A Foal and his Box

by TheGovernor

Rating: teen
Tags: Tragedy, Slice of Life, Doctor Whooves, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Sad, Other
Length: 3615

Do you really only live once?

The short but interesting life of a young foal and the cardboard box that helped him live.

Published 2013-02-22 07:10:01 UTC
Last updated 2013-02-22 07:10:01 UTC

The one and only chapter

Some believe everypony has their own vision of heaven, that when you get there you experience something unique to you. To fulfill something you couldn’t while alive, see your parents one more time, or something else. To do that one thing you always wanted while alive, to travel to that one placed you couldn't afford. No one pony saw the same image of true heaven. Well this is the story of a foals heaven, and the story of why that came to be. A young little British foal, who was never known, not often lived, and quite frankly forgotten. Not in his life at least.

The young british foal, was never named, for his parents had never decided a name which quite fit his unique look. They came across many different names, but always disagreed in the end, calling him simply "Foal". Foal was born on a rainy day, during a rainy week, in a rainy month. Under the stars in Northridge park, was where he popped into life. He was born into the family of Gafrray, an ancient family, twisted within the roots of pony history, a rather poor family although, but they handled themselves to the best they could. They had a home, though it was small. Had food, though it was few. Had friends, although they were far away. Foal himself, was always rather short and scrawny. Nearly half the size of the others his age, he was often mistook for much younger than his own age. He had a light orange mane, and therefore was often referred to as "The Ginger" but along with that came a stereotype, which did not fit him in the slightest. The stereotype of “soulless” was far from descriptive of him. He had more soul than anyone in his family, to say the least. They were somehwat of a bore. Though with little nourishment from food, it was hard for him to grow, so to hide his skinny little limbs, when he grew up he would always venture out with a trench coat on, which became his closest clothing item over the years. Although he did look a tad ridiculous at times, of course. He went through phases with is clothes, as many foals do in their youth. At first he enjoyed clothes that made him look fancy, often worn by the elderly in the town, then he had a thing for more of a hippy look, clipping little flowers to himself, then onto scarves and jackets of wide colors, then the trenchcoat of course.

His family lived in a crummy house, in a crummy neighborhood. They bought the home cheaply, being one of the oldest in the area. It was almost entirely made of old wood, with paint they had to redo from wear and tear over the years. They then had to duty of restarting the power in the home to get anything to work. They had little money. They had no connections to their distant relatives, so they had no means of asking for loans from them, living on their own the best they could. On more than one occasion, Foal was nearly taken away from his home, the life not being fitting for a child. The first time this happened was the first time he had a friend come over. After seeing their horrible lifestyle, he blabbered to his mother and the rest is history. The next time this happened, Foal did it himself, after getting in a fight with his parents, but regretted it and snuck back away to his home in the night. He stayed with his family ever since. He was raised watching people beaten and bullied on the streets and at school. He tried to stop a bully once, but was beaten so horribly after he developed somewhat of a fear of contact with other. That night he returned home to the terrible smell of alcohol. He saw the bottles aligning the window sill, his father passed out below them like a dead man. Each night he was able to sneak quietly into his room, and have a peaceful nights rest, hiding from the smell under his blanket. But one night he wasn't so lucky. His father was already awake when he got home, but far from sober. He grabbed his kid by the forearm, and the rest I shall not repeat. This is when Foal first realized his aspiration. He wanted to help. He wanted no others to feel the pain that he knew. He first dreamed of the army, then CIA, but settled on police. So then he could help locally. Help the people he knew and the home he loved, even with its flaws.

At school, he always was top of his class, which is how he always remained. He was brilliant at all subjects, except that of making friends. He noticed different groups of people, none he liked or wanted much to be a part of. There were the bullies, one of the smaller groups, who would harm people just for the pure point of doing so, having the undying need to cause pain. The popular kids, one of the largest groups, showed absolutely no free-thinking, just falling into their ranks, and eventually bringing others in to become robots like them. There was also the quiet ones, who looked a tad odd, but stayed quiet in the shadows, so quiet most forgot them soon after they entered. People came and left often. He knew a Steven, a Rosemary, a Barbara, and even a John. But they all left, and he never again saw them, but he always remembered.

The one thing that was always with him, was the river. There was a small little river outside his school that he found on his way home one day, it goes all the way through his town, and into the next, and so forth. He would sit beside it for hours and watch its beauty, captivated by its flow. He would tell his secrets into it, and watch them float away, far away, taking the concern of them out of his mind. And for once in his life, It was always there.

He always wanted to leave his home, to travel the world on his own. He wanted to see what other places were like, how other people acted, just about anything besides his bland life he lived now. He read books of far away places, places that were hot or cold, places peaceful or war ravaged, places where people lived in the sky or under the ground. Places still existing, places from the past, even places in the stars in old Sci-Fi books. But he never left his home, not one time.

Then one day, he heard his parents ordering a tv on the phone. When it arrived, the first TV he had ever gotten to see for himself, he was taken away that day, far far away. He saw a whole new world through the TV, a world where he saw all he ever wanted. He saw the colors, he saw the people and the places, he saw everything. The TV could take him anywhere and everywhere, at any time, under his control. Then he saw the box.

It was just an ordinary old box, sitting beside the TV, discarded in a lonely corner of the house. He took the box out into his room, and studied it over, peeling away all the annoying little stickers until it was no more than a cardboard cube. He began coloring it, gathering a box of markers from under his bed. He put down whatever color came into his head; yellow, white, a little brown, but mostly just blues, his favorite. It was his own. He would climb inside and close his eyes, curl up into a little ball and it would take him away. Wherever he wished it to. He would be inside for hours, thinking of adventure and danger, romance and conflict, heroes and villains. Then he’d have to come back, back to his sad gray little world. But he’d always return. Every day. The box was always there, in that old corner in his room. Always ready for adventure and travel. And so was he.

As they boy grew, he always stayed the same. He was always bookish and quiet and quirky, following the rules and never doing anything too outgoing with his life. He dreamed of being adventurous and wild, and often tried to get up the courage to do so, but always failed, never stepping past the sidelines. His fathers drinking grew worse over the years, to the point Foal was frightened to enter his home, and now it would be a rare occasion the boy saw his father sober. So Foal hid away in the only safe place he knew, his box. The box where he could be anyone. Where he could help people, just like he wanted.

Then he met Kevin. Kevin Chei Foreman, was an odd boy, with an odd name, from a odd place. He moved into the school in the middle of the year, like most odd kids do. His mane was always a brown mess, he often wore the same old black hoodie day after day, and was critical to anyone who interacted with him. Foal avoided Kevin the best he could, afraid of what could happen if they met. But the one day, the first sunny day in weeks, as Foal exited his school, he saw some of the school bullies grab Kevin by the mane and pull him out behind the school. Foal, fearing the worst for the kid, followed close behind, but out of view.

The boys dragged Kevin a little ways into the woods out behind the playground, and threw him to the ground, furiously beating on the him, until finally he lay limp on the ground. Foal hid behind a bush, watching the whole events by just barely peeking over, until he had seen enough. Sneaking into a nearby portable class room, he grabbed a little yellow screwdriver and scampered back to the woods. Foal hurried past the bushes this time, moving right to the others. The first fell as he impaled his weapon into his back. The second, with a strike to the knee. And the third ran, ran far away, farther than the river goes.

As Kevin slowly opened his eyes and looked up to see his guardian stand above him, something changed between in the glance between them. Offering his hoof down, and a home to clean up in, Foal quickly befriended Kevin, and Kevin befriended Foal. Soon they were inseparable, the first friends each other had.

They spent every day after school together, reading a book or watching the TV, or even exploring out into the woods for adventure. Foal, although, barely had time for his box anymore. Until he showed Kevin.

It was a rainy day, so the boys could not leave outside this time, to their major disappointment. As they sat around, holed up in Foal's room, reading some old comic books, Foal spotted the old box sitting away, gathering dust. He made his way over, looking closely at it to remember the last game he played inside, and then pulled it out, and climbing quickly inside. At first Kevin scoffed at the idea, laughing at Foal for being a geek, but Foal was already taken away. He imagined himself as a alien hero, saving the universe from bad aliens. As Kevin watched his closest friend have a blast in the box, imaging the greatest adventure he'd yet though of, eventually he too joined him inside, right by his friends side. And that’s how they spent each afternoon after.

The river. Always so blue, always so calm and peaceful, changed that day. It flowed in a perfect motion everyday, all day, never being disturbed, the current never changing. Until a new color entered its stream, mixing with the blue, mixing with the current. The day blood entered it. The day the flow was stopped by an object in the river. A body.

Foal left school early, it having been a half-day then, and ran home quickly to play away the day in his box. He didn’t take notice of the unusual quietness of the home though, and he soon entered his room, locking himself away from the world, just like every other day before. Today he was a police officer, entering a call box to report a murder to his station. Then he heard the bang. The loudest sound he'd heard, right beside his head. His door flung open, followed by his father barging in. He grabbed Foal by the collar of his trench coat, lifting him and throwing the boy over onto the floor, standing above him. He just stood there like a statue, unmoving, expression unchanging, a horrible mix of pain and anger on his face. So Foal did what he thought best, looked away with fear. He was all of the sudden grabbed, moved to face his father, separated by only inches, a look of pure anger on his face now, right in front of Foal’s own.

His world went black.

When he awoke, he was in a white world. White walls, white ceiling, white blanket over him, white everything. It was the one place he hoped to never travel within; a hospital.

He lay in a patients dress, all alone in a long square room. Next to him though, he saw the sleeping form of a young blond mare, much younger than himself. What had happened to her? What had happened to me?

As the doctor entered his room, they explained to him the serious condition his heart was in after being protruded by a knife, they decided to give him a few moments alone and let it sink in. The next news he received was far worse.

His father was now in court, for the crime of hospitalizing his son, and murder of his wife, whos body was supposedly dumped in the nearby river. Foal lay in shock for countless hours after, before once more, his world went black.

He was awoken again, this time by a high pitched beeping sound. But he was informed that in reality, it was the signal of his death. His heart constantly gave out in his slumber, three times already, but each time he’d been revived, though for increasingly shorter times. They didn’t think he could last for then thirteen times, at this rate. He now had ten to go.

On his fourth stretch he put his scarf around to protect himself from the cold, stepping out into the world, to say goodbye for the last time. He watched the leaves fall from trees in the park, watched kids play nearby, and stopped for a minute to see the closing moments of a womans funeral. His mothers.

On his fifth stretch, Kevin visited him, bringing him the most glorious salad he’d seen in his life. All kinds of toppings were stacked upon it, and they feasted like kings on that day. As he began to leave again, Kevin made him promise one thing.

“Don’t leave me Foal. Don’t leave me with these people, in this world. These bad people, in this corrupt world. It will find a way to ruin me too.”

On his sixth, Foal was angry. Angry at the doctors who tried to help him, but were failing altogether. Angry at the shows on his TV and the food he was given, nothing seeming good to him now. Angry at each and every little bit, feeling this world cheated him, cheated him of a long happy life, cheated him of any form of happiness. Then he spotted a little umbrella leaning up against the wall, covered in a rainbowy display of color. And that brightened his face, the first time that day.

On the seventh he enjoyed television once more. He watched an opera, based off an old Edgar Allan Poe story, one he'd not yet seen. As he watched the colors blink out for probably the last time, the people once more disappear, he wondered when it would be his turn to click off.

On the eighth, he met Susan, the mare in the bed beside his. He finally got up the courage to scoot his bed closer to hers and introduce himself, forcing his last ounces of kindness into the words. She later told him of the damage to her brain she had gotten from her Grandfather, which brought her here, her last place to stay. They shared tales of their lives, experiences the other would never know. Foal with his box and Susan with her family. Susan was the light of his world now, the last beam of happiness he had to hold onto He spent the rest of his eighth with her, before she was taken away for surgery. He never say the little ray of sunshine again.

On his ninth he mourned her. He mourned how she, and so many other innocents had died. How many more would have to die? He spent that day sad and alone.

And on his tenth he met a cop. He had previously revealed his dream of being in the police to a nurse named Martha, who in return brought one in the meet the young lad. He had so many questions spill of himself, out to the man, everything he’d ever wondered and dreamed of. And not just of being a cop, of the mans life. Where he’d been, the adventures he’d had, everything Foal had not known. The cop shook his hoof and left that night, leaving Foal to wonder why Martha waited until this day to bring that man in.

He was hardly awake for the next two, only seeing glimpses of life flash by. Then the thirteenth, he lacked even the basic strength to open his eyes, to move, or to speak. All he could do was hear.

He heard the arguments of desperate doctors trying to save him, trying their hardest. The sound of metal objects clicking together, followed by silence, then a few more clicks. And then the desperate cry of his father, yelling at the doctors to do better.

“Do more! Hes dying god damnit! Save him!”

“I’m only the Doctor! I can only do so much!” One yelled back, after being lashed out for minutes on end, finally buckling under his rage.

Then the sound went out. He experienced death one more time. He felt the wave of nothing wash over his body, all feeling flushing out.

The next thing he saw was light. An area of bright white light, all around him, going as far as he could see. He stood alone in it though, not a sound or movement in sight. He knew this was his afterlife.

He thought of his life, the box he’d loved so deeply, that took him for adventures everywhere, and it therefore appeared before him, open wide to take him again. He remembered his dream of the police next, and the box grew tall and wide, turning blue in color to represent a police box.

He remembered the worlds he’d read of. Both past and future, and suddenly a landscape appeared around him, encasing him in a new world that spread for miles. He remembered the people he met in his life, and a Steven appeared before him. And a Rose next, and a Barbara, then a Martha. He remembered little Susan with her brain issue, so he gave her the strongest brain of all, and became the grandfather she never had, but always wanted.

But he remembered the evils in life too. The bullies who tormented just for the sake of doing so, and so he encased them in metal, just as he’d seen them before, shells of human emotions. He remembered the real emotionless, and they became robots as he saw them. The quiet ones, became faceless, always hiding away in the shadows, always being forgotten. But most of all, his father, with his cold emotionless stare. He became a statue. A crying statue, weeping for his son, but he did not make him alone. He gave him others, just as mournful.

Then there was Kevin. He made Kevin just as he had been, the only one John had ever related to. He set himself on a quest in this new world, to make amends with the stallion, for leaving him as he had promised not to. But he couldn’t help but make Kevin spiteful. Make him as he knew he felt to himself.

And so he lived the rest of his existence as he always wanted. Exploring the universe, past and future, with the friends he could never make in real life, fighting the fights he was too afraid too, and helping those he never go the chance to. He would travel for thirteen more lives, each one different than the one before it. But he would still feel that loneliness, the one that followed him his whole life. He felt it until his last day in this world, before he finally passed on to another place. Another existence. Finally entered the real heaven.

And what did Foal call himself? He claimed himself The Doctor. He named himself after the last man he heard as he lived. The man who tried so hard to save him, but failed. He would help him succeed this time, help him help others in this new life. He would make the Doctor proud.
He was a hero.
Or just a Doctor.