//------------------------------// // Chapter 5: Tangled Up in Rainbow // Story: Healthy as a Horse // by Crescent Pulsar //------------------------------// Anon slowly paced around some building blocks, trying to manage both his locomotion and stacking blocks with telekinesis at the same time without messing up either. Thanks to his body being a few days old by the time he had woken up earlier in the day, ponies being able to walk soon after birth like horses from his world, and his crawling experience as a human, walking had come awkwardly but easily enough. Using his horn had been Twilight Sparkle's suggestion rather than something that he had been ready to initiate himself, and Isopropyl had accommodated his need to practice. It had been decided that he should start learning how to feel and handle his magic sooner than planned, in order to help prevent him from using his magic on accident again. Unlike what he had thought, using magic was easy enough to do if he didn't think too deeply about what he was doing, but it made sense considering what he had been told about the feats that babies could accomplish on a whim. To ensure that unicorns weren't a danger to themselves or others, they had to train their minds to manipulate magic deliberately, rather than allow the magic to respond to any desire or thought. Due to another alicorn baby preceding him, they were pretty sure that access to his horn wouldn't be interfered with by his maturation, which meant that he'd have uninterrupted access to his magic. Normally the growth of a unicorn's skull and brain eventually interfered with their magic for several years, thus making the possible incidence of newborn magic use and surges relatively short-lived, but an alicorn's thaumaturgical system was interconnected throughout the body instead of just between the mind and horn. He didn't have to practice with both his magic and walking at the same time, but he wanted to distract himself from thinking about certain things, things that made him feel strange, uneasy or confused. He'd known that there would be challenges and stuff he wouldn't like about being a baby going in, but the surprises were somehow worse than experiencing incontinence and having his diaper changed, which hadn't been fun or comfortable at all. If not for any of that, he would have been excited about using telekinesis and glad about his upgrade in mobility. He was just thankful that Isopropyl was such a caring and understanding pony. Although the naps were nice ways to retreat from reality as well, especially when he woke up with Isopropyl— Shaking his head clear of Isopropyl's friendly visage from his mind's eye, he threw off his balance and fell forward, planting his chin flat against the floor. The block that he had been levitating dropped beside the short tower and bounced his way, softly hitting his cheek. Isopropyl chose that time to return after attending to some of her pre-bedtime routines. Upon seeing what kind of position he was in, and the tears that had beaded at the outer corners of his eyes, she hurried over, scooped him up into one of her forelegs and worriedly asked, "Are you alright?" Embarrassed, Anon looked away and nodded his head. The blush and averted gaze reminded Isopropyl of the circumstances, so she gently put Anon down and apologetically said, "Sorry. I'm so used to taking care of real foals that it's hard to not act before thinking." Not wanting to think about how comfortable it had felt being cradled — however briefly — as he wiped the tears from his eyes, and curious about the pony tasked with taking care of him, Anon levitated the stickerboard over and asked, "You take care of foals?" Smiling pleasantly, in light of the subject, Isopropyl replied, "Yes. I normally work at a hospital in Canterlot, in the maternity ward. When I'm not working, I volunteer at a daycare whenever they need me." Confused, Anon inquired, "You came here?" Isopropyl nodded her head. "My talent is sterilization, and sometimes I get requests to help with something serious. When Princess Twilight Sparkle reached out to our hospital for aid, the administrator came straight to me to provide you with a safe environment and purging all of the germs from the external portion of your body." Upon finding out that she'd had a hand in saving his life, on top of everything else, Anon was so surprised and moved that he needed to set the stickerboard aside and sit down. Isopropyl was a rare breed of individual where he came from, as far as he was concerned, and he never thought that he'd ever meet one personally, let alone be on the receiving end of their care. He could only imagine how he would have been affected by her had she actually bore him, as it had been planned, because even without a parent-child bond he was seriously considering making some allowances for her maternal disposition. Speaking of whom, she was regarding him with a concerned eye, no doubt due to his reaction. Offering her a smile to reassure her that he was fine, he used the stickerboard long enough to say, "Thank you for saving my life," before choosing one of her forelegs and giving it a hug to further express his gratitude. Normally he wouldn't bother being touchy-feely, but things weren't normal and he felt safe expressing himself a bit more than usual with his current company. "It was a group effort," Isopropyl modestly replied, who smiled down at him and lightly pat his withers, "but I'm glad I was able to help." When they disengaged, Isopropyl glanced at the alarm clock before asking, "Are you ready for bed?" Anon shook his head, since he didn't feel tired and was allowed to choose his bedtime unless his body demanded rest. Instead, since he was already asking questions that were revealing consequential things that he hadn't known about, concerning someone who had a significant connection to him, he retrieved the stickerboard and decided to broach a subject that he had been trying to not think about throughout the day but had bothered him nonetheless. "Why did Rainbow carry me to term?" Isopropyl was reluctant to answer, but after some consideration, while being subjected to his unerring gaze, she sighed and softly admitted, "She didn't have a choice." Stunned, Anon had to pick the stickerboard back up so he could hastily tap out, "What do you mean?" "Your life was of paramount concern," Isopropyl began to explain, sad eyes joining her subdued tone, "so many safeguards were put into place, which would activate as soon as your surrogate mother received you. Safeguards that would protect you from ambient magic, and anything that would deliberately tamper with the spells. There was also one spell that would anchor you to the surrogate mother until you were physically attached to her, to prevent you from being dislodged from her body and the many potential threats to your well-being that could follow." She turned her head aside and looked away, and Anon heard what sounded like a hint of strain in her voice as she continued. "There were so many spells involved, and some very complex ones, that stability and compatibility issues took precedence. When those were addressed, finding a way to make them safe to dispel on top of that would have been extremely difficult and time-consuming, and by then they were confident that they wouldn't need such a measure. When you were unexpectedly sent into Rainbow Dash, it was decided that trying to remove certain spells — so you could be placed into me — would be too risky." Anon bowed his head and stared down at the floor as he absorbed all of that. Not only the fact that Rainbow Dash had to carry him to term for his sake, whose earlier comments and behavior he now understood a whole lot better, but how Isopropyl felt about the situation. She had tried to hide it, but ponies — the ones that he'd interacted with thus far, at any rate — seemed to be rather expressive, to the point where he didn't need to try very hard to read them, and her evident love of children had made it easy for him to connect the dots. Missing out on bearing him aside, he could give in and allow Isopropyl to treat him more like a foal, but as tempting as some of that was he was still unsure about his feelings on the matter. As for Rainbow Dash... He couldn't even imagine what it would have been like to be in her position, mostly because he'd never had to worry about becoming pregnant. Not too long ago he likely would have felt like her situation wasn't any of his business, and thus not something to care about, but — despite not being responsible for what happened — his involvement still made him feel bad. More importantly, however, he'd never wronged someone anywhere near as much as her, regardless of it being an accident, and that definitely weighed heavily on his conscience. Heck, her house was so damaged that it was unsafe for her to sleep there until repairs could be made. With misfortune heaped upon misfortune, he couldn't help wondering how he could make it up to her. Considering his reaction to what Isopropyl had told him, it wasn't a surprise when she placed a comforting hoof on his shoulder and kindly offered, "Would you like to see her?" Raising his head to meet her gaze, trepidation stopped him from answering her immediately. At the very least he could apologize to Rainbow Dash, because he hadn't been able to earlier, between his shock and her storming off after she barely managed to stop herself from yelling — possibly at him as well as the heavens — several times, but she inspired a lot of emotions that he wasn't ready to deal with. Between not wanting to show that he was afraid of visiting someone, and knowing how easy it was to put something off indefinitely once started, he tentatively nodded his head in response despite knowing that he was out of his element. Isopropyl placed Anon on her back and picked up his stickerboard with her magic. After she made sure that he was stable, she said, "The princess' guest quarters are a bit of a maze, but hopefully we will find her before it gets too late." After opening the door and stepping out into the hallway, she looked down one way and then the other, trying to decide which way to go. Secretly, Anon hoped that they wouldn't find Rainbow Dash, but — at the same time — his heart jumped a little with anticipation at the thought of meeting her again. Unheeded, a vision of the pegasus appeared in his mind, of her standing proud, rainbow-colored hair carried by the wind, with her wings spread and a determined expression on her face, looking like a force of nature. Then her gaze fell upon him, and her features blossomed into the embodiment of maternal love. As he hit himself over the head, in an effort to clear it, he heard Isopropyl say, "What's that?" She started to walk, presumably toward what had caught her attention, so he looked around the side of her neck that was facing the far wall and saw four sources of light appearing to come from the floor, in the middle of the hallway. Once they were close enough, he could make out that the lights were shaped like hoofprints, which started to disappear and reappear farther ahead of them when they drew near, as if there was an invisible pony walking away from them. "Will this lead us to Rainbow Dash?" Isopropyl wondered aloud, since she'd never been told about a feature that would help ponies find their way around the castle. She couldn't think of what else it could be, partly because she wasn't willing to entertain the thought of it being something scary or dangerous in a place that she assumed was safe. After some consideration, she decided, "Well, following this can't be any worse than wandering aimlessly..." Once she was following directly behind the moving hoofprints, which resulted in Anon being unable to see them, he settled back onto his haunches and tried to relax. Unfortunately, that was hard to do because his mind wouldn't stop drifting back to his looming visit with Rainbow Dash.