This time, I awoke, truly awoke, to the feeling of disorientation. The world was literally spinning before my eyes and I could hardly stand on my hooves.
Eh, the funny thing was that I was starting to get used to the feeling of being a quadruped. It didn’t last all that long each time, but with every new experience, it was easier to slip into character. To fall back into this like it was an old habit.
“So… where am I?” I asked to no one in particular, as soon as my vision cleared.
It seemed to be a simple grassy field. As far as my eyes could see. I was all alone in the middle of a field, a windy one, with no civilization in sight. I would need to rely on my non-existent set of tracking and camping skills to thrive by.
At least it was a beautiful sunny day.
‘Ask and you shall receive!’
Guess who?
Instantly, my mood darkened, leaving me scowling at the incoming thunderstorm in the horizon.
“Of course…” I grunted.
I had run right into that one.
‘What?’ Discord asked innocently. ‘You’re never satisfied with what you do have, so I thought you wanted this to be different.’
“Likely story, D,” I sneered. “And if I do tell you that you misinterpreted me, will you bring the sunny weather back?”
‘Well, for that, I would have to be mistaken.’ He became visible again, this time taking a ghostly consistence.
…He had appeared more solid before. Why was he transparent now? Was he losing power or something?
Eh, like I’d ever get that kind of luck. He was most likely to screw with me again.
‘Besides, what fun would there be in leaving you stranded in the middle of nowhere under Celestia’s sun?’ See? Don’t you feel better just telling me the truth, D? ‘Oh shush, ye of little faith.’
Right, mind reader. I’ve got to remember that. This can bite me in the ass so hard if I keep forgetting.
I looked up, trying to estimate how long I had until the downpour. This time, however, I did not think of any number and give Discord ammunition. In fact, I decided that thinking was off limit as long as he was in the vicinity.
Scanning my surroundings told me virtually nothing about my location, nor did it give me a way to avoid being soaked to the bones as soon as it started to rain. So, with nothing else to try, I turned around to Discord.
“Where’s the nearest friendly pony, D?” I asked with a sigh.
The spirit of Chaos and Disharmony snapped his claws together, blinding me with a flash of light for a second. As soon as I had blinked away the spots of darkness, I was granted with the sight of a big neon flashing arrow pointing to my left. There was even a big ‘PONY’ written on it in bright yellow.
It distantly occurred to me that I was getting way too used to his way of shaping reality to his whim.
‘I can guarantee you that there are ponies this way.’
Without a word, I turned fifty degrees right of that and started walking.
That got Discord blinking. He even floated right up to my side, as I stubbornly refused to think of anything but the feeling of my hooves on the grass.
‘Hey!’ He protested. ‘What gives?! Giant sign post don’t just come out of nowhere, you know.’
…Normally.
Oh look, a cricket. Better be careful not to step on it, I didn’t have shoes after all.
A brief bout of hilarity visited me when Discord affected being dumbfounded, but I squashed it mercilessly. No getting distracted from being distracted!
‘Feel the grass under your hooves. Think about how it brushes off under them, how it tickles just a little.’ My face crunched up in concentration. It was probably funny looking to anypony that would have assisted to the scene. ‘Practice your other senses, you have barely done any of that before. Now’s the time to do it…’
…Well, this did not come to me easily. I got that my senses were different, but the “how” still eluded me. Some were overpowering while others… not so much.
I was so focused though, that I jumped and neighed in fright when the lightning first stroke.
Crouched abnormally low, I shot glances around instinctively, panting madly, before my brain caught up with me. Immediately, my eyes went down to my mouth, while I was left wondering where the heck that whinny had come from.
Of course, Discord was laughing his draconequus’ butt off at me in the meanwhile. ‘You should see the look on your face!’
Alright, lesson learned. Ignoring him for too long would mean bad surprises along the line. All a fine matter of balance.
“Haha.” I forced out a mostly sarcastic laugh. “Really funny.” I rolled my eyes and started going on my way again.
‘Why are you always so serious?’ Discord stared at me intensively, holding his chin in his paw, like he was… analyzing me.
That idea was disturbing.
“Because… if I’m never serious, I’ll never get anywhere in life?” It was embarrassing how hard it had been to answer him.
The fact that he grinned made me shiver.
‘Is that so?’ He asked, slowly closing in on me, his tail swirling around to cut off any way of retreat.
“Y-yes…” I replied quietly, gulping down and trying not to show too much fear.
I blinked.
Just like that, he was gone. Disappeared, in a cartoony puff of pink smoke.
My brain failed to catch up with my mouth. “W-whut?”
Confused, I looked around, but he was nowhere to be seen. How quite like the mad god to act this randomly.
Another shake of my head and my ideas were clearer.
“Alright…” I muttered. “First, getting to civilization as quickly as possible. Second… I’ll see when I get to that. Maybe Ponyville? It’d be a brony crime not to go there if I get the chance to.”
Nodding, I trotted away, unflinching, even when drops of rain started falling on my muzzle. In itself, the sensation was much more mindboggling than the weather. Equestria couldn’t be all sunshine and rainbows all the time, right?
However, after a few minutes of ever intensifying rain, I realized why most domestic animals hate being splashed by water.
Wet fur that clings to every inch of your body is uncomfortable as hell.
“Sorry, Giantonio,” I whispered, remembering that time I had thrown him in my bathtub following his preceding visit of a mud hole.
I still hadn’t forgiven him for the subsequent bites and infections. Stupid fatass.
Just like that, I made my way through the field, under a powerful rain and the occasional thunderbolt, grumbling about my pet cat. What better way to spend my first day in Equestria?
I did not get to see Discord at all for the remainder of the day, something I was thankful for. It was in fact, downright boring, how I had simply walked until it was too dark to see anything in front of me. The downpour had not stopped at all, which had gotten more and more aggravating with each hour of nothing but that.
I also got my first taste of a meal in Equestria: free washed-up grass. It wasn’t as bad as I had feared, just a little too many fibers. I could easily see why horses and ponies needed flat teeth, darn.
There was still no pony or anything in sight, no light or campfires whatsoever. I was still all alone in that grassy field.
All alone…
I could still feel the grass on my coat and under my hooves. I could easily hear the sound of every droplets of water around me. I could not find a way to be comfortable with a wet coat.
There was not much else.
Slowly, the loneliness started to crawl in me, tugging at the wrong strings. The evening was getting colder.
With no other choice, I settled down, awkwardly trying to lie on the ground, avoiding landing in a puddle. It would not make a big difference, in the end.
I curled up, trying to get a bit of heat from my limbs. It did not work.
My eyes shut down on their own, as the fatigue started catching up with me. Sleep did not come easily however.
The rain endlessly kept battering on me.
I dreamed of my parents, of Christmas, ten years ago. My aunt and my cousin Johny had managed to make it for the first time in four years, so, of course, I was ecstatic, especially since I was worshipping the ground he was walking on at the time.
The fact that my cousin was a huge jerk that stole my candies and ignored me joyfully went right over my head. Heck, even the time when he went into my room and hid his dirty magazines there, only for my mom to find them at a later day… even that little stunt had not dulled his magnificence in my mind.
“Move away, squirt!” Johny pushed me away as a way of greeting, followed by me trailing him like a lost puppy.
God, I was so dense back then.
…
I just heard snickering and facepalms. Who the hell just did that?
“And here is your present!” My mom declared, making me jump in excitement.
“Thanks! You’re the best mommy ever!” I hugged her as hard as I could.
She smiled back and laughed, small tears of happiness shining in the corners of her eyes.
Cliché diabetes-inducing sweetness aside, it was the last Christmas I actually enjoyed.
My body felt warm, too warm for a stallion that had slept alone under the rain. The fog of sleep had not yet dissipated in my mind, but I felt… sticky, with some points on my body receiving a precise pressure.
I stirred up awake, kicking one leg to stretch as my mind focused more and more on this uncomfortable feeling. It wasn’t like badly dried fur, more like…
My eyes shot open with disgust and instantly darted off to my side.
“SLUGS!” I yelped in disgust, jumping to my hooves. Fighting the urge to barf, I trashed around, shaking my body wildly. “SLUGS! SLUGS! SLUGS! SLUGS! SLUGS!”
I threw myself on the ground, rolling on my back as if I was on fire, but more intensively, because slugs!
The contact of many of these disgusting invertebrates with my coat had me shivering and shuddering like crazy. There were no words!
Then, as I rolled like a madpony, some of them were crushed, in the most sickening ‘squish’ since the beginning of time, my sense of touch being a complete traitor by allowing me to feel it against my back, and I snapped.
I take back my previous assessment. For this, there are no words!
The experience had at least one small positive side-effect: there was no civilization anywhere near my current location. It would have been impossible for anypony not to hear my screams.
When I finally crushed the last slug under my hoof, I was an out of breath, disheveled, sickly, traumatized stallion. In a fit of rage however, I turned my anger toward the only reasonable perpetrator of this new and exotic torment.
“DISCORD! I AM GOING TO GET YOU FOR THIS!” I yelled at the empty air. “I AM GOING TO KICK THE EVERHATING CRAP OUT OF YOU!” His creepy laugher started to fill my ear. Oh heck no, he was not mocking me!
He was.
‘My goodness, boy, you make even the smallest things hilarious.’ The draconequus appeared, wiping a tear from his cheek, holding his sides.
My vision turned red. Blood thirst, rising!
“I’LL BUCK YOUR ASS SO HARD YOU WILL FEEL IT NEXT WEEK!” I ran toward him, passing right through his image and falling face first into the mud.
‘Tsk, tsk, tsk.’ He waved a claw at me. ‘I am not physically here, otherwise I wouldn’t both- no, wait, I would still bother with this.’ He snickered. ‘As for your anger, I don’t understand.’
“DON’T PLAY INNOCENT, DISCORD!”
‘The slugs?’ He asked, genuinely surprised, or being so good of a liar I couldn’t tell he was faking it. ‘You slept outside in an open field, in the rain. What did you expect?’
My left eye twitched. It was my only reaction.
‘As for that other statement of yours, I must refuse.’ He pouted. ‘Who says that without offering a drink first? Oh, the horrors!’ Discord then mock-fainted on a couch that materialized out of thin air.
As for me, I tried to process what he was saying and my brain only gave me this answer: SYSTEM ERROR. Rebooting did not work either.
“W-what?” I muttered dumbly.
‘You do remember what ‘buck’ is slang for in Equestrian, right?’ The draconequus hid his face behind a fuschia paper fan, wiggling his eyebrows and batting his eyelashes at me.
Ah, the connection was made and my brain was operational again.
…
I threw up.
All these attacks on my brain had multiplied my nausea by the critical factor, meaning I got to find out what color digested grass is.
It was green, for those that are curious.
Discord, meanwhile, looked taken aback.
‘My, that actually hurt.’ He flew a few meters in the sky, flexing his arms and rolling his muscles. ‘By all standards, I am plainly gorgeous. It’s a first, really. Not to mention the sheer strength of your reaction is just mean. Who does that?’
“Oh shut up…” I muttered miserably, taking deep breath to avoid being sick again.
There had to be something wrong with the Spirit of Chaos and Disharmony rolling his eyes at me and doing so rightfully. There had to be.
Weakly, I started walking in the same direction as yesterday, trying to ignore the nausea settling as a familiar but hated sensation. This time, it was sunny and it stayed the same. For the first fifteen minutes, according to him.
Never the same trick twice.
RIGHT!