to be one of the worst mistakes of my life. I was shocked to find that we weren’t heading just out of the way, but to a very high distant cloud. It crossed my mind as I passed around that this would be a very convenient place to harass an innocent pony and beat him up, where nopony could see or hear you.
Which is just what they did.
My tail was grabbed and I was slammed into the cloud, where every single one of the bullies either insulted or pounded me.
“Think you could get the best of us, Pasty? You know what we got put through because of you? I don’t think I can ever properly sit down again.”
“What did you think you could prove, pulling off a stunt like that?”
They growled at me, until they stepped aside, providing me with a clear path to roll off the cloud. But before I could do so, one of them grabbed my wing roughly.
“Oh, no, Pasty. We’re making sure you won’t do that again.”
He kicked.
An audible Snap and a round of sniggers later, excruciating pain dug its talons into my wing. I screamed in agony as blood ran from the jagged wound in the middle of my wing, which now hung limply with a terrible bend in the middle.
The biggest of the bullies stuck his face right in front of mine, so I could smell his rancid breath as he smirked. “So long, Pasty.”
Then he kicked me over the edge.
I fell, feeling the rush of the wind like many times before. However, this time I was not in control at all. Spreading my good wing, I barely managed to turn the terrifying free-fall into a spiraling glide. It did little to slow me, however, and I hurtled toward the ground, with the same gut-wrenching feeling as if I were in an exhilarating dive.
But I knew that there would be no triumphant return from this fall. I closed my eyes, preparing myself for the end. But instead of a crunch and the void of death, I found my fall broken partially by a low-hanging cloud. I broke through the spongy material, then crashed through the branches of a tree and tumbled into a bush on the ground.
I opened my eyes, finding myself in a pine forest, tangled within a bush. At first I felt relieved, bursting with happiness from simply being alive. From crashing through the flora, I only received a few cuts and bruises, and I was alive!
Then the pain returned as my terror receded.
Pain, like burning daggers, pierced my wing as it hung limply at that terribly wrong angle. I almost passed out from the overwhelming waves of nausea and stabbing agony emanating from my wing. But the pain was nothing compared to the terrible realization that dawned on me.
I was grounded. The thrill of flight, which had brought me happiness all my life, would be lost to me. I wouldn’t even think of the possibility of recovery, my panicked mind was dead set on the harsh fact that I would never feel the wind beneath my wings again.
I wept between moans of agony as I lay there, convulsing in terrible pain. Eventually I got my body under control; at least by not moving I would cause my wing more pain than it was already in. I must have lain there for hours, buried in agony and despair.
Imagine my further despair, when I heard voices and crashes from the underbrush. I was neck-deep in depression and suffering, and here it was, insult to injury. The bullies had returned, perhaps to finish me off, perhaps to heckle me into the ground.
No matter what they were going to do, I couldn’t take any more. I shrank back as far as I could into the bush and tried not to make a sound, though my eyes watered like crazy from the pain.
I sat there, knowing that my white coat would give me away immediately, and once again waited for the end.
But it wasn’t the bullies who appeared before me, full of cuts and bruises from tramping through the bushes. It was a little green unicorn filly, paired with a sorrel earth pony colt! He had a star on his forehead! My word! If I hadn’t been in such a pit of despair, I would have laughed my socks off right there! They matched! His star and her horn!
The earth pony turned to the unicorn and, in a gruff voice, asked, “Now Green, what on earth possessed you to go traipsing around in the middle of this dismal forest?”
“Shush, Adam!” she said, and closed her eyes. Her horn gave off a light green glow and she shuffled forwards, in my direction. With a faint ding her horn flashed once and blinked out, and she opened her eyes.
“Oh!” she startled, rearing a little, when she caught sight of me.
“What is it?” the earth pony growled, pushing her behind him. “Oh!” he shied a little as he saw me too.
“Just stay right there, please! I’ll get help!” the unicorn told me, then zipped away.
“So, what’s going on? What happened?” the earth pony inquired, eyeing me warily.
I began to tell him the story, starting from where the bullies drove me away yesterday, relating how they broke my wing for revenge today, and finally ending with a blubbering meltdown on how my life in the sky was over. The colt at first never lost his suspicious expression, but then as I told him how much grief the bullies gave me, he grew more and more sympathetic.
He snorted. “Those ruffians better hope that I never catch hold of them, I’d give them what for… anyway, you shouldn’t worry about that wing of yours. We got the best doctors in Ponyville. They’ll fix it right up.”
Yeah right. I just know that what these monsters did to me is going to leave me flightless for the rest of my life. I’m gonna be that sad pony who can’t do anything, because I have no magic nor earth pony strength nor–
“He’s over here, sir.”
“Ah, thank you, miss. We’d better get him to the hospital right away.” I hadn’t even noticed, but the unicorn filly had returned, accompanied by a white unicorn stallion with a medical cutie mark. His horn glowed, and I found myself untangled from the bush and gently lifted into the air. That’s the last thing I remembered before blacking out.
When I awoke in the hospital, I was in a hospital bed, my wing was in a cast, and the doctor sat next to me. He smiled.
“You’re wing’s gonna be fine, sonny. You’re lucky we got to it in time, which would have made flight impossible even with successful recovery. You’re going to be back in the air before you know it, kid,” he informed me and walked out of the room.
My wing’s gonna be… fine? I’m not gonna be grounded for the rest of my life? I’m gonna… fly again?
My heart nearly leapt out of my chest for the sheer joy and relief I felt with those thoughts. I couldn’t help but grin. I’m going to fly again! I’m going to fly again! Inside the cast, my wing itched like nothing else, but it didn’t matter! I was going to fly again!
Suddenly the door opens again and I saw the two foals that rescued me enter.
“Oh my gosh! You’re alright! We heard the news; your wing’s going to be fine!” the unicorn said.
“Told you it’d be fine,” the earth pony gave me a grin.
“I guess you did!” I laugh.
“Say, my name’s Green Sigil, but you can call me Green. This guy’s Adamant. What’s your name?” the unicorn asked.
“Sky. Sky High.”

Confrontations

Those two had shown me that day that no matter how bleak the future looks, there is always a reason to live. The bullies never bothered me again after that. I guess a mysterious spectator relayed their brutal try for revenge and made sure that they were never again without supervision. I know that they seethed at me behind their watchers’ backs, but they never tried anything again, to me or any other pony.
And, as for Green and Adamant, the two of them became the best friends a pony could have. I guess there’s nothing like saving someone’s life to tie your destinies together like that.
Even now, while I stood at the edge of the Everfree, I felt their support as they stood next to me. The forest was unnervingly creepy tonight. Even in daylight, it’s fairly unsettling, with the unexpected popping up from behind every tree. Tonight, though, it billowed with mist, giving the illusions of a dozen smoky phantasms groping at our hooves.
“Well, what are we waiting for?” Adamant said shakily, hesitated, then plowed right into the mist. Green and I nervously followed his lead, glancing at one another.
We crept through the eerie mist, the air giving each tree a dark skeletal appearance. The very sight of this sent shivers down my spine. But continue we did, for the sake of the Element of Honesty.
Eventually we reached a small clearing, where the gray pegasus stood, next to a great tree where Applejack hung, bound and gagged. The gray pegasus turned to us, his body rippling as he took the form of a large black snake.
“So all three of you have come. This is not what I expected, but it does not matter. I come here from across time, space, and reality to ask something of this world. That is, for one of its inhabitants to accompany me on, let’s say, a little adventure. What say you? I offer to let this mare go, if one of you will join me freely.”
At the snake’s words, Adamant growled and pawed the ground.
“You filthy liar! Why should we believe you? You would just come back once one of us is dragged into whatever backwater place you decide. Then you could cause even more problems! We don’t even know who you are!”
The snake hissed and reared up. “You little fool. Very well. I give you my word that I shall stay with the one who chooses to come. As for who I am, you needn’t bother your little minds with that. All you need to know, is that I am renowned throughout worlds and dimensions, and I am known as Wither.”
Adamant snorted, ears flat back. “You arrogant son of a bitch!” He charged Wither, but ropes leapt out of the darkness, binding him to the ground.
“Now, now. Let’s not do that. You might hurt yourself.”
At this, Green roared at Wither, horn flashing with all her might. Green bolts of lightning crackled as she turned her magic towards Wither, but the snake just laughed, and the lightning turned back on its master, imprisoning her in a cage of light.
“Really, ponies? I thought we were all adults here.”
Adamant struggled in the ropes that pinned him to the ground. “Sky! Go! Alert the princesses! They’ll take care of this trickster!”
“I’m afraid not,” the snake sneered. “You see, as a reality bender, I’m not affected by this mundane biological form of magic that you ponies wield. It’s in my very nature. No, earth pony. Your so-called Elements of Harmony won’t work on me either. I bend reality. I make or change the rules.”
With this statement, he hissed, eyes glowing. Suddenly gravity vanished entirely, causing everything not firmly attached to the ground, including me, to float in the air, giving me a very intense feeling of vertigo. Wither hissed again, and gravity righted itself, making me land on my head.
“I can alter physics…” he hissed. “Reality…” and suddenly every single blade of grass became razor-sharp blades of diamond. “…and space…” every single tree up to about fifty feet away abruptly vanished, causing air to rush into the voids created by their absence.
“So, you realize how this is quite futile, no? Even if your princesses attacked me with their magic, I can just bend reality to make their powers useless. Like what I did to you, unicorn.”
“So what?” Adamant scowled, “That draconequus, Discord, could do all you can do, and he was defeated by the Elements of Harmony.”
Wither looked thoughtful for a second. “Maybe so…” he mused, “maybe not. But, you need all of your Elements to try that, don’t you? And I happen to hold one of the six captive. You have no choice.”
He turned and stared directly into my eyes. I squirmed before his gaze. “You. I know what you want. I can give it to you. I can give you the… adventure… you seek.”
It was then that I realized that his voice was what I heard in my dream. “Yessss…” he hissed. “It was, indeed, myself, who sent you that dream. As well as your friends’. I can enter your minds and project images, thoughts, and dreams. You cannot fight me.”
Alarmed, I spread my wings, preparing to take off to seek the princesses’ aid. “I already told you, that won’t work,” Wither said, freezing me in my tracks. “I am not leaving without my goal.”
“Your goal, which is?” Adamant glared at Wither from the ground.
“I already told you. To have one of you accompany me to another world. You must understand, your world is well known through… stories… in this other world. I’d explain it further, but your technology hasn’t caught up to theirs, so you wouldn’t understand. Anyway, there, tales of Equestria have, well, a kind of cult following. These people, they call themselves ‘bronies’, or ‘brother of ponies’… it very much interests me what reaction the sudden transportation of one of their idols into their midst they would have.”
“So this is just one big… show for you?” Green stared at him, aghast. “You’re throwing innocent ponies’ lives into danger for your own entertainment?”
Wither made an odd movement in his upper body, like the snake equivalent of a shrug. It was very odd, as if his body was phasing into itself, and it made me blink rapidly. “Well, you don’t seem to have any choice in the matter, so I guess one of you will have to play my game. I give my word that I will not myself harm any pony who comes with me. I just want to see what happens for awhile.”
“So afterwards, you’ll return that pony here? After you’ve had your fun?” I demanded. He merely smiled.
That sent a shiver down my spine. Nevertheless, if none of us agreed to accompany him, well, he already showed us what he was capable of. He was right. The alicorns stood no chance against him, and neither did the Elements, at the moment.
He could have the whole of Equestria under his control within a matter of hours.
I sighed.
“I’ll go with you.” I told him.
“NO!” Adamant shouted, and struggled violently with his bonds, to no avail.
“You can’t!” Green protested, trying with her magic to control her lightning cage, but all she received for her efforts was a powerful shock.
“I must. You both know what can happen if he’s not appeased. Besides, this is what I always wanted. To soar high and far in distant skies, seeing sights no pony has ever seen before. Argue all you want. I’m going.”
Wither smirked at me. “I see. I called it right. You were the one to contact.”
“Let us go too!” Adamant shouted at Wither.
“I’m afraid that won’t be necessary. One pony is enough. Three would make quite a spectacle, but might make this too messy for my taste. The pegasus will come with me. Alone.” Wither said, and turned to me. “We have a deal. What’s your name, pegasus?”
“Sky. Sky High.” I told him defiantly.
“Well, Sky. Let’s go.”
And a light enveloped us both. The last things I saw of Equestria were the ropes disappearing from around Applejack and Adamant, and Green’s lightning cage dissipating, before I blacked out.

Into the Unknown

“Get up, lazy pegasus.” Wither kicked my neck.
“Unnnnnn…” I groaned as I rose to my feet. I looked around. I was atop a hill in the middle of rolling country. The wilderness around me looked… harsh. Sparse trees and scrub brush dotted the brown-green hillsides surrounding a very cold-looking settlement. It appeared to be made of some hard substance, a very rock-and-steel appearance that sent shivers down my spine.
“Here’s what you will do, pony. You will fly down to that town there, see? I want you to take a good look at the lower part of it. See the group of creatures down there? They’re called ‘humans’. Look at me, I’ve turned into one for you.” I turned sharply to look at the odd creature Wither had become.
One of my eyebrows threatened to rise right off of my face. What the hay…? This… thing… didn’t look like it should be rightly standing. It stood precariously on its hind legs, with no way of counterbalance. No tail, just all of its weight distributed directly above its feet. It was also very small; only by standing erect like that it was able to look slightly downward at me in the eyes.
It kind of resembled a pinkish ape, but it wore clothes like some of the more sophisticated ponies of Canterlot. It was also almost completely bald, except for some thick coating on its head, and some mildly thick hair on its arms and legs. Other than that… it might have absolutely no hair anywhere else. I didn’t particularly want to know.
Its face… could you even call it a face? It was simply a squashed oval with features slapped onto it. It was just so… flat. There was no definite shape to it, and its features looked extremely odd. The nose was just a small lump of flesh with the nostrils on the underside, the eyes were far too small to look proper, and the ears resembled strange fungal growths that simply jutted out from the sides of the head.
I…don’t even know. This thing was definitely weird.
“The group you see down there…” here Wither gestured with one of his forelimbs, which ended in, uhhh… talons? Paws? The tips had no claws on them, just flimsy-looking nails. How the hay do these creatures survive? They have no natural defenses, they looked extremely weak, and they threatened to fall over on their clumsy legs at any moment. “That particular group is the one I want you to meet. They’re the so-called ‘bronies’ who are obsessed with Equestria.”
I looked at Wither warily. “What do you want me to do then?”
“Just fly down there, and do whatever. See what happens.”
“Alright,” I said. I spread my wings, and in doing so, realized that something was off. I looked at my outstretched wings, and realize that they look different somehow. They’re bigger, for some reason, each wing extending longer than a full body length, and about a third as wide. I looked at the rest of my body, and saw that my legs were thinner, my head was smaller, and my body was sleeker, somehow. It appeared that my proportions were changed so that they resembled Princess Celestia’s…
“Yeah… about that. The laws of physics in Equestria are moderately different from the laws here on Earth, so I had to alter your body just a tad when we made the transition between worlds. It might have been what caused you to black out.” Wither pointed at my wings. “See, in Equestria your wings were fine for supporting you, but here it’s not even close to enough. Also, your body needs to be aerodynamic, as humans call it, so your body needs to be thinner, your head needs to be smaller, and your bones need to be lighter. Some of your fat mass had to be converted to muscle.
“Don’t worry, though. I made my changes so that you can still move like you used to.” Wither looked at me while I stretched and found that I could, indeed, move my forelegs like always, even behind my back. “The animal closest in appearance to you here, the horse, which is merely an animal here, can’t do that, see? They look like, well, a pony, but not intelligent at all, so don’t bother trying to converse with them, even though they look like they should be able to talk. They can’t. Humans are the only intelligent life on this planet, and that’s a stretch even to say that.”
Wither’s lip curled. I took that to mean that he didn’t hold these strange creatures called humans in high regard. Not that he held ponies in high regard either.
“Oh. There’s one other thing you should know. One of the greatest mysteries to me. Tell me, this has been bothering me for quite awhile. How, HOW in the blazes, do you hold things in your hooves?” Wither asked me.
“Well, you just…” I reached down to pick up a rock. I grabbed it– and it wouldn’t come with my hoof. “…do it…” What? How was I unable to do it? Granted, even I was unsure of just how we ponies managed that, but I kind of just took it for granted before.
“Yeeeeeeeaaahh… so, I was unable to duplicate that so that it would work for Earth physics, so I just left it out. Sorry about that… but you’ll just have to make do without.” Wither didn’t look a bit sorry, but I let it drop. You can’t have everything.
Just as I was spreading my wings again, Wither piped in, “Also, I was unable to duplicate your ability to walk on clouds as well. Apparently it’s caused by ‘innate pegasus magic’, which only works on your world, as there is absolutely no magic on this world whatsoever.”
I turned to him. “Then how can you do, well, weird things here?” I asked suspiciously.
The creature that was Wither puffed himself up. “I,” he said proudly, “am a reality-bender. I can change the laws, remember? As such, I’m not really affected by the rules of any specific world, as I make the rules. So, basically, I can use my powers regardless. Shame about yours, but we must make do with what we have.”
“Then why not change the laws for me? That way you wouldn’t have to, well, alter me this way.”
“Yeah, well.” He looked just a bit sheepish for a minute. “When I say I make the rules, I don’t mean that I can just snap my fingers and make all gravity reverse itself. See, it only works within line-of-sight, and if my changes disagree with the laws of the world, well. I know this sounds insane, but worlds kind of like their laws the way they are, and they’ll start to correct after awhile.
“Basically, you’d have about an hour, maybe two, before the laws of physics dictate that you’ll go plummeting into the ground.”
I turned away, muttering, “Stupid arrogant son of a…”
But I spread my wings nonetheless, and downstroked, leaping off of the hill. Immediately I realized that Wither was right; the laws of physics were all screwed up in this world. It’s kind of hard to explain, but just believe me when I say that it made flying a hell of a lot more difficult.
There were tiny undercurrents everywhere, and the new gravity strained my coordination built out of flying in Equestrian physics. Needless to say, it took me awhile to figure out flying all over again, so I spend a few minutes just circling, diving, and soaring, just to get used to it. I nearly crashed into a hillside when I misjudged the wind above it.
But, I soon got used to it, at least a little bit, and I figured time was a-wasting, so I glided down to the town where I saw the group of humans gathered. It was a little harder than I thought, gliding. Back in Equestria, everything is nice and predictable, because weather is controlled by pegasi, and, as such, each current and thermal is nice and orderly.
Here, I had to constantly compensate for random little eddies in the air around me. It was quite annoying.
As I neared the group, first one, then more and more of the strange creatures took notice of me. When I had the entire group’s attention, I was just about to land. I heard squeals and gasps of delight and wonder, at my arrival, and I wondered just how weird these humans could get.
As soon as I lit down, the group mobbed me. I mean, literally. They swarmed all about me, petting me on the mane, flank, and sides. They were really starting to weird me out. Weirdest of all, I caught sight of some of them in what could only be defined as shell-shock, wide eyed expressions on their faces. They kept pinching themselves all over for some reason. What…? Oh. They must not believe their eyes, and making sure they’re not dreaming. I guess if one of these creatures suddenly dropped onto my doorstep, I would be in the same position.
“Uh, ahem. Can I get a little space to breathe, please?” I asked them.
The entire group silenced. I wouldn’t have thought it possible before, but their eyes got even wider.
“You… you can talk?” One of the humans, a male specimen (I think) with long dark hair tied back said incredulously.
“Yes, he can! Dude, Richard, this is a pony! Look, he has a cutie mark!”
HOW THE HECK do these creatures know what a cutie mark is? Oh, yeah, Wither told me. These humans know all about Equestria from… stories? I’ll have to pick his brains later…
Meanwhile, I was again being swarmed by these bald apes, who had now surrounded my hindquarters, squinting at my cutie mark, which was the same (At least Wither hadn’t changed that…) Great. Now I have apes checking me out.
“Ahem… humans? Can I please have a little space?” I asked again irritably, and they jumped, before scrambling to back up, their faces turning red. And I thought their appearance couldn’t get any stranger…
“Sorry, sir. Ummmm, what’s your name?” The one called Richard asked, stepping forward from the rest of the group. Man, how do they do that without falling over? They’ve got no counter-balance at all! I mean, not even the Diamond Dogs, who only sometimes had a tail, weren’t always bipedal. But these humans didn’t even have the arm length to support themselves from the front!
“I’m Sky High.” I told him.
“Nice to meet you, Sky High. Ummm, wow! I can’t believe it! I mean, a real pegasus, right out of Equestria! What brings you here?”
I considered what to say for awhile, then decided to just say, “Only sightseeing. I always wanted to explore new places.”
Richard nodded. “Ah, like Daring Do. I see.”
Geez, their knowledge of Equestria is kinda… scary.
“What’s your cutie mark for? I think it’s a cloud, but you’ll have to forgive me, I can’t really see it that well.”
“It is a cloud. It symbolizes, well, that I just love to fly, is all.” I said self-consciously. I briefly wondered just why I was self-conscious, surrounded by such odd-looking creatures. I guess it’s just the strangeness of all this.
The humans and I chatted for awhile, discussing Equestria. They surprised me even further by asking about the Elements of Harmony. That wouldn’t have been such a shocker if they hadn’t asked about them in name. I mean, geez! They know freaking too much about Equestria for my comfort zone, but I was careful not to reveal my discomfort to them.
One thing that they did not know, and that they were genuinely curious about, was the ditzy gray Ponyville mailmare that the bullies from my nightmares had made life hell for before my time. I was actually a little amused at the intensity of their curiosity about her, given the fact that they didn’t even know her name.
“Silly humans, how can you not know her name? You really scare me with the amount of knowledge you have about nearly everything else, so why the obsession?” I laughed.
“Well, see, she’s not really covered that well in the show, it mainly focuses on Twilight and the other Mane Six, she’s more of a background pony, “ a female human with hair almost as long as Richard’s said.
“Show? Mane Six?” I wonder aloud.
They kind of shut up again, and looked at each other. “What?” I started to get very nervous.
Richard recovered first. “That’s right… you don’t have T.V., so you wouldn’t know what a show is. It’s moving pictures that project a story with sounds like music and voices. It’s like a glass window with a play behind it, kind of. It’s hard to explain. And the Mane Six are what the fanbase–that’s what we call the entirety of those who are fans of something, in this case, Equestria–calls the Elements of Harmony. There are six of them, and they all have manes, cuz they’re ponies, so they’re the Mane Six.”
I started to get very suspicious. “Where do the stories for this ‘show’ come from?”
Another pause. It might have been my imagination, or I might have just seen Richard quickly wipe at his forehead, as if brushing off sweat.
“Well, uhhh… umm… you see…”
“Hey girly men! Hows that prissy pony show going for ya?” I heard a mocking voice call from behind me. I turned to see a different human, one I didn’t recognize from the group, standing there, a few feet away. He had strange markings on the skin of his forearms, which his sleeveless shirt revealed quite well. I didn’t think humans had such markings, I thought they just had uniformly-colored skin.
“What?” I raised an eyebrow.
“Just ignore him. He’s just a parasprite.”
“Wait, how is a human a–“
“You dweebs sank so low that you’re worshipping your girl show by gluing wings to a real horse? Man you guys suck.” The human with the markings taunted.
“What do you mean, horse? I’m not an animal!” I screeched at him. He proceeded to widen his eyes to the size of dinner-plates, as he shook his head violently, before fleeing.
“So why do you call him a parasprite?” I asked.
“Well, we got people who like to make people angry just for the sake of making them angry. We call them ‘trolls’, and they usually delight in putting people down, just to make themselves feel better. ‘Kay, so you should know that, in human society, we bronies are, well, a little misunderstood. This makes us a general target for these trolls, and, as one of the rules states, do not, ever, feed the trolls. Meaning, if you argue with a troll, it’ll just set you up for some more verbal abuse.
“So, seeing as the same is true with parasprites; if you feed them, they’ll cause you a whole hell of a lot of trouble, we call trolls who bag on bronies parasprites.”
I got suddenly intrigued. “Tell me about human society.”
I listened to the humans explain about themselves. I learned about their society, and the roles in their society. I was a little surprised to learn that, despite their differences, human and pony society was not all that different. They grow up with their parents, go to school, work, then retire, just like ponies. They have families of their own and care for each other, like ponies.
The main difference is that in roles here emphasis is placed more on males than on females, unlike in Equestria, but I supposed that was because of the obvious differences in physique of the females. There isn’t really that much difference in the physical strength of males and females of ponies, so it all came down to numbers, of which the females had more of in Equestria.
It just goes to show. No matter where you are, at the very basest of the condition, in the most bestial of the conscience, might always makes right. It was the same as in Flight School, with the bullies.
But as the humans went on to explain, I realized that there were, indeed, stark differences besides this. I was extremely shocked at the ways their super-communicator, the Internet, changed the nature of humans. I didn’t exactly understand how it worked, but I did know that it was the equivalent of sending lightning-fast messages, like teleporting letters, from one human to another, and somehow they were visible to everypony. I would have thought that such an invention would perfect the human race by allowing for perfect communication.
Boy, was I wrong.
As Richard explained, the majority of the jerks called ‘trolls’ were to be found using the Internet. I was confused at this, until he explained. Humans will act completely civil to each other in person, but when a barrier of space and anonymity is present, they will see that as an excuse to tear each other apart. They use the fact that the others won’t know them in real life as a shield in their conquest to beat others down.
I shied in shock and exclaimed, “You humans are cowards! All of you! You’re conniving cowards who can’t stand the thought of each other!”
“Now, wait wait! That’s the bad side of the human race! Humans can be good too! Just listen to me!” Richard cried, and I calmed down a bit.
He went on to explain how some humans could be completely selfless, like those who helped their fellow humans escape from some detention area across the sea that they got thrown into because of their beliefs. They called it something… like ‘holocaust’, or something. These people would help each other escape while risking death or worse at the hooves of the officers in charge of the facilities. I could see how they were plenty noble.
But humans also were at the root of the atrocity in the first place. I wasn’t sure about this.
In many of the other scenarios Richard brought up, I saw that the same thing was taking place; the human or humans who nobly made sacrifices for other’s sake, and went down in history as heroes, were always compensating for the cruelty and corruption of other humans.
There were some exceptions, like heroes who save innocents from natural disasters like hurricanes and so on, but I still wasn’t convinced. I only knew one thing.
Humans are as confusing and inconsistent as the ever-changing wind on Earth.

Strange Land

This thought was confirmed when another group of the parasprite humans showed up. They shouted at the bronies, “Take this, fags!” and then the pelting of stones began.
It wasn’t anything that would cause serious harm, as they didn’t throw many rocks or rocks big enough to actually hurt anypony, but nevertheless their sudden arrival and assault startled me to the point that my instincts took over. I reared up in the air, spooked. The bronies screamed and backed away in terror, but one female wasn’t quick enough. As I came back down, lashing with my forehooves, one hoof caught her arm, snapping it like a twig.
I was horrified. I had no idea exactly how fragile humans were, and it turned out that they were even more delicate than they looked. I took one glance at the blood streaming from her wound and my already racing brain took another shock. I barreled away in a mad rush.
I tried to take off, but the damn Earth physics wouldn’t let me. Apparently the air, so still near the ground, makes it difficult to take off here. I tried a leaping takeoff, but I wasn’t used to the strange air currents and I only got marginal force upwards. So I was forced to gallop through the streets, made of a strange tar-colored rock-hard substance.
I ran and ran until I could run no more. I sank to my knees in exhaustion, as a wheeled metal behemoth suddenly pulled up alongside me. I was too tired to rise to my feet again; I just closed my eyes and despaired.
But fortunately, it was just the brony Richard. He climbed out of the metal… thing… on wheels. He must have seen the confusion in my eyes, because he turned toward the thing and patted it.
“This is a car. It’s what we humans drive around in, because unlike you ponies, we can’t run very fast. It’s kind of like a carriage, but it’s got its own internal engine, so it can run on its own using fuel,” he said affectionately.
I looked at him strangely. Humans… how could they show such feelings toward an object like that? This behavior rivaled that of Rarity the bitchy unicorn’s obsession with gems, fabric, and clothing.
“I caught up with you to warn you,” Richard’s face became dead serious. “The show you gave back there made those hooligans report to the police. You broke Kellie’s arm back there….”
I winced. “I-I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to!” I stuttered in desperation.
“I know you didn’t. She doesn’t blame you. I guess anyone in your position might have been startled, it’s just that you’re so much stronger, that your reaction just had a bad effect. None of us think you’re a bad pony! But nonetheless, the police have been alerted of a mad horse on the loose.”
I snorted. “Horse… I’m not an animal…”
“I know you aren’t. All us bronies know. But, you see, humans don’t like things they don’t understand, and, you can imagine, we don’t get ponies travelling from other– from Equestria that often.” He shuffled uncomfortably. “So, you’re gonna need to get out of here, like, pronto. “
“Why? What’s going to happen?” I paw at the ground, squirming.
“If they manage to catch you, and find out that you’re not a real horse, but a real pegasus, I mean, with wings, they may turn you over to scientists to, I don’t know, study you! Maybe even dissect you! Or worse! Vivisect!”
I shuddered at the thought. Ugh! No! Just No!
“Or the other worst-case scenario is, the brony-haters could just try to kill you to take a stab at us bronies. Or, the police could just think you’re a real mad horse and euthanize you on the spot.”
Thinking about it later, I realized that we might have been overreacting. True, it still would have been a really bad idea for me to stick around to find out, but I’m pretty sure that, unstable as the human condition was, I don’t think they would go that far.
But still. I would be placing my life in the hooves of strangers in a strange land who I didn’t know much about, and had a terror of all things unusual, like me.
So therefore, despite being in an incredibly frantic state of mind at the time, I don’t regret my decision.
“Thank you so much, Richard. I’ll leave right away. I’ll never forget your kindness and welcome, even if you humans are weird little creatures.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment. Thank you, Sky High, for giving me and the others a little piece of Equestria right in our home.”
“You guys can call me Sky. It’s quite alright.” I told him, out of politeness, even though I was itching to get out of there. After all, they were kind enough to give me a welcome, albeit a weird one. Plus Richard likely saved me a bunch of drama, or even my life. But I didn’t want to think of that.
“Alright, Sky. Farewell, and good travels. I doubt we’ll see each other again, but I’ll look out, alright?” Richard waved to me with one of those weird paw-things on the end of his arm.
I was suddenly overwhelmed with curiosity. “Eeeeerrrrmmm, Richard? One last thing. What the heck are those things?” I pointed a hoof at his paw-thing,
“Oh, these.” He stretched them out, wiggling the appendages at the ends. “You guys wouldn’t know about these, ponies only have hooves, griffons have talons, and Diamond Dogs have paws. These are called hands. These wiggly things are called fingers.”
“Ah. Thanks. Tell the others I said goodbye!” I called as I waved to him.
Determined this time, I spread my wings again. Making sure that my greatly expanded wingspan wouldn’t hit anything, I took off at a full gallop, then leapt with all my might. With a few powerful strokes, I just barely made a successful takeoff.
It was a success nonetheless, and I nearly whooped with the simple joy of liberation once again. I circled once to wave to Richard, then soared on an updraft, feeling powerful and free. I felt all my anxiety melt away as a small grin formed itself on my face. Rising once again, I watched the ground shrink away with the familiar rush. Yes, I was still unused to the unpredictable nature of the air of this world, but still.
I was free.
Reveling in the feel of the wind between my fur and feathers, I turned south, and let my mind go, to sink myself in the giddiness that bubbled up from my very core. I then began to meditate, relying on my newly gained muscle memory to keep me aloft.
It wasn’t for hours until I gained back my consciousness. By then I was completely calm. I also found that I could now navigate the strange Earth eddies of the wind, as if I had been flying here my whole life. Practice, even during meditation, makes perfect.
I then remembered how Wither told me how I couldn’t walk on clouds anymore, which made me insanely curious once again. How did Earth clouds feel? I remembered Equestrian clouds, which were extremely soft and springy, and compressed under one’s hooves, yet were sturdy enough to stand on.
Swinging by a medium-sized cumulus, I hovered for a minute, then slowly approached it. I couldn’t perceive its margins, as it kind of faded around the edges. That’s another thing about Equestrian clouds. They have insanely defined margins, which are clear as day, instead of being blurry, like this. This resembled fog on the ground.
I kept flying forward, wondering if the cloud had a solid center, maybe? Or maybe it got more dense as you went, making a bundle of semi-permeable essence in the center?
But no. Just as I was wondering that, the cloud around me got lighter, until it disappeared entirely. Phooey! I went right through it! I guess Earth clouds are completely intangible. How the heck do humans control them?
Oh, right. Earth physics. No one controls them. They just happen.
I took a moment to be glad that this doesn’t happen in Equestria, even though it didn’t really matter to me at the moment, seeing that I wasn’t in Equestria.
Even though the cloud was intangible, I realized that it was getting harder to fly. A quick investigation revealed that the reason why was that my coat and feathers were now drenched in water.
Huh. Well, I guess Earth clouds at least serve the same purpose as Equestrian clouds. To get water to the ground. But how does the water get back up?
I took awhile to think, then gave up. Because it can. Because MAGIC. Even though… Wither said that there was no magic here… whatever. I’ll have to ask him later.

Plummet

I heard a strange roaring sound coming from the east. I saw a cloudbank in the direction of the noise. Huh. Storms don’t usually make noises like that. I decided to investigate.
I flew up to the cloud bank, realizing that the noise was increasing in pitch and crescendoing. Must be moving closer. I fluttered to the side, curious, but I was not about to get run into by something.
The noise became almost deafening. Every instinct in my body screamed at me to just skedaddle, but I got angry at my cowardice. I was going to find out what made that noise, if it took my wings off.
I inched closer, squinting into the cloud.
Turns out, I probably should have listened to my instincts. Something large, metal, and extremely fast shot straight past me. Once again, Earth physics took me by surprise, because the air surrounding me became turbulent, throwing my body about.
It would have been completely fine, if my wings weren’t so incredibly huge and awkward. The suction tossed my body out of harm’s way, but my left wing got backlashed, then smashed by giant metal behemoth.
I looked in dismay as my left wing was completely stripped of its primaries, then I dropped out of the sky.
As I fell, I got a quick glance at the culprit, which resembled an ugly metal bird with steam shooting out its ass. Trying desperately to slow my flight, I spread my wings, but unbalanced as they were, they only served to slow me down slightly. Looking down, I saw a black forest with sickly trees standing skeleton-like thickly rising up to meet me. I closed my eyes.
Snap! Snap!
Pain, excruciating pain, lanced throughout my body. I thought that breaking my wing was the worst injury I had ever suffered. I was wrong. This was worse.
Crash! I landed on the ground. To my utter astonishment, I was still alive! I survived the fall!
But… I look at my back.
Gone! Completely gone! My wings! No! No! No!
Thoughts flood my mind. Despair. Pain. Loss. Anger. My life was spared, but at the cost of my freedom. My wings! Blood spilled from the jagged wounds on the stumps of my once glorious wings.
And the pain! To add insult to injury, it felt like both my wings were being stabbed with a dozen needles! Gah! I don’t even have my wings anymore! How the hay can they still hurt! A thousand things rush my brain at once, but the intense spiky pain crescendoed until I succumbed to it.
When I came to, I found that a puddle of blood had gathered around me, spilling from my stumps. Most of my raw panic was gone, replaced by a creeping feeling of utter loss and despair. I’m going to die! I sobbed. I’m going to die!
It’s alright. Why would I even want to live after this? My life is over. I can’t fly. Never again will I take comfort in the utter joy of soaring above the clouds, soaring and wheeling… I mean, a pegasus is born to fly. I–I mean…
I took comfort in that fact, and waited for the end to come. What déjà vu! I remember when I lay like this, wounded, in the middle of a forest before. That time, like this, I was determined that I would never fly again, but my salvation wouldn’t come this time, as it did with Adamant and Green back then. I was truly alone. I didn’t want to be found.
Unfortunately for me, I was.
I heard crashes in the bushes. It’s Green and Adamant, here to rescue me! How the hay did they get here? And-oh. My pain is causing me delusions. A human figure appeared behind a tree and my heart sank out of my chest in despair. I blacked out once more from the pain as I cursed Wither in my mind.

A Glimmer of Hope

As he walked away, I felt just a bit better. The news that my fate to be grounded was now sealed dragged on my heart like a weight, but the fact that somepony cared lifted my spirits just a tad.
I looked around again, seeing as there is nothing else to do. I saw the edges of my paddock, which resembled the pens ponies kept pigs and sheep back in Equestria. I could definitely have jumped the fence with my wings tied behind my back normally, but in my current weakened state, I rather doubted that I could have jumped it now.
I wonder if Wither is watching this. I bet he’s having a laugh at my predicament. The bastard! I hate him! I hate him!
But, seeing as there was literally nothing else to do, I laid my head down, throwing mental abuse at that son of a bitch and dropped into a fitful sleep.
When I awoke, the sun was just about to set. I remembered how Wither told me how the laws of physics were so much different here than in Equestria, and, as I looked at the sunset, I wondered just how the celestial bodies were moved in the sky. I looked around, and found that the moon was already high in the sky. How is that possible?
As I mused, I came to an uncomfortable conclusion. I recalled how the air currents and clouds were so unpredictable because they acted on their own. I gulped.
The sun and moon here move on their own accord as well.
How can humans stand this? Knowing that so much is out of their control? I guess because they’ve lived like this since the beginning, they must not know any other way. They must be used to it.
I knew I never could. It made me wonder whether Equestrian physics, if showed to a human from Earth, would make them shudder as much as Earth physics made me shudder.
I spent almost the whole night just looking at the stars as they slowly twinkled into sight, one by one. I found myself reliving the moments when I took flight into night skies just like this. I missed the way the moonlight turned me into a shining silver comet as I hurtled through the velvet sky. I dreamed the night away, almost forgetting about my plight.
Until I remembered. I’d never be able to ever do that again. Never again will I streak across the stars… Falling into depression, I sighed, then closed my eyes. Eventually, I fell asleep again.
The next morning, I stirred to the sound of the human Dr. Placard’s arrival. He set down a bucket of oats next to me. The night’s sleep I had eased a little of my depression, and I found that I was ravenous. After all, the last meal I had was two days ago, with Green and Adamant. I lunged into a sitting position and buried my face in the bucket, all dignity forgotten.
Dr. Placard laughed a bit, and I twitched an ear in annoyance. But he apologized quickly and began to speak about something intriguing.
“I’ve arranged the transport of you to another facility.”
I pulled my head out of the bucket to look at him strangely. Licking my lips to remove them of oats, I said, “So?”
“I have an idea for how to put your soul at ease. It will only work once, but I think I can give you the satisfaction of flight one last time.”
When I asked how, he told me. I was a little suspicious at first, but I considered it. I looked down at my feet, never to leave the ground again. I realized that there really was no decision. I was going to get that satisfaction, even if I would never again see it.
“I’ll do it.” I told him seriously.
“That’s what I thought. Just remember; pretend to be listless and unintelligent, or this plan may backfire.” Dr. Placard rose and started to leave.
“But wait!” I exclaimed, “What about you? If we do pull this off, you’re gonna face some repercussions for this.”
Placard stopped, and sighed. “I know. But… I don’t know. There’s something about loss like this… that you just have to do something about. It’s not like you’ve always had to live like this. You know how it was to live with the thing you lost before you lost it, so it’s always at the top of your mind, unless you find a way to cope.
“And I’m not sure you can learn to cope. I mean, you’re being contained as an SCP. I doubt you’ll find much moral support here, because the researchers and personnel are mainly focused on, well, research. There’s this one SCP we just now acquired, a young boy, who has the ability to remove and take on the injuries and sicknesses of any who touch him. The directors strongly forbid us to call him by name or comfort him at all. They say he’s just a tool, not a real person.”
He turned away, and, was it my imagination, or did I see his eyes glisten with tears?
“It’s probably just as well. They’ve experimented with him curing mental diseases, and now he’s got the mental capacities of a toddler. He doesn’t know, or care, about the state he’s in.”
Placard knelt and looked me in the eyes. “I do this, because I know first-hand the suffering you’re going through. I had a colleague who was placed in a similar situation, and I did nothing to help him, or even comfort him. Now he’s dead, preferring the grave to merely existing with a fate worse than death.
“There’s a different SCP, numbered SCP-591. It’s a painting that, with the right requirements, will cause sensory loss in whoever looks at it for more than a minute. After we tested it with Class D’s, the expendable delinquents we recruit, some idiot left it out on the table after they left the area.
“Needless to say, after the blind and mute Class D’s left with the researchers, my colleague walked in, not knowing that the painting was an SCP. Seriously, the security was really lax that day. He took a minute to admire the painting, when I walked by. I knew that it was an SCP, so I yelled and rushed to stop him. But it was too late.”
Placard sighed. “The effect had already set in. I saw him scream and clutch his ears as I wrenched the painting off of the table. I saw the outline of his face in the wood, which meant that the painting had done its work. It only took a second for us both to realize that he had lost his hearing, as well as feeling in his right hand.
“You have to understand. This man was an avid musician and connoisseur of music of all sorts. His very life was music, and song was in his soul. He was not the same man afterwards. He was detained by the officials and watched, because an SCP had affected him, so I was unable to see him. But I read reports that said that his request for an electric keyboard had been approved, and all he would do was just listlessly sit at it, turning it on occasionally and pressing random keys, crying all the while.
“His sanity deteriorated. Eventually another lapse in security brought him the opportunity to escape his room and make his way to the holding area for a Euclid SCP he knew was memetic, meaning hallucinogenic. He opened the door to its area and locked it behind him. We found him dead in the room an hour later, a smile on his face. We all figured that he had one last momentary state of bliss until the SCP killed him with its effect.
“I decided, that day, that if I had the chance in the future to deal with some poor soul in the same position, I don’t care if I get fired or worse. No one should have to exist like that. I’m helping you.” He stared at me solemnly.
“But why…?” I stared back.
“Because I was the fool who left SCP-591 unattended. I was the one who dragged the man down into that state of utter despair. It’s all my fault. This way, I’ll be able to make amends to his memory, and put myself at ease. Please let me do this!” Placard begged, eyes glistening.
I stared in shock. These humans, I had discovered, were so inconsistent and beastly within their core. But here was this one human who was so determined, so dead-set, to provide a poor creature with one last moment of joy. Even though the others in this facility would just turn away from my suffering, this one would sacrifice so much just to ease it a little. Kind of like how Green and Adamant saved me that one day…
“Alright. Placard… I… thank you. Thank you so much! I’ll go with your plan. Thank you for caring, when no one else here will.” I bowed my head to him, out of respect for this generous soul.
Placard laid his hand on my head, and I didn’t even care. After a few seconds, he removed it, then strode out of the paddock and into the buildings.
I felt a warmth in my heart. Some faith in humanity had been restored with this act of Placard. His sacrifice would allow me to have one last feeling of freedom before fading away. I rested my head on the brown scratchy grass…
Wait a minute. Why is it so scratchy? It was lush and green just yesterday, so how could it have dried up so quickly? While I thought this, I was surprised by another abrupt visit from Wither. This time, he didn’t appear by walking up to the paddock. He just materialized out of thin air as a snake in the grass.
“You!” I hissed. “You’re about to hijack Placard’s plan, aren’t you! I knew it. Just as I’m about to have a last moment of happiness, you have to stomp on it, right?”
Wither just stared at me with a bored expression. “Of course not,” he scoffed. “What would be the fun in that? I think that it would be more boring if I tried to do that. Letting it unfold, I think, would be much more amusing than halting it. What would there be for me to watch? Just letting you melt into that brown grass like a useless blob?
“Oh, speaking of which,” Wither pointed with his tail at the grass underneath me, “you might be wondering why the grass dried up so fast. It’s a simple matter of the side effects of reality-transportation. You see, most times, different realities don’t like to mix with each other. They kind freak each other out, if that makes any sense.
“So, even though the Foundation personnel fools have been watering the grass as per normal since you arrived, the grass has died. The reason? The essence of Equestria lives inside your body. Inside your very being, in fact. The grass, being of Earth, reacts poorly to the essence of other realities, thus it is adversely affected to the point that it sickens and dies.”
Although I rather doubted him, remembering what Dr. Bright had said about Equestria being just a made-up story, the dying grass beneath me was still unnerving. I looked at him in horror. “Does that mean that I’ll die too if I stay here too long?”
“Oh, no. You as a life-form are too advanced for it to affect you too harshly. You might be mildly sick after awhile, but it doesn’t really affect you that badly. But it has hampered your regeneration. Take a look at your wing stumps. Beneath the bandages, they’re just as raw as when you tore them. You’ll find that they have stopped bleeding freely, as they’ve clotted a little, but it’s still severely decreased. Also your health will very slowly deteriorate over time, but it’s not really enough to kill you straight out.
“So you see, separate realities are separate for a reason. Equestria and Earth were never meant to mix. So, you see, everything Equestria will be antithetical to everything Earth, and vice versa. This doesn’t really matter to you, just thought you should know why you won’t be healing for quite awhile.
“But this isn’t the reason why I’ve appeared before you. After your little plan either succeeds or fails, I’d like to make you an offer. Let me take you back to Equestria, in return for the entertainment you’ve provided me. I can do nothing about your loss of your wings, but when you get back, you can at least heal. And you will be able to see your friends again.”
Adamant. Green. “I’ll consider it.” I told him.
“As you wish,” he said, then winked out again.
I didn’t trust him. On the other hand, he hasn’t really lied to me yet, just told me half-truths and watched without helping me when I ran into trouble. Still. He could definitely lie to me and leave me in a worse situation than I’m in right now. But what am I talking about? It’s the option between dying or living completely flightless inside of a pen on this alien world that’s poisonous to my very being.
I decided to wait on it, and think some more.

Brief Jubilance

Weeks passed. I grew more and more listless as the essence of this world sucked the life out of me slowly. My absent wings shrieked with pain every now and then, even though they weren’t there. I had heard of this “phantom pain” that amputees sometimes got, but I never thought I’d ever get it. It all just seemed like one cruel joke on the part of my body.
The gardeners eventually gave up watering the grass in my paddock, as it didn’t even make a difference. I still pondered Wither’s offer to myself to pass the time, but, other than that, I was too listless to move.
Researchers from the Foundation arrived every now and then, to take blood samples, bring me my food and water, and poke and prod at me. One time, after many futile attempts to make me rise, they resorted to using a painful shock to lift me to my feet. I remember the pain, and thinking that I’d never have thought I would have sunk so low. Alone, flightless, and playing monkey games with a bunch of, well, bald monkeys.
Eventually, beaten down and fatigued, I saw Dr. Placard striding towards my paddock, the first time in what seems like an eternity that I’ve seen him.
“Everything’s ready. The others are readying the plane, but we’ll have to load you into a crate. I’m sorry about the indignity, but we don’t have much of a choice.”
I saw a group of other humans drive a small motored vehicle up to my paddock, with a crate on a trailer behind it. It took almost all of them to get me up to my feet and into the crate, I was so fatigued. But I eventually managed to get inside.
After the humans lifted the crate inside the giant metal behemoth they called a jet, Dr. Placard opened the door to the crate and I shuffled out weakly. Soon I felt it lurch into motion, and we were off.
I was soaring above the clouds, riding the wind again. It was what I had wanted before, but the feeling I longed for was missing entirely. This was not flying. This was hurtling forward inside a giant metal shell, faster than humanely right. I felt no wind in my mane, like proper. I had no thrill of exhilaration as I rose into the sky, just a feeling of heaviness as we ascended.
I sighed. This was one of the machines that took my freedom away, and now I was supposed to be gaining it back by riding inside one.
Dr. Placard, standing beside me, put his hand on my shoulder momentarily, then walked through the door at the front of the cargo area we waited inside, entering what he called the “cockpit”, where the controls for the vehicle were located.
I closed my eyes, and waited. With a sudden jerk, the floor heaved beneath me. The ground tilted as the nose of the plane tipped up. We were headed into a sharp ascent, sharper by far than anything I had ever achieved. Then again, I was flying in a mechanical behemoth, not by my own physical strength. This lasted a second, then…
Suddenly my kneeling body left the floor, and I was free. Weightless. Granted, I still couldn’t feel the wind in my mane, but nonetheless, I was free from the control of gravity. Ecstatic, I turned a couple of flips in midair, then exhaled at the floor, rocketing toward the ceiling. I still missed the feeling of power I got from lifting off with my wings, but…
I don’t know. It was something. And it was a hay of a lot better than being stuck on the ground. My phantom wings twanged with the memory of soaring through the sky again. I could almost imagine, in my current floating weightlessness, that I was once again streaking over land and sea, proud and free.
My eyes leaked tears as I experienced my last moment of freedom I would ever feel. I looked up and saw Dr. Placard floating beside him, the joy in his face a mirror of mine. He stroked my muzzle with one hand, then the plane wrenched itself into a normal flight. Security must have regained control of the flight. I didn’t care. I got to enjoy freedom for one last time.

Tables Turned

I sat in my new paddock, listlessly. Nowadays, I just existed in that small space, among the dried grass antithetical to my very nature. My imaginary wings twinged more and more each day. I really don’t know what’s my body’s problem. If losing one’s wings were insult enough, I saw no reason for this madness. To make matters worse, my body thinned depressingly, poisoned by the nature of Earth. My ribs were clear as day, and my joints swelled out from my emaciated legs.
My pit of depression was gone. I no longer felt sad about my plight, but I could never again feel truly happy, either. The only emotion I really felt was gratitude to Dr. Placard, for showing me the spark of light within the thickest of blackness.
As we predicted, he did suffer serious consequences. From researchers who came to my pen to take samples from me, or just to go outside to smoke near my paddock, I heard that Placard had been questioned for his conduct, then, when he failed to offer any explanation that satisfied the directors, he was stripped of his authority, then euthanized.
I mourned my friend’s death, the only man here who gave his life for a lost soul, wandering in a foreign, adversary land, even though that soul had nothing to give him in return. I knew now, that humans can’t be all bad. There is still some goodness in them, even though it’s rather hard to find.
I was interrupted in my thoughts by a clash coming from the buildings nearby. A loud roar cut through the air, and glass shattered somewhere. Screams echoed about the buildings, and I pricked my ears up.
I saw Wither, stuck mid-morph between a human and a bird, shoot through a wall and come stumbling toward my paddock. “Gah! Help me! SCP-106 is after me!” he screamed.
I looked back toward the building and saw the walls turn brown and corroded, like advanced rusting.
“I’m outta here, because there isn’t enough time to talk! So long, sucker!” Wither cried, and gathered his energy about him. But it fizzled out before anything happened, and he gawked at this feathery hands in shock.
“Oh no, oh no, oh no!” He frantically tried again and failed, then began to hyperventilate. “The SCP drained my powers!”
I look at him condescendingly. “Yeah, right. You told me yourself that magic doesn’t affect you.”
“Yeah, but by that I meant the natural magic tied to the world you live in. For alicorns and unicorns, that means the magic of Equestria. See, as a reality-bender, I call the shots when it comes to how the laws work. Some unicorn uses his magic on me? I just change the laws so that magic either can’t manifest, or manifests in a way that turns on the wielder unexpectedly.
“This is different. This is another reality bender. Its powers are in the same category as mine, only more focused on corruption rather than travel and physics manipulation. Therefore, offensively SCP-106 is more powerful. Look!” He turned around, revealing a nasty-looking corrosion on his hindquarters. “The damage the SCP did damaged me physically, but also corroded my powers. I’ve lost most of them!”
With a crack, the now completely rusted wall began to fracture. Humans in white lab coats and orange jumpsuits sprang into action, aiming guns at the widening crack.
I remembered how Wither had screwed me over, time and again. He messed with my life, messed with our lives, just for the sake of his own enjoyment. He’s nothing more than a bully, just like the bullies at Flight School, or the humans who threw stones at the bronies. I turned up my nose and turned away, as the phantom pain lanced through my wings.. Let him die. If the SCP eventually gets him, then good. I don’t care if it gets me too. I’ve got nothing else to live for.
I saw, out of the corner of my eye, Wither slouching in defeat, a strange lost look in his eyes. I never saw him like that before.
It was like looking in a mirror. Wither lost the thing that truly defined him. His powers. Just like how I lost my wings. He didn’t know what to do, totally helpless like he was. Just like me.
Somehow my reluctance to step in to help seemed to be dwarfed by the situation. What if I just ignored him? Past wounds aside, if I didn’t step in now, I would be–
I would be just like those who just stood by when I was bullied in Flight School. Or those Foundation members who viewed me as an animal while I suffered.
Pity washed over me as I beheld the poor distorted creature cowering on the dead grass.
I heaved myself to my feat, gazing in sadness at my emaciated state, coming from months of living on a world poisonous to me. Nevertheless, I must try. Try not to become the very thing I had raged against all these years.
“Get up! On my back!” I ordered Wither. He looked up sharply, shocked. I guess as an all-powerful reality bender, he’s not used to taking orders from mere mortals. Well, tough. He’s not all-powerful anymore.
I glance nervously at the wall, as with a gut-wrenching tear, part of the façade fell away, revealing the demonic grin of a skeletal old man, skin dark as liver. The squad of humans open-fired, but it only laughed as the bullets tore through its skin, with no effect on its determination.
Wither still sat there, shocked at my display, but then shook his head. He summoned some minimal power and levitated himself onto my back.
“I’ll use my last remaining strength to support us. I don’t think your strength is enough,” he said.
I felt a thrill of force as Wither concentrated. My body instantly felt lighter, and as I summoned up my remaining strength I found myself galloping towards the fence of the paddock. With aching muscles I launched myself into the air, clearing it.
I ran. I ran like I’d never run before. Looking back behind me, I saw the SCP in hot pursuit. It had ungodly strength for its frail appearance.
“I thought the report said that it was lethargic!” Wither said from my back, with the lapse of concentration, I felt my limbs start to drag on me.
“Concentrate!” I shouted.
I felt my weight lessen as Wither once again applied his power.
As I give it my all, I heard the SCP scream in rage as his quarry began to escape. It doubled its efforts, beginning to gain on us. With its inhuman stamina and my weakened state, it approached us.
“I think I can manage to build up enough strength to teleport us to the other side of the facility. I read in the report that the personnel can detain it by using traps and live bait. I think that may be enough for us to escape it.” Wither shouted into my ear. I nodded.
My body instantly became vastly heavier. My limbs dragged at me, and I struggled to draw breath. I don’t care if Wither just lied to me. Again. It doesn’t matter. I’m still dead. Even if I live I’m still dead. Grounded. Flightless. None of it matters anymore.
Drawing my last resources of strength, I strained my muscles to gallop in earnest. For a few seconds, I thought that, despite Wither’s levitation leaving me, I might still make it. I might still escape this thing.
But no. My stamina gave out. Foam sprayed from my mouth as I moan in despair. The SCP screeched in victory as its rotting fingers reached toward my flank. Two inches. One inch…

Consolations

A suction feeling. A flicker of light. We’re on the other side of the buildings. We’re safe!
“Uuuuugghh…” Wither groaned from my back. As I sank to my knees on the gravel, he slid from my back. I saw his form shimmer for a second, then re-form as a small rodent-like creature no bigger than my ear. I blacked out from exhaustion…
And woke up in my new paddock, with a new, taller fence around me. With no researchers in sight, I saw a small ball of fur scurry up to me. It spoke in a strange squeaky voice.
“You all right, Sky?”
I nodded, surprised. “Wither?”
“Yes, this is my true form. Silly, isn’t it.” He looked himself over, then suddenly broke out in a huge grin. “I guess in my arrogance, I always go for the big, intimidating forms, don’t I?”
Wither sat on his haunches. He looked very cute. It’s hard to believe that this was the cruel all-powerful reality bender that made my life such a mess. As if in response, my no-wings twinged again.
“I have to say, Sky. I never expected you to do that. As a traveller, I’ve seen plenty of acts of kindness between mortals. I always suspected that the only reason for you doing that was to build rapport between each other, so you frail creatures can survive and coexist with each other. Selfish selflessness, I guess you could call it. I be nice to you and you’ll be nice to me, when I need it.
“You have to understand. I come from a reality rampant in reality-benders like me. These beings are corrupt with power and arrogant, and the main rule is survival of the fittest. So you get brutal reality bending battles every other day, and the weak are abused to the point of death, because our vast power corrupts us so much.
“So you can see why I decided to escape. With all my strength I tore a hole between realities and squirmed through. I travelled from world to world, seeing new sights. The twisted teachings of my brethren, that anything weaker than you is a lower being and is only meant to be used or destroyed, guided my actions. I stirred up trouble just for the sake of stirring up trouble.
“I see it now. You had nothing to gain and everything to lose by helping me. I had hurt you time and again, but you nevertheless refused to stand by and just watch while I faced utter obliteration.”
I was suspicious about Wither’s change of heart. “Well, that was a sudden reversal, given your behavior in the past.”
“You don’t understand me. I’m a reality bender. I’m supposed to be invincible here on these realities. Never is one such as me supposed to get into a position like that. We aren’t supposed to… die…”
He looked at me with such fear in his eyes that I realized that he was telling the truth.
“Let me make you a new offer.” Wither looked me in the eyes, head tilted to the side. “Tell me what you want most of all.”
“My wings.” I said instantly. Phantom pain flared through my imaginary wings.
He shook his head sadly. “There are some things that are easy for me to do, others that are harder. Limb replacement is… complicated. Other than having to fully comprehend the exact dimensions and connections of the musculature, skeleton, and tendons of the physique, I’d have to re-create your missing nerves, which are a pain and can go horribly wrong, as well as be able to re-create matter in the first place. The law of conservation of mass is a bitch, and it’s there in pretty much any reality.
“Besides, I’m nowhere near full strength. I guess it might take a century, and I don’t suppose you ponies live that long. No? Oh. And I can’t really time-travel too far or the continuum will start to reject me and snap me back. The farthest I can manage at a time is about a decade, and consecutive time-leaps don’t really work. It gets exponentially more difficult the farther I travel. Don’t ask. It’s complicated.”
I didn’t. These things sounded really complicated.
“But, I can do this.” He waved his hands, and a shimmering aura in the exact shape of my wings appeared on my stumps.
“I don’t see how–“
“Look, I know a thing or two about psychology, and I can at least ease your phantom pain; it looks like it’s bothering you.”
A jolt lanced through my non-wings. I nodded.
“What I want you to do, is bend them in in your mind. Concentrate on it. Remember how it feels to move them in, and out. Up and down. Curl your wings at the tips and ruffle your feathers. Look at your wings!”
I did, and as I thought of the movements and stretched non-existent muscles, the spectral wings moved. With a wave of relief, the pain ceased.
“Oh, thank you!” I said happily, and the illusion disappeared.
“It’s the least I can do to help,” Wither said.
I thought for a minute. “How are your transportation skills?”
“I have enough energy to send you back to Equestria. Is that what you want?”
I nodded enthusiastically at firs, but then I remembered. “Isn’t Equestria just some fantasy show on T.V.? It’s not real.”
“Well, yes. On many of the Earths it is. But what this Dr. Bright fails to understand is the theory of separate realities, which exist independently of each other, yet are born of multiple thoughts, possibilities, and turnings in the path of time. For instance, remember the story of the missing ore?”
“Yes,” I remembered my parents telling me of it, “For want of some ore, the iron was missed. For want of the iron, the horseshoe was missed. For want of the horseshoe, the war-pony was missed. For want of a war-pony, the battle was missed. For want of a battle, the victory was missed. For want of a victory, the kingdom was missed. And all for want of some ore.”
“Well, suppose that the ore was in the blacksmith’s pocket all along. There are two possibilities for this outcome: the smith finds the ore and thus the kingdom was saved, or he misplaces it and the kingdom is lost. Both are very real, and happen at the same time. But not the same place. You just witnessed the birth of a separate reality. Within both, the inhabitants are convinced that their history is the true history, without knowing that, at the same time, there is also a history for which the alternative happened. Get the point?”
“Yeeeesss…” I was still confused at this, but I let him keep going.
“This also happens to your dreams and imagination. With each imaginary world, there also exists a separate reality, parallel but never touching, to your own. It happens whenever a story is written, or a play is directed, or whenever you dream. But the realities with the most attention, the worlds that live in the most hearts, have the most impact on the entirety of the web of realities. Thus, through its massive fanbase, your Equestria is very real. Dr. Bright does not know this, in fact, no one knows but the reality travellers, like me. This is because separate realities, while close to each other, never touch, physically, nor by magic, nor by any way of perceiving.
“So your Equestria is as real as this Earth, the original Earth, and any other reality. You know how I told you that this is the wrong Earth? Well, that’s because the SCP Foundation is just a series of creative writing pieces on the Internet of original Earth.
“So, I ask you once again, would you like to return to your home?”
I nodded. I knew that, even though flight would be forever lost to me, there is always something to live for. Like when I was chased in the jungle, I knew that the sky would welcome me. And when I broke my wing, my friends found me and made me discover that there was always hope.
“Very well then. And, to avoid turmoil, I shall stay here while I regain my powers. I think, I shall take this form, so nothing will be missed.” He shimmered, then I stared at a duplicate of myself in his place.
“I shall be the new SCP-042, and send you on home, alright?”
“Thanks.” I said.
“Goodbye, Sky. Thank you!” he waved, and then the world shimmered, making me black out.

I woke up in the Everfree, entangled in a bush. I inhaled, rejoicing in the feel of my world. It feels so… right. My state of bliss was interrupted by some familiar voices…
“Green, what on earth got you so worked up?” It was Adamant. He sounded weary and sad.
“Shush, Adam. I sense something!”
They stepped into sight. They stared into my eyes and I stared into theirs. I smiled in simple joy of being home. As we embraced in happiness, I almost forgot that I had no wings.
For I may be simply sitting here, grounded, but in my heart I was soaring. High, high above.

Secure. Contain. Prison.

As I came to, I could make out the blurred faces of several humans leaning over me. I tried to move, but found I was tied down to the floor in a white room. The humans, who were dressed in orange jumpsuits, sneered at me, lying on the floor. One kicked me, and the others began poking me. Weak as I was, I couldn’t even protest, just make a few halfhearted whinnies.
“Eehh, it’s just a normal horse, with weird things on its back.” One of the orange-suited humans spat.
Not a… horse…
I heard an automated voice echo around the room. “All Class D’s move away from subject for testing to commence.” The orange-clothed humans moved away from me, revealing another human, this one with a mask covering his mouth and garbed in a white coat. He held up his hand, which held a needle and syringe filled with liquid.
Oh no…
He injected the syringe into my side, and I knew nothing more.

I woke once again, lying on grass. I found that there were bandages around my wing stumps, as well as some other places, like my sides. I shifted around–
Wait! I can move! I’m not restrained anymore! Looking around, I saw that I was in a small paddock nearby a brick building complex. The fence of the paddock was only half my height. I can escape!
But no. Even if I do, then what? I fly away? I can’t fly anymore…
With that simple thought, my heart turned to lead and my ears flopped. I lost my life in the sky. Gazing at the sky, I felt a tear roll down my cheek.
I never should have come here. I never should have wished so strongly for passage to other worlds like this. I came in search of adventure, to fly in mysterious skies, and what do I get? I lose my sky, my one comfort in life. Pegasi were born to fly. Why me? Why MEEEE?
But… it doesn’t matter whether I had wished it from the start. Someone had to sacrifice himself to save Applejack, Green, Adamant, all of Equestria…
I felt a deep sense of confirmation. Yes. It was worth it all. If I could save my friends from this fate, I would have given up much more than my wings. I still did the right thing.
But, how are my friends holding up? Do they miss me? Of course they would. My gosh, how I wish they were here to bring me at least some comfort…
But, for the entire world, I wouldn’t wish for them to be dragged to this forsaken place, like Wither did to me.
That trickster, Wither! That bastard. Why did he have to bother Equestria in the first place? For his own entertainment? Was he even aware of the fact that he put others’ lives in jeopardy for his pleasure?
Oh, speak of the devil. Here he comes. I thought to myself, as I saw a dark shape morph into the form of a human in a lab coat from shadows behind the building.
“Have you had enough of your games?” I hissed in disgust as he approached.
“Well, yes, thank you. I particularly enjoyed the episode in that forest. Such delicious irony, I must say! Still, now that you’ve landed yourself in the hands of the SCP Foundation, there should be an even greater show on its way. I look forward to watching it, and exploring this fascinating place,” he said smugly. I glared at him.
“SCP Foundation, what the hay is that?”
“Well, I might have miscalculated when making the transition between realities, but no matter. This isn’t the Earth I wanted to go to. This is the universe of the SCP Foundation, which gathers supernatural artifacts and creatures to, well, secure, contain, and protect. That’s what SCP stands for.
“So, SCP’s are the creatures and items that the Foundation keeps away from the general population, for risk of danger. Some of these things are wondrous, some are creepy, and some might, just might, cause an apocalypse to occur on the planet. Like, for instance, the zombie virus that could decimate the human race, or the concrete sculpture SCP-173, which can’t move when you look at it, but will move to you in a flash and snap your neck if you look away or blink.”
I raised an eyebrow at that.
“Needless to say, there are supernatural things in here that Earth physics can’t comprehend, reality benders like me and paranormal deities, that could make a huge mess of things if they got into the general population, because literally everything else obeys the laws of physics, and they could cause mass panic. Or worse, kill or enslave the world if they’re hostile.
“And, I see that you’ve become one of them. From listening around, you’ve been inducted into their ranks. Nice to meet you, SCP-042. Hope you like your number; you just inherited it from a poor reality bender sap who got annihilated by this one guy Dr. Clef, the reality bender slayer. It was actually kind of stupid how he got killed, but I digress.” He bowed mockingly.
“What? First I’m just a mere animal, now I’ve been demoted to a mere number?” I exclaimed.
“Yeah, well, tough. As long as I’m here, I might have some fun elsewhere. Ta-ta.” Wither waved and began to retreat.
“You sadistic bastard! I’ll kill you! How dare you just leave like that! You like messing with innocent lives, all for your own enjoyment! You’re sick, you know that?” I screamed at him, he paused, fading out slowly.
“You ponies,” he sneered, “and humans as well, for that matter, are to me as ants are to you. You cannot comprehend me, I exist on a level far greater than you can imagine. I’m a reality bender. You mortals mean nothing to me. But don’t worry. I can’t stand the thought of death, so I’ll do my best to make sure you don’t expire while I’m here.”
He faded out completely as I glared and cursed the wretched being who could so calmly drag humans and ponies to their doom without batting an eye. I rose to my feet shakily as I heard a door slam. I look to see another human in a white lab coat jog over to my paddock. He had some facial hair on his lip and jaw, and wore glasses. He looked ecstatic to see me.
“A real pony! My god! With a cutie mark and everything! My Jesus! It’s a pleasure to meet you! My name is Dr. Bright, I work here at the Foundation. What’s your name?” He jabbered at me.
I hesitated, surprised at the verbal onslaught of this human. Was he another one of those bronies? He seemed to know I was a pony, and recognized my cutie mark.
“I-I’m Sky High.” I said cautiously.
“Oh great! Can I call you Sky? Gee it’s a pleasure meeting you, as you can see, I’m a huge fan of yours. I gotta tell you, I’ve been accustomed to the unexpected happening, after all, I do work in the SCP Foundation. My soul even resides in a magical amulet. Long story, but to summarize, this isn’t my real body. I’m just a copy of Dr. Bright’s psyche that got sucked into a magical amulet. The psyche can duplicate itself into any person or animal that comes into contact with the amulet. I really have no idea how many ‘Me’s there are running around, but I’m guessing quite a lot.”
I stood there shocked. Wait what? His soul is in an amulet, and yet he’s here too, and he could be in lots of other places too? What exactly is going on? My head felt like it was going to explode. I decided to let it go.
“Sooooo, you’re a brony… I ran into some of those awhile ago. There’s something I don’t understand… I get that these ‘shows’ are how you know about Equestria so well, but… where do they come from?”
“Well,” the human began, “see, you guys are characters in a show called ‘My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic’. That’s how we know all about Equestria. But the idea for a show has to come from somewhere. That somewhere is sometimes make-believe, or sometimes real events and it’s just a retelling of them. In your case, the idea for the show came from the mind of the animator Lauren Faust, who made other cartoon shows like ‘The Powerpuff Girls’ and ‘Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends’. See–“
“Waitaminute WAIT a MINUTE! You say that the show came from the imagination of a human? How? It’s a real world and your information seems pretty accurate? How is it possible that a human simply dreamed up every single facet of life in Equestria?” I asked, a feeling of dread beginning in my heart.
“Well, because your entire world isn’t real, of course! None of it is. It’s not real life. It’s just fantasy… caught in a landsliiiide… no escape from reality… eh. Don’t mind me.
“I really don’t know. In the Foundation, we’ve learned to think outside of the box a little, so I have a few theories. It may really be a legitimate universe in a different reality. We get portals to things like that, and beings that have their own pocket dimension. Anything is possible.”
First I lose my wings, now I find out that my world is a lie? A fantasy? Was I just dragged out of nothingness into being for some reality benders’ play? I felt a strange stabbing pain where my wings used to be, as if to accentuate my grief.
“Anyway, I figure you’re a pegasus, because of those stubs on your back and your cutie mark. What happened to your wings?” The human asked.
This was too much. I sank to my knees, tears in my eyes.
“Hey hey! What’s wrong? Was it something I said?” Dr. Bright asked in concern.
Just then I saw out of the corner of my eye another human in a white lab coat confronting Dr. Bright.
“Now, Dr. Bright, we can’t have you depressing the subject, now, can we? Seriously, what’s gotten into you? First that incident with SCP-237, now this? I tell you, do you even take our mission seriously? You’re a real drag sometimes, Bright. “
“Awwwww… can’t I have a little fun?” Dr. Bright whined.
“Not the way you’re seeming to go about it. I mean, you’re a pain in the ass, either causing security breaches or decreasing people’s morale with your ‘fun’. This is another one for your List of Things Dr. Bright is Not Allowed to Do. Now get back inside.”
“Alright,” Dr. Bright pouted, then slouched off back into the building.
The other man walked over to my paddock and leaned on the fence. “Sorry about him. He can be a real pain sometimes, but he’s damn smart. He’s provided so much to the Foundation, and has potential to give so much more. I hope he didn’t depress you too much.”
I sighed. “It’s alright. I’ve not been in the best of moods lately. I guess finding out that your world is just the brainchild of an animator is just the thing for sinking you into a pit of depression.” I flicked an ear.
This new human patted me on my head. On any other day, I would have been indignant at such patronization, but this time I just took it, appreciating that someone cared.
“My name is Dr. Placard. I’m one of the personnel, but nowhere near as high up as Bright. Still, I may be able to do something to help. What can I do for you?”
I was a little surprised at this question, but I figured what the hay? What do I have to lose? Besides, he may actually be genuine with this question.
“Well, first, you can tell me what exactly happened to me.” I began to tell him how I ran into that huge metal thing in the sky, how the strange air currents blew me away, and I ended up tumbling to the ground.
“Yeah, that’s a jet engine. It’s a vehicle designed to fly using powerful engines using expensive fuel in order to provide lift through massive thrust and aerodynamically shaped wings. The air currents caused by a great mass moving will blow you around the wings and body of the jet, yes. It’s a shame about your wings. But hey, at least you didn’t get sucked into the engine. You would have been shredded to pieces.”
I sighed again. “I’d rather be dead now. I’ll never… fly… again…” My nonexistent wings throbbed, and I began sniffling with that thought. “My life is over…”
“Yes, loss of limbs is quite traumatizing, I’m sure. But remember that your life isn’t over yet…” he assured me, but I didn’t care. I just knew that my cherished freedom was gone forever.
“Normally we have prosthetics for missing limbs, but I’m really not sure that any technology we have at our disposal could create actual functional replacement wings. The very best arm and leg prosthetics still don’t hold a candle to actual arms and legs, and wings are complex things to get right,” Placard mused.
“But,” I thought aloud, “you humans have perfected flight, right? That jet thing I ran into, you made, right?”
“Well, in truth, flying inside aircraft is more stressful than fun, but then again that’s coming from a human, and we weren’t designed for flight. I guess if you were into flight, you’d actually find it quite boring. You’re just basically hurtling through the air in a giant metal box, kind of like in a car or train.”
I had travelled by train once in life. It was when I was just a colt, and I was bored the entire time, and constantly asking my parents if we could just fly there. Of course, my wings weren’t strong enough for the entire journey, but I refused to believe that at the time.
“Well, could you just use that technology to design, I don’t know, engines that let you really feel like you’re flying?” I snorted.
Dr. Placard’s face fell. “Yes, some people have been working on personal flight, and they’ve even made some clever devices like jetpacks and personal hovercraft. But…”
I tilted my head to the side. “But what?”
“Buuuuut…” Dr. Placard looked frustrated, “these things either require a massive amount of fuel, power, or resources to maintain, and even if we had those things, I’d need clearance to get you one. Not to mention the fact that they’re designed for human use, and adjusting one for your body would be quite the challenge. That rules out hang-gliding and parasailing, as well.
“There is no way I’d be able to get an order for you to get one in the first place. The directors of the Foundation have very strict orders regarding the sentient SCP’s, because we want to make sure you can’t escape. An intelligent creature is harder to contain than a non-intelligent one.
“So our best bet for getting you anything here is the façade that you’re completely non-sentient. I know it’s demeaning, don’t give me that look. I’ll try to think of something, but in the meantime it’s probably in your best interest to act as unintelligent as possible. I’ll talk to you later; I should get back to my advisors. They’re expecting a report on the new subject, and I can’t leave them hanging.”