Doctor Dream Heart had been the psychiatrist and therapist for Ponyville General Hospital for several years now. A rather boring position with very little patients for her to take care of. She could only think of a handful of clients she had seen regularly over the past few years, and all of them were rather regular cases for her. None with any serious issues that had to be addressed. A small town like Ponyville was nothing if not peaceful, even if that meant that the hospital staff were almost always trying to find something to occupy their time with.
For Dream Heart, that was the latest Daring Do novel. A series she had begun indulging in after she found the need to pass the time in her office. ‘And as Daring Do descended into the pit, her eyes caught sight of the glittering golden city that laid just beneath the-‘.
Knock Knock. A rare visitor for the Doctor had appeared, right before she got to the big reveal of the golden city. Dream Heart did her best to hide her annoyance, tucking the book away underneath her desk before speaking. “Come in.” She said evenly, expecting a nurse or another doctor to come in. Not for a consultation, probably just to have lunch with her.
Who she didn’t expect to see come in was Ponyville’s resident apple farmer. An orange mare with a loosely tied blonde mane, three apples adorning her flank, and a stetson hat atop her head. Out of politeness, she removed the hat and held it to her chest while inside the office.
“‘Scuse me, ma’am,” said the farm mare with her country twang, “You are Dr. Heart, right? The psychologist.”
“Yes, but you can call me Dr. Dream, there’s a lot of Hearts in our hospital.” She couldn’t even begin to count the amount of times she had been mistaken for the Head Nurse Redheart. “Applejack, if I am correct?”
“Yes ma’am, ah mean- Dr. Dream.” Applejack nodded her head.
“I know you have heard it already, but it would be awful for me not to thank you for the barrels of cider you and your family donate to the hospital each year. They’re gone faster than you can swallow when cider season comes.”
Applejack grew a smile hearing those words. “Well o’ course. For everythin’ you all do fer Ponyville, it’s the least we can offer.” That warm grin fell back down afterward. Dream noted an annoyed twitch coming from her right eye. “That ain’t what ah’m here for today, though.”
“Of course,” Dream sat up in her chair and gestured to the seat across from her desk. Applejack took the seat and tried to keep her breath even and slow. Something was making the farmer angry, but she was trying to keep herself cool. “How can I help you, Applejack?”
“It ain’t fer me. Ah was hopin’ ah could convince you to come and see my brother.”
“Your brother? I believe his name is…”
“Big Mac, Big Macintosh Apple.”
“Ah! Yes, Big Macintosh. Is there something wrong that I can assist with?”
“No-… well yes, maybe. It’s difficult to explain.” Applejack’s twitches grew more apparent. “Ah don’t think it’s anythin’ more than my brother bein’ a stubborn ass, but on the slightest chance ah’m wrong, he may need help.”
“Can you give me some details? Did something happen that made you believe he needs a psychologist?”
Dream was quick to catch any body movements made by Applejack. Her twitching was obvious. The way she shifted in her seat as she continued was another piece of the puzzle. Applejack’s eyes never stayed on the Doctor for too long, shifting away and wandering elsewhere. Talking about this topic alone was creating a point of frustration or anger in the mare. She also seemed uncomfortable approaching Dream about this, as if she wasn’t sure it was necessary. Her preliminary guess was some form of relationship trouble between siblings. Co-running a farm as large and important as Sweet Apple Acres is bound to create some conflict between families sometimes.
Applejack let out a long sigh. “A few days ago, me an’ Big Mac got into a big fight. It started off with us arguin’ over what apple varieties we were gonna plant for the new growth, then it grew into somethin’… a bit more personal.”
“The next day, my brother started actin’ differently, and every day since.”
“Could you describe what kind of changes? What in particular stood out to you?”
Applejack’s nose released a vent of hot air. “His routine ain’t changed a bit! Still the same worker he’s always been, he’s been doin more work in a day than we usually finish in two days, but he talks to me in ways that ah ain’t ever seen him do before.”
“What kind of ways?”
“He talks!” Applejack exclaims, “Ah’ve gotten used to learnin’ how to read my brother, because he’s normally the quiet type, but now he’s talkin. Which- Yeah ah know that doesn’t sound bad, but for Mac it’s weird!”
Dream was leaning more towards sibling dispute at this point. “Were there any other parts of his behavior that felt different?”
“Yup, that one ain’t even the biggest issue!” Applejack wasn’t trying to hide her anger. Her nose was flared, eyes narrowed, “My brother has been actin like he ain’t my brother for days now!”
“And what made you believe that he doesn’t see himself as your brother?”
“Because he outright told me!!” She barked at Dream. Applejack’s anger wasn’t enough to cause the doctor to recoil in surprise, but her eyes did widen, a gesture the farm pony recognized.
“Ah’m sorry, that was rude o’ me.”
“It’s alright, being told by family that you are not family would certainly be a good reason to be angry. I can imagine that makes you feel frustrated.”
“It does! He made up a stupid name, and keeps actin’ like ah’m a stranger!”
“And why do you think he is doing it?”
“To piss me off! Ah made him mad and now he wants to get back at me!”
“Has he done anything like this before?” Asked Dream Heart
“No.”
“Miss Applejack, you told me at the start that you didn’t think Big Mac was being anything more than a stubborn ass, but you also said he may need help. I think you’re here today because you do believe something else is going on, is that correct?”
Applejack, ever the honest mare, couldn’t hide her uncomfortable shifting. None of the boiling hot anger she had before, just an unsure tension that radiated from her. “…Ah still think he’s bein’ an ass, but ah still care for my brother even if he doesn’t care about me. He’s dead serious about this ‘not bein my brother’ thing, and he wasn’t one for lyin’ before. If he actually does believe it, then ah need to make sure he gets the help he needs. Just like any good sister would.”
“And if he’s actually fakin’ it, then ah get a good excuse to buck him in the flank!”
That was enough for Dream Heart to place a question mark next to the “sibling dispute” angle she was working with in her head. There certainly was a sibling dispute involved, but she felt there was something deeper in the description Applejack had provided her. A stallion who one day acts like a complete stranger to his own family. An interesting case, and one Dream Heart would be happy to help with. There was just one problem.
“I would be more than happy to meet with Big Macintosh and talk to him, did he come with you to the hospital today?”
Applejack shook her head. “That’s the other problem. When ah offered this therapy stuff to him, he refused. Ah was hopin’ you’d be willing to come to the farm, talk to him there.”
Dream scrunched up her face, that was the real problem. “Unless Big Macintosh is a danger to himself or others, I'm afraid there is nothing I can do. I cannot force him to partake in therapy that he does not want to partake in.”
“Well then how am ah supposed to help him? He kept tellin’ me how we can’t afford it! Ah don’t even know what that means!”
The meaning behind that was lost to Dream as well. Why would he be worried about the cost? “My door will always be open, you can try to convince him. Let him know that I am interested in talking to him, and that it will be completely free. Just come by when he has free time.”
“You don’t know my brother, he’s as stubborn as a mule. There’s no way he’ll change his mind.”
“But if Big Macintosh truly is somepony else right now, perhaps he can be reasoned with?”
What she said left a mark on Applejack. Dream noted the way her words sunk in. The realization of a possibility she didn’t want to accept was coming to the farm pony. She didn’t speak for several moments while taking in that revelation. Applejack let it settle at the pit of her stomach before she spoke again.
“Ah understand what you mean, doc. Ah’ll try an’ convince him.”
Dream Heart smiled. “That’s good to hear. I hope to see you again soon.”
Work, for me, has always been a therapeutic experience. I worked in a mechanic’s shop, fixing cars was my day to day life. Talking with the customers or dealing with the boss was always a pain, but when I was left alone with a job to do, I couldn’t be any happier. My mind and body became occupied in routine tasks it knew how to do over and over and over again. Replacing tires, oil changes, body work, alignments, any number of jobs on a car needed time and effort to complete. Time and effort that wasn’t spent making small talk or thinking about things I didn’t want to think about. There was a job to do, and I could clear my mind and focus completely on it.
For that reason alone, I should be happy that I ended up in the one body in Ponyville who perfectly matched my work philosophy. I wasn’t happy, but I had plenty of work to keep me occupied. As long as I didn’t think too hard about walking on four legs or not having fingers.
Today was grass cutting. Two fields on the farm needed to be cut down to be made into hay. Thankfully, this was a job I could do solo. I wasn’t comfortable being around Apple Bloom or Granny Smith, and especially didn’t want to be around Applejack. The conversations I've already had with this body’s sister haven’t gone well at all.
The grass cutter fit nicely onto the harness fitted around my neck, and the steady rhythm of hauling it behind me was a nice distraction from all the thoughts creeping up inside my head. Questions I’ve been asking myself on repeat ever since I woke up in the body of a giant red furred stallion. There were no answers I could give the questions, so I worked myself out until I was too exhausted to care about it.
It took a lot to make this body exhausted. Hauling a giant blade around my own neck barely phased this muscled farm pony body. It could walk for days on end and probably keep going another two more. If I put enough force into a buck, I could snap a tree off from its trunk through sheer force. It was all too easy, and I had to do triple the work I used to do at the shop to achieve any challenge. That didn’t feel right, it wasn’t right. My body couldn’t handle this, his body could.
So where was he?
“Big Mac!” The voice of his sister rang in my ears, and I couldn’t stop the audible groan that came from my throat. I had avoided having any kind of conversation with the rest of the Apple Family, except for Applejack. She was the only one who had heard me speak the truth so far, which made it all the more annoying when she called me that.
“Ah am not Big Mac.” I said, unable to prevent the twang from coming out. A leftover from the real Big Mac. My grass cutting rounds were cut short, and I stood still as Applejack approached me in the field.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah, you ain’t Big Mac.” She rolled her eyes, “But ah ain’t callin you a gryphon name, so Big Mac it is.”
My eye twitched. Even before Applejack’s refusal to accept my real name, I was annoyed at her. What for? I’m not quite sure, but as soon as I saw her I could feel the anger building in my chest. Was Big Mac always this unhappy seeing his sister, and his body just reacted as it naturally would? I don’t know, but it didn’t help my ability to speak normally with her.
“Yer cuttin the fields for hay?”
“Eeyup.”
“We were plannin’ on doin’ the grass cuttin’ next week. Why are ya doin’ it now?”
“Ran outta work, ah needed somethin’ to do, grass cuttin’ it is.”
Applejack opened her mouth, clearly looking to argue with me. Probably about not overworking yourself or sharing the workload or some other dumb argument like that. I could get it done, why shouldn’t I do it? Otherwise I would have had a slow day today, and slow days mean thinking about things I didn’t want to think about. I never found out what argument she would make, however, as she shut herself up and held back.
“Ah went to Ponyville General today and met with Dr. Dream Heart.”
Oh this again. I groaned, and Applejack pressed before I could argue back. “Look Mac, if yer entrenched on this idea that you ain’t my brother, despite lookin and feelin and talkin just like him, the least you can do is see somepony who can help you figure that out!”
“Ah don’t need to see somebody cause ah already know what’s wrong! Ah’m not Big Mac, Big Mac isn’t talkin, and until ah can find him in this big head o’ his, ah’m stuck here!”
“And yer really figurin’ out where Big Mac is by cuttin’ the grass a week early?”
All I could do was glare. She called me out perfectly. I still had a few arguments to make at least. “The farm can’t afford to pay some doctor to look inside mah head!”
“That’s the dumbest thing ah’ve ever heard you say. The therapy’s free for Celestia’s sake! Ya don’t pay a bit fer it.”
…Drat. I probably should have thought that Equestrian healthcare would be better than what I had before. “…There’s still plenty of work ta-“
“You have already done a week’s worth of workin’ in three days, Mac. If anythin’, you have a vacation to use.”
I could feel my throat rumble as I growled at her. “What is the doctor supposed to do?! Ah don’t need therapy, ah need an expert on souls to dig me outta here and pull Mac back up!”
“Well ah’m sorry to say, but Ponyville’s a bit short on soul experts. So Dr. Dream is gonna be your next best bet!” Applejack sighed in exasperation. “Please, Mac. If ya don’t want to do it for yerself, do it for me, or Apple Bloom, or Granny. If ya still care about ‘em at all. They’ve noticed the change in you too, so either we gotta settle the problems between us right now and stop this nonsense… or ya gotta get some help. Please…”
Ponies had one advantage that I couldn’t overcome, and that was the big, adorable eyes that they used. Applejack was weaponizing them against me with that pained expression on her face. There was a part of Big Mac’s body that wrenched at the mere sight of a pained and concerned Applejack. Actually, that could have just been me.
“…Fine! One visit, that’s all ah’m promisin’.”
Applejack forced herself to smile, maybe part of that smile was real, but I could tell she had to hold back words behind gritted teeth to make it. Not that I didn’t already know she didn’t believe me. “Good, she said she was interested in meetin’ you, so get goin.”
“Ah still gotta finish the grass.”
“Ah’ll finish it.”
If there was one thing I knew about Applejack, it’s that she was incredibly stubborn. Big Mac was stubborn too, but not in the same way. I huffed and disconnected myself from the grass cutter. “Fine.”
“Fine,”
“Ah’m still not Big Mac.”
“And Ah’ll believe ya if the doctor agrees!” She called out while hitching herself up to what was previously his job.
Now he had nothing to occupy his mind, so he started thinking, and he really didn’t like thinking.
Being in Ponyville still made me nervous. I had to come to town once two days ago to deliver some apples, and I swore I felt that ponies noticed I was different. I wasn’t Big Macintosh, and as much as his mannerisms and colloquialisms made me feel like Big Mac, there was no way I could hide it from the ponies who actually knew him.
Big Mac never rushed anywhere, so I kept a slow pace, but I really wanted to gallop as fast as possible through town. The less time here, the better. Ponyville General was on the opposite side of Ponyville that Sweet Apple Acres was on. It was hardly an exercise for this walking pile of muscles, but it did mean passing by every major landmark on my way.
Which included Sugarcube Corner.
“Hey Macky!” A pink mare with a darker pink mane hopped in front of me. Pinkie Pie, the town’s resident party planner and baker at the Sugarcube Corner. She was also the self proclaimed friend of every single pony in Ponyville. With her incredible memory, manic personability, and amazing baking skills, it wasn’t just a proclamation, it was fact. Nopony in Ponyville wasn’t Pinkie’s friend, and she made sure she knew about each and every one of them.
That long list of friends she kept track of also included Big Macintosh. “Are you heading somewhere?” She asked me.
“Eeeyup.”
“Is it the library?”
“Nnnope.”
“Oh! The spa!”
“Nnnope.”
“Oh! I know! You’re going to visit Dr. Dream Heart at the Hospital!”
What the absolute hell, how did you guess that Pinkie Pie?!
“Or that’s what I just did, actually. She didn’t want a party for her birthday so I promised one whole week of cupcakes for her birthday! She just got fifth one today.” Pinkie hopped in one place as she hummed out her words. “Anyways, gotta run, nice seeing you Macky!”
The pink mare wasted no time at all bouncing away to the tune of a song. While I breathed a sigh of relief. I may have told Applejack who I really was, but I am not ready to make it clear to the entire town that I took over Big Mac’s body. His family was always around him, so hiding it would only have made it harder to talk to ponies like Applejack. Which was already pretty hard to do. I didn’t want to make the entire town start seeing him as a crazy person when he got back.
He was going to come back eventually. I couldn’t be in his body forever.
The nurse at the front desk of the hospital was expecting my arrival, or at least I thought she did. Nurse Redheart, I knew her, and apparently she knew I was coming.
“Hi, Big Mac,” She said with a warm smile, I did my best to try and give that patented Big Mac look to her. Redheart didn’t notice or didn’t care. “I believe Dr. Dream Heart is expecting you?”
“…Eeyup.”
“Just down this hallway, three doors on the left.” Redheart gestured toward the hall that adjoined the waiting room.
“Thank ya.” I said, only barely able to hide my annoyance. Applejack had set him up. She knew those adorable little sister eyes would work on his body’s big brother tendencies. This was Big Mac’s fault, not mine.
It felt like the longest walk of my life, going from that lobby to the doctor’s office. I knew what awaited me there, I knew what they would say, and I was dreading every moment I stepped toward that fate. There was no way a therapist could help me, they couldn’t find where the hell Big Mac went. She wouldn’t know why I’m alone in his head, trying to figure out what to do to fix it. That was far beyond some mental health issues, I needed Princess Celestia, or… I don’t know! Just not a psychiatrist!
I could just turn around, walk out… But all I had to do to get Applejack off my back was talk to the doctor once… Who knows, maybe it won’t be entirely awful. He knocked on the door, and a mare’s voice called to let him in. When he opened the door, a light blue unicorn mare with a short purple mane stood waiting for me with a smile. White spectacles sat on the top of her muzzle, accenting the mint colored eyes behind them. A cartoonish dream bubble adorned her flank, as if ripped straight out of a comic book. I also noted the cupcake crumbs on her mouth from Pinkie Pie’s fifth birthday present for her.
I prepared for the worst, and stepped inside.
Dream Heart heard a heavy knock against her office door. Smiling to herself, Applejack must have been successful. She stood up from her seat. “Come in,” She called to the door.
When it opened, she was met with by far the largest stallion she had ever met. The red furred pony with a short orange mane practically towered over her smaller frame. Hell, she could probably ride on his back. Green eyes stared down at her with a tinge of annoyance dulling their color. The Big part of Big Macintosh was making a lot more sense.
“Ah, you must be Big Macintosh.” Dream Heart said, holding her smile up and extending a hoof towards him. The stallion took her small hoof into his far larger hoof and shook.
“Nnnope.” He shook his, placing his hoof back down. Surprisingly gentle with his shake. Dream Heart realized her first mistake immediately. Applejack already told her that he was going by a different name.
“I’m sorry, that was rude of me to assume.” She said, “My name is Dr. Dream Heart, you can call me Dream, if you’d like. What is your name?”
Big Macintosh didn’t reply immediately, his brow was raised at him. Clearly he didn’t expect somepony to accept any other name than Big Macintosh. It was important for her to assess who exactly she was talking to.
“Gabriel.” The large stallion said, “And no, it ain’t got nothin’ to do with griffins.”
Her first thought was griffins, good that he corrected that immediately. It takes away a possible path of questions she would have taken. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Gabriel.” Dream gestured to the nearby couch. “Would you like to take a seat?”
His eyes narrowed when she motioned to the couch, but he still went to sit on it. The floorboards underneath him creaked as the weight of his body pressed onto the cushion.
“If ya don’t mind, doctor, ah’d like ta skip ahead a bit.” Gabriel said while she took a seat of her own. Dream tilted her head at the comment.
“What would you like to skip, exactly?”
“The part where ya try ta explain what’s gonna happen and how ah can say whatever ah feel like. We both know why ah’m here so let’s just get to the meat of it.”
He doesn’t want to be here. It didn’t take her doctorate to figure that out. If he wanted to get right to it, then she had to oblige. “What would you say is the meat of it, Gabriel?”
Her horn lit up to bring a notebook and pen to use for this impromptu session. It wasn’t like she had anything scheduled anyway.
“Ya know what the meat of it is, yer saying the name of it. It’s me!” He let out a hot snort. “Ah’m not Big Macintosh, ah’m Gabriel. Ah woke up in his body, and ah have no idea why or where he ended up. That’s the problem, ah don’t think you have a way of bringing back a soul. Anythin’ else?”
Dream raised a brow at his response, and looked away from her notebook to regard his posture, his angry disposition towards her, the way his ear flicked while it waited for a response. “You are correct, I don’t have a method that would bring Big Macintosh as you know him back, but that isn’t why I wanted to talk to you.”
“And what exactly were you hopin’ to talk about?”
“About you, Gabriel. I want to talk about you.”
Gabriel’s combative posture he had been holding since the moment he sat down finally had a crack. He didn’t respond after she said that, so she pressed on.
“I am not able to influence the soul, and I certainly have no influence on the mind. What my role is here is to be a listener, to hear your story. Have you had a moment to talk about who you are, and not Big Macintosh?”
No, he hasn’t. His ear flicked again and he’s avoiding eye contact. Gabriel is unsure of what to say, but Dream couldn’t press him any further yet. She waited patiently until he was ready to answer.
“Applejack doesn’t believe me, and the only other person who knows is you. Ah don’t want to involve anypony else in this. Ah just want to get out of his body, everypony will be better off that way.”
Everypony will be better off that way. Dream Heart made sure to write that down. “I understand, but perhaps taking the time to tell this story could help find a clue as to why you are where you are.”
I didn’t like how much sense Dr. Dream had said already. If there was one thing I had been avoiding since landing in Big Mac’s head, it was really contemplating my circumstances. I was never good at these types of serious talks, so I drowned them out with work.
“Would you be willing to tell me how you came to be Big Macintosh? If that is something you can tell me.”
Now was the time to really think about it. “…Ah was sleepin, ah think. What happened just before it is fuzzy fer me… but when ah woke up, ah was big and red and four legged. That was four days ago now.”
“Four legged? Were you not a pony before now?”
I shook my head. “You ain’t gonna believe me, unless ya know what a human is.”
“I cannot say that I do, could you describe it to me?”
“Imagine a tall, hairless monkey, only hair we got was on the top of our heads like a mane. Walkin on two legs, with two hands to hold things with.”
“I see… and you were a human, then?”
“Eeyup. A mechanic. Ah worked on-“ The description of a car probably wasn’t necessary, so I decided to skip that part. “Ah worked on machinery, fixed it up, made it run better. That was my livelihood, before this, well, this happened.”
“And you only remember falling asleep? Do you remember where you were?”
Holy shit, Gabe watch out! Gabriel!!
“…Ah think ah was at the shop. Normally ah don’t doze off while ah’m workin.”
“Could you describe to me what it was like, that morning when you woke up as Big Macintosh?”
“Panicking, at first. Imagine ya wake up with somebody else’s memories stacked on top of yer own. Also imagine ya have a completely different body that ya gotta learn how to use. Doesn’t go that well.”
“I can imagine, were you able to get used to this body? You seem comfortable enough as of now.”
“Big Mac’s got plenty of his own muscle memory. As long as ah don’t think about what ah’m doin too hard, it’s not too hard.”
“And that’s what you have been doing? Tapping into parts of Big Mac to function day to day?”
“Eeyup.” I nodded my head, “Ah didn’t talk like this before either.”
Dream’s ears perked up. “Oh? Do you think you could show me how you talked before? Is that something you are able to show me?”
…Was it? The voice in my head was exactly what I thought I sounded like. Maybe… I worked my throat and mouth until I felt comfortable trying, and then spoke.
“Ah…I spoke a little bit like this. I didn’t have any draaaw-… drawl in my voice.” When it worked, it really worked. It sounded exactly like how I remembered, even if it was hard to hold together.
“Did you have a typical accent for a pony- I’m sorry, human from where you lived?”
“Ah’d say so.” It was far too much effort to keep up my original accent in Big Mac’s body, so I didn’t bother. “Ah was nobody special.”
“And did you have any family or friends to speak of? You do not have to answer if it makes you uncomfortable.”
Thinking about them reminded me that I wouldn’t see them again as long as I was here. A painful thought, but it wasn’t one that stopped me from speaking to them. “Parents died when ah was about ten, it was me an’ my sister after that. She… “
Why would you say that to me, Mac?!
“…Ah’d rather not.”
“It’s okay to refuse.” The Doctor must have filled an entire page worth of notes, and has flipped to a new one… or was this the third page? She’s been writing a lot. “You said earlier that you have memories of somepony else stacked on top of your own. Are they Big Mac’s?”
“Eeyup.”
“Does that mean you recall his own memories? Can you remember what happened to Big Mac before you took over?”
“…” I could, at least partly. Except I didn’t want to say it. The moment I recall that memory, guilt pours up from my chest, weighing me down like sandbags. What happened that day hurt Big Macintosh, and it still hurts me now. “Ah can’t recall, no.”
She eyed me for a moment, but nodded her head and continued writing. I was dying to know at this point what she had been writing down. “What’s your evaluation then, Doctor?”
“I’m sorry?” She asked me.
“Your evaluation of me, mah diagnosis. Ah assumed ya were thinkin’ about somethin’ with all that writin’.”
“Were you expecting me to have a diagnosis for you today, Gabriel?”
“…Nnnope, cuz there ain’t no disorder that fits the bill.”
“I wouldn’t say that.”
My eyes narrowed, I could feel the fur on my borrowed body standing on end. She wasn’t supposed to say that. “And what’s that?” I asked, with a bit more aggression than I expected.
“Gabriel, I would not do you the disservice of placing any diagnosis upon you so early. While I may think about what you have told me and consider the possibilities, I do not know enough to say anything conclusively.”
“So ah knew it, this was a waste of time.” I got up from the coach and groaned, whatever this doctor had to say, I didn’t want to hear it. I couldn’t hear it. There was nothing outside of outright magic that explained what happened to me. Why else would I be stuck in a pony land in the body of a horse?!
“Please wait.” Dream said just before I grabbed the door. His body stopped, and I was forced to wait. Damn him and his stupid body. Why wouldn’t it listen to me?
“You’re frustrated, and you don’t think there is anypony in the world who can help you, I get that. However, if you truly believed there was no way for me to help you, I don’t think you would have come.”
“No, Ah came because of Applejack and her stupid eyes! Ah came so ah wouldn’t hurt Apple Bloom and Granny! Ah know there ain’t no single damn pony in the entirety of Equestria that can explain what happened ta me, or help him come back. So until Big Mac comes back to his family, his home, his life, I’ll keep livin and workin. So that ah don’t go and screw everythin’ up!”
I could feel the heat of my blood pumping through me. My breath was heavy in the anger and aggression I felt. I was sick and tired of being told all of this. After my outburst, I didn’t have the energy left in my to be angry anymore, and I looked at the ground instead.
“…Ah’m not the one that needs yer help.”
“…” Dream was hesitant to talk, probably because I just screamed at her. I was big, and intimidating, and I just yelled at a small unicorn like her. Great job, me. I stared at the ground in front of me, holding back tears. Until I felt a gently hoof touch my foreleg.
She didn’t say anything, I don’t even know when she did it, but Dream Heart came and wrapped me into a warm embrace. It was the first time I actually felt somebody’s warmth in a long time. Big Mac’s body wrapped his hooves gently around her, and held on. My heartbeat began to calm itself back down from its rapid pace. I could feel the muscles on my body relax after an anger fueled tirade. When she shifted underneath my body, I loosened my grip and saw her eyes look up towards me.
“You want me to help Big Macintosh.”
I didn’t have the heart to speak, so I nodded instead.
“I want to help him, Gabriel, but if you want me to help find him, I have to go through you. There are ideas I have, thoughts I want to work with you on, but you need to be willing to accept help. You don’t have to do this alone.”
…Say no, get out, don’t come back. There’s nothing that will help you here. The answers she can give will only hurt, don’t do it.
You don’t deserve it.
“…Alright,” I said quietly. “On one condition.”
“What will that condition be?”
“If ya can help me find Big Mac, and bring him back. Ah want you to destroy me.”