For the last time, I close door to my apartment that I'd lived in. Looking past the closing door, I see Tail Flight under Wind Rust's wing and hoof starting to cry. I look away as I myself feel tears rolling down the bottom of my eyes. I hear the door close as I lift myself off the floor at the top of the staircase.
Outside, I keep up with Luna to see where she's going. I see almost all of southern Geneva, all the way down to the American Legion pool I used to swim at so many years ago. Holiday Manor, flooding with memories of back when I was starting with Sim City, then Rollie Pollie Ollie, the play of Narnia, those times I woke up early to play myself on Uno, Super Mario All-Stars, Junior, that very vivid nightmare about Crockey and Simba turning into a legit crocodile and lion respectively, and Hammy. I'm so flooded with memories, I start having tears rolling through my eyes again. Luna seems to notice me looking down at the ground.
"Is there anything that's caught your mind? I noticed you looking down."
"Oh, I was just thinking back to where I lived over a decade ago. It's amazing time's gone so fast."
"Quite. Before you know it, we'll be 'fast' into Equestria."
I crack a smile on my face.
"Also, over a decade you say? Well, let's see if you could handle memories from over a millennium ago." I start to chuckle under my breath. I'm not sure about the rules of comedy, but I think Luna's gotten a grip on that. I've learned that if I'd make fun of anyone, it might as well've been myself. Any subject, I'm sure I could think of something golden out of.
I close my eyes for a second, last flying just below the base of clouds. Suddenly, I feel a huge rush on my hips. I open my eyes again. What was once a plain with scattered residential zones had become a valley with an entire town up ahead. Luna stops, which gets me to look at her. "Think you could get to your new house from here?"
"Oh, I don't think so. I know so."
"That's good. I have to get back to Canterlot. I'll see you later."
I wave goodbye as Luna flies away from me. I start to sweat again, this time with pain in the torso and the abs. I start to fall, but just as the pain eases, I concentrate on just flying, which raises me back away from the ground. But the pain comes again, causing me to fall again. This time, I'm not successful in avoiding a crash landing. I crash chest first on the floor. I start to moan as even more pain crosses my chest. I crawl for a while before a pony finds me on the ground as I stop and flop onto my face.
"What the heck? Josh! Is that you?!?"
I somehow manage to belt out something with my face on the ground. "How do you know me?"
"Josh! It's me!"
"Who?" I barely look up and see a set of white hooves. "Oh, Isolate Mercy."
"Quick! Let me see your chest!" I roll onto my side with my left wing touching the ground. Isolate Mercy looks carefully and rolls up the bottom of my shirt. What she sees seems to worry her. "We have to get to the hospital, right now." Now I'm worried. I have no idea what she's talking about.
Isolate Mercy grabs me by the arms and picks me up, rising in the process. Now, I feel like I'm about to fall asleep. "Isolate. Grab anyone you know and have them come to me. I may know some of them."
Suddenly, closing my eyes, reopening them led me to see that I'm in a room instead of just outside Ponyville. Several ponies are in front of me of where I lay now. Bulk Biceps, Isolate Mercy, Thunder Lane, Rumble, Moon Dancer, DIamond Tiara, Silver Spoon, but then, a light gray male pegasus with a blonde mane. He's got orange eyes and his cutie mark is a single yellow lightning bolt.
"What happened?"
Thunder Lane looks at Isolate Mercy. "Well, now we know he's not in Heaven yet."
"What's going on?"
"Hey Josh."
"Isolate Mercy? Didn't I just see you?"
"To be honest, you fainted."
"Fainted?"
Bulk Biceps comes to me now. "But don't worry big man. We gotcha covered."
"What time is it?"
Isolate Mercy looks up above the door adjacent to the window. "It's eleven at night."
"ELEVEN O-CLOCK?!?"
Moon Dancer starts to look at me. "Yeah, you were out cold for a little while. Just be thankful it was just on a scale of hours."
Diamond Tiara jumps onto the bed beside my feet. "When Silver Spoon and I were at Sweet Apple Acres and heard you fainted, we followed Isolate Mercy the entire time before coming here to visit you."
"Exactly. We're not letting a Wonderbolt faint on our watch." Silver Spoon joins Diamond Tiara at the end of the bed.
Rumble jumps onto the bed beside my head and rubs his cheek in mine. "Better?"
I nod. "Yeah. Still a little drowsy though."
The grey pegasus comes to me now. "Wonderbolt or not, we care about you. We don't normally see ponies in this condition, but since you're in it, it's you who we're sticking by."
"Thanks everyone. I especially thank Isolate Mercy. If she hadn't found me when I needed it most, I'd probably be seeing Sydney and Sugar by now."
Isolate Mercy comes to me now. "One more thing Josh. There's a few ponies who'd like to see you." Clearing my view of the door under the clock, I see four ponies enter. Celestia, Luna, Soarin' and Spitfire.
Spitfire walks over to me with Soarin'. "Hey Josh. Heard you fainted today. We wanted to see how everything's going over here, so in case we don't have you up yet, practice is cancelled tomorrow."
"Spitfire and I examined you before we got the princesses, and the results were heartbreaking."
"What's going on?"
"It turns out you have a dysrhythmia that is unknown to us, but it must've come from you losing your gut so fast. Either that, or it must've been from the ton gum plants."
"In turn, the dysrhythmia had gotten worse when you fell onto your chest." Spitfire comes to a projector and shows what looks like my chest. It looks like the middle of it was cut open. It is at that moment that I realize what happened. I split my chest skin open when I fell to the ground.
"Wait a minute, Rainbow Dash said that ton gum plants were only used on me because I was a human with wings. Could you take a look at my wing for a moment? I know the outward coverts go at seven for a normal pegasus."
Princess Celestia pulls out my blanket, revealing that I'm in a patient's outfit with the Wonderbolt symbol on it. She looks back and forth from my wing and Spitfire's. "It seems you have that same number too." No way in heaven. I have pegasus wings. That means, I'm part pegasus.
"I think I know what's been happening. The ton gum plants will cause a moment of death to a pony, and since I had pegasus wings when I had Zecora's ton gum brew, it recognized some of the cells in my body. That's probably why I lost the weight so fast, not the training I did. And with losing the weight so fast, my heart didn't get to get used to it, and with that and the possibility to have been passed down to of what my father has, I might have a combination of dysrhythmias. But why do I keep having the sweating fits?!?"
Spitfire comes to me. "Same reason you lost all that weight."
"You mean the ton gum plants killed my sweat gland cells too?!?" Soarin' nods. "That means, I could start sweating bullets just flying home!"
"And the worst part, not only will you have the inability of exertion during the sweating fits, it could affect your lung performance. We'll see what we need to do tomorrow. At worst case scenario, we might need some samples for one of the ingredients for our pipes here in Equestria."
"Well let's hope I don't get injected with an IKC."
Spitfire shakes her head. "We'll see." Soarin' and Spitfire leave the room and leave me and the other eight with Celestia and Luna.
"We wish you the best of luck, Joshua. We will hold strong, and we will help your life stay in Equestria." Celestia proceeds to wrap me in her extremely large left wing. I'm slid over near the end of the bed with Celestia rubbing her cheek in mine. It's adorable when Rumble or Tail Flight does it, but Celestia?!? Now ponies are just trying to kill me with glee. My heart detonates, three times. I can't help but wrap my right arm over Celestia.
I sadly sigh. "If only Tail Flight, Wind Rust and Wiretap were here."
Celestia takes out my UCD that I haven't seen since my first departure from Equestria. Only now do I know that I'll be departing again relatively sooner to what I original thought. "Is this yours?"
"Yes. It is mine. But how'd you get it from my house?"
Princess Luna draws closer. "Joshua, it wasn't in your house. It was in your pocket. You're very lucky it went unscathed."
I levitate the UCD closer to me. I dial my phone to see if Wind Rust or Tail Flight would pick up. Ten seconds later, someone actually picks up. I gasp. It's Tail Flight. "Hi Tail Flight... I didn't say I'd call you right away when I got home... I know it's late... Because Princess Celestia gave me my UCD back and said that I was lucky to have unscathed... It was in my pocket when I fell onto the ground... I fell onto the ground... I'm with twelve ponies... I, uh, know, right?... Oh, it's nothing... Tail just don't worry about it..." I sigh again. "Nothing happened my either line... I might want to get going... Okay." I hang up the UCD and put it on the table next to the bed.
I have no way of knowing what will happen to me tomorrow. All I can do is hope for the worst and expect the best.