//------------------------------// // Home // Story: Portal to Another World // by Backburner //------------------------------// “…hospital.” The portal opened and took on the purplish hue of Twilight’s magic. Running back to Roger, she took a mouthful of his shirt and began dragging him toward the portal. “Twilight,” Roger said. “What are you doing, the portal’s open, you need to go.” Roger’s plea went unheeded as one by one the other ponies helped pull Roger toward the portal. Pinkie even managed to convince Fluttershy to help, Twilight didn’t hear the full conversation but it had something to do with her Element of Harmony. As the group made it through the portal, Twilight raised her head just slightly enough to see Roger’s face as he passed out. * * * Twilight awoke on a hospital lounge chair sitting bolt upright. On either side of her were the sleeping forms of her friends all getting well-deserved rest. It was at this point Twilight realized Rarity wasn’t the only one who looked ragged; everypony was in desperate need of a bath and a hairbrush, but they had all refused to go home until they received word on Roger. It was quite a sight when the group came through the other side of the portal. They had ended up on the third floor where a small group had formed around the opening. Needless to say, a group of nurses and doctors suddenly confronted with a gaping hole to another dimension with six horribly mattered ponies and a never before seen creature coming out of it created a chaos Discord would be proud of. After Twilight had a chance to explain what had happened and Roger’s predicament he was rushed away to surgery while the ponies where escorted to the lobby. There they had stayed for almost a day now waiting for word of his condition. Twilight looked around the room and saw everypony that had come to join them. Spike, Sweetie Bell, the Cakes with twins, the entire Apple Family, Twilight was surprised when the mayor herself didn’t show up. Everypony had been so happy to know Twilight and her friends were ok, they all decided to spend the night with them in the lobby. There was probably a friendship lesson in that she should write the princess about, but after what Spike had told her happened to Ponyville since they left, a letter explaining what happened to them over the past few days sounded better. Twilight was about to drift back to sleep when one of the nurses walked into the room from the main section of the hospital. “Everypony,” she said in a voice loud enough to wake the sleeping forms, but soft enough to do it gently. “Your friend has stabilized and as far as we can tell he’s going to be fine. The object lodged in him required extensive surgery to remove and we were working on a creature we had never studied, but the doctor has instructed me to inform you that the surgery will be classified as a success.” Twilight let out a sigh of relief and could hear her friends do the same. It was good to know she had made the right choice in bringing him here. “However, we don’t seem to be able to communicate with him. Is anypony here familiar with his language?” Twilight got out of her chair and walked to where the nurse stood. “Wait, I can talk to him to!” Pinkie said. “Can I come?” Pinkie hopped after Twilight, something she was happy to be able to do again. “I might not be as good as you two, but I can understand some of the things he says.” Rarity added as she trotted behind the bouncing pink pony. “I’m sure Roger will want to see all of us,” Twilight said, checking the nurse pony’s reaction before inviting her friends to join her. The group followed the nurse into a large room close to the lobby door, Roger had been placed on two beds that had been pushed together and slings had to be attached to his feet so they wouldn’t hang off the bed. Roger’s shirt had been removed and a layered wrap covered his midsection. “Six to see you sir,” the nurse said before leaving. “Somehow that didn’t sound like feeding time.” Roger said. As Roger slowly sat up and saw the ponies come to visit a huge smile crossed his face. “Thank god, someone to talk to, Twilight I’m thankful you brought me here but I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to help me tell the nurse what I eat, that sandwich tasted like it was full of grass. In fact I wouldn’t be surprised if it was grass.” Twilight smiled. “Unlikely, but it could have been ferns.” Twilight and her friends gathered around Roger and with a nod from the others, Twilight looked up at Roger with a glint in her eyes. “The girls and I have been talking, and we know you may not want to, but we’d like to invite you to stay with us until you recover. Of course you can go home at any time, but you’re welcome here as long as you’ll stay.” Roger thought it over for a moment. “I suppose in my condition travel is out of the question, and what better place than Ponyville to recover from a traumatic experience. But I don’t know Twilight, you sure you want the reminder of what you learned in my world?” Twilight nodded. “Even if we aren’t real there, we are here, you were such a good host to us it would be wrong for us not to offer.” Roger thought this over. “Well… I could stay a day or two, ‘till I got better that is, no longer.” He said. Twilight smiled at her new friend, maybe Roger didn’t belong here and maybe he would fit it perfectly, but after what she and her friends had been through, somehow this creature from another world seemed like a long lost friend.