A Wobble.
That was the word that came to Sunset Shimmer’s mind as she fell out onto the hard ground before the portal from Equestria.
A distortion of space that stretched and pulled at her body in every direction through a cosmic river of bright colours that was mesmerizing, disorienting, and what could be considered one of the worst experiences of her life.
Or, to simplify, a Wobble.
Satisfied with the summation of her thoughts, the next sensation Sunset focused on after being unceremoniously dumped on the ground by a spacetime teleportation was the lack of sensation in her hooves.
She couldn’t feel the ground.
That was not entirely true, she admitted. She could feel something that matched what she would expect from ‘ground’, but it didn’t feel right. There was no pressure from implanting her hooves into the dirt or the grittiness as keratin contacted earth. It all felt dulled.
It was arguably worse than the Wobble.
Sunset realized she had closed her eyes sometime between being dumped out of the portal and impacting the ground. Understandable given the circumstances of having dove through an onslaught of oversaturated colour.
Opening her eyes, she found herself immediately regretting that decision.
Where her front hooves should have been were instead two long appendages with strange flat additions on the end. Attached to the flat pieces were four long cylinders with a thicker, shorter one at the base.
A quick glance over the rest of her body revealed other changes. Two more long appendages took the place of her back legs. Her torso was elongated and slimmer than even the wimpiest of ponies.
She was furless except for long strands of red and yellow mane falling from the top of her head. Scrunching her face, she was disquieted by the flatness of it.
An attempt to move forward on her strange appendages caused her to stumble and plant her face into the dirt.
Clearly this body was not made to move like a pony.
Combing through her memory, she attempted to recall a creature that had a similar body structure to her current one. She soon thought of Minotaurs. They stood upright, trotted on two legs, and used… something to grab things.
“Darn. What was the word?” Sunset thought.
The word came to her a moment later. Hands.
They used their hands.
Focusing on her memories, she recalled how they had stood, how they had moved when they visited the palace from the faraway lands of Mazein. They had stood on their back hooves, and moved forward with one hoof placed in front of the other.
Sunset took a deep breath and pushed herself up into a crouch with her four flat appendages firmly planted into the ground. Once ready, she proceeded to the next stage.
With a firm push, she brought herself up to a standing position on her back legs.
She was immediately overcome with a sense of vertigo from the sudden change in perspective. Sunset flailed her arms — she recalled the Minotaurs calling them that between all the flexing they did — until she managed to regain her balance.
After she felt that she wouldn’t topple over, she sighed in relief and surveyed her surroundings.
Sunset stood in some sort of stone courtyard before a marble statue of a pony rearing up on its rear legs atop a square marble block. A gentle touch to the base caused the surface to ripple confirming the location of the portal.
Directly across from the statue was a massive red and brick mortar building. In the distance were lines of similar structures confirming the area to be some kind of town.
Another more thorough inspection of herself revealed that she was wearing clothing. A black jacket over an orange shirt, denim jeans, and knee high boots. Curious of the material of the jacket, she rubbed her new hands along the front.
The material was similar to the old armour worn by Griffins some hundreds of years ago that her mentor had introduced to her during her history lessons.
Leather.
It took all her willpower to not retch at the realization.
A burst of thunder from above startled Sunset. She looked up just in time for a deluge of rain to pour down from the dark sky.
“Great,” she growled. “I’ve been here not five minutes and this world already wants to make me miserable.”
She needed shelter from the storm, preferably one that didn’t require her to move far. That meant the building across from her.
With a resigned sigh, she walked to the front doors and grabbed one of the handles. A strange feeling washed over her as she stared down at her legs.
That had been strangely easy for someone used to being quadrupedal.
Another burst of thunder caused her to jump and shelf the oddness of her quick adjustment. For now, she needed out of this rain.
A quick push granted her entry as she dashed inside.
Sunset walked hesitantly through the dimly lit hallway. Exposed glass light bulbs provided her only source of illumination and caused stark shadows to cling to the corners of the hall. The floors and ceilings were tiled with steel lockers lining both sides of the corridor.
The place felt damp, which was at odds with the actual appearance of the interior.
She was reminded of Celestia’s School for Gifted Unicorns, the absolute last place she wanted to be. At least with that observation, she could surmise the purpose of the building to be a school for… whatever her current species was.
Her stomach growled. She had last eaten some several hours before she had left Equestria. Most schools had a cafeteria, so, by that logic, she should be able to ‘borrow’ some food for herself from there.
With a goal in mind, she began her search only to cry out as the lights all went out.
Standing in the darkness, Sunset breathed heavily as she held onto herself with both hands. Just before she had resolved to try and continue without the aid of light, the bulb above her turned back on bathing the hall in a sinister red glow.
Each light in the hall turned on red one by one at a steady, consistent pace. It continued until only the far reaches of the hallway were drowned in darkness.
“That’s not a welcoming sign,” Sunset muttered.
A sense of unease settled over her as she decided that dealing with the storm might be a safer option in light of this strange occurrence. However, when she turned around to leave through the door she had come through, it was gone.
Biting her lip nervously, she looked down the ominous corridor before her.
With no other choice, she continued her trek into the unknown.
As Sunset made her way forward, she soon realized that no matter how far she walked, how many corners she turned down, she would always find herself in the same dark hallway.
Any doors she came across were locked, and a peek through the windowed portion would leave her unsettled by the dark interior.
Suddenly, as she trekked towards an unknown destination with growing unease, the sound of water drops hitting tiled floors echoed through the building.
Rust coloured water followed shortly after, flooding the hall and rising just above the soles of her boots. It mercifully didn’t soak through the material, but still set her on edge with every splash she made.
Another change occurred a short while later. Plastered across a locker on her right was a poster.
It was a shade of bright white that made it stand out in the darkness of the hallway. She stopped and read the headline written in bold all caps across the centre of the paper.
STUDENT FAILS TEACHER, RUNS AWAY LIKE COWARD.
A hot, roiling coil of rage filled Sunset’s inner being. It was a feeling she was well acquainted with since it was what dragged her into this mess in the first place.
She walked past intent on ignoring it, but couldn’t help running back, ripping the poster off the lockers, and crumpling it into a compact ball before throwing it into the water.
After a few steps, another poster appeared. Against her better judgement she read it.
DOTING TEACHER BETRAYED BY UNGRATEFUL-
Sunset ripped the paper off and shredded it to pieces. Looking further along the hallway, she found similar posters lined along either side of the corridor.
STUDENT EXCEEDINGLY BAD AT MEETING EXPECTATIONS.
STUDENT RUNS AWAY AS A FAILURE AND TERRIBLE DAUGHTER.
TEACHER IS DISAPPOINTED IN WASTE OF TIME ON FAILURE.
It was a struggle to contain the rage inside of her as it boiled to the surface. She continued her trek and, despite knowing that they wouldn’t tell her anything new, she read the increasingly insulting posters as she went. Each one worse than the last.
Headline after headline battered at her fragile state of calm until, finally, it snapped.
She ran.
Splashes of water followed her course as she stomped through the shallow pool on the floor. She ignored the soreness of her limbs, the ragged breathing of her chest. Eventually, exhaustion caught up to her and she bent over clutching her stomach, catching her breath, unable to continue.
Her anger reached its final breaking point. She screamed in frustration and punched a nearby locker, denting the metal.
Sunset was not a failure.
After gathering her thoughts, she roamed over the headlines of the text she had read. The posters had only ever mentioned a Student and a Teacher. She was projecting. There was no reason to believe that the text had referred to her and… her.
Besides, she had only just arrived in this world, it was ridiculous to assume it was about her.
They were clearly referring to someone else.
Thwack.
She fell backwards into the water as she was struck across the face by some blunt force. Gingerly touching the area she was hit, she hissed at the tenderness of the welt.
The source of the blow loomed above her, a long strip of thick paper similar in consistency to the posters plastered along the wall. Runny ink dripped from it as it coiled in place.
It reared back and swung at her.
Narrowly avoiding a second blow, Sunset scrambled away down the hall.
Using a nearby locker as leverage, she kept her eyes on the strange tendril as she stood back up. A shuffling sound resounded behind her. Turning to face it, she saw dozens of those same strips descending from the ceiling.
With the cold grip of fear clutching her chest, she dashed away from the tendrils, adrenaline granting her the strength necessary to push past her exhaustion.
As she careened down the hall, her assailants continued to follow. More of them burst from lockers, from underneath floor tiles, out of doors, and through the ceiling.
Everywhere she ran, those blasted strips chased her. Everywhere she looked, more posters berated her for past transgressions.
Tears flowed from her eyes due to the dual assault against her psyche. Air pumped through her as she kept her running pace.
Running from her unknown attackers.
Running from her problems.
Running from her.
Sunset tripped on the wet tiles due to a misstep and slid along the ground, her shoulder taking the brunt of the impact. She winced as searing pain coursed through her arm.
She struggled to recover. The pain and exhaustion pulled at her energy, but she couldn’t stop while being pursued by those strips. If she stopped, she would be hurt.
Managing to get into a crouch before collapsing once more against the floor, she felt more tears sting the corner of her eyes.
“Fine,” Sunset sobbed. “I should have thought things through. I should have been more in control. I screwed up.” Through the sadness, rage blew through, pressurized from being bottled up for too long. “But she did too!” she screamed.
Emboldened by her own rage, she pushed herself into a standing position. She swung her head around looking for her assailants only to find her surroundings to once more have changed.
The room was arranged like a traditional classroom. It was bathed in the same red light from the hallway with no doors, walls, or windows. Twenty-five wooden desks positioned in rows of five were placed and scrawled with black ink.
A quick read showed all the words to be hateful insults and slurs against whomever presumably sat at the desk.
Centred on each desk was a tall glass vase containing a wilted flower. Any attempt at identification was impossible due to how rotten each flower had become.
At the front of the classroom, separated from the rest, was another desk clean of words with a glass vase containing a single, vibrant orange and red coloured rose.
Just past it, floating in empty space, was a chalkboard.
Sunset hobbled forward using the desks to steady her. She leaned against the front desk, gazing at the flower. She touched it lightly with her fingers. Soft petals, intense colour, covered in thorns along the stem.
Diverting her attention away from the flower, she gazed intently at the chalkboard.
It was a dark green slate contained within a wooden frame. Words in chalk rapidly appeared and disappeared in rapid succession. Deep gouges marred its otherwise smooth surface. Rust coloured water leaked from the open wounds, flooding the floor.
“So, it was you,” Sunset stated rather than asked.
The words erased themselves and a new one was written in a neat cursive script to replace them.
Rude, Sunset read.
Sunset scowled. “Seriously? You drag me into this Tartarus cursed place and call me rude?”
Yes, the Chalkboard answered.
With a weary sigh, she worked herself around the table and sat down facing the chalkboard, her back lightly touching the vase on the table. She wanted to rally against this… thing that had seemingly attacked her, but the relief she felt at having the chance to rest sapped her will to do so.
As she sorted her thoughts, she found herself angry at being trapped, but it was hardly worse than what she had done to her.
“You know,” Sunset said thoughtfully, “despite how scared I was, I still prefer being here than back home.”
Why? the Chalkboard asked.
“Those posters were far too on the nose for you to not know most of the details.”
Of course, the Chalkboard answered, but it would be good for you to say it out loud.
She mulled over her thoughts for a moment. “I made a lot of mistakes,” she eventually said. “I won’t apologize for my ambition, but…” she scowled. “I regret getting my only friend caught up in the crossfire. I also should have been more in control of my anger. But I’m not the only one that needs to apologize.” She felt the familiar roil of rage return to her. “She made mistakes too, and refused to acknowledge them. She taught me, but failed to impart the most basic principles.”
Sunset leaned forward, her arms resting on her knees. She glared into empty space seeing the face of the one who was at the center of her rage.
Her grief.
“She pushed me harder than she had any right to. She used me to get what she wanted, and when I couldn’t meet those expectations, she abandoned me.” She angrily wiped away the tears from her eyes with the palm of her hand. “So, yeah, I’m not happy you put me through that, but at least you didn’t sit there with a smile on your face and lie about how you weren’t putting me through Taratarus,” she growled. “I hope Celestia enjoys the comfort of being alone.”
The gouges in the slate sealed shut, the water ebbed until only tiled floors remained. Lights brightened back to the white glow they originally had emitted. The Chalkboard cleared itself.
I’ll keep you company, it wrote.
A comforting warmth spread through Sunset as the Chalkboard began emitting a soft red glow. It seeped into her, reduced her inner turmoil and left her feeling calm
New words appeared on the Chalkboard as Sunset watched.
What was that? she read.
Was I not just thinking that?
Are you reading my thoughts?
Stop that!
The Chalkboard cleared itself and left behind a single curled question mark. Sunset took a deep breath as she gathered her thoughts. Focusing, she projected her thoughts towards the object.
You read thoughts? Yes.
Just my thoughts? All Thoughts.
Mulling over the implications, she decided that she would shelf this new information for later. She wasn’t in a state to think clearly or make decisions. She posed another question in her mind.
How do we get out of here? We don’t.
Then what do we do? We wait for the Cabin.
“What is the Cabin?” Sunset asked aloud.
Seemingly summoned by her inquiry, a column of bright blue light burst to her left. She turned just in time to see a large square metal box appear from the floor with two inset metal doors on its smooth surface.
The box emitted a ding as the doors swung open revealing a red plush interior lit by a small chandelier hanging from the ceiling.
Sunset turned back to the Chalkboard. New words had appeared.
Carry me, she read.
Rolling her eyes, she eased herself off the desk and, begrudgingly, lifted the object off the wall, gripping it between both hands. With a grunt of effort, she shuffled awkwardly into the strange metal box.
The doors closed behind her as she turned to face forward. Another ding resounded inside the chamber. She stumbled slightly from the rumbling of the box as she felt its downward movement.
She released a long beleaguered sigh. She was in for a long night.