Time seemed to come to a crawl after that first incident at the hospital, the sedatives they dished out seemed to help out with that. Whatever 'they' were, their medical facility seemed to be well stocked on painkillers.
Desmond laid there in his bed staring up at the ceiling fan as it lazily spun around in circles. Mind numbing substances sure do take the edge off of being mutilated into an alien horse.
The meals too were typical hospital gruel, tasteless yet somehow nutritious. Eating said meals was a bit of a chore, as having your limbs tied down to the sides of your bed frame somewhat limited the options on how to go about eating it, even with hands it would have been difficult.
An all too familiar clacking of hard hooves hitting linoleum flooring along with the squeaky wheels of a dolly meant it was once again dinner time. Tilting his head to the side the human saw his predictions came true once again. "Afternoon Tulip, how's things?"
The trolley came to a stop at the foot of the bed, the pink creature who pushed the dinner cart wore an expressionless mask as always. Not that Desmond cared too much if his captors were happy or not, but it was a bit rude to ignore the attempts at small talk for this long.
"I bet it's a real bright day outside! Real shame I can't see it from here... If only I could walk up to a window to see..." a few tugs on the restraints added some emphasis, "Would you be a dear and untie these?"
The mare only gave Des one of her usual deadpan stares at the theatrics, "No."
"OH C'MON! Pretty please with sugar and cherries on top! I promise I won't run away like last time!"
At this the pink creature rolled its big blue eyes before she began preparing the dinner tray from the cart. "We made the mistake of removing those before, your head injury hasn't healed and you're more a danger to yourself if we let you go trotting through the hospital again. Not that you could have gotten far, you didn't seem capable of even standing on your hooves last time we caught you."
That was another thing the human had noticed; these aliens had some of the most human like expressions, even on one that kept acting so cold towards him. It was a bit odd getting used to the abnormally sized eyes, but their faces moved in a similar enough way that a smile was a smile and a frown a frown. Add in the ears and tail acting very much like a dog's and it was relatively easy to understand what each of them were feeling.
At the moment Tulip wasn't very amused with Des's antics.
Picking up the tray in her teeth the nurse moved beside Desmond placing it down on the beside table, the man looked on in disgust at the tray, "Do you really need to carry it around in your mouth? That's highly unsanitary, especially for a hospital."
The pink animal shrugged her shoulders at this, "Can't help it, I'm not a unicorn like you or some of others."
"Ah, but see that's where you're wrong, I'm a human being! Homosapien Sapien. A Huuumaaan." There was actually a small giggle at the exaggerated name from the lady horse dog.
"Riiiight. And I'm a magical undersea princess from Saddle Arabia," she picked up a spoonful of mashed potatoes and brought it forwards. Des didn't protest as he chomped down on the mash, he was hungry after all.
"Don't know where you got that name from, but as far as I can see you look like an average Unicorn stallion to me."
Swallowing the slightly salty mush Des had already prepared for this, "Ah, but see I wasn't one of your people until I ran into that bat at the bookstore. She must have changed me into this while I was knocked out!"
"Ponies," the mare corrected, "And calling somepony just a 'bat' is a little derogatory. Also, Thestrals can't preform magic like that."
"Well that's all I can recall from that night, one minute I was fine and healthy, the next I briefly woke up with a 'Thestral' standing right above me. I'm just telling it as I saw it."
Nurse Tulip was a decent judge of character, her family liked to say it was due to some ancient ancestral link to the world famous Apple family, but really she didn't buy into that, seemed too fake to her. No, just growing up on the streets of Manehattan meant learning how to judge at a glance, or else you'd wind up with all your bits stolen. That gut intuition never lied to her, but now she couldn't say... What this loopy unicorn was saying was too far fetched to be real.
"Well, that certainly is a mystery to solve, but too bad that's not really my problem," she shoved another spoonful into the stallion's open gob, he seemed to have been about to say something, but the look on his face as he was forced to bite down on the plastic spoon was satisfying enough for her.
Soon the tray was empty and the earth pony cleaned up any of the mess her charge had made. Before she left with the cart a thought did cross her mind, "You might just get some answers sooner than you think, I hear from Jubilee your mysterious marefriend might be coming to visit this evening."
"She's NOT my 'marefriend' or whatever you ponies call it!" Tulip giggled behind her hoof as she left the room.
Melody hadn't heard the end of it when she had eventually returned to the shop, Biblious had left her ears raw with the ranting he gave her. "What were you thinking leaving the door unlocked?! Of course a pony would walk in and get their head caved in, that was why there was a sign out front saying we were closed! What do you mean you left work to visit him at the hospital, without telling me about it first?!" And so on and so on.
She knew Biblious was just showing her he cared, that deep down beneath his grump old exterior he cared for his employee, but 'tough love' like that reminded Melody too much of her grandfather. He was one of the reasons she had left her hometown to begin with.
I suppose that's why I'm taking the night off as well, to get away from cranky old fossils who yell too much. This time she made sure to get the okay from her boss before she left.
As she flew through the city skyline Melody tuned out most of the negative thoughts that had been clouding her head as of late. Night flying really did put her in a good mood, even when she knew she was about to confront something that would definitely sour her night.
In her hooves she carried a small wicker basket, filled with things you would give to somepony in a hospital; an assortment of flowers, a 'get well soon' card, and a jar of Melody's favorite mango jam. The last one she wasn't too sure about, but if anything was true about hospitals it was that they lacked flavour in their meals, hopefully it would help make it go down easier.
Soon the blocky concrete of VGH emerged amongst the sea of taller buildings, the mare's nerves reacting at the sight by causing her ears and tail to flick uncontrollably. Well, here goes nothing...
The receptionist that greeted the bat pony on the other side was different from last time, but that was to be expected since Melody hadn't taken the emergency entrance this time around. A bored looking cinnamon brown griffon sat behind the desk filing her talons.
The receptionist never heard the doors slightly opening, nor the feint hoofsteps that approached her counter, she continued to maintain her talon without a clue. It wasn't until the third time somepony had made a fake coughing noise did the griff realize she wasn't alone anymore, she looked up but didn't see any pony or being at her eye level "Somebody there?"
"Umm, down here..." it came from below the sil of the reception desk, Matilda had to lean over to see the basket carrying Thestral below.
"Oh, sorry about that, how can I help you this evening?" The griffon smiled politely.
Instead of replying back the bat pony put down the basket and pulled out a form from inside, without a word she placed it up on the desk for Matilda to see. Slightly puzzled at the quiet mare the receptionist quickly read the paper over. "Permit to visit after regular visiting hours are over..." realization dawning on the nurse, "Ah I see, you must be from the other night! I remember the girls talking about it, your friend here has been a bit of a troublemaker!" The eagle lion chuckled as if remembering some old joke.
Melody cringed at that last part, what kind of trouble did she mean?
As if reading her thoughts the nurse just smiled and gently shook her beak, "Don't worry about it too much, nobody was hurt and I'm sure your friend isn't in too much trouble. I'll just page somepony down and they can take you right too him."
It wasn't long before a familiar light blue mare came through the doors. "Melody?" Blooming Jubilee rushed over to the mare with a broad smile on her face, she looked better than the last time, "Oh its good to see you again! Are you doing well?"
Melody met the other mare's smile without as much energy, but she did feel genuinely happy to see the familiar face. She nodded back in response to the question, with a hoof she pushed the basked over to show Jubilee.
"Oooh, carnations and hyacinths?" the mare gingerly picked up the basket to admire the white and indigo petals, "They're gorgeous, I'm sure our little friend will love them, I know they taste great too."
A warm toothy smile beamed back at hearing that about her choice of flowers, Melody wasn't used to making such presents and to have another pony find it pretty filled her with joy!
"Oh, what's this flower in the middle?" Jubilee peered into the basket, "Is that a bluebell?"
"Oh, umm yes... I grow them on occasion..." the nurse turned her attention away from the bouquet in her hooves and stared at the Thestral before her, even though they had communicated a bit since a few nights ago it was more words than she had ever heard be spoken by the dark grey mare.
"Melody... These flowers are pretty, but they're also not really something to go handing out willy-nilly."
The look the mare gave Jubilee told her that she was sure, she smiled as she took back her basket.
"Well alright, let's just go see if our friend upstairs appreciates it just as much."