“Mommy mommy! A pony!”
Well that didn’t last long…
A few feet away I watch as a small five year old girl is scooped up by a very worried looking parent, which I am very grateful for. The last thing I wanted was to be grabbed and petted by some over-excited brat.
{ You and me both…} Sunset mutters in the back of my mind. Seems she shared by dislike of children, or maybe she was worried by the fact that the girl was about the same size as us. Either way we both agreed. Kids bad. No touchy.
By this time most of the shoppers have recovered from their shock and returned to whatever they had been doing prior to my arrival. Mostly… Much to my annoyance I could see a couple pulling out phones and snapping photos while the mother of the child was struggling to calm her down.
{ Hurry up…} Right. We were here to get clothes, although I had a feeling we would be restricted to whatever was in the kids sections. Nothing else would fit. Giving a sigh I start making my way there, doing my best to ignore the stares and phones following me as I go.
I suppose I shouldn’t be too surprised. Despite having a population of 50k Grande Prairie had a bit of an ‘out of the way’ feel to it. Much of the population either worked for the oil field, the lumber mill, or one of the gas plants that were scattered a few kilometers out. While most of us didn’t know one another, news had a way of easily getting around. And as far as I knew I was the only pony in the city, maybe even the province itself. The whole pony thing had seemed like an American problem, most didn’t think it would ever migrate here.
“Any ideas on what to wear?” I mutter quietly as we start to pass the children clothing section.
{Ponies don’t tend to wear clothing. Usually it’s reserved for special occasions or formal events. Meaning I usually wore a dress of some sort when needed.} she replies. Well that wasn’t helpful. I certainly wasn’t about to start wearing a dress. My masculinity had taken enough hits…
{Please don’t buy childrens clothing. It’s embarrassing enough that we’re here.}
“Well what else can I wear? Nothing fits us.” I mutter in reply, pausing to look at a pink dress for a four year old and shuddering.
{Don’t worry about size. Get into a dressing room and I can resize it.} she replies. Well that was certainly convenient. Made me wonder what else she could do with magic.
{A lot. Do I need to remind you what I used to be?} she chimes in. It’s starting to bug me how she can apparently read some of my thoughts. I liked my privacy, and the thought of someone, a stranger, being able to know what I was thinking was rather unnerving. I could feel Sunset in my mind; a presence of sorts but I was unable to sense what she was thinking, not that I wanted to…
“A made up character?” I reply with a smirk, for which I am rewarded by a sharp pain in my head.
{That man was full of it. I am not a fictional character.} she replies angrily.
“Oww, fine fine. Just cut it with the migraine pains alright?” I grumble “And if you really are so talented why did you almost get us killed last… Er, Saturday night?” I ask, pulling a purple t-shirt off the rack to examine.
(What I told you about not being a fighter is part of the reason. There’s also the fact that I haven’t used magic in a couple years. So it’s a mix of me not being used to using magic as well as I can, and my body doing the same.} The explanation made sense. The same can be said for athletes who go months without training. They can’t just expect to return to their respective sport and expect to perform as well. They needed to retrain, strengthen their muscles, restore that endurance.
{Exactly. Thankfully it doesn’t take as long to get back to peak condition with magic. In a couple days I think I could probably win if we were in that situation again. It certainly didn’t help that I knew nothing of the area.} she grumbles. I was inclined to agree with her; a pack of wolves, cornered, darkness, being tired and unused to magic? The cards had been stacked against us.
Sighing a drape the t-shirt over my back and move on, avoiding anything overly ‘girly’ as I grabbed a pair of khakis. I knew my dad wasn’t going to be happy until I was completely covered.
“U-Uh, hello?” frowning I place the pants with the shirt and look over to who had spoken. I’m greeted with the sight of a nervous looking man clutching a somewhat expensive looking digital camera and a pad of paper. If I had to make a guess I’d say he was a reporter.
“Um. My names Scott Grisson for the Herald… I was wondering if I could ask you a couple questions.” He asks, confirming my earlier thought that he was a reporter; and for the local paper. I never read it. Grande Prairie usually had little news that I couldn’t just digest over the radio. I was rather surprised that they had been able to scramble a reporter over here so fast. Someone had probably called their office from the hospital and then from here. Then again there was a good chance I was wrong. I didn’t know anything about how newspapers worked.
“What for?” I ask, already knowing why. Turning around, I continue perusing the pants selection, in case something better than these khakis popped up.
“Well… Uh. You. You’re the first pony to appear in the city… Our readers would like to know what you’re going through…” he asks. “Do you mind if I record this?” he then adds causing me to look over to him again. Did I want to do this? The Herald Tribune was a small time newspaper, they had no mandate and probably wouldn’t try to misconstrue or warp whatever I say into something else.
“Fine, what do you want to know?” I reply, giving him my full attention. “And I don’t got all day, my dad’s waiting for me.”
{I don’t see the point of this,} Sunset mutters in my thoughts.
{Hes’ going to write an article about us anyway, so we might as well make sure he gets his information right. Besides, wouldn’t you want to make a good impression?}
{I guess.}
“Right. Parents. Well first, what’s your name? And how old are you?”he asks, pulling out a tape recorder and turning it on.
“Twenty one. My name is Jean Claude Veilleux, but you can just call me John.” I reply calmly, watching as he scribbles the information down. “Mind following me around, just to speed this up?” I ask turning around and heading towards a couple jackets that had caught Sunsets attention. For now I was going to defer to her suggestions. She knew what looked good on her body. Well, mostly. Those boots she had been wearing looked horrible. And uncomfortable.
“John… And sure. We don’t want to keep your dad waiting,” he says, still scribbling some things down, the tape recorder resting on the clipboard.
“And no, I don’t live with my parents. He’s just helping me get home,” I add. I don’t know why I said that. I couldn’t care less what others thought of me, or weather I live with my parents.
“Oh. Ok.” He mutters, seemingly put off by my comment “So… John, when did this all happen?”
I sigh and look over to him, considering what to say. “I was driving home on Saturday morning after work. When I woke up I found myself by the Smoky river. Thankfully some hunters noticed my lightshow that night and brought me home,” I explain, deciding to omit the whole Discord thing, and the ‘The Grey’ moment I had with the wolves. I make a horrible Liam Neeson. “Ask the cops. They wrote up a whole report about what happened.” I could already see he wanted to ask more but it would have taken way too much time.
“I… See… Well alright, another question then. Are you a Brony? And if so, do you know what pony you’ve become?” Somehow I feel I should have expected that question. And will probably get many more like it in the days to come.
{That one will do,} Sunset chimes in as I pull a jacket off the hangar and add it to the clothing pile on my back.
“No… I watched an episode once, and now plan to watch the rest when I get home, but I never was a brony,” I tell him as I head towards the changing room. “As for who she is… I’m a unicorn called Sunset Shimmer. As for how I know… She’s in my head,”
“In your… Well you’re not the first person to say that. But not a Brony? That’s new.” He says, scribbling down some notes furiously.
“Excuse me” I quickly say and duck into the change room with the clothes.
{Alright, do whatever it is you need to do} I think, no point in freaking out the reporter more by talking to myself. After a few moments I feel my control shift away and after a moment of pain am once again riding passenger.
Now in control Sunset stares at herself in the mirror for a few moments with alook of distaste before wiping some grime off her face with a hoof
{I need a shower, or maybe a bath. Do you have a bathtub at home John?} she asks, floating the different clothes off her back and looking them over one by one, and pulling the tags off.
{Just a shower,} I reply quietly, most of my focus right now is on feeling what is happening with the magic. {What exactly are you doing anyway?} I ask, causing her to hiss in irritation as I break her concentration.
{I’m trying to use a spell I learned many years ago. It resizes the clothes but its only temporary, lasting a couple hours before I’ll have to recast it. Most unicorns prefer to get a tailor instead since their work is, well, permanent,} She replies, channeling a bit more magic into the jacket. { But for now I think this would be an excellent way to exercise my magic as it’s not too intensive,} she adds but I don’t really pay attention as the jackets form starts to warp and shrink until it appears to be wearable.
{Nice…} I mutter and feel her smirk at my comment. A moment later she floats the t-shirt over and starts the process all over again. Once we get to the pants (Which she punched a hole in the back for the tail) I have the spell sort of memorized. Hopefully once I get back control I won’t need to keep switching just to maintain it…
{There. Now then…} Once again I’m treated to the weird feeling of being a passenger as Sunset starts to dress.
{Wow… Much better…} I mutter as she turns around to look in the mirror. Without realizing it I’d managed to reconstruct her attire from the dreamscape (Sunset was probably behind it all; she had been sort of guiding me in my selection). Without the boots and skirt I have to say it transferred over to her pony form rather well, although I think I could do without the pants. They chafed and it had been a pain getting the tail to fit correctly. Maybe a skirt wouldn’t have been too bad…
{Yep. Let’s get out of here.} she replies and a moment later I’m surprised as the world around us warps and we’re standing in the parking lot. A couple shoppers exiting the building were standing there in shock, one old lady dropping her bags. This wasn’t part of the plan!
{Wait, are you planning to steal these?!?} I asks in anger. The truck is sitting a short distance away and Sunset is already making her way there.
“Why not?” she asks without any trace of sarcasm in her voice.
{Why not?!? Because we’ll get in trouble! That reporter is still waiting for us, and he’s not the only one to see us go in. I can afford the clothes Sunset. But I can’t afford to go to jail!} I reply. Seriously? She couldn’t see how teleporting out of a store with clothes you didn’t pay for might be a problem?
“Yeah, right. If this world is anything like the other human one I was in, they wouldn’t be able to imprison me..” She mutters but stops walking.
{Sunset, please don’t do this… That reporter can really mess thing up for not only us, but ponies in general if word gets out that you’re using magic to steal.}
“Fine. Just trying to save us a bit of money, but if you insist.” Once again the world warps around us and we’re sitting in the dressing room again.
“Thanks Su- Huh,” I mutter as once again I’m in control. Looking around I grab the tags and step out of the room to a surprised looking Scott.
“Is everything ok? I saw a flash and… And… How did you get those clothes to fit you?” he asks, rather surprised.
“Magic. Sorry about making you wait. Is there anything else you wanted to ask?” I reply calmly. Because apparently being able to use magic is something I’m just accustomed to now. What’s happening to me? Glancing over I take stock of the items floating around me. A bag with my wallet inside, the tags for my clothes… I can only imagine it was looked much crazier earlier when I was looking for clothes.
“Right… Well actually, yes I do. What kind of magic are you capable of then?” he asks, following me as I head towards the cashiers.
“ Right now? Just telekinesis; Sunset was the one to casts the spell in there.”
“So Sunset is capable of taking control?” he asks.
{I’m not talking to him} the mare mutters.
“Kinda? She can help me cast magic,” I reply, complying with Sunsets wish. I didn’t want to give her control again. It hurt! Besides, I wanted to make a good impression, something I doubt Sunset cared much for.
“Alright. Just one more question then,” he says as we arrive at the cashier. Once again I ignore the stares from the other customers, and the slightly angry stare of the cashier as I place the price tags on the counter. “Overall, how do you feel about everything that’s happened?”
How did I feel?
“Confused, frightened, angry…” I mutter, quietly “Why me? Also, can I ever get back to normal? What’s going to happen to me if I can’t?” Once again I start to think about just how messed up this whole situation was and sigh. Maybe one day, when this is all behind me I might laugh, but for now I feel like I’m drowning in worry and stress.
“Well… If it makes you feel any better you’re not alone… Maybe you should go to New York, I understand many of those affected are heading there in search of answers,” he replies. Honestly it seems like that’s going to happen. There was little reason not to. I was probably unemployed but I had more than enough enough money for the trip. No one would really notice me missing…
Giving a small nod I pass the cashier my debit card and take the tags back along with a receipt “Thanks…” Looking over to the reporter I give a shrug “I probably will. Sounds like New York is the place to be.”
He give me a nod and looks over to the exit “The article should be published tomorrow, and probably front page as well. It’s been a slow news day,” he says with a small shrug before bringing the camera up. “You mind?”
With a sigh I put on my best face, smiling for the camera as he snaps the photo. “Thanks. It was nice meeting you John. Good luck.” And with that he’s gone. Heading out the front entrance.
{So now what?} Sunset asks and I look over at the McDonalds near the doors, reminding me of how little I’ve eaten over the last couple days.
“Food. Then home.”