"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!"
I was on fire!
Admittedly, I was enchanted to prevent any significant harm, and there was a safety officer nearby with a fire extinguisher, as well as a medic with a full burn kit... but I was still on fire! Or, to sum up:
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!"
"Your main strength," Safe Guard had told me earlier, "is in long-term strategic planning. Your main weakness is, well, you're a cow. No offense."
"None taken."
"Some of the nobles I am aware of have spent most of their lives practicing dueling and duel-related activities. Put simply, there is no way that I can train you to match their abilities. It would take a year or two of full-time training simply to bring you up to snuff as a competent fighter."
"I hope that's all the bad news."
"Not quite all of it - you still have your day-job, and I can't make you miss too many hours of that, without hampering the Dairy's own long-term performance."
"Anything else?"
"One more thing - whatever is brewing, it might be tomorrow, or the day after, or any given day you care to name. So whatever training I do offer you, can't be something that takes too long, or takes too long to recover from."
"Well - that's certainly... a lot of limitations."
"To put it mildly. I can't turn you into a standard fighter - but what I might be able to do, with a few days' worth of part-time, non-disabling training, is to help you... become more able to use your strength, even in extreme conditions."
"That... doesn't sound too bad, actually."
"Are you sure?"
"Will it help the Dairy's long-term goals?"
"It's the best idea I've got for that."
"Then I'm sure."
"Remember you said that. Come to think of it - I'd better get you to sign some waivers."
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!"
"Oh, come back here, it's just a small dragon!"
"AAAAA<glub>AAAAAAA<burble>AAAAAAAAA<glub>AAAAAAAHHHHHH!"
"You're doing great! Just a couple more hours, and we'll move you to the big waterfall!"
"HNNNNNNNNNGGG!"
"You'll be fine - just try not to roll around too much, they love your body heat. See you in the morning."
All of that was bad enough - and as I got used to each situation, I became more able to think while under stress - and even do tasks, like solving silly puzzles.
And then came the drops.
I'd never been phobic about heights... exactly. I was a bit uncomfortable walking across high bridges, and extremely reluctant to go on any rollercoasters - but I'd never had any issues about climbing ladders or fixing roofs or anything like that. So when Safe suggested that, with all the possible appropriate safeguards, Red would climb as high as she could while carrying me and let me go, I was about as reluctant as I was for any of his other proposals, but did, in fact, sign off on it.
While Red, and another pegasus who'd been drafted to help lift my bulk during the climb, lifted me into the air, I tried to pull some inspiration from the old Zen story about the fellow trapped halfway down a cliff, with a tiger above, a tiger below, and mice gnawing on the vine he was holding onto... who found a strawberry next to him, popped it into his mouth, and thought about how sweet it was. So I enjoyed the scenery, from the sight of Canterlot right below to the mountains in the distance. I even tried to pick out Ponyville itself.
We got as high as the two pegasi could lift me.
And they let go.
And my mind went as completely, utterly, mind-numblingly blank as if a whole herd had linked horns with mine and were running magical current through my brain.
The next thing I was aware of, I was dangling from my parachute, already halfway back to the ground - about where the automatic safety was supposed to kick in.
The low-altitude pegasus safety crew checked to make sure I was alive and conscious, and then let me finish drifting down.
After I landed, the medic checked me over, and nobody made a single comment about my bowels and bladder now being empty.
Safe asked, "Are you up to a second go?"
I looked up at the sky.
I'd always heard of knees knocking, and seen it in cartoons. I'd never actually felt anything it.
I could think of all sorts of reasons to end this right now - there were so many better things I could be doing with my time, the expense of hiring the safety crews, the risk if all of the safety precautions failed... and it was utterly obvious that all such reasoning was mere rationalizing the fact that I just didn't want to do it again.
I wasn't used to my emotions crowding out my brain like this. Being set on fire - sure, it hurt, and I ran around a bit, but it wasn't that bad. Even getting caught up with Cheerilee, as enthralling as she was, I could still consider whether any given thing would make her feel better than any other thing. But falling like that - I didn't have words for it.
My mouth was dry, so it took me a couple of times before I could answer him. "Gimme... gimme the next parachute."
The second time I reached the ground, my legs couldn't hold me up, and at least three of my four stomachs had emptied themselves.
I heard Safe talking, and the first I remember him saying was, "The point isn't to make you suffer, it's so you can get better - as fast as possible, given the potential time constraints. I don't think you're going to do any better at this today - and you might do worse, if you push it. Maybe tomorrow."
The next day's exercise had nothing to do with falling; it was simply to remain perfectly still.
For hours.
On my hindlegs.
In a 'mine field' which would 'blow up' if I shifted a hoof.
The day after that, the exercise actually covered most of my ordinary work-hours, as well: Safe set me to keeping a cup of water balanced on top of my head the whole day, as long as any failure wouldn't endanger any significant papers.
I spent most of the day with a wet head, but did increase my awareness of my body's movements.
The day after that, Safeguard wanted to try blind training - which didn't really require more than taking off my glasses - and I frowned at him. "When are we going to get back to the drop?"
He looked away from me, eyes hidden by the side of his Greek-style helm. "I'm not planning on using that exercise again. I shouldn't have tried it in the first place."
"What makes you say that?"
He managed to look me in the eyes. "I want to give you full credit for giving it a second shot - I know exactly how scared you were. I just don't think sending you up again will do you any good."
"I've been skimming some of the unicorn dueling manuals. At least some unicorn duelists have been reported as casting mental illusions, to plunge their opponent into seeing, experiencing, whatever they wish. Is that inaccurate?"
Reluctantly, he admitted, "Not to my knowledge."
"Then - all that an opponent would need to do to render me completely helpless and defeat me, is stick me into an illusion of falling. Yes?"
"I suppose."
"Then what can we do to... fix me?"
"That's what I've been trying to figure out for the past few days. Just dropping you again and again would probably make you worse, not better. Maybe some mental magic might work - but I'm loathe to try anything so radical. Maybe your psychologist might know."
"Hello, again, Doctor Brown."
"Hello, again, Forty-Two. How did your new training exercises go?"
"Some good, some bad. It's the latter I'm here about. Seems I have an excessive fear of falling from heights - and given the requirements of my job, it would be better if I could deal with that better. As in, at all. Would you happen to know what the best research is for treating such?"
"Naturally. The treatment for phobias with the best results, overall, seems to be exposure therapy. When it's of something simple, such as a particular sort of animal, I would start with mild and distant exposure, such as in a cage on the other side of the room, until the patient becomes accustomed to it; and then increasing the level of contact, step by step. However, I am not quite sure of how that could be applied to falling..."
"That's merely a technical problem."
"If you say so. While I have you here, why don't we talk about your marefriend. Have matters improved since our last talk?"
"Well - a bouquet may not solve all problems, but it certainly helps..."
"Alrighty, ponies," I looked around the round table at the Dairy's collection of geeks and lab-techs. "Today's team-building creativity exercise is to come up with an economical way to allow a pony, or cow, to experience freefall for an arbitrary length of time. Standard problem-solving suggestions apply: try to describe what the full parameters of the problem are, before suggesting and becoming attached to any given solution."
"Can I ask something, Doctor Missy, ma'am?"
"Of course."
"Why do you have a bunch of teacups on your back?"
"Because it beats trying to watch the grass grow. Alright, who's got some chalk?"
"So whose idea was this?" Safe looked dubiously at the resulting invention.
"It was a collaborative effort," I said. "Really, most of the credit should go to the Materials Science - I didn't know we had anything like this in our arsenal."
"And where did the name come from?"
"I believe it's a slang for a rubber eraser. I wonder if we can make a profit from it?"
"What? How?"
"Perhaps some ponies - not pegasi, obviously - would be willing to give this a go..."
"That seems incredibly unlikely - even if you do survive."
"One way to see if it works, I suppose. The triple checks are all done so - if you'll excuse me - I've got a bunjee rope to test, before the standby rescue pegasi start charging me overtime. ... GeronimooooaaaaAAAAAHHhhh... ah... ahaha... ha... okay, that wasn't so bad, just a second or so. ... so who's going to pull me up? ... Um, hello? Somepony still up there? Safe? Red?
"Anypony?"