//------------------------------//
// Night 2: Everybody Needs Somebody 
// Story: 6 Universal Nights 
// by The Blue EM2 
//------------------------------//

Tom sighed in annoyance as he heard his ringtone start up. He flipped open his phone and looked at it, suddenly noticing that the call was coming in from Rebecca. "Great," he sighed. "Way to rain on the parade. Can I go answer that? It's my sister."

Steph glanced over to him, a smile on her face and warmth in her eyes. "Sure thing. We'll wait for you."

Tom hopped out of his seat and headed for the elevator, turning his head around as he walked off. "No need, I'll catch you up!"

He opened the door on the elevator, and stepped out a few moments later, heading for the room in which he stayed (room 101, most ominously) and slotting his key into the door. A lot of hotels used keycards to control the doors. They were unreliable, difficult to use, and most notably the card readers often didn't work. But a traditional key- sturdy, reliable, and would often work in the key, able to be turned in the slot as he went in. He rotated the key in the lock and heard the satisfying sound of the tumbler turning in the lock. The door opened, and Tom stepped in, locking the door once he had crossed the threshold into his room. He then answered the call. "Rebecca, you specialise in calling at the worst possible time."

"And you never seem to be around!" Rebecca retorted on the other end of the line. Tom was five years older than her, and no longer lived with her or his parents. They were still in London, but Tom was established quite firmly in Nottingham, where his job was before endlessly transforming became something of a side job. The others didn't know, of course.

"Well, we do live three hours apart," Tom answered. "How are things in London?"

"Well, dad's still working in the city, mum is still running most things for church, and I'm starting GCSEs. How's America?"

"It's great," Tom answered. "Universal's really pretty, and the people are nice. My friends are enjoying it too, and the locals are really nice too."

"Including your girlfriend?"

"Katrina is not my girlfriend," Tom grunted. "So stop saying she is. OK?"

"Sure thing. Still, it's hilarious you all bonded over the fact you like My Little Pony." The irony of this was that Rebecca was a pegasister, but neglected to mention it here.

"It is not funny!" Tom exclaimed, then stopped in horror. His voice was extremely high pitched, like that of a young girl.

"Do you have somebody in the room with you?" Rebecca asked, confused. "Could you put my brother back on?"

Tom had realised what was happening. He dropped the phone, which smashed on the floor, as his hand had started to shrink in size. It was his turn again, only his folks had undoubtedly heard what was going on. "This is the worse possible time!" he continued, in that incredibly high pitched voice which sounded oddly familiar.

His body continued to shrink in size, his clothes piling up on him like several tents, and he fell onto the floor as his shoulders and hips were forced together, his legs decreasing in length and all traces of his facial hair vanishing. He would miss that fine moustache.

His skin turned blue. "Who is thi- AAAARGH! Fuck that hurt!" Tom's manhood had decided to pull a vanishing act. That was never a fun experience, but it seemed to be especially bad now in terms of pain. The growing mountain of clothes was added to by her socks falling off and her shoes landing on the floor. Briefly aware of a fragment of pink hair, Tom suddenly ran her hair through it, and saw his hair had fallen to shoulder length by looking in a nearby mirror. Not only that, it was pink, and stook up in the middle as if gravity had no effect on it. His brown eyes then suddenly flashed blue.

Lying in amongst this mess, Tom was suddenly aware of a glowing light. The shirt began to shrink in size onto her body, and then merged onto the pants, which were lying further down. Other garments were reduced in size, which, as per Jimmy's tales, we shall not dwell upon for reasons of taste, and the pants merged into a skirt. The skirt then shrank up to her knees, and the resulting dress turned red. Tom barely noticed the sleeves shrink back slightly and puff up, nor did he notice the skirt puff out slightly. Her socks turned white, reduced in size until they fitted perfectly, and slid up her legs until they were about three quarters of the way up her thighs.

Tom slowly leaned forward, and reached for the trainers over on the floor. Both of them morphed into black shoes. Thinking it would be a good idea to have footwear, Tom pulled them on, doing the strap up on them to hold them in place. She still had no clue who she was. Then, glancing in the mirror, she suddenly got a clue from all the colours.

"Ocellus?" she asked. "Of all the characters, they had to hear Ocellus!" The darker element soon hit her. They had heard it all. They knew what was happening. They knew she was a freak.

Ocellus had little else to do other than cry.





Ocellus had no idea how long she sat there sobbing quietly. Moments later, she became aware of knocking on the door. 

"Excuse me?" she heard a voice ask. She wasn't sure who it was.

"Are you in there Tom?"

Ocellus decided not to reply, simply continuing to look at the floor.

"Are you OK?" another voice asked. This one she did recognise. Gallus?

Seconds later, she heard the key turn in the door, and the door opened. Ocellus looked up to see Sandbar, Gallus, and Smoulder standing there, looks of shock on their face.

"What happened?" Gallus asked.

"They know," Ocellus sniffed. "I was on the phone when it happened. They heard it all. They know we're all freaks!"

Sandbar bent down and looked into her eyes. "You're not a freak, not in the slightest," he said, gently. He then took her hand, and helped her up. "We're all friends, and the last thing we'd do is throw each other away." At which point, he took her in a gentle hug.

Ocellus returned the complement. They didn't know how long they'd be there. Sandbar reacted to Gallus suddenly tapping him on the shoulder.

"Dude?" he said. "I don't think Yona will react well to this."

"You do realise that was a joke, right?" Sandbar replied. "We were never serious in that regard. There's only one for me, and that's you, Ocellus."

Ocellus felt warmth in her heart. She wasn't isolated and alone. She had her friends by her side. "Thanks, Sandbar," she whispered, as she broke the embrace.

"No problem," Sandbar replied. "Now, do you want to head into the park? There's still plenty of day to go, and based on what Smoulder said, there's a big error we need to fix."

Ocellus nodded. She felt a lot better now. "Thanks," she whispered. "I- if it's OK, Sandbar, I'd like to go on a ride with you."

"Your wish is my command," Sandbar replied.





The ride that Ocellus selected was Race Through New York with Jimmy Fallon, an intense motion simulator ride starring the former Saturday Night Live host. The fact his full name was James Thomas was not lost on the two riders, who soaked up the sheer weirdness of the encounter including subway chases, races, and even flying through New York City. Then they went into space and into inflatable tubes, before arriving in the Late Show studio once more.

Stepping outside, Ocellus simply looked at Sandbar in confusion. "What was that all about?"

"Beats me," Sandbar sighed, as he spotted Gallus and Smoulder leaning on a lamppost. Gallus had a guitar in his hand, and Smoulder had her electric bass on her person. Sandbar grabbed his from the same lamppost.

"All we need are our percussionists," Smoulder said. "We already have the piano ready, so Ocellus will be catered for."

Just then, Silverstream appeared from nowhere, and Yona sprinted over, knocking over a bin as she did so.

"I got your phone call, Gallus!" Silverstream called.

"I know, you answered it," Gallus replied.

"Yona need tambourine!" Yona called.

"Ocellus passing tambourine!" Ocellus called, sending it over. "I think that's all we need."

"Well, let's outdo the Blues Brothers," Smoulder smiled.





In the middle of the crowd, most of the bystanders were astonished to suddenly see a group of My Little Pony characters (or, to be more precise, their Equestria Girls counterparts) launch into a musical number. The crowd cleared out to reveal the Young Six.

There was Sandbar out on lead guitar. Next to him stood Gallus, a confident smirk on his face as he strummed away on rhythm guitar. Next to that was Ocellus, who was doing her hardest to work through her nerves as she accompanied on the piano, Smoulder having a complete lack of nerves as she provided the bass line. Next to that, Silverstream was on the drumkit, and Yona was bashing a tambourine out of time.

"We're all so glad to see you here today!" called Sandbar. "We're especially thankful to the personnel of Universal Studios Florida, who let us play for you lovely people in the park! We all sincerely hope you all enjoy the show, and whatever you do to live, thrive, and survive, there are some things that make us all the same. You, me, them, everybody! Take it away Gallus!"

The microphone opened up, and Gallus promptly let rip. Sandbar joined him on the backing vocals.



The last chord rang out, and the crowd erupted into cheers.

"Well, we pulled that one off," Smoulder smiled. "Probably outdid the Blues Brothers in the process."

"We haven't jammed like that together in a long time," Ocellus replied. "We should do it more often."

"Are you doing a meet and greet?" asked a woman in the crowd, holding back two very excited children clearly keen to meet the characters.

Sandbar smiled. "Why not? The more, the merrier."

Suddenly, in the crowd, there was a rather angry voice. "Ocellus!"

Ocellus glanced up from the keyboard. She saw who it was, and gulped.