Gifts and Curses

by flamevulture17

2. Impossible

[Chapter 2]

Impossible

---

Alex heard a loud scream coming from upstairs. It surprised him that it might be more serious than he originally thought. He knew Andrew was not one for holding back an outburst enough to let it out in such a cheeky way.

“What are you doing up there Andrew!?” he raised his voice to make sure his older brother could hear him.

A long silence filled the house. Neither brother said a word for the next few minutes as Alex continued to watch his show for which was almost over. Only then would Alex decide to check on his big brother.

- - -

Andrew could not believe was he was looking at.

In the mirror there was a figure not more than four feet tall. It resembled a small horse like he had predicted earlier, a pony perhaps. A pony with what appeared to Andrew as himself projected through this mirror. Just his luck, either he was dreaming, or he was going insane. Another feature that hit him as very odd was the colors. It was no normal color for a horse. They matched his arms. It was blueish, sort of the same color as his ceiling, turquoise really. He shuffled around in his baggy clothes and the mirror image did the same. This cannot be real.

Andrew slowly walked closer to the door to get a better look at himself. The fuzz on his face became more distinct and clear. He was calmer at this point than when he let out that scream minutes ago. He learned not to freakout about things that he could do nothing to change. Andrew just wanted to know who or what caused this and wanted to know fast. He looked at his blue hooves and his socks. He uncovered the socks to reveal his feet were hooves, too. He figured that's what they would be considering his change of appearance. He looked back at his face. It was longer than before, large yellow eyes, snout, big ears. Wait, yellow eyes!?

“I must be going insane.”

His hair was a dark blue and white color and nicely combed too that stretched past the back of his neck. He did not recall combing his hair, nor did he remember taking a shower the day before, thus his hair should look like a complete mess. The clothes he wore hid most of his body, for which he assumed the fur was the same color as his face.

Andrew almost screamed again when he saw long hair far behind him of the same color. A tail, sure, what else is new? he thought to himself sarcastically. This should be fun. His tail was quite the average length in proportion to his body size. The part that was most freaky above all was his ability to move it and felt it like an extra limb. This amused him to some degree, but he was not liking it at all.

Andrew scanned his head again, looking for anything he missed. He thought he was just seeing things on his head, like there was a horn on his forehead.

Yeah right, like I'm gonna believe that's possible, he thought. He used his right hoof to feel his head. Something stopped his hoof from moving properly across his forehead. Andrew's eyes grew wider. His eyes did not lie, there really was something there.

A horn!? Are you kidding me!? he violently scream in his mind. After everything he found impossible today, this one took first prize. He still could not quite figure out the logical reasons for turning into a horse since it was not scientifically possible. Neither was that loud sound from last night.

“Yup! I'm insane.” Those were his last words before he heard faint footsteps coming up the stairs.

Andrew assumed it to be his brother Alex. He started going through mental scenarios on how to let his brother know what happened to him. Oh no no no no, I can't let him see me like this. I can't let anybody see me like this. But I need help. I need to know what is wrong with me. I need to know why this happened to me and why not somebody else. I need a friend I can trust. I need... … he continued flooding his mind with thoughts and whispered to himself on how to avoid his family. He kept thinking whether or not he should keep himself a secret from his little brother. Alex would find out eventually based on how often they saw each other, but Andrew could try and prevent that.

As soon as he was done thinking, Andrew opened the bathroom door as darted into the closet on the opposite side of the hall and closed the door halfway to not draw attention to his location. He heard the footsteps disappear onto the carpet in the hallway. His heart pounded more and more. He could hear his brother's voice coming from down the hall. He decided to get his attention and lie to him.

- - -

Alex slowly walked up the stairs. He had just finished watching his show. It was a good episode. He now had nothing else to do but check up on Andrew. As he reached the top, he heard a noise down the hall.

“Andrew? Is that you?”

...

“Come on man, no more games.”

Alex got a little more concerned, but stayed calm.

“Just tell me where you are so I know you're not going to scare me again.”

…

“I'm in the bathroom,” came his older brother's voice.

“Are you alright bro?” Alex asked with a sigh of relief.

Silence filled the hall once more before he spoke again.

“Yes! Wait no. Wait yes! I mean... don't come in here!”

Alex never really listened to his older brother as much as he should have. It came to him as an invitation rather than a 'go away' speech. He walked toward the bathroom.

- - -

Andrew tried to make his misery sound convincing enough to get his brother out of sight so he could make a run for it to his room on the opposite end of the hall. He knew Alex rarely listened to him when he told him not to do things.

“Don't come in here,” he repeated. He made sure he had the right tone in his voice.

Through the crack in the closet doorway he could see Alex walking toward the bathroom. He kept an eye on his position, opening the door ever so slightly as he passed by. He waited until Alex entered the bathroom. As soon as Alex was unaware of anything else, Andrew ran for his life. He ran as fast as he could on all fours hooves to his room, almost tripping into a complete fall once he got the doorway. He slammed the door shut and struggled to lock the door without his proper hands. As he heard the lock snap in place, he sunk down to the floor. His heavy breathing slowed a little from relief of being safe in the privacy of his room.

Andrew felt sorry for deceiving his brother like that and wanted to make it up to him. He didn't know how given his physical body. He didn't know what his little bro would think of him.

He found that walking on all fours was easier than when he was human simply because his original form was not meant to walk on their hands and feet. His current form of this horned pony made it easier to stay on all his limbs. Although he did not like it any more than hiding from his brother, he'd have to live like this until this was all over. Andrew wanted this nightmare to end, if it was even a nightmare to begin with. The more he thought about it, the more real it felt.

Before he could reach his desk there was knocking on his door.

“Is this another one of your jokes Andrew? Just tell me what's wrong,” Alex's voice was muffled behind the door, but still enough that Andrew could hear him.

Andrew needed to stall his brother and get away from the rest of his family as long as he could without raising suspicion. It was too late for his brother though.

“No. I can't talk about it. It's personal.”

“Then why do you have to hide from me?”

Andrew was not doing a very good job of keeping his cool.

“Because. My hair... my hair looks horrible.” Andrew wanted to lie again, but knew this was true in some way, seeing now that his hair is white and blue with a horn appearing out through the top.

“Oh come on bro, you don't look that bad.”

“No. Just no.”

“Are you sure? Because there's something going on around here and you seem to be the one causing it.”

Andrew thought about what Alex had just said. What could he be causing that compromised his 'transformation' to his little brother? Or worse. All he had done is get a good look at himself and hide from everyone. Nothing more.

“What am I causing that is so important for you to know about it?”

“I don't know. You have just been acting all weird lately.”

“Oh.”

Andrew was hoping that was the answer, or something close to it. He let a deep breath to try and calm down. Except his deep breath distinctly sounded like that of a horse's snort. He panicked and covered his mouth in a way that allowed him to make it sound fake. At least Alex doesn't know anything more than to believe he is playing tricks on him.

“I told you I'm fine.”

“Whatever you say,” but before Alex could go back downstairs, he noticed a dent in Andrew's door. He inspected in with great attention to detail. It was circular, or half a circle, like a horseshoe shape.

Since when did this get here? thought Alex, examining it with his fingers. He wondered why Andrew had a print of a horseshoe on the outside of his door. At that moment, he was more curious than ever and did not want to wait on what Andrew was keeping a secret.

Andrew was putting things in his duffel bag like his phone, his iPod and earphones, his wallet, his camera, his hat, and his sunglasses. He had a hard time getting all his stuff in the bag with no hands. So he slid the objects off the desk into the bag he was holding in his mouth. He was planning to sneak out the window and go to his best friend's house, Dale. As he was about to jump out the window to the green grass below, he heard Alex trying to force his way in the bedroom door.

“Let me in dude!” shouted Alex, rattling the doorknob.

Seconds later, Alex broke the lock off the door and let himself in with lightning speed.

---

“What's so interesting Princess? Is it something horrible?” asked Spike.

“No. I'm not entirely sure.” She paused. “Come. Let's talk over here at the table.”

Celestia led Luna, Twilight, and Spike to the table full of magic scrolls and other books laid a mess on top. They stood there for a few seconds as Twilight was still looking around the room, amazed at all the old piles of information she never thought existed. Celestia turned around and looked a little embarrassed at the mess she caused.

“Sorry for the presentation, but I was up all night with what you see here.”

“Why is that? Does it have to do why we are here?” asked Twilight, afraid she might have jumped to her questions too soon.

“Yes it does Twilight. I am also sorry for not telling you in the letter I sent you. I did not want to risk too much attention to the event.”

“Event? Did I miss something Princess?” Twilight felt bad for interrupting her, but the suspense was eating her brain.

“Yes. I have not told you yet. There was an energy surge somewhere in Ponyville last night. It lasted only a few seconds and scared away some of the critters in the area. Fortunately, there were no ponies around to notice it since it was so late at night that everypony was sleeping. It came to my attention when Luna here felt it from her room. She notified me right away and both of us tried to figure out what it was ever since.”

“You don't look tired, Luna,” said Spike, soon realizing it was stupid comment.

“I'm up all night regularly. It is Celestia who needed the rest, I think I could have handled it myself, but my sister insisted it was not something to go at on my own.” Luna felt she needed to add some little detail that she had not yet told Celestia herself, but did not want to impose much concern with her big sister while she was awake. “I told her to sleep on it while I do it myself, but she politely refused and asked me to help her with looking it up in the Mysterious Magic section here in this building. She felt it was not your ordinary foal magic surge learning magic, but something of foreign in nature, so I couldn't just leave her to solve it herself.”

“It's quite alright, Luna, I'll sleep now that my work for the start of the day is done. But first let me explain more specifically why you are here.”

Twilight and Celestia both sat on the couch where the Princess had fallen asleep earlier that morning. Luna and Spike began cleaning the table off of unnecessary items that did not aid in their work. After getting in a comfortable sitting position, Celestia spoke in a low and honest voice.

“My faithful student, I apologize for the trouble the trip has caused on your busy schedule. I need your help to trace the origin of the surge and hopefully find out patterns, properties, or any other useful pieces of information we can use to study the nature of this unusual magic.”

“So you don't know what it was either?”

“That is the problem. Magic is unpredictable sometimes. Even I don't have control over some of its mysteries. This is the first time in a quite a while something of this magnitude has occurred.”

“What can I do to help?” Twilight asked with a peak in interest.

“I've been looking through all the magic scrolls and books in this secure part of the castle to find what exactly I am dealing with, but I am falling short on time and information. That is where you come in. You are one of two students I trust that can efficiently interpret the meanings of certain types of magic. It is only fair that you try to look for any spells in these rusty old scripts that can explain the event. Everything in this wing is for you to search through and any books you may have brought with you.”

Twilight felt like so much weight had been lifted off her shoulders from the explanation Princess Celestia had just given her. She was always prepared for anything. It seems that she could not tell whether this event Celestia was talking about was either safe to study or highly dangerous, but had an instinctive feeling that it was not serious. All her speculation of it being a life-threatening issue was wrong, and her hunch that it was only something that concerned Celestia was right. She was now in a state of curiosity with such a strange event to increase her motivation. Whatever the problem, Twilight wanted to make sure she could do her best to help her mentor.

“I'll see what I can do,” she said, eager to get on the job. “Don't worry about my schedule Princess, this is more important than all the things I was going to do this weekend anyway.”

“Thank you, Twilight. I must rest now, for Luna will assist you until I return. I hear Spike is a great assistant as well.”

“He sure is. I don't know what I'd do without him.” Twilight was so happy to have Spike along for this mission. Never in her life had she been so grateful for someone like Spike to make a difference in her life.

She had begun unpacking her books from her case before she stopped to think. She had thoughts of needing some help for this investigation, then she remembered Celestia saying she was one of two students she trusted. She assumed that meant she was not the only pony Celestia called for this mission and wanted to know who else was going be helping out on her research, if anypony at all.

“Now, I must be off. I hope you can handle it from here.”

Twilight nodded. “I'm sure I can manage.”

Before Celestia could leave, Twilight asked her about the other potential helper.

“Princess? Can I ask you one last question?”

“Yes of course, Twilight. What is it?”

“You implied I'm not the only one who will be working on this investigation. I was wondering, who else is going to help us out?”

“I'm glad you caught on Twilight. I'm sending another unicorn that might be of great use to you. You two might have also been acquainted in the past.”

“Who?”

“Lyra Heartstrings.”

---

The room was empty. The only evidence that Andrew was present a second ago was his missing personal belongings, duffel bag, and an open window.

“Dammit Andrew. You have serious issues man.”

Alex inspected the rest of the room. He knew it just as good as Andrew himself, but did not find anything that lead to why Andrew would go through the trouble to avoid him. Neither did he find his personal things, assuming he took them with him out the window. Alex walked over to the window and found no one outside other than warm air and the apple tree in the backyard. I must have just missed him. That guy is unpredictable, Alex mentally said to himself. He was so tempted to search Andrew's room for anything suspicious, but decided not to.

Alex then heard the front door open and the voices of both his parents in the middle of an adult conversation. He sprinted downstairs to meet them. His mother was helping her husband with a few brown bags he brought from the store and his father had his own share of bags in his hands. As Alex got to them, he was out of breath. He was too tried with a pant in his breath to form words but could not get them out clear enough.

“Oh hey there son, you go for a run?” said his father.

“I- uhh... Anhdserw uhh... hhe uh... ugh... whew.”

“Whoa slow down there sport. Just relax and you can tell us after we put away the groceries. Can you help by bringing in the last two bags from the car, son?” He tried to calm Alex down by using his key talent of careful words in a fatherly voice.

Alex took a deep breath, “Okay dad.”

As soon as Alex heard the voice of his father, he had almost forgotten why he was in such a hurry to tell them something. His dad was good at calming his family down with his voice.

When Alex left to do what his father asked him, he thought for a moment. Maybe I should just keep this to myself. He decided he'd keep it a secret and act to his mom like it was nothing worth worrying about.

He grabbed the remaining two bags out of the front seat of the car. He just wished this day would go back to normal and not have his older brother ruin it for him.

- - -

Andrew barely made it out of the house and out of sight. He heard a car pull up the driveway and assumed it was his parents returning from their usual errands. He wondered how he was going to get to his friend's house without being noticed by no more than one person. He wondered how he was going to tell his friend Dale about his current predicament, if at all. Even though he trusted Dale with his life, Andrew started having doubts if it applied now.

Dale's house was just down the block, about six houses down and on the other side of the street. That would explain why they remained good friends after grade school. They had been living so close to each other since the seventh grade. The sun was rising higher and higher directly above his head. He figured it was close to ten or eleven o'clock. Many different thoughts of getting there was a challenge. Going over to the backyards of the adjacent homes would be the easy part. The hard part was crossing the street undetected.

Andrew jumped the various short fences separating each line of property as quickly as he could, but on the other hand was unsuccessful at stealth. Every time he jumped over the short fences his duffel bag almost fell completely off his back. He made sure the contents of his bag did not break. He felt like he was so loud that people from a mile away can hear him. He tensed up his now 'pony' ears as if it was going to help to silence his escape. Maybe that explains why he can hear everything so clearly. Horses probably have better hearing than humans, he wasn't sure. Fortunately, nobody came out of their house as he passed every different backyard and even if one did, there were so many places to hide in the bushes and tree in the area. It was not long until he reached the second-to-last house at the end of the neighborhood.

“Now for the tricky part.”

Early in the morning not many people would be out in the middle of the road playing street sports because he knew that was a regular activity for kids on the block. A miniscule amount of cars drove through the street regularly. Only residents and delivery trucks traveled through here. Andrew went around to the front of the house he was trespassing on.

Just his luck, not one person or car could be seen or heard. Andrew was confident he could make it with little effort at being spotted and waited a few seconds before sprinting towards the house in front of him. He moved so fast as possible that it surprised him that he was able to run that fast without getting too tired after a sprint. Again, he figured it was the current body he was in. A horse's greatest qualities are its speed and stamina. He ran around to the back, jumping over one last wooden fence. Andrew had already gotten used to his pony body since it was not that hard to control.

Dale's house was much smaller than his. The backyard was nicer than that of the rest of the neighborhood, as far as he knew. The front door was out of the question and the back door was an option, but he saw a car out front and thought Dale's mother might still be home. Dale's room was on the first floor at the back side of the house. He has been here almost every week since they were friends, so he thought he'd get his attention by tapping on his bedroom window.

“First step, get help from the only person in the world I trust,” he said to himself.

Andrew trotted over to his friend's window and paused for a second, then tapped lightly on the window pane with his right hoof.

- - -

Dale was just getting out of bed after laying in bed awake an hour earlier when he heard something at his window. He was half asleep and ignored it. He sat upright on the side of his bed and put his hands on his face. He was so tired from late last night from typing up half of his chemistry paper. Like his best friend Andrew, they had something in common in terms of science. Dale chose to write his essay on gunpowder and explosive substances. He's always been a guy for watching things blow up, though he had no idea what went in to making things explode and cause bullets to shoot out of a gun at the speed of sound.

*Tap tap tap*

Dale quickly snapped his head toward the window. He paused for a second.

“Hello?”

He kept on staring at the window to see if it would happen again. A few seconds later it did.

*Tap tap tap*

Dale only thought it could be none other than his friend, Andrew. He walked over to the window and opened the blinds. There was nobody there. As far as he could see, it was a beautiful day that need not go to waste. He still wondered what he was going to do for the day. He was planning to hang out with his best friend in the world and a couple of his other friends later that afternoon.

“Hey! … Andrew? Are you there?”

Not a sound, save for the chirping of birds and ruffling of leaves.

…

“Okay man, we playing hide and seek or something? You know I don't like that game.”

…

Dale waited another minute, then got annoyed and ignored it once again. He shut the window and sat down at his desk. He opened his laptop and sat there looking at the screen. He kept thinking of the taps on his window that seemed to be freaking him out a little. Andrew would never hide from anyone, especially his best friend.

Another minute went by. Then two... Then three... then...

*Tap tap*

Dale rushed to the window and opened it quickly to try and catch Andrew running to his hiding spot.

“Dammit Andrew! Stop it already and show yourself!” He was usually paranoid in the morning, especially on the weekends. He decided he would play Andrew's game and find him outside. So he put his good shoes on and climbed out the fairly small window. Wherever he was hiding, it would take forever to find him.

However, the yard was well maintained and free of major imperfections. Dale should have no trouble finding his friend back there in this small area.

- - -

Andrew watched Dale taking careful steps across the lawn, listening for any sound that could lead to his position. He needed a distraction. He knew Dale was bad at this game and was not sure if it was right to trick him like this. Andrew was right around the corner of the house in the shadows next to the Dale's bedroom window.

As soon as Andrew saw Dale go past the only tree in the yard, he made a break for it. He ran back around to the window and jumped through with hardly any faults, besides his bag hitting the side of the wall. He then ran to into his friend's closet to the far left of where he entered. It did not have much elbow room, but given his current size, it was big enough to hide in. The door slam shut, but that noise was intentional.

On the other side of the door, he could hear Dale climbing through the window shouting.

“Damn bro! That was awesome! I couldn't even see you struggle your way in the window frame.” Dale was confident it was indeed Andrew who tapped on his window and evaded him outside. “Can you just tell me where you are so I know it's you?”

Andrew's heart was pounding. He was indecisive on how he should approach this unbelievable reveal. He hesitated at first.

“I'm in here.”

Dale sighed with relief, recognizing it as his dear friend Andrew. He could barely hear his voice from behind the door.

“Whew. You do that again and I might have to put security cameras around the house.” Dale laughed.

“I'm sorry dude, but it was urgent.”

“Urgent? What's wrong man?” Dale started toward the door to hear him better.

“Um...” Andrew inhaled, then exhaled slowly. “Uh, I don't know what's wrong.”

“How can you not know your own problems?”

“That's hard to say this one time.”

“You wanna tell me what it is? Why don't you come out of there already?” Dale began turning the doorknob but suddenly recoiled from Andrew's refusal.

“NO WAIT! Don't open the door! … I mean, hold on a second.” Andrew felt guilty for shouting at his friend on the other side of the door, but couldn't help but panic. He was thinking on clearing things up first.

“What is it?”

“Just hear me out on this one.”

“Okay, but I don't know why that's necessary. It's not like you got more ugly,” Dale joked.

…

It was quiet for a moment, and he felt stupid for saying that.

“Okay I'm listening.” Dale followed up with respect for his friend hiding in the closet.

“Um … well. I don't know how to explain it, so I'm just gonna say it …”

…

“I'm a... sort of a... a... a unicorn.”

Comments

[Kittuar]

I'll read.

[SouthernmostDogs]

I like dis. Make moar chapters.