To say that Manteo was in a state of quiet was an understatement. Ongoing health scares and concerns about a certain disease were a continual reminder of the fragility of the world (not least a certain orange man's slow response to the problem). Although no cases had been reported on the island of Roanoke at the time of writing, people were already bracing for the worst should it come. No orders to isolate or shut down shops and cafes had been issued yet, but the townsfolk had mostly taken things into their own hands and either chosen to shorten business hours or, if they owned no establishment, limit the number of hours they were in contact with other people. This meant that, for the most parts, the streets of Manteo were practically deserted, and those who did dare (pun) to venture outdoors did so only for as long as they had to, to minimise the risk of infection. People no longer made physical contact with each other, and wore gloves or used tissues to pick things up, not wanting to risk transmission. These measures may have seemed over the top, but it is better to be socially distant then infected, after all.
For people such as Jimmy, who was naturally introverted, this meant that things hadn't changed much at all. He spent the bulk of his day in his home, usually on networking sites like Fimfiction or Deviantart, and usually only went outdoors in order to get some exercise. But now that people were minimising the amount they were outdoors, and contact with others was not advised, Jimmy had even less reason than usual to go outdoors. So, that morning, he found himself looking through his messages to see how his friends were getting on.
Tom, in Nottingham, had already gone into lockdown, working from home and only leaving his house if absolutely neccesary. Katrina was with him, having gotten trapped in Britain after the borders were sealed. However, she had been assisting her family in getting the supplies they needed, as well as trying to prevent other people from aggressively panic buying (which the stores were doing little to prevent as it boosted their profits). Even entertainment establishments such as cinemas and theatres had shut down locally, and there was no chance of getting a flight somewhere as most of those had been cancelled too. It was a good thing they'd done Universal when they did, before this crisis became a global pandemic.
This presented another problem for Jimmy. He had acquired something of a reputation as a 'transformative expert', to use his own words, which usually entailed being in the wrong place at the wrong time with strange magical objects. But if people weren't allowed to touch things with their hands, this added an extra level of safety for him. His skin had to be in contact with the object in order to it to set things off, and if that wasn't the case, he was therefore safe for a while. As were the islands. Rodanthe had filed a noise complaint against a DJ blasting dubstep well into the small hours of the morning, and small boats had been seen until they had been stopped by police. It was a strange few days indeed.
Thankfully, his hazmat suit (cleared to Class A specification) was well suited to short sojourns outside his small home. Imagine living in there with multiple people! It would be a squash. Jimmy was about to pen a reply to Tom when he suddenly saw a bright flash of light outside his window.
"What was that?" he exclaimed. Something had happened outside, and he had to find out what it was. He went into his bombproof vault and put his hazmat suit on, a process that took about 15 minutes, even with practice. Once the outer protective coating and boots were on, he checked the helmet was correctly secured in place and that the radio was working. WAVY News had been broadcasting advice about what to do in the event of emergency, and Jimmy regularly tuned in for safety updates as to what to do. His task complete and his suit ready, he headed outdoors to see what the strange object was.
He found it, sure enough, in his garden. Still glowing like a meteorite, it was golden in colour, and seemed to be a curved piece of metal (probably a gold and bronze composite, to enable it to hold its shape more easily that pure gold) which curled upwards at the sides to (presumably) clear the wearers ears. In the centre of this strange curved object was inset a purple gem, almost a diamond in shape, though not a diamond as diamonds are not purple (and also not forever). Still with his gloves on, Jimmy picked it up and waited for the blue shock.
Nothing happened.
A scene transition shall now occur, taking us to a few minutes later.
(Screen goes blurry and harp music plays)
Thank you, Mr Harpist. Here's your paycheck.
Jimmy had decided to bring the mysterious object, which though mysterious felt somehow familiar to him, indoors, so he could study it. Slowly and carefully, so not as to damage it, he placed the piece of metal down upon the table, and left it there as he walked away to remove his Hazmat suit. This took him another 15 minutes, and he later strolled into the kitchen, where he had left it. He sat down in his chair, and studied the item very closely indeed. "This looks oddly familiar," he said, peering at it closely. "I can only assume that this is meant to be worn on the head, but it doesn't look like it was made for a human." He put a mirror behind it to observe it a little more closely. "Well, this is interesting. That text is in a language I can't understand. Latin maybe?"
He snapped a photograph of the text quickly, before getting up. A little too fast, as his hand brushed across the object. The connection generated a blue spark that hurled him across the room, and he crashed into a chest of drawers that lay next to a mirror.
Jimmy sat up with a groan, trying to remember what had happened. He happened to be lying opposite a mirror, and took the moment to observe his messy appearance. As he looked more closely, there was a flash. In that instant, his usually blue eyes turned purple.
"Wait, what?" he asked, as he leaned forward. Moments later, his ears elongated in length and began to look more like those of an animal, accompianied by the improved capacity to hear. Seconds later, his nose and mouth began to grow out of his face, sliding and merging together as his teeth began to flatten, canines and other sharpened teeth giving way to those of a herbivore as his face stretched into a muzzle. His glasses fell off his face and landed on the floor.
"What the hell's going on?" he exclaimed, apparently still able to speak logically as white fur began to spread all over his body, starting at his forehead and whipping across him like a tidal wave. His ears were now huge, reaching at least to the top of his head and sticking up like a pair of radar dishes.
He grabbed at his head as something began to make its prescence known under his forehead. The dull ache slowly grow into raging pain, and he screamed as a horn suddenly exploded out of his skull and grew rapidly, curving and twisting as it did so, stopping when it was almost a foot long, he estimated. His already long hair began to whip about as if in a hurricane, and grew even longer, beginning to float of its own accord. As it grew continously, it began to change colours, shifting from its usual brown to a chaotic mixture of light blue, turquoise, cobalt, and pink in strands that made it look like candyfloss.
No sooner was that all done, then his upper torso began to tingle. As the fur continued to spread, something seemed to be bulging under his shirt. He was suddenly forced into a crouched stance by forces unknown. His arms snapped backwards into a more equine stance, and his hands balled up uncontrollably. No matter what he tried, he couldn't reopen them. That was when his fingers melted together, creating the bottom of a hoof. His thumbs retraced into his hands, leaving him with front hooves, which were soon covered with golden, ornately decorated horseshoes. Moments later, the pressure under his shirt continued to build. It felt like something had grown out of him, and within moments his shirt could take no more. It tore down the seams and under the arms (or former arms), falling away as red tatters as a pair of white, gargantuan, regal wings chaotically waved back and forth, Jimmy not being used to suddenly having so many extra appendages. Then his chest and stomach grew in size and rounded out into an equine barrel.
On the topic of extra appendages, he groaned as his hips started to widen, starting to strain his slacks. There was a loud tearing sound as the seat was blown open by a tail erupting from his ass, which had started inflating like a balloon, and the tail soon took on the same colours as his hair (or mane, I suppose), growing longer and longer until it began to float of its own accord. Not long after, his manhood was sucked into his now firmly equine body, and a symbol of the sun appeared on both of her flanks. Her legs snapped backwards, adopting a quadrapedal look, and two more horseshoes, similarly ornate to the ones at the front, floated around her now completely furry body as his toes shrank into his feet, which then shifted into rear hooves. Acting subconsciously, Jimmy pulled her hooves out of her shoes and torn socks, and let the two horseshoes slip on. After several minutes of being stretched to their limits, his slacks tore along their seams, falling to the floor as a mass of fabric.
Jimmy stood in shock as the metal object from earlier floated onto her head, neatly clipping around her ears, and golden barding materialised around her neck and ran down her front. It, too, had a golden finish, and had a purple gem set into the front combined with a high collar around the back of her neck. Very elaborate patterning ran up the front of the barding.
Jimmy looked in the mirror and gasped. "I'm... Princess Celestia?" There was no escaping it. The mane, the tail, the regalia... he was Sunbutt now.
Moments later, the door opened, and his landlord walked in. "Hello Jimmy!" he said. "I just wanted to check on-"
Jimmy turned and looked at him.
"-you."
Seconds later, the room was filled with a blinding flash, and Luna, Cadence, and Twilight all appeared, in their full armour and apparel of their respective offices.
"Tia, there you are!" Luna called. "I was so worried when you went missing. Whoever would have guessed we would have been brought here?"
"Well, this place is known for large numbers of strange magical occurances," Twilight explained, going into full nerd mode. "After all, we are standing on a nexus point of spectra and Equestrian energy that somehow leaked out of our world."
"But at least you're safe, Aunt Celestia," Cadence smiled. "Shall we return home?"
Just then, Celestia's personality and memories flooded Jimmy's mind. She knew full well who she was, and her duty to raise the sun and protect her people. "Yes, we shall," Celestia replied. "Though this may get a little bumpy!"
There was a blinding flash, and all four ponies vanished. The landlord looked confused. "Where'd my tenant go?"
Arriving back at Canterlot Castle, Twilight headed back to Ponyville to resume her duties as Headmare of the School of Friendship, whilst Cadence returned north. Luna spoke to her sister. "Tia, would you like to accompany me to the Palace gardens later?"
Celestia smiled. "That sounds delightful. Of course I would, dear sister. But first, I must return to my duties. After all, those bickering nobles aren't going to straighten themselves out."
Luna laughed. "Just do not blow their eardrums. They still need to be able to hear something."
"That they do. Is there any cake available?"
It was just another day in the running of Equestria.