//------------------------------//
// An Imaginary Emergency 
// Story: Only an Imaginary Friend 
// by i_am_the_jam 
//------------------------------//


√-1          √-1          √-1



An Imaginary Emergency


After the three pony tribes were fully integrated, thanks to the leadership of the Princesses over 1,000 years ago, all towns, cities, and settlements began to establish services and cater to all three tribes, and thusly, over time, no village, town, or city—except the pegasi cloud cities—could be said to be exclusively an earth pony, pegasus, or unicorn town, regardless of the majority of the population at any given time.
One of the first services to be fully integrated in all towns and cities and settlements were the medical facilities. In fact, one of the first laws that were passed by the Princesses at the start of their reign precisely required all townships to provide medical care to all ponies. All healers—as they were called back then—were to give treatment to all three pony types, regardless of the tribe of the healer. Later, as hostels and inns began to specialise in the care of the sick, they made sure that all three pony types could be tended to, and the healers of all three tribes eventually worked together and shared the medical knowledge accumulated exclusively by each tribe until then, thusly giving medical science an important boost. Then, when hostels became exclusively medical facilities: hospitals and clinics, medical science advanced even further, giving rise to the age of medical specialisation, again by all three pony types, for all three pony types.
The latest boost had been rather recent: Equestrian doctors—earth ponies, unicorns, and pegasi—were now able to treat gryphons, zebras, donkeys, cows, sheep, goats, and even cervine species up north.
Large cities, like Canterlot, Manehatten, or Vanhoover, now had specialised hospitals, with sections designed solely for the treatment of injuries or illnesses exclusive of earth ponies, unicorns, and pegasi.
Small towns like Ponyville, naturally, had one general hospital, but even then, it was able to treat all three pony types without any problems.
For instance, Ponyville General had a small ward designed specifically for unicorns.

And it was there where Twilight, Rarity, and Big Macintosh had taken Imaginary just now.

The three had burst in the emergency entrance, with Rarity still carrying Imaginary with her magic, and it had been Twilight who galloped to the receptionist’s desk and declared, “Quick! We have a unicorn with a blunt force trauma to the horn that resulted in a magical rebound and backlash!!! He needs a suppressor ring immediately!!”
Nurse Redheart was about to ask Twilight to calm down, but when she saw the dent on Imaginary’s horn, she visibly blanched, which wasn’t easy considering she had a white coat to begin with.
She pressed a button on her desk and spoke to an intercom, “Code 12-U, Code 12-U at Emergency, prepare a Suppressor. Code 12-U.” Then she ran around her desk and pulled up a stretcher, where Rarity finally laid him down, with a gasp of relief as she stopped her magic flow. At that moment, several unicorn orderlies burst through the ward’s doors, took one look at the groaning unicorn stallion, and rolled him inside the emergency ward.
“Miss Twilight, Miss Rarity,” Nurse Redheart already knew who the Knights of Harmony were, “are either of you his relative? He needs to be checked in.”
Rarity couldn’t answer; she was panting with slight magic exhaustion, so Twilight replied, “N—no, we’re not. His sister and brother-in-law will arrive shortly, and they’ll be able to check him in properly. We can only tell you what happened…”


√-1          √-1          √-1


As Twilight, Big Macintosh, and Rarity explained to the nurse the incident, Imaginary’s injury was treated and his magic was stabilised with a magic suppressor ring on his horn. Thirty minutes later, Pip Squeak and his parents arrived.
The unicorn mare had a chestnut coat with a black mane, and her cutie mark was the summation symbol: ∑
The earth pony stallion was a brown and white pinto, just like Pip, though almost the size of Big Macintosh. His whole head and chest were brown, and his mane, tail, and unshorn fetlocks flowed with a combination of both.



And his cutie mark was that of an oblique angle.
They were able to give Nurse Redheart all the necessary information to have Imaginary properly registered, and they would have stayed to talk with the others, but at that moment, the doctor, a tan unicorn with a brown mane and tail, came out.
“Family of Mr. Imaginary?” he asked, and the three newcomers stepped up. “His magical backlash has been stabilized, and his horn has been properly sedated and numbed. He’s still unconscious, but if you wish to see him, you can go in now.”
Thanking the doctor, the family trotted into the ward…


√-1          √-1          √-1


It was night time now, and it had been a while since Imaginary’s relatives finally left. Big Macintosh had also returned to Sweet Apple Acres, shortly before Bulk Biceps stopped by to see how his friend was doing, but once everything had been explained, he, too, eventually returned home, relieved that his friend would be okay.
However, Twilight and Rarity decided to stay for a while, because they were waiting for two other ponies to show up.

And show up they did, finally, at 8 pm.

The unicorn mares looked up when they saw two other mares enter the waiting room.

“Ah, good evening, my two friends,” Twilight began. “What brings you two to such a glum place like this hospital?”
“Uh…hi, Twilight,” said Rainbow Dash, with her ears down and her wings slightly open, but pointing down. “We were just—”
“Passing by?” asked Rarity, indignantly. Her mane and tail were slightly dishevelled, but for once in her life, she didn’t mind.

Or care.
She had more pressing things to discuss with her fellow Knights.

“Pinkie Pie, you and Rainbow weren’t just walking around town, looking to prank somepony, and then decided to prank somepony here in the hospital, were you?”
The pink mare also had her ears lowered, as well as her head. “Um…hi, Rarity. How…how is Im—”
“Immy?” asked Twilight. “Oh, you mean Mister Imaginary, the stallion who has specifically asked you to not to call him ‘Immy’. Well, considering that this is his second stay in this hospital, he’s doing quite well. It’s not as if the magical backlash sent him into a magical coma, or, at least, another week long nap due to magical exhaustion because he nearly spent his entire magic font in less than one second. We managed to avoid that by getting him here in the nick of time.”
“Oh…” Rainbow Dash shuffled her hoof on the tiles, “…so…he’s going to be okay?”
Rarity snorted very unladylike, and replied, “Now why would you ask that, Dame Dash? You and Dame Pie seem to enjoy pranking other ponies, regardless of the consequences. Tell me, you two, are you both continuously looking for ways to top your pranks? I mean…was not the sneezing powder enough? The painted apples? The disappearing ink? The lightning bolts right on top of Princess Luna? The constant insistence of calling her Nightmare Moon, despite the fact that all six of us were there when the Elements of Harmony wiped her clean of that dark power??”
“Hey, we were only trying to give him a new mane cut, just like when Apple Bloom did it to you, Twilight!! And nothing bad happened to you then, either!!” replied Pinkie Pie, somewhat indignant.
Slightly angrier now, the purple unicorn replied, “Oh, is that all?? Well, you do realise that this time, you didn’t use a steel ring, but a horseshoe, which weighs 1,516 percent more than Apple Bloom’s loop-de-hoop? Furthermore, Apple Bloom was careful to not throw it at my horn the moment I was casting a spell, but even then, I was worried when it managed to cause a few sparks!!!” Twilight started pacing in front of the guilty mares, and continued, “You know, Pinkie, I expected something like this from Rainbow Dash, being as careless as she is—”
“HEY!!!”
“—but from you?? I thought you were a pony who always considered the possible repercussions of the pranks you do! Have you any idea what you two did just now??”
“Yes!!” replied the pink mare. “That’s why we’re here!! We’re here to apologise to Immy, duh!! And Dashie was going to use her insurance to cover for Immy’s medical expenses, but since it was my idea to prank him with the horseshoe, I want it to be my insurance! It was MY fault, okay???”
Rarity rubbed her face for a moment, and hissed, “Pinkie, Twilight just mentioned repercussions. In case you don’t know what that means, it means that your prank caused a lot more trouble than just sending Imaginary to a hospital!” She stomped and glared at them, “For starters, I’ve never seen Pip Squeak cry so much and so loudly for his favourite uncle, whom he considers the ultimate stallion to emulate. In other words, the opinion he has about Imaginary is the same opinion Imaginary has about us!!! And now he saw, in front of his face, his uncle fall to the ground and wallow in the most horrible pain imaginable for a unicorn, and he was powerless to do anything about it! And despite Fluttershy’s help, that memory is going to stay with him for the rest of his life!”
Rainbow Dash and Pinkie Pie winced and backed off slightly.
Twilight stopped pacing and faced them again, “And that’s just Pip. His parents are now without a foalsitter for the time being. Imaginary had agreed to pick up Pip from school because both of his parents are still out working and shuffling their schedules until both can settle down properly. And now one of them is going to have to cut his or her working hours just to pick up Pip from school. And…did Imaginary ever tell you where he worked at?”
“N—no,” stuttered the blue mare.
“He works at the Magic Research Institute in Canterlot. He’s a pencil pusher, yes, but only when he’s actually there. The reason he lives so far away from everypony else is because often times the MRI assigns him magical experiments—mostly dealing with illusion and teleportation—and he needs a lot of open space to carry them out. And now the MRI is going to be without a very valuable employee for at least 48 hours. And that’s just so he can show up and present his findings. He won’t be able to wink to Canterlot to send his work, which means he’s going to have to rely on the normal pegasus parcel service, and you know how long they take!” She snorted, “Ugh…have you any idea of the damage that a magic backlash can do to a unicorn horn?? If he hadn’t released part of his magic charge by shooting Pip Squeak up in the air, the amount of magic that imploded in his horn would have caused him permanent horn damage, and even BRAIN damage!! You two came to say you’re sorry??? Well…” she sighed, “I’m afraid ‘sorry’ is not going to cut it this time.”
Rarity glared at the pranksters and continued, “It’s all fun and games for the both of you…until somepony gets hurt.”
“I’ll foalsit Pip!!” cried Pinkie. “For Faust’s sake, I’ll pick him up from school, I’ll TAKE him to school, on my back, if I have to, but we just want to—”
“—to make things right?” said Twilight. “It would be a start, but right now I doubt that Pip’s parents will even want to talk to you, let alone allow you to go near their colt. Let’s just hope you didn’t lose them as your friends, but right now, it’s very, very doubtful that Imaginary is going to want to be your friend, much less let you give him any kind of party.”
The purple mare shook her mane slightly, and finished, “And I was hoping that the talk we had earlier would have encouraged Imaginary to take the first step and accept the friendship we were so keen on offering him. Now…I’m going to have to start from zero once more, but first, Rarity and I are going to have to go to MRI tomorrow to personally give a full report to Imaginary’s boss…and hopefully recommend a temporary substitute for his work. Dame Rainbow Dash, Dame Pinkie Pie, have a good night.”

Twilight huffed and stomped out of the hospital.

“And have very pleasant dreams,” added Rarity, tossing her mane and refusing to look at the other two, as she also left the building.

And once more, Pinkie Pie and Rainbow Dash were left alone.

Completely alone…