//------------------------------//
// Chapter 1: Lyra 
// Story: The Exchange Program 
// by Sozmioi 
//------------------------------//

"Yo, Rachel."

I looked up from my book. Rhiannon was in her bathrobe, her long curly hair frizzed out every which way. It's so bad she looks like a stereotypical witch. Normally she doesn't pull that off.

"If I didn't want to do any housework other than clean up after myself for, like, two months, how much would that cost me?"

"I dunno. Look in the yellow pages."

"I mean, without bringing in anyone from the outside. Just you."

So it's one of those nights. "Why? Can you make your point without basing it off of a mistake I made in a wild estimate?"

She blinked at me. "No, seriously. How much to hire you to take care of the apartment for two months? Shopping, cooking, dishwashing, cleaning the common areas. Laundry."

I rolled my eyes and visualized giving up piles of money and having to do the work. When I found myself torn between the two options, I gave my answer. "Seven fifty each month, and I'm not doing your intimates."

"Twenty-five a day? Well... all right."

And with that, she handed me a fat stack of twenties. Counting, I said, "What's this?"

"What we just agreed on, plus my half of rent for the next two months, obviously."

Rhiannon turned to go to her room as I finished counting. "I mean, what's going on? Did you get a ton more hours or something?"

"No, I quit. I've got something lined up for two months from now, don't worry."

At 'quit' I was up off of that broken couch and on my feet like I'd been spring-launched. She'd stopped short, so I had to back up to avoid talking straight into her sternum. "What are you doing, then?"

She smiled. It was uncanny. She was not a very smiley person. She could pull off a lip twitch at a joke, or relax her face when content, or when puckish, pull off a smirk. But a simple broad smile was not something I'd seen from her. This wasn't one of those either, but it... well, it was a two-sided smirk, without the eyebrows coming down. That's more like a normal smile, right?

She said, "Studying. Now, could I have some quiet for a while? Oh yeah, how much for you to keep it down when I'm studying?" She seemed not to think the question needed to be answered, and she headed into her room and shut the door.

And with that, I went to the kitchen to start on dinner for two. She didn't normally throw money around, and certainly didn't normally try anything like this. Something was up.

Shankar called, and we chatted and organized a movie date as I stirred the parsley celery marinara sauce. But I chatted quietly - my roomie had just handed me just over two thousand dollars, and I wasn't inclined to make her regret it.

When we were done, I poked my head in her room. She had done her room up magic-style again: a big pentacle inscribed in a circle drawn on the floor, with various bric-a-brac at the corners.

"Umm, that job you set up for two months from now... you're not... relying on magic to get it, are you?"

She paused pouring sea salt along one of the edges and looked up. "No. Just, applied for a job to start then, and got it."

This is going to be an interesting two months, whatever she does. I backed out and got back to reading.

After half an hour, she came out to eat; she was very distracted, I didn't ask her what she was doing, just continued reading. Partway through, she said, "Would you tell Joanne at the soup kitchen I'm going to be out for the next two months? This came up since my last time there." I nodded.

She finished her supper, nodded in thanks, then returned to her room and remained there.

When she began chanting, I didn't feel like listening, so I slipped out of the apartment and stood at the corner. If she keeps chanting, I'm handing the money back.

But I gave her this one time.

After an hour and a half, it got dark enough that it was awkward to read. I'd let that go longer than I'd intended. Hoping she was done chanting, I headed back in.

One thing I really didn't expect to hear was muffled crying. She hurt herself somehow? Doesn't sound like that kind of crying, though.

But I knocked on her door and said, "You okay?" I noticed there was a note taped to it, but it didn't say 'keep out' in big letters, so I figured I could read it after.

The crying subsided. "HELP!"

I opened the door and hit the light, and there she was, lying in the middle of her pentacle. Stark naked. Back arched, legs and arms spread to the points. The way she was elevating her body while partially supporting herself on the backs of her wrists, her toes, and her arched-back head? Well, that looked incredibly uncomfortable. I was impressed that she could even hold the position. "Geez, Rhiannon, give me some warning. Umm, what's the problem?"

"I can't move."

"Did you, like, drug yourself?" That wouldn't exactly be a first, but it would be unexpected - Rhiannon had tried a large number of things one time each, but never alone, and never in conjunction with her... religious activities.

"No? So, this... isn't normal? Not what you meant to do?"

What. "No. It is not, and I did not."

"Good!"

I came alongside her to help her up. In the process, I disturbed one of the lines, and she collapsed flat to the ground.

Now, the timing of that was kind of odd. I noticed my disturbing the line as I did it, and that that was the moment she fell... and she couldn't have seen it because she had been facing away. How did she do that? Must have heard it.

She rolled over onto hands and knees, turned around, and looked at me. I felt kind of awkward with us both on hands and knees. Especially with her tear-streaked forehead.

She blinked, raised one fist as if to shake hands with it, and said, "Hello, and thanks for freeing me. My name is Lyra. I'm here for the exchange program."

I sighed, closed my eyes and counted to three. Reopening them, I looked pointedly past my roommate's nakedness and said, "Rhiannon, I'm about five seconds from handing you back your two grand."

She turned to take a glance behind herself - and in the process, knocked over the crystal bottle of oil. Rhiannon's prized violet-glass bottle that she got from a Nepali mystic on the vernal equinox. She'd just turned and kicked the thing over by accident. And not really reacted.

I dove for it so at least the oil wouldn't stink up the apartment. The bottle wasn't damaged - not noticeably, anyway.

"Oh, I'm sorry! At least it didn't spill much?"

And right there, the notion that this was Rhiannon suddenly became preposterous, though not as much as magic working. Only a few drops had fallen out. I wiped it up with my finger and scraped it back into the bottle (her lack of aghast reaction at my spoiling the bottle reinforced my judgement that something was seriously up with her). Deciding to play along for a minute, I said, "This bottle belongs to Rhiannon. She is rather fond of it. Do you know who she is?"

Lyra pursed her lips. "No, but I'd guess I'm in her body. Are you my teacher?"

"No." An idea occurred to me: see if I could get her to crack. What's a good name? Once I'd pulled myself back up onto my knees, I said, "I'm Julie."

Lyra showed no sign of knowing that my name is Rachel as she smiled calmly and once again offered her fist as if to shake hands. When I offered my hand open-palm, she slowly opened hers. We shook. "Nice to meet you, Julie. Do you know where my teacher is?"

"Teacher? Well, I guess that would be Gwyneth. Rhiannon was mainly self-taught, though."

Then it occurred to me that there had been a note on the door. I stood up and was about to go find the note when Lyra gasped. "What? Wow!"

I looked down to her. "What?"

"You're tall!"

No one had ever accused me of that before. I laughed it off, reached over and ripped the letter from the door.

"Let's see what you had to say to me... 'R, I'm off to study with someone in a different dimension. Someone will be possessing my body. Before you free him or her from the circle, please do some basic checks to see if he or she is dangerous.'"

I looked over to Lyra, who was staring at her hands and moving the fingers one at a time. "I have so many toes!" she murmured.

Back to the page, I only skimmed the precautions, since I'd mooted them by freeing her - and she seemed harmless anyway. 'I will be back in two months. In the mean time, would you please direct the student to Gwyneth, or other teachers as appropriate. Since I sprung this on you, please have another $500.' No cash was attached, but I figured that I could search for it later.

For $500, I'd definitely 'play along', though at this point I was losing confidence that this wasn't legit. "So... Leia, was it?" No, that's not it. What was it?

I looked in to her - she was now trying to stand up, steadying herself with both hands on the side of her desk - but her back legs... er, her legs... were too far away from the desk. She was sort of half way between standing and a pushup. I asked, "Lyra?" Right, that was it.

She looked to me, clearly terrified. "I'm... stuck."

"Step forward. Get your feet under you."

She tentatively did as she was told, and soon she could have stood up. But she remained bent over, hands white-knuckle gripping the edge of the desk. Then with a lick of the lips she took one of those hands off, reached up, and put it on the wall. She released the other hand, and slowly straightened.

"Congratulations. You stood up."

"I'm really tall."

I heard a knock at the door. I snatched up Rhiannon's bathrobe and tossed it to her. It caught on her shoulder; I slipped out and closed her bedroom door before letting him in.

"Shankar! You're early."

He glanced to the clock. "Not much."

Thumps and bumps came from Rhiannon's room.

He went on, "So... we heading out for that movie?"

"Umm." I need time to think! "Rhiannon's either high as a kite while in some ways stone cold sober, messing with me much better than I think she can, or she temporarily switched minds with an alien named Lyra."

At that, Lyra opened the door to her bedroom. She was sort of half-standing, leaning against the wall with the front of her body rather than the side of her shoulder. She had managed to get her bathrobe on her arms properly, but was holding it closed rather than using the velcro spot. "Hello." she said.

I quickly interposed myself between them in case her holding it closed was incidental, and looked rapidly back and forth. "You can see what I mean?"

Shankar coughed. "You call that sober?"

I helped Lyra the rest of the way up, saying "Now, Lyra, it's much easier and better for you to stand straight. And these patches here hold the robe shut." I did up the velcro. "Anyway, whatever it is, I don't think we can leave her here alone."

And with that, she overbalanced and nearly fell backwards. I caught on to her arm, keeping her from toppling, but then her feet slipped and I ended up merely slowing her descent. Shankar whipped around and caught her other arm, and pulled her back to her feet.

Lyra, embarrassed, said, "Maybe I should sit down?"

We helped her over to the sofa. She put her right hand and leg on it, and we let go. She proceeded to lower herself onto it belly first, elbows in. She spent a little while trying to figure out what to do with her knees, as Shankar and I stared.

"Just what kind of creature are you?", I asked.

"A pony." She shifted her legs again.

"A pony." Well, that explains the reluctance to stand on two feet.

"I had expected to find, well, a school. That was what the exchange offer said."

I grimaced. "I don't know whether she was lying or didn't know what she was doing. Anyway, there's no school. There is someone you might learn from, and there are a number of books. I would have said they're worthless, but they were apparently good enough to get you here. And of course there's, well, our world. Exchange programs are supposed to broaden your horizons, right? Plenty of other things to learn."

Lyra brightened. "Right! So, Julie, I heard that you have movies here?"

Shankar, who'd been looking at me in confusion, finally could not contain himself. "Julie?"

I blinked, totally having forgotten my ruse with the name until having it shoved in my face. "Umm, oh right. When I said I was Julie, I was testing if you're Rhiannon. She would have been confused at my calling myself Julie, since I'm not."

Lyra gaped, then fumed. "Lying to me..." Meanwhile, Shankar's frown peaked and he said, "You're taking her seriously."

"Neither of you has seen what I've seen. Please, understand I'm in an awkward situation here."

Lyra accepted that and asked, "So, what is your name?"

Shankar had been about to make some objection, but he paused, turned to her, and stared with his mouth hanging open. This time, her tone had been totally unlike anything we'd ever heard from Rhiannon - simple, sweet.

"See what I mean?" I asked him. Then, to Lyra, I said, "I'm Rachel Anne Batson."

She repeated this. Then she looked up to Shankar and added, "And you, I gather, are Shankar?"

He nodded. "Shankar Malakar. I don't think you ever heard my last name anyway."

Lyra added, "And I'm Lyra Heartstrings. I'm a student in Princess Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns."

Neither of us knew what to do with that. To me, he asked, "Is Rhiannon into LARP with Liz and Zoë? I forget."

"No. Nor is she in Ben's improv group. Lyra, I'm sorry, but we're having some difficulties believing that magic exists. You say you're a unicorn?"

Shankar interjected, "The main alternative being that you're an alternate personality of Rhiannon."

Lyra cocked an eye. "But I am, right? I'm a visiting personality."

I joked, "Let's not have her committed just yet, please?" I remembered the physical evidence of her falling strangely upon my breaking the circle. I definitely don't want things to leave my control. If Lyra is real, the last thing anyone needs is for her to go into treatment for multiple personality disorder or whatever it's called. And if that's what it is... She seems harmless so far, more so than the 'base' personality. Yes, I really thought that. Well, I suppose it's true - Rhiannon is a net good, but she is definitely not harmless.

Shankar fumed. "So, if we can't leave her, what?"

"I don't think a movie would make the most sense right now. Maybe walk down to O'Malley's? They have live entertainment on friday nights."

Shankar gave in. He turned to Lyra. "Sound good?"

She shrugged, and slipped off the sofa and struggled to her feet. We helped her upright, and I took her to her room. "So, we'll need to get you properly dressed to go outside."

Lyra wobbled a little on her feet for no clear reason, then steadied. "Why don't you pick my clothing? Seems safest."

"Yes. Yes, it does." I shuffled through the closet and grabbed a loose-fitting dress with no strings to tie or buttons to fasten. "I don't know where Rhiannon keeps her intimates... let's see..." I pulled drawers open. "Got 'em. These go here, these go here." I gestured to the appropriate body parts, then thought better and pulled out a bra. "Let me help you with this one. It's not trivial."

She held steady for that, watching with interest. Once she had that on, I left her to handle the rest. Shankar was waiting patiently in the other room, a bemused smile on his face.

He asked, "So, what was it that you saw that I didn't?"

"When I found her, she was sort of floating in air. Her hands and feet were touching the ground, but not hard enough to support her. It would have had to be one heck of a stage magic trick, considering I couldn't find any equipment."

"So she was crouching on the ground but not... hard?"

"No, she was on her back, legs and arms out, with one toe touching the ground on each foot?" That was only a slight exaggeration. I had also left out the way her head was touching the ground.

"So you're saying Rhiannon is actually a legit witch."

"Maybe. What she was doing could have just gotten the attention of the unicorns and they did it all."

"Yes, that is clearly a much more sensible explanation." If your sarcasm detector didn't go off there, take it back to the dealer.

"L. O. L." I said facetiously. "If you think this is Rhiannon... she disrespected her own sacred bric-a-brac. She... oh, right. She told me in advance that she'd be going to study, and she gave me over two thousand dollars to cover expenses while she was gone."

That got his attention. "Gave. As in, it's yours."

"Yup. Cash up front. In fact, why don't we swing by the bank on the way to O'Malley's?"

"If she's faking, that ought to draw her out. Could I by chance take a look at those bills?"

I pulled them out. The notion that they could be counterfeit hadn't occurred to me, but he soon handed them back, saying, "Look legit to me."

I knocked on Lyra's door. "Everything okay in there?"

"Yeah, just brushing my hair a little... all done!" She did her wall-hugging walk out the door; everything appeared to be in order, because I wasn't looking closely enough.

I was thinking of how she'd get down the stairs. Looking back to her, I realized this challenge was to be deferred, since she had not put on her sandals. "Feet too - we don't have hooves. Try the flip-flops. They're easy to put on." I tossed them her way.

She braced herself against her door frame with two hands and tentatively put one on. In a moment she recoiled, pulling her foot back out; she bent her other knee and bobbed back up from the involuntary dip. "Gah!" She stood there, shivering. "It goes between my toes!"

She took a deep breath and tried again. This time she kept the flip-flop on, though she drew in a few sharp breaths as she had to fight down panic reactions. Then she tried the other foot. This was easier. She stood up straight, and tried to let go of the wall. Success. She took a step out into the middle of the room. So far, so good. Another step. Wobble, recover. Step, then she rushed to the wall near the door to the stairs, almost toppling on the way, and clung to the frame.

Shankar said, "I give it an eight."

Irked, I asked, "What, as faking or as first attempt at unaided bipedality?"

"Either way."

The stairs, it turned out, were not particularly more difficult than anything else - she simply used the hand-rail and looked at her feet and it all worked out. She was faster going down than my grandmother.

At the bottom, she held up her free hand and commented, "You know, these forefeet are pretty amazing."

"Hands. We have two feet and two hands."

"Whatever they're called, I bet Earth ponies would love to have them."

Figuring she meant ponies that live on Earth, I replied, "Oh I bet they would."

Shankar said, "Would you like to meet some? We can stop by the stables on the way to the bank."

I took Lyra's arm and we set out, ambling slowly in a direction I did not often go.

Of course, the first car that drove by got Lyra's full attention. She looked to it, to us, to the parked cars on the street, then back to it, and tracked it as it moved. But she didn't panic. As it came closer, she gestured to a parked car and asked, "What are these called?"

"Cars. Automobiles. The big ones are trucks, or buses. We can show you more later."

She stared as another car passed, then stopped specially watching them.

As we crossed the street, she asked, "Why didn't you stop?"

"Huh? Oh, that sign is only for the cars. And bicycles, I guess."

She nodded. She stared at some things but not others. She seemed perfectly at home with trees and houses and even apartment buildings, but the television we saw through a window arrested her. As a lawn-mower started up, she gripped my hand and looked to me for my reaction to it, but made no other visible reaction.

When we reached the stable, Shankar hopped the gate, undid the latch, and let us in. Lyra frowned at the obviously lower-grade building. When we came to the open side-door, her eyes went wide open at the horses in their stalls. "What... what... this is horrible!"

She rushed in as far as she could, reaching from door-frame to stall to steady herself. "Hello everypony! Is... if... Everything's going to be all right. We'll get you out of here, won't we, Julie? I mean, Rachel?" She looked back to me pleadingly.

I wasn't ready for this - I hadn't really been thinking about it - so I was simply agape. Shankar bit his lip, taking her seriously for once, but similarly remained silent.

Lyra turned one way and then the other, getting a closer look at each of the horses. She came down from her panic. "You... you don't understand anything I'm saying, do you?" Then, to us, "They're not people. This is creepy." After a few more seconds, she headed for the door as best she could. "Let's get out of here."

I took her arm and we hurried out more directly. She clung to me and did not speak. I couldn't see her face. I wouldn't have known what to say anyway, but it might have helped.

At the bank, though, she seemed a bit better. The notion of an ATM was very interesting to her, and Shankar explained as I deposited almost all of the cash. I unproductively mulled over what I might do with Lyra on the medium term while Shankar explained the notion of electronics.

O'Malley's was full and noisy, as one would expect on a friday. As I was pulling out my ID in response to the host's request, Lyra asked, "ID?"

The host said, "Identification, like a driver's license?" - "Whatever for?" - "So we can see if you're over eighteen."

And just as I was saying, "We'll be dry tonight", she said, "I'm thirteen."

Shankar and I looked to each other in alarm. What did I get myself into?

I amended, "I guess she's going to be dry for the next five years."