Blue Angel

by V-Pony

Prologue-Pt 3: Toes For Breakfast?!

“Mmm, who’s cooking what,” Volare moaned as he breathed in the smell of biscuits and eggs; fried, by the smell of it. He felt his stomach rumble at the thought.
…wake a sec…
Dead men don’t smell breakfast cooking or feel their stomachs growling!

Volare’s eyes snapped open and he took in the scene around him as his eyes focused. Everything seemed…almost too brightly colorful and cheerful, almost as if it weren’t real. But the wooden floor he was lying on was certainly real, as was the blanket covering him.
And so was the smell of the food!

“H-hey!” he croaked, his voice cracking in his dry throat. He could hear movement on the other side of a wall, which was where the smells seemed to be coming from. “Who’s there?” He tried to weakly sit up, but only fell back down again; his legs feeling too weak and wobbly to support himself.

The clatter in the other room ceased almost immediately with a gasp, and Volare could hear footsteps clicking on the hardwood floor, and after a moment, their owner appeared around the corner…and Volare’s mind just about snapped in two.

“Oh hey bro, welcome back to the land of the living,” the small green and purple dragon…yes a frickin dragon…greeted him cheerfully. But Volare’s thoughts had checked out for the moment because he realized who the dragon was, but he just wasn’t quite grasping it yet. He responded to the dragon’s salutation with a series of breathy mumbles. “Um, are you ok, dude?” the dragon’s green eyes betrayed a look of concern, but Volare didn’t quite come to his senses until the dragon clicked his claws in front of his face.

“Huh-wha-how the-what’s going on here?!” Volare finally got his mouth and brain working again. “I’m supposed to be dead!”

“Well, um, you’re not!” the dragon replied with a grin. “And that’s always good news!”

“Then I must be going insane or dreaming, because you’re a frickin talking dragon who cooks breakfast and I know your name,” Volare babbled. Even to a figment of his imagination, he must look totally out of it. “You’re Spike.”

“Yep, the one and only…er, well, at least the only Spike I’ve ever met,” he shrugged his shoulders before giving Volare a sideways look. “Say, how do you know who I am?”

Volare’s mind searched for the answer, but he was in no condition to go into that just yet. “Just…let’s say it’s a long story and…um…Spike, I’ve got a question,” Volare announced, trying to bend his knees under the blanket. “How come I can’t feel my toes?”

“Oh, that’s cause you don’t have any toes, dude,” Spike said matter-of-factly. “At least, not anymore.”

Volare’s eyes widened in fright. “Did you cut them off or something?! Is that what you’re cooking in there?! Oh God, I’m salivating in here over the smell of my own toes being cooked for breakfast!!!” Volare started to panic, thrashing under the blanket but getting his legs tangled up.

“Calm down, dude! Ah crap! Twilight, Dash, you better get down here!!” Spike shouted towards the stairs. “Your flyboy is up and he’s freaking out!”

Volare’s ears heard the familiar names, but his mind didn’t register them as he finally got out from under the blanket and tried to scoot away from Spike, utterly convinced this was some sort of bad hallucination or dream. He should be dead, for crying out loud!!!

He heard footsteps, or rather, hoofsteps on the stairs and as he turned to look, he saw two more beings right out of his memories. The purple Unicorn nearly got run over by the rainbow-mained Pegasus as she raced into the room, stopping just feet away from him before the Unicorn joined her.

“First!” the Pegasus declared, much to the chagrin of the Unicorn.

“So getting here to greet him first was more important than not knocking me down the stairs, Dash?” she said in irritation.

“Oops,” the Pegasus grinned sheepishly before turning to Volare with a wide and friendly smile. “Hey, nice to see you’re awake! I’m Rainbow Dash, fastest flyer in Equestria, and my slower friend here is Twilight Sparkle,” she exclaimed as Twilight rolled her eyes.

Volare looked back and forth between the two before he screamed in confusion and fear and took off crawling across the lobby. Dash immediately guffawed loudly at the sight but quickly shut up as Twilight scowled at her.

“He’s obviously very shaken up, Dash. Give him a break!” She slowly trotted up to Volare, who had comically tried to climb the bookcase wall in panic, but had merely succeeded in hurling books all over the floor. He turned to face her, back pressed against the wall and his chest heaving in panicked breaths as she gave him the kindest smile she could muster.

“It’s ok. We’re not going to hurt you,” Twilight said softly, taking small steps towards him.

“W-where am I?” Volare finally spat out again. “Why am I here? This isn’t some sorta crazy afterlife is it?”

“No, no, no,” Twilight shook her mane. “You’re in my library and this is certainly not the afterlife.”

“But why am I here?” His breathing had slowed a bit but his eyes were still wide and very confused.

“That…is a bit of a difficult question to answer,” Twilight tapped her chin with her hoof before Dash spoke up.

“You’re here because your plane fell out of the sky and I swooped in and saved your butt!” Dash punctuated the statement by flying up to the ceiling and diving back down again with a dramatic flare of her wings. “And then I created an awesome Sonic Rainboom and Twilight’s spell activated and brought us back here!” She smiled proudly, but Volare’s mouth simply hung wide open.

“Y-you saved me?” he asked in shock, his mind playing back over the crash…the fire…the pain…and then the flash of blue and prism colors.

“Heck yeah I did, cuz I’m awesome like that!” Dash crossed her forelegs and hovered in midair proudly. “Could’t let ya get cooked and all.”

Twilight facehoofed heavily. So much for taking things slow, though she knew that wasn’t Dash’s modus-operandi anyway. She looked back to Volare, who still wore a look of surprise, but at least his jaw had risen from near his chest somewhat as he digested all this new information. “Sorry if that was a little blunt for you,” she apologized. “Dash can be…a little more forward than most ponies.”

“Hey I just don’t like wasting time, that’s all,” Dash shot back. “Besides, I’m not nearly as bad as Pinkie Pie in the “in-your-face” department!”

“Dash, that’s like comparing a earthworm to a python. Nopony is as “in-your-face” as Pinkie is,” she chuckled. Volare managed a smile at that one; she was right after all.

“So, you sorta calmed down yet, flyboy?” Dash asked with a friendly smile.

“Yeah, a bit…but…are you sure this isn’t a dream?” Volare asked, looking back and forth between Dash, Twilight, and Spike, who had since gone back to cooking breakfast, only glancing back every once in a while as his friends handled the situation.

“Not unless we’re all having the same dream,” Spike replied from in the kitchen. “But that’d just be weird as heck!”

“Yeah, it’d be like that one movie if we were all in the same dream at once,” Volare muttered.

“Say what?” Dash asked curiously.

“Um, nevermind,” Volare shook his hands in front of himself to dismiss the subject…except he didn’t have hands. “Whoa, what the hell?!” He looked down at the hooves that had replaced his hands and then finally down at his feet. Spike was right; he didn’t have toes anymore! He had frickin hooves!! He looked back up at Twilight and Dash, fresh panic in his eyes. “OK…what the hell happened to my body?” He squeezed his eyes shut, afraid to look at the rest of himself.

“Dash,” Twilight spoke up. “Go get my mirror, please. Now Volare look, I”-

“Whoa, how do you know my name!?” he cried suddenly, but Dash gestured to the tattered flight suit draped over the back of a chair.

“Your name was on your flight suit,” the Pegasus explained as she fetched the mirror and carried it over in her mouth before Twilight took it with the magical glow of her horn. “Your name is Volare, right? Or did you kill the real Volare and steal his clothes?”

“What the-yeah…yeah, that’s my name,” he confirmed, smiling at her comment despite his fresh fear.

“Dude, we looked up your name and what it means!” Dash smiled brightly. “It’s Latin for “flight”! How sweet is that!? And you’re a pilot and everything. Pre-tty sweet, man,” Dash crossed her hooves again and nodded approvingly, hoping to calm him through compliments; hey, it always worked for her!

“Heh, thanks Dash,” he replied with a slightly embarrassed smile as Twilight approached with the mirror before her.

“Ok Volare, this may come as a bit of a shock to you…or judging by what I’ve seen of you already, a really big shock,” Twilight frowned. “But you’ve gotta know the truth at some point. Take a look.” She floated the mirror in front of Volare who gasped loudly as he beheld himself.

“I…I…” he grabbed the mirror in both hooves and his silver-blue eyes went wide as inspected his new body, a short layer of blue fur covering nearly every inch of himself. “I’ve got a muzzle…and four legs, and a mane, and a tail and…” he then felt something move on his back and he moved the mirror upwards past his yellow and black mane. “Holy crap…I’ve got wings! I’ve got frickin wings!! Oh my god! Holy shit…I’m a flying Pegasus!!!!” he exclaimed, unable to help the wide grin that split his face. The feathered appendages wiggled almost of their own accord, sending the strangest feeling along Volare’s spine It wasn’t an unpleasant one, but it was certainly different!

“Heh, you can thank Dash for those,” Twlight smiled, but then Volare looked back up at her fearfully.

“What…what happened to my real body? My human one?”

“Oh, is that what you bipeds call yourselves? Humans? Interesting,” Twilight nearly ran out of the room for a quill and scroll but stopped herself at the last minute; there’d be plenty of time to take notes later! “Sorry about that, Volare…I get carried away in my studies sometimes.” She blushed slightly.

“Come on and tell him why I decided he should have wings and be a sweet Pegasus like me,” Dash butted in with a smirk as she elbowed Twilight impatiently.

“Very funny, Rainbow Dash,” Twilight replied with a shake of her mane. “It’s a good thing you’re the Element of Loyalty and not the Element of Modesty; I dunno how you’d survive.” Dash opened her mouth to shoot something back, but quickly slammed it shut again before grumbling in her throat. The Unicorn gave her friend a self-satisfied smirk of her own before turning back to Volare, who chuckled a bit at the proud Rainbow Dash being told off by the egghead Twilight Sparkle; a rare occurrence indeed. “I apologize again, Volare.”

“Nah, it's no problem, relatively speaking,” he waved a hoof pointedly. Man, he didn’t know if he could ever get used to this. “So…why am I in the body of a pony? I take it you couldn’t save my old body…how bad was it?” he asked with a wince.

“Alright brace yourself, Volare,” Twilight put a comforting hoof on his shoulder. “It’s a good thing you’re already sitting down because this may be rather hard for you to hear.”

“Man, this guy sure passes out a lot,” Dash exclaimed as she and Twilight dragged the unconscious blue and yellow Pegasus over to the couch and tossed him onto it. “I hope it’s not a health problem.”

“No, I’d say it’s more of a ‘holy Celestia I’m in a different world, my old body is gone forever and I’ll never be able to live my old life again so I’m gonna panic and pass out now’ sort of problem,” Twilight said sarcastically; but she said it in such a dead-pan tone that Dash cracked up anyway. “Hope you didn’t make eggs for four, because I don’t think Volare’s going to be joining us quite yet, Spike.”

“Hey no problem; extra helpings for me aren’t something I’m gonna argue about,” the dragon declared as he plunked the plates of food down on the table and noisily dug into his own eggs and biscuits.

“Hey Spike,” Rainbow Dash paused before heading to the kitchen just yet. “Gimme and Twilight just a few moments; we need to talk about something real quick.”

“We do?” Twilight asked before being pulled towards the front door.

“Don’t take too long guys, or I’ll eat your food too!” Spike stated between mouthfuls of eggs.

“Dash, what’s going on now?” Twilight asked before Dash shushed her with a wing. “What is it?” she hissed.

“Ok, during our whole retelling of how Volare got here, you notice how he said he was chasing a mysterious blue object and how I left the part out about me being that object?” Dash whispered, glancing back at the couch to see Volare still out cold.

“Yeah, what of it?” Twilight asked, a little confused.

“Look…I don’t want Volare to know that was me, ok?” Dash wore a look of worry. “I don’t want him to know that I’m the reason he nearly got killed. Imagine how mad he might get if he found out!”

Twilight nodded in understanding. “Yes I see…but you sure it’s not better to tell him as soon as possible so you’re not basically lying to him all the time, Dash?”

“No, that’s not a better idea Twilight!” Dash hissed in irritation. “That’s the worst possible idea! Just promise me you won’t ever tell him, ok? Cuz if he finds out and hates me forever for what I nearly did to him….that’d be almost as bad as if I’d just let him hit the ground and die in the first place!” Dash again gave Twilight the pleading face from earlier, and it succeeded yet again after a few moments of uncertainty. Twilight bowed her head in concession.

“Alright Dash, I’ll do it…but only for you because you’re my friend!” She gave the Pegasus a stern look. “But if he ever finds out about this, it’ll be on your head, understand?”

“Relax Twilight,” Dash said with a return of her usual confident smile. “With a little luck, the thought’ll never cross his mind…”

“Ok then,” Twilight nodded and headed back to the kitchen. “Hey Spike, we said to wait!” she shouted as they trotted in on Spike devouring hers and Dash’s biscuits.

“Sorry guys,” Spike burped and smiled a bit guiltily but still continued to eat their breakfast. He was enjoying getting back at them a little for making him stay up while they got to rest. “I gave you fair warning and you two took too long!”

“Not cool dude,” Dash crossed her wings and forelegs and shook her rainbow-maned head in disappointment. “Not cool at all…”

The shaking of her mane flashed a multitude of colors across the room and onto Volare’s face, threatening to bring up familiar memories into his slumber. But just as the prismatic visions reached the surface, they sank to the bottom of the river of his consciousness. Volare slept on peacefully, dreaming of flying higher than he ever had before.
Soon…very soon, he’d get a chance to do more than just dream about it…