//------------------------------// // Chapter 17: Reaching Out // Story: Pandemic: What you are Meant to Be // by Halira //------------------------------// The humans had set up for the night in one of the side buildings of the church that normally operated as a private school. After the census takers had finished with all the ponies on site all the humans had retreated back into the building for the night aside from a few soldiers from the national guard that stayed awake to watch over the area overnight. Mattie and Haley approached this building with the intentions of having a doctor look at Haley's eye and giving them a brief checkup. There were three members of the national guard on duty around the entrance on guard. They didn't seem to be actively worried about anything as one sat in a chair by the entrance, another was playing on his phone, and the third was trying to look over the shoulder of the one playing on his phone. The one sitting seemed to be trying to pay attention to the area, but it was pretty clear none really expected any trouble. The fact the one was playing on his phone made Mattie wonder if the internet was back up and working again. "Excuse us, but any chance we could see one of the doctors. Haley here took a blow to her eye the other day and we just wanted to make sure everything is okay," Mattie said after they came up to the guards. "I'm sorry but you'll need to come back when the doctors are working in the day. Orders are the doctors and the rest are to be left undisturbed at night unless there is an emergency," the soldier who was sitting said to them. The one who had been playing on the phone put it away and the he and the other were now clearly on alert. "We are night ponies, we sleep during the day. The sun comes out and we start getting sleepy. I am even pretty sure that keeping ourselves awake too long after sunrise isn't healthy for us. Surely somepo..someone in the government anticipated that night ponies would need attention at night, right?" Mattie complained as diplomatically as she could. "I admit that we were not given any special instructions about how to deal with night ponies. I agree that your concerns seem to be perfectly legitimate and show signs of a possible oversight, but I can't do anything to help you with those tonight. We have orders to make sure the team inside is undisturbed for the evening unless there is an emergency. A black eye does not qualify as an emergency. I will pass along your concerns to the doctors and my superior officer when our shift ends, but for now you have to accept that nothing is happening tonight," the same soldier said apologetically. Mattie bit back a nasty retort. The fact was the guard was just doing his job, and he wasn't doing anything to personally earn her ire. He was being polite and even seemed sympathetic. He didn't deserve her yelling at him, much as she very much wanted to. She took a breath and tried to calm herself down. "Fine, but please pass that along as soon as you can in the morning. I'm not mad at you, I'm mad at the fact your higher-ups were shortsighted in their planning, and night ponies seem to have been completely forgotten about somehow. We'll try again in the morning before we go to bed," Mattie finally said. Choosing her words carefully so nothing came out wrong. She had already been somehow listed as some sort of troublemaker, and arguing with a guards that were just doing their jobs wasn't likely to help out with that. There was no need to dig herself a deeper hole. "We'll make a point of doing so on our debriefing in the morning. What we can do is make an incident report about however she got a black eye. It may have happened before we got here, but we can still take a report on it," the guard offered. "That won't be necessary," Haley stepped up and said before Mattie could open her mouth. "We should be getting on our way and find something else to do with our time. Is the internet back up? We'd like to be able to get and send word with our families. Plus we have been out of the loop on what is happening elsewhere for a while." "It is working just fine. Been watching videos with no problems. Don't figure most ponies would be using the internet though. Hooves and all that," the guard that had been on his phone said as he glanced down at their hooves. "Nothing that can't be overcome with patience and a stylus; or a pencil to tap keys with if dealing with an actual computer," Haley said with a smile. "Well, there isn't any restriction on you using it, so go have at it if you have some way to get on it. So much stuff going on right now it is hard to keep up with it all. Probably why the whole night ponies are only awake to be seen to at night thing slipped through the cracks," the cell phone using soldier. "Come on, Mattie, let's go find something to get on the internet with," Haley said as she nudged a somewhat confused Mattie away from the guards with her wing. "Why didn't you want to report John for domestic violence?" Mattie asked once they were out of earshot. "I want John out of my life, I don't want to have the army locking him up or anything," Haley said with a glance back at the soldiers. "I doubt it would come to that," Mattie said skeptically. "Under normal circumstances yeah, but who knows what they will do when they hear about a pony being physically violent. They have you and your mother on some sort of watch list already, and you two haven't even done anything wrong. What will they do to a pony who actually has done something wrong? Maybe I am just being paranoid, but I didn't see anything to gain from reporting him in any case," Haley explained. "I do think you are being paranoid, but if you don't want to report him that's your call. Were you really wanting to go check what's going on by the internet? I am pretty sure there is a computer in the AV room of the church that we could try to use if you want to," Mattie said with a gesture of her muzzle towards the church. "I do, but mainly because I want to try to get in touch with my family before we try showing up. You know, to buffer the shock of me being a pony and let them know I am planning on visiting rather than scaring them half to death by just showing up in the middle of the night," Haley said with a sheepish grin. "That sounds like a good idea actually. If they are actually checking the internet. Worst case scenario I suppose you could just call them. If we can work a computer then we can work a land line phone. Just have to put it on speaker," Mattie replied with a smile of her own. "That's a good idea too. Just lead the way and let's get to it," Haley said as she nuzzled Mattie. The AV room did indeed have a computer in it. It was a few years old, but not some ten or twenty year old relic that some churches with less money would have. It took them a few minutes to track down a pencil to use in order to manipulate the keyboard, and the computer also took a few minutes booting up once they got it turned on. Thankfully it did connect to the net quickly after everything loaded and there was already a icon for a messenger that was easy enough to click and the mouse was surprisingly easy to manipulate with hooves. "Twping wit a penssel in ma mout iz not ffun," Haley mumbled around the pencil as she typed in her username and password. Then paused and glared down at the keyboard before reaching around with a wing and using the end of her wing to hold down the shift button in order to capitalize a letter. "Maybe we can figure out a way of typing with our wings with enough practice. You are pressing that one key with no problem," Mattie suggested as she sat and watched. "Urgm," Haley mumbled incoherently as she clicked the mouse to finally get signed in. Immediately when it signed in about a dozen messages for Haley popped onto the screen. Haley spit the pencil out onto the desk and began clicking them to check them. "Seems there were a lot of pon...people trying to get in touch with you," Mattie observed as she came over and stood on her hind legs while placing her forelegs up on the desk. "Looks like it. Most of these are family too. I am going to take a few minutes reading through it all before I try responding to anything," Haley said as she started manipulating the mouse to click through the images. It really did seem she could manipulate the mouse just as easily with a hoof as a human could with a hand. The messages were what they both expected. Requests for her to tell them how she was doing, pleas for her to call or text her family. There were a few surprises. One was a message from Haley's mother saying that her little sister Catherine had gotten ETS and was isolated away from everyone else. It said all the ponies and transforming had been told to stay in one part of their apartment building. All these messages were dated before the internet went down. "So Cathy is a pony too," Haley said with a blink as she looked over the messages. "How old is she?" Mattie asked. "She just turned seventeen. Not sure if she is considered a filly or a mare at that age," Haley said as she stared at the message. "How old are you by the way? I never really asked," Mattie asked. "Twenty-two, you?" Haley said with a glance at Mattie. "Twenty," Mattie replied. "Not a huge age difference. Anyway, I suppose I should try replying to all this," Haley said with a sigh as she glanced sadly back down to the pencil. "I think it might be better to call if they have a land line. Since none of these are from today they might not be checking the internet for messages and still think it is down," Mattie said as she looked over at the office phone. "I suppose it isn't too late for them. It is only like ten. Late for ponies but not really too late for humans. Alright, let's try this. If you hear a lot of yelling in Spanish in the background don't worry about it, my parents and grandmother tend to do that between one another when on the phone," Haley said with a blush. The midnight blue mare grabbed up the pencil again in her mouth and used it to deftly dial out the number and put the phone on speaker, before spitting the pencil out again and cuddling close to Mattie. The phone rang about a dozen times and Mattie thought it was going to end up just going to voicemail. But the line was picked up and a female voice gave cautious greeting. "Hello? Who is this?" Came a woman's voice. "Hi, Mama. It's Haley," Haley said in a sheepish tone. "Haley!" The voice exclaimed. An excited string of words in Spanish followed which were quickly echoed in the background by voices of others in both Spanish and English. "Are you okay? Are you safe? Where are you? Are you a pony?" "I'm fine, Mama. I am a pony, a night pony. I am over at that big church you can see from the interstate when you are driving into Summerville. Is everypony..everyone, excuse my pronouns if I slip, okay over there?" Haley replied. "We are all well as can be expected. Catherine went and got ETS and she is a pony too now. We just got her back over with us after the news said that there wouldn't be any more ETS. She is one of those earth ponies, all green furred and has a purple mane and tail. She keeps messing with my potted plants and I keep fussing at her about it, but otherwise she seems to be happy with her lot. We are all just kind of adjusting. It is disconcerting looking at this furry little thing and thinking that is my daughter," the woman said with a hard to read tone. A string of things were yelled in the background that Mattie and Haley could make out. "Miguel wants to know what color your fur, mane, and tail all are. I kind of want to know what my other pony daughter looks like now too." "I have really dark blue fur, and a dark purple mane. I'm a night pony so I have the bat-like wings, and I have eyes that match my fur," Haley said. "Did you stop smoking? It was never healthy, but that must be really unhealthy for ponies," Haley's mother questioned her. Haley rolled her eyes in response and Mattie raised an eyebrow at her marefriend. "Yes, Mama. I haven't touched a cigarette since becoming a pony. I don't even know how I would manage to light a cigarette with hooves. I am not feeling any cravings though. Is this really important? You are embarrassing me in front of my marefriend," Haley said with a snort. "Marefriend?" The voice said with confusion, and then another string of sentences in Spanish were said which were answered by a chorus of voices. "Did you finally leave that terrible excuse of a boyfriend? Did becoming a pony make you a lesbian somehow? I am not judging you if it did, anyone is better than that piece of crap you were dating." "Yes, John and I are done. I always liked females too. So no, I am not just suddenly a lesbian, Mama," Haley said with a sigh. "Oh praise Mary mother of God, the jackass is gone. Your new girlfriend is there? What is her name? I am assuming she is a pony too. When are you two going to come visit your family?" Came the succession of questions in rapid fire. "Um, hi? My name is Mattie. I don't really know what to say, but nice to..meet you?" Mattie stumbled through answering. Haley giggled at her. "She sounds nice, but needs more backbone." Mattie raised her eyebrows in response, unsure if she was complimented or insulted. "You didn't answer the question. When are you going to come see your family? We want to see that you are alright. We got word from some of your cousins down in Florida who are all ponies down to the smallest child, but it has taken forever for you to get in touch with us. We were worried sick about you, Haley," the voice continued on. "We can come by tonight if you wish, Mama. It should only take the two of us a few minutes to fly over there and we don't have anything else pressing to do," Haley said. "Please do so we can stop worrying so much about you. I will see if I can get your sister up. I don't know how she can sleep with all of this going on, but she is still out like a light. You will be here soon?" the voice asked. "We'll leave right away, if it takes thirty minutes I will be shocked. Flying is much faster than driving," Haley said. "We shall see you soon. Bring your girlfriend for sure so we can get a look at her too," the voice said. "I will let you go now and will see you soon. And Haley, I know I don't say this enough sometimes but we all do love you." "I love you all too," Haley said, tearing up. "We'll see you in a few minutes." Mattie realized that she was about to be put on display and judged by Haley's human parents. The thought of that gave her a sudden desire to go anywhere else than to go see them.