6. Wilderness Survival. Too Bad I Was Never in Boyscouts.
Imagine Carrot Top spinning around on the ground on her side, screeching like there was no tomorrow. That was me right now, after the realization sunk in that the mind-meld was complete, and that Carrot Top and I were one in the same. I was trying- and failing, to spit out the most vulgar swears I could as I twisted like a madpony in the dirt.
So, any who, when this whole episode was over, I had to shake out dirt from my mane and coat. I gulped and sat down, plopping my orange butt onto the ground.
“This just sucks,” I said. “I don’t even know if I can talk to Carrot Top anymore! She was at least a secondary form of company that I could always talk to!”
“Well, if you’re the same,” Gertrude started. “Then would you even need to talk to her? Everything she knew before the meld will be in your head, so you won’t need her anymore.”
“Oh,” said I, feeling pretty stupid for not realizing that, even though it was really obvious. “But still, she was company!”
“And we’re not enough?” Fine Line butted in, grimacing as he apparently tried to hold back tears from the pain of his broken horn. “You don’t seem like Carrot Top.”
“I don’t know,” I replied. “As soon I insult one of you or myself, then I’ll know. I already can’t curse like I could before, so that’s there… oh, God, bad thought, bad thought!”
“What? What is it?!” Gertrude yelled.
“If I am now Carrot Top, that means that I have always been a male, and a
female! GAGHFAOPIBGF!”
Yes, if you had decided to spell out the sound that I had just made, it would have looked like that. Creepy, huh? Back to the matter at hoof, which was my now conflicting gender, and I was turning it into a terrible drama. It must be
the now feminine side of my mind overreacting to the situation.
“If you were always a male, what about now?” Fine Line asked, struggling not to laugh. “You’re a mare now, so you can’t always have been a male.”
“Shut the BUCK UP!” I yelled, my head automatically censoring the word I had intended to use with the equine equivalent… or at least the Equestrian equine equivalent.
“Leave it, dude,” Gertrude said. “It doesn’t matter that much and you know it, so stop being Rarity and shut up.”
This calmed me down… to a point. I was still reeling in mental shock from all of what had happened, and my head still hurt, too; I forgot about that. I was forgetting a lot of things.
"So," Gertrude said, changing the topic of conversation. "What are we going to do now that we're stuck in the middle of nowhere?"
I looked around. We were stranded in an open field near the road.
"Uh..." I said, thinking. "We can't go anywhere with him injured!"
I pointed a hoof at Fine Line, who was sitting and watching.
"I'm not just 'him!'" he yelled in outrage. "I have a name! Preferably Fine Line."
"What else are we going to do?" Gertrude asked.
I smiled as both Carrot Top and I apparently had the same direction.
"Hitchhike!" I said, raising my hoof dramatically.
"Oh, Jesus," Gertrude muttered as Fine Line started to laugh. "You men are idiots."
***
We stood by the road, hooves raised in what may have been considered to be Nazi propaganda. Luckily, Fine Line started laughing and told us what we looked like. We stopped.
"This is pointless!" Gertrude said. "A single car hasn't passed by in forever! Let's just go and try to find another way!"
I sighed and nodded.
"Fine," I said.
"What?" Fine Line asked.
"No, I was talking to Gertrude," I replied.
"Oh."
We all gathered what stuff we had that survived the crash, which was most of our things, and we began to walk off into the field.
"How did our stuff make it through the crash?" Fine Line asked.
"Just be glad it did!" Gertrude said. "We may need it."
And it turned out that we did, when five hours later, we were still walking through a field, sweating and trying to continue our journey.
"Let's stop!" Fine Line said for the millionth time.
"We must keep going!" Gertrude yelled breathily. "We must find a town!"
I just watched them bicker on as I breathed deeply and tried to focus on walking. Soon, I just fell to the ground.
"I think we should stop!" I yelled. "I really don't believe we can go further!"
The others just plopped down. Gertrude pulled out bottles of water and tossed them at Fine Line and me. I grabbed it in my mouth and suddenly reached a dilemma.
"Uh... how will I open this and drink from it?" I asked.
Gertrude paused and thought. She shrugged.
"I don't know," she admitted. "I would ask Fine Line, but he, you know..."
We were trapped in a terrible dilemma, one that was urgent and required our immediate attention. If we did not get water, we would die of thirst or heat or something.
"This sucks!" Fine Line yelled as he tore at the bottle's cap with his hoof, grunting in frustration. "Why are bottles not made for pony use?! And Gertrude, why'd you bring these if you're a pony?!"
"I'm sorry," she said with a huff. "It was all I could find in the house!"
Fine Line gnawed at the top and was rewarded with a snap. He laughed triumphantly.
"Ha! I broke it!"
And so he did. He had torn the cap right off the bottle, which he tipped back into his mouth.
"C'mon, you guys!" he said after a long swig.
I wrestled with mine and was gratified the same way, with a cracking and a few pops. I chugged half the bottle and smiled. Gertrude did the same, and soon we were all laughing and sighing in relief as our thirst was quenched.
"Whew!" I said, dropping onto my back. "That was good."
"Hell, yeah!" Fine Line replied.
"Now, what-" Gertrude began.
ROAR!
We all snapped into attention and looked around. Soon, we all focused on the single, solitary red object approaching us. My eyes widened as it grew closer, the roar getting louder.
"Okay," I said. "That is just stupid."
The object was a red pickup truck, barreling forward at breakneck speed, heading right for them.
"Jump!" Gertrude yelled, voicing what were about to do anyways (thanks Captain Obvious).
We jumped, and the truck ran through where we once were, and right over our supplies... including my electronics. The vehicle slid to a stop twenty feet later, and a man wearing camo overalls stepped out.
"Whoa!" he said, staring at us. "There are ponies everywhere!"
I had a really bad feeling about the future.