I slipped and fell upon the freezing ice immediately. I saw it coming rapidly, but had absolutely no way to stop the sequence of events I had set in motion. I witnessed my be-skated hooves hit the ice, immediately felt the change in friction, heard the cutting sound of the skate against the ice; felt my center of balance go awry, and sure enough, I fell right onto my stomach.
FUCK, was what I thought. THAT’S COLD. I felt my ears flatten against my head as I frowned, that was weird. I guess that was some kind of natural response from my body to my own annoyance? Being a pony was weird. So many little things, and I still had no idea how any of them worked. I groaned, and shook my head, my messy mane getting in my eyes. I saw why Apple Bloom wore a bow, this mop was very thick and unruly.
I heard giggling from behind me “Geez Apple Bloom, I wasn’t expecting you to wipe out so fast!” a particularly orange chicken said to me, as she skated around me, surprisingly agile on the ice.
I looked back, and saw Sweetie Belle wobbling, but staying up decently. I groaned. So of course I had become the clumsy one. I had been doomed to clumsiness in my old life, and it seemed I was in my new one as well. Well, it could just be my unfamiliarity with my new form, but even still, Apple Bloom had always been the clumsiest of the CMC, so I didn’t expect to ever truly become dexterous.
“Yeah Apple Bloom! It’s not-woooah!-That hard!” Squeaked Sweetie Belle, her legs wobbling as she slowly scrabbled across the ice.
My legs shook as I struggled to rise, my hooves wobbling back and forth, each inch feeling more like a mile as I slowly rose to all four hooves, victorious! Ha! I could do this!
“Yeah!” I squealed in jubilation, and leaped into the air, realizing my mistake a moment too late, before falling back down and all four of my legs splaying in different directions, as I tried and failed to keep my balance upon the ice. I slipped and fell on my stomach, and once more experienced the unforgiving frost of the frozen water. My teeth shattered, and my face flushed. I chuffed in annoyance yet again, and looked over seeing Sweetie Belle giggling.
“Golly Apple Bloom, I’ve never seen a pony so clumsy as you!” The little marshmallow filly tittered, and I felt myself infected by her good mood, a smile breaking out on my face. I started to laugh through my chattering, as I wobbled back to my hooves, as Scootaloo skated over to help steady me. Soon, all three of us were giggling.
“Yeah, I s’pose I am pretty clumsy, aren’t ah?” I finally said, and put on a serious expression, ready to try my best to actually work at this. I mean, I knew that I wouldn’t be getting my cutie mark for ice skating seeing as I was destined to eventually get it in season five, whenever that was in this timeframe, but it would still be fun to try and get better at ice skating alongside my friends! After all, any time I got to spend with them was a good time...Wait, no, hang on. I was thinking of myself as Apple Bloom again, and that was not a good thing. Every second I felt myself identifying with this filly whose body I inhabited was a distraction from my ultimate goal of finding some way to reach my old world again. This was not my home, these were not truly my friends. But...What if they could be? Ugh, that just raised more questions. Why did my life have to be so confusing all of a sudden? I just wanted to go home!
No no no, I couldn'’t let myself fall into that sort of thinking, that was the wrong thing to do. I needed to stop focusing so much on the negatives of my situation, and take a while to enjoy myself. I deserved this! Getting hit by a truck gives you the excuse to goof off a bit, after all. I took another step forward, and almost fell over a third time.
“Gah! How do ya work these darn things?” I asked, stamping my hoof onto the ice and coming dangerously close to falling once more.
“It’s easy, watch! Just put one hoof in front of the other…” Scootaloo said, demonstrating, and then said “Next, you just gotta push yourself along, kinda….at an angle!” She then demonstrated that fact, gracefully gliding along the ice. My eyes widened as I witnessed her natural skill, and was struck by the unfairness of it all. The way the girls got their cutie marks in the show simply was not good. It was a travesty, honestly. They each had such good skills in other things, but they were shoehorned into the role of all doing the same thing, which was utterly ridiculous. I shook my head, and tried to copy Scootaloo’s movements.
“One hoof...In front uh the other…” I said, and slowly did just so, placing it down, and gently kicking out, gasping as I started to glide forward. “Hahah! Ah’m doin’ it! Ah’m doin’ it!” I cheered, and tried to put my other hoof in front of the first one “Now just gotta keep goi-Woah!” I yelped, tripping myself up under my own hoof, and flopping down onto my face, my chin impacting the ice with a whump. “Ow…” Once again, my headache returned. Dammit that was getting annoying. I needed to stop injuring myself. I wondered how long it would take this dreadful headache to go awa-
I was back. I was back in my world. I saw my own body, lying in a hospital bed, I was floating above it. It wasn’t breathing, I was intubated. There were all manner of tubes stuck inside me, and I was looking...not good, to say the least. My vision panned down, and I saw that both of my legs were simply gone. My head was wrapped up tightly in layers of gauze, and blood was soaking through said gauze. Yet this body was not mine, I was not inhabiting it...But that was me! I knew that face, as torn and bandaged as it was. No, this couldn’t be me, this couldn’t be me. This was utterly impossible, there was no way that this could be happening. If I was in such bad shape, how was I even alive? How had I survived? Oh good God I had to wake up, was I awake? Was this real life? Was I completely separated from the husk that lay in the bed, barely tethered to this mortal coil, alive in only the barest sense of the word? I couldn’t take it, I couldn’t ta-
I was back. I was back in Equestria, and I was Apple Bloom again, my headache fading. Oh God, this was not good. No no no, this was not good at all. If what I had seen was true, that phantom nightmare vision was in any way correct, then...Something was very wrong. I was a physical wreck, in what seemed to be a brain dead coma. Fuckity fucking fuck. I wanted to cry, but-
“Er, Apple Bloom, you alright? You got that weird look on your face again”
I looked up, and both Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle were staring at me. Scootaloo offered a hoof to help me up, and I took it. I shakily clambered to stand, hiccuping. I was crying, I could feel tears running down my cheeks.
“Apple Bloom?” Sweetie Belle asked, her melodic voice full of concern. “You alright? You’re crying!”
“Ah, uh…” I mumbled, wiping my cheek. “Ah was jus’....” I had no way to express how I felt, I didn’t know what to say. They’d think I was crazy if I mentioned what had happened to me. I shook my head. My headache was completely gone for the moment, though admittedly that was replaced by my pounding heart and shaking limbs. God I felt like a wreck, I didn’t know what to do, what to say. My thoughts were a tornado, I was unable to focus on any single branching path, I didn’t know what to do.
“Apple Bloom? You look like you’re about to throw up. Are you sick or somethin’?” Scootaloo said, nudging me gently. Her wings flittered nervously and rapidly, and she coughed quietly.
“Ah jus’...uh...Ah don’t know, ah was jus’ reminded uh somethin sad. Ah don’ really wanna talk about it” I said, sniffling and hiccuping again.
“Is it your paren-mff!” Sweetie Belle squeaked, before Scootaloo quite literally put her hoof in the filly’s mouth.
“She said she doesn’t want to talk about it!” Scootaloo said, before removing said hoof from Sweetie Belle’s oral cavity. Sweetie nodded, and slowly leaned forward, resting her head on my shoulder, before pulling me into a hug. I was suddenly pressed into Sweetie’s soft fluff, with my head leaning against her shoulder. I sniffled and almost instinctively nuzzled in, squeezing my eyes shut tight. I felt another hoof placed on my back, probably Scoots. I let out another hiccup; oh great, I had the hiccups too. I drew in a deep and shaky breath, trying to calm myself down. Admittedly this was made easier by the fact that I was so encapsulated in that marshmallow coat. I rasped out
“Th...thank ya girls...Thank ya so much,” and heard Sweetie Belle say
“Well hey, what are friends for?” She said, and bumped her nose against my cheek. I laughed, and slowly pulled back after just a few more selfish moments of that hug. That felt amazing, and I wiped my cheeks off, my tears finally stopping. I let my breath out; I hadn’t even realized I was holding in a breath.
“Y’all are the best friends ah could ask for, ya know that?”
Scootaloo blushed and waved me off, while Sweetie gasped and seemed to swell with happiness.
“Anyway, Ah’m ready to get back to tryin’ this stuff!” I said, standing up again, feeling just a bit more sure of my limbs. The two of them nodded, and soon enough I was back to falling all over myself on the ice. I wouldn’t give up, not until I was at least somewhat competent at this whole skating thing. Time seemed to slip away after this, and I did feel myself getting somewhat better at this whole thing with time. Well, better is a subjective term. I didn’t ever get what could be called ‘good’ at skating, but I did manage to stop falling down every five seconds. Eventually, me and Sweetie Belle ended up just sitting back and watching Scootaloo doing all manner of tricks on the ice, and she was happy to show off her agility. Her and I watched as Scootaloo stood on two legs, and twirled around on the ice, before she raised one hoof and jumped into the air, landing yet again on two hooves, and twirling round and round, before dropping back down to all fours and skating in a figure eight, stopping in front of us and taking a bow.
“Yeah! Go Scootaloo!” Sweetie Belle cheered, and I in turn said
“Wow Scootaloo! That were amazin’! I ain’t ever seen nopony do a trick like that before!”
Well, I’d seen Rainbowdash do some cooler things in the show, but there was no reason not to make Scootaloo feel better about herself. It was really a neat trick, far beyond anything I or Sweetie Belle were capable of doing. I felt true pride in this pegasus filly who was my friend, and yes she was my friend and...Oh God why was I going in circles again? These damn mental circles I kept running myself in were getting tiring. Were the Cutie Mark Crusaders my friends or not? Well, they were fun to be around, and I definitely seemed to fit in among them as well as Apple Bloom had, so that was a plus. But the potential that I was still technically alive threw a wrench into this mix. It made my life just that much more difficult. My body was broken beyond belief in the real world. I’d lost both legs, and any other damage that was there I couldn’t see. It made me want to scream with the quandary I was facing.
I took another deep breath. I could think about all this tomorrow, right now I needed to focus on the now.
“Thanks! It just comes natural, I guess” Scootaloo said braggadociously, with a smirk on her face. She definitely was similar to Rainbow Dash in quite a few ways, including her boastfulness. “But seriously you two, means a lot to me that you guys think that.” she said, blushing and trying to play it off. That Scootaloo always tried to act just like her hero, didn’t she?
“Wish ah was that good at skatin’,” I said, kicking the snow, and then followed with “But watchin’ you is fun Scoots! Ah wonder if ya got yer cutie mark for it, you should check!”
She proceeded to whirl around and look, and show her flank, which was blank. Well, yeah that made sense. Sweetie Belle checked hers, and sure enough she got nothing either, I didn’t even bother looking at mine.
Alright, what was next? I needed to go see Twilight! Yeah. Not only could seeing her help me figure out what season this was, but also she might be able to help me figure out my situation. I could ask her about...What would be a good story for why I was needing to know about different worlds? Well I could just pretend to be curious, but why would I be curious about such a thing? The sun was still high in the sky, based on it’s position it looked to be around 3ish in the afternoon? I was never that good at telling the time based on the sun, but that’s what it looked like to me. My thoughts rambled on too much, I noted to myself.
“Alright girls, ah needed to go see Twilight an’ ask her somethin’. Y’all wanna come?” I asked, before Scootaloo said
“Nah, the meeting of the Rainbowdash fan club is today, and I definitely gotta be there seeing as I’m the leader and all!
“I need to dry off, some snow and ice got in my coat and is melting. Water makes me feel funny. And Rarity wanted me to help her with looking for more fabrics, sorry Apple Bloom”
Huh, that actually worked out pretty well, that meant I wouldn’t have to hint at Twilight what I meant when asking about different worlds. Still needed to figure out a reason as to why I would be curious about such a thing though. Ah well, I’d figure out a reason along the way. Together, the girls and I dropped off the skates back at Pinkie Pie’s room in Sugarcube Corner (And Mrs. Cake told me to tell Applejack thanks again for fixing up the roof so quickly). Afterwards, we said our goodbyes for now, and I trotted into the town center. Ah right. Where was Twilight’s house?
Fuck. I wandered around looking for either...It was either the library or her sparkly castle, and I really hoped it wasn’t her castle, because that would mean we were season five or later, and if we were in that time, then that meant that I had virtually no knowledge of things to come beyond a few episodes. I hadn’t even watched the episode where the CMC got their cutie marks, so I really had no hope for how to proceed here assuming we followed the show. Oh God, if the castle was here I would-oh!
I almost ran right into the Golden Oak library, and rubbed my head. Thank God, thank Faust, thank Ganesh, whoever was up there. This meant we were at least season four or earlier. Now all I had to do was knock on the door...Knock on...the door...I sat in front of the door apprehensively. Shoot, what was a good reason for me to be curious about different worlds? What would help, come on think...It’s not like I was known as a particularly erudite filly, I wasn’t dumb, but I had no reason to be pondering such high concepts as alternate realities.
And then the door opened and Twilight ran right into me, her face buried in a book.
“Gah!” she said, as she flopped over me, once more today I was knocked to the ground in a tangle of limbs. Man, that had to be some kind of record for times knocked down in a day or something. “Oh my gosh! I am so, so sorry! Sometimes I get so absorbed in a book I just don’t look where I’m going and...oh, hi Apple Bloom!”
I huffed, and said “Hi Twilight” as I extricated myself from under Miss Sparkle, and stood up, dusting myself off. I did a quick lookover of her. She had wings. Aw dammit, that’s what I was worried about. Okay so she had wings, and the library was still here. So we were probably season four-ish. That was something I could work with, but it still wasn’t ideal. Aw well, better than the alternative. “Twilight, ah was lookin’ fer you actually!” I said, my voice cracking on the ‘you’ . Had I thought yet about how much it sucked to be a child again? Good god it was annoying to deal with stuff like that.
“Oh! Well what’d you need Apple Bloom? I was just busy with this book on royal etiquette. It’s not really my thing, but I figure I should know it just because, well, you know.” She said. The book she was holding was a large thick leather bound volume titled On the Pracktices of Equestrian Nobility, It looked absolutely riveting.
“Ah’m sure that’s a very interestin’ book an’ all Twilight, but ah was jus’ wonderin’ if you had any books on, or uh knew anythin’ about different worlds?”
What the fuck did I just say? Did I really just blurt that out without any sort of build up? Did I have a brain injury? Well obviously I did, but did I as Apple Bloom have some sort of brain issue? I couldn’t believe I’d just outright said that without even having an explanation as to why I wondered about such a thing.
Twilight’s shocked expression as she stood up told me everything I needed to know. Oh God I had fucked up. This was bad, this was very very bad. I needed to deflect, I needed to figure out what to say. I stood there frozen, staring at her. Oh god no, she looked horrified! She knew! She knew something was wrong with me! Oh n-
“Er...Apple Bloom, why don’t you come inside with me?” She asked calmly, her expression smoothing out.
“S-sure thang Twilight!” I said, my voice stuttering just a bit despite my efforts to speak smoothly.
I followed her inside the treehouse, and she closed the door behind us. It had not been closed for a single second when she whirled around, and stared directly at me
“How do you know about the crystal mirror?!” She almost shouted in amazement.
Oh. OHHH! She thought that was what I meant.
“Wha? Crystal Mirror? What’s that?” It honestly sucked that Equestria Girls was canon, but at least it provided a deflection from any suspicions she might’ve had.
“Oh! Uh! It’s nothing. Haha...It was just something that happened to me a few months ago, uh...But I might have a few books like that. I didn’t think you liked fantasy books Apple Bloom!” She said cheerfully, humming as she started pulling books out of the shelves.
“No, ah was wonderin’ more about uh, different worlds as like a concept! Like, the possibility of there bein’ different worlds”
“Really? Wow Apple Bloom, I didn’t have you pegged for interest in stuff like that!”
Well, that hurt. I mean, she wasn’t being mean, but was she indirectly saying she thought that wasn’t intellectual enough to want to know about that kind of stuff? Nah, I was sure she didnt mean anything by it.
“Well yeah! Do yah have any books on the subject? Ah’m uh, tryin’ ta broaden my horizons, and ah think that ah might even be able to get mah cutie mark for scientific pursuits!”
“Eee!” she said, clapping her hooves excitedly, her horn sparking up with its familiar purple aura as she started to pull books from the shelves. “Sure!” She said cheerfully “Like this one, and this one, and this one, ooh and this!” She said, levitating out and dropping several large and heavy books directly on top of me
“Twilight wait! Ah can’t carry that much!” I cried out, raising my hooves above me for protection as I was suddenly crushed by almost half my body weight in books, falling upon me with several whumps.
“Oops,” I heard Twilight say from under my book mountain.