Just Dropping In

by Gunsmith


Chapter 2

Darkness. Black, all around me, a void with no end. I cannot feel anything.

Wait, no...there is something...feeling begins to return to me.

I feel wind upon my face. Fast wind. The kind of wind one feels when riding a motorcycle, or sticking their head out of a car window. It feels nice. Cold, relaxing. I can hear it, too, the air rushing off of my face and ears, but I am still in darkness.

There is another feeling. It is not in my face, it is lower...higher?...in my body; I feel disoriented. My body's center of gravity seems to be shifting into my upper chest. I know this feeling...

Falling.

I am falling. The worst of my fears. The fear of heights is one of the most popular fears among humankind; however, for many, like me, it is not the height, it is what happens if they were to fall from the height. A quick death would ensue, but the ride down would be an absolute nightmare, nothing but pure fear the whole way down. I had never liked roller coasters, parachutes, anything like that, because they felt too open, it felt too easy to fall; being in a tall building or an airplane was quite the opposite, for I knew it would be nearly impossible to fall unless what I was inside of did so.

But now, I am falling, inside of nothing. I realize my eyes are completely closed; I do not dare open them. I try to think of anything happy, but fear overrides these thoughts. And so, I continue to plummet. How long must this horrible nightmare last?

As if to answer my thoughts, I feel a hard impact on my right shoulder. My head slams into the same surface milliseconds later, causing multicolored flashes to explode like fireworks inside my closed eyes. My hearing goes out, replaced by a piercing ringing inside my own head. My momentum continues propelling my face-planting body onward, flipping it farther into a forwards roll. As my face leaves the surface, my back impacts the ground. Something behind me, that feels like it is on my upper back on the right side, makes a sickening crunch.

The pain takes its time reaching my brain. And when it does, my vision behind my closed lids erupts into pure white flashes. It could be compared to holding a stun grenade in front of one's face as it detonates. I feel pain rocket through my body, starting at a point on my back, spreading to my chest and torso, and eventually enveloping my body.

I continue to tumble forward at what definitely feels like a vicious speed. I land, over and over, upon the area on my back, each time with a renewed spear of pain and a crackle of what I am sure is broken bones shifting and fracturing even more within my own skin.

I feel an impact on my skull, have a split second of recognition, and black out.

***

My mind enters a state of consciousness and control. I snap open my eyes, but immediately regret doing so because of the blinding white I am greeted with. I inhale sharply after being blinded. I squeeze my eyes shut, and my brain begins to function properly.

I can feel the warmth shared by my body and a bed I am lying upon, and a soft pillow lies under my face. Odd, I don't normally sleep on my belly. The room is quiet, save for the muffled chirping of birds; probably cardinals, Ohio has a lot of them. I note there is no alarm; did I forget to set one? I hope it isn't too late in the day. The room lacks anything to smell. And a stale taste, the taste of morning, sits in my mouth.

Christ, that dream was horrible...

As a kid, I was plagued by what are called "night terrors", basically nightmares that feel much worse and create a lot more panic. Those nightmares paled in comparison to what I had just felt. I must have had my feet covered or something; if my body got too hot, it seemed like the night terrors would arrive.

I decide there's not a point in mulling over it, though. I roll off of my chest, on to my left side, and on to my back, just lying there for a minute, eyes closed. I inhale and let out a sigh through my mouth.

I reach over with my right arm blindly, hoping I don't smack my glasses off the bedside table by mistake. I feel the impact of a paperback book on my arm; I should be close. I move my arm around over the surface of the book; no glasses.

Shoot, I probably did knock them on the floor. Damn it. I'm going to have to open my eyes...

I turn my head to the right side, and open my eyes slowly, squinting. The bright light in the room hurts my eyes momentarily, and I soon force them half-open.

What greets my eyes is something I am not expecting to see. The first thing I notice is the book; it is not Rainbow Six. The book is one colored in brown, with a picture of a mustard-yellow horse with gray hair and wearing a safari hat upon it. What? I quickly read the title: Daring Do and the Crystal Pelvis. Wait, what?! A hint of recognition at the name sparks in my mind, then dies. Another thought registers in my head: I can read that. Without my glasses... I attempt to find the rims of my glasses in my vision, but see none. My vision is perfect; I look back to the book, hoping for an explanation. What I see next as I look back is the table upon which the book is sitting. It is a white table and holds only the book and a picture frame; there is a picture filled with multicolored horses, six or so by the looks of it. Confusion has fully overtaken me at this point.

My eyes finally dart a fraction of an inch downward and focus upon the most foreign object of all. It is resting beside the paperback book. It stands out from its entire background due to its color. The walls, floor, and table within my sight picture are all various shades of white or gray; this object is black. Not a jet black, not a gray-black, but a matte black. I recognize the shade of black easily because it is my favorite color. I don't know why matte black looks so nice to me, but it does. Others think it to be a very plain color, or one that represents evil or something like that; I disagree. It looks sleek and refined. It is not entirely out of place in daylight, yet blends in at night. I owned a few combat knives with blades of this color; oftentimes they were nice to just look at.

This matte black object appears to be a cylinder. It is neatly outlined by a faint black of a darker tint. Its origin seems to disappear in the bottom right corner of my field of view. This can't be my...is it? I decide to find out. I subconsciously command my brain to move my right arm up. My brain sends a small electrical charge through my body and to the sensors in my arm, activating the muscles and moving them as I desire. The black cylinder raises a few inches.

I stare in disbelief. I try to move my arm again, and the cylinder moves as I desire. I continue to wave the appendage repeatedly a bit, until my mind is content, I suppose.

And then, panic begins to set in. My next action is to bring my opposite arm, my left, into my field of view. I tilt my head slightly to the left to see it. Another matte black cylinder-like appendage waves back at me.

More panic. Where are my arms?! I bring both appendages in front of my face, and begin testing various joints. I attempt to bend the elbows of both; to my now greater surprise, my outstretched appendages bend away from me, as if my arms have been turned around backwards. I can feel my eyes widen.

What the FUCK?!

I quickly move to my wrists, attempting to bend them to and fro. To my slight relief, they appear to function the same, moving forwards and backwards. Finally, I attempt to flex my...

Hands? Fingers? Where did my...

I desperately attempt to flex my hands or fingers, but nothing happens. I stare blankly at the unmoving tips of the black cylinders in front of me.

WHERE THE FUCK ARE MY HANDS?!

I begin panicking. I am afraid to see what the rest of my body looks like, but I know I must look down at some point. I shift my eyes downward, and my jaw drops.

Beneath my raised appendages lies a body...my body?...outstretched upon the bed I am on. It is the same color of the appendages, a matte black with a darker outline. I slowly look down the body. It is completely bare, devoid of all or any clothing. I reach what has replaced my legs. Despite the new color, my thighs look normal, but upon reaching the knee I see something entirely new.

The thigh cuts off with a knee of sorts, extends down (or back, if I were to stand) shortly, then levels back out into another cylinder-like appendage on my left and right. It looks like an odd distortion of a human leg, with an undersized shin/calf and oversized thighs and feet. Like the appendages above these, there are no extensions made of bone on either leg at the end known as toes.

My mind goes completely blank, probably in overload. A few seconds pass, then my brain switches to primal instinct. Being that fighting would mean fighting my own arms and legs, flight seems logical.

I give out a loud yelp, a quick shout of sorts, and kick off to the side of the bed in an attempt to escape the foreign appendages and body that had seemingly overtaken mine. Not looking far enough into the future to see what kind of results kicking off of the bed would bring, I find myself in the air off to one side of the bed, heading towards the floor a few feet below me.

Inevitable gravity brings me down with a thump as I hit the floor and wall at nearly the same time. Or more, my head hits the wall, and my back hits the floor. I feel the impact of an already-injured skull upon a wall, which, oddly enough, feels hard at first and then soft, once I cease moving towards it. I grunt as the hit makes my vision flicker and blur and replaces my hearing with a loud ringing. My back makes contact with the floor, and something behind me makes a crunching noise. I feel a massive burst of pain from the high-right of my back, but shock kicks in, and I pass out.

***

My head throbs, and with each throb a new wave of pain arrives with it. The throbs come in perfect time with my heart:

Tha-thump. Tha-thump. Tha-thump.

Something else hurts, too. It's behind my back, but I don't know what is in pain, or what is causing the pain. All I really know is that it hurts like hell.

I can feel pressure on my back. I must be lying on it. Am I in my bed? Was I asleep? I recalled the events that seemed so recent. My body...not being mine. Not being in my own room, being in a foreign place. And...the pain. Dreams didn't ever have that much pain, did they? Mine never had before, unless I had fallen off my bed or something. But...that couldn't have happened, right? I still feel like me. Except for the pain...this was some of the worst I had ever felt. I need to find out where it is coming from.

I open my eyes. I see...white. I'm looking directly up. There is a wall at the top of my field of view, also white, with a window in it. The window is open, I think. I attempt to lean up into a sitting position, and am able to do so. My head throbs a bit harder with the change in position and altitude.

"Nngh..." I groan.

Alright...I need to see if that dream was...a dream. I move what feels like my arms in front of what I believe to be my face. I take in a deep breath and hold it in. I open my eyes.

What greets me is two matte black cylinders in front of my face, which I can see with crystal-clear, 20/20 vision; and my glasses are not resting upon my face. I look down. My entire body is the same color, darker outlines and all. My legs remain the same odd shape they took on in my "dream". I glance back up at my "arms", and bend them at the elbows. They bend away from me. I roll my shoulders a bit, turning them towards me, and then they bend towards me, like human arms should. My shoulders seem to be angled so that my "arms" can be turned in nearly any direction, like in a ball-and-socket joint.

I can't tear my eyes off of my arms. I blink a few times, and they remain there, as alien to me as ever. I begin panicking again, beginning to shove off of the oddly soft floor with my legs towards the wall again, but am stopped by said wall. Pain shoots from my back again. Where is that coming from?!

I crane my neck around to the right in an attempt to see what is causing me pain. I see an oddly shaped thing sticking out of my upper back. What it is is hard to discern; it is covered in...medical tape? Yes, white medical tape. I attempt to move it, flexing various parts of my back as best I can. Eventually, it moves an inch or two downward. I begin to wonder, and curiosity gets the best of me.

Knowing most bodies are generally symmetrical in design, I twist my head over to the left side of my body. What I see is...feathers. Matte black feathers, the color matching the rest of me. They are arranged in an orderly fashion, or were supposed to be. Some of the feathers are bent or slightly tilted off position. I resist the urge to re-arrange them. There are many of them, layered on top of one another, row upon row of them. They look very soft, as bird feathers do, a silky kind of feel. Birds...

I don't know what I am, but I know what these are. These are wings. Large, matte black wings, attached to my back, and my right wing is in medical tape and is the source of my pain.

What am I?

And where am I? I turn my head back to a centered position. I am staring at a bed. In fact, the bed I was on in my "dream". It has a blue bedspread on it, and I can see part of a decal on top of it that uses multiple colors. I look to my left and see the bedside table. It is actually not white, but a purple with a white top on it. The purple matches the actual frame of the bed I am beside.

I need to get a better look around...

I need to stand up. I attempt to do so, lifting myself with my arm-things off the ground and onto my footless legs. Too late I remember why humans actually have feet. I stumble backwards a bit, nearly falling over, and smacking the wall, wings first. Damn it. I rebound off the wall, falling into an all-fours position. Oddly enough, it feels...normal. Is what I am four-legged? It's like playing 20 Questions with no one to answer any of them.

I look down at my...forelegs. I lift them up and down, right and left, trying to get a feel for them. I begin bear-crawling (except now it feels like walking) in a small circle, corresponding legs at the same time. My right foreleg lifts as my right leg does, and vice versa. I trot around in a circle a bit, staring at my legs, proud of my small accomplishment. I snap back to reality after a minute and lift my head back up.

I take another look at the bed. The decal on the bedspread is of a storm cloud with a lightning bolt streaking out of it. A rainbow lightning bolt. Wait...I know that design...no, it can't be. I shake my head to clear my thoughts. I look over to the bedside table. On top is a book titled Daring Do and the Crystal Pelvis, and a picture frame with a picture of six horses standing in a group...wait, not horses...they're smaller and look different. They look all too familiar. I again shake my head and turn away.

There is a bedside table on the other side of the bed, too. Piled upon it are more books with various titles, most beginning with "Daring Do and...", but a few are books based upon flight. I see a few titles: Aerodynamics and Pegasi, The Stratosphere and You, and Advanced Wing Maneuvering are a few. The stack looks like it might fall over if even one more book was placed atop it.

I continue to scan rightward. There is another pure white wall with a window centered on it. Not only is the window open, it lacks blinds, curtains, or even window panes, it is merely a precisely cut hole in the wall. Maybe it has shutters.
Underneath the window sits what I believe to be a dresser. The drawers are filled with small articles of clothing. I see a few types of clothing hanging out of a few drawers; I can make out a rainbow-colored scarf and...socks? No, stockings by the looks of it. That's a bit odd... I look right onto the next wall.

The fourth wall of the room is undoubtedly the most filled of the four walls. In the center of it is a floor-to-ceiling doorway. The door is opened a foot or two, and I can see some stairs going downwards outside the room. To the left of the doorway, from my perspective, is a double sliding door, much like those one often sees on closets; in fact, it is a closet. One door is slid open all the way, showing half the closet. Inside, contrasting the white insides and doors of the closet, are a few larger pieces of clothing. I can see two different dresses, at the least; one has some gold accessories attached to it, and looks quite flashy (then again, it is rainbow colored), while the other, also a multitude of colors, looks a bit simpler. Both are definitely formal. Another door, also cracked open sits on the right side of the main doorway. I note a large bathtub through the open door and decide it is a bathroom. Between the three doorways, filling the void space on the walls, are posters; these posters have pictures of the small horses on them, with wings and in blue suits. Logos reading Wonderbolts are scrawled in an electricity-esque printing across the bottoms of both posters.

As I stare at the posters, reading them and again recognizing the name "Wonderbolts", a thought clicks within my head. I glance back at the door I presume leads into a bathroom. Don't most bathrooms have mirrors...?

My stomach turns a bit at seeing (or more, confirming) what I have...turned in to? I attempt to push the feeling away, and steel myself. I begin walk--no, trotting towards the door right of the door leading to the rest of wherever I am. As I approach the door, I lift my right foreleg and thrust it out with a bit of force. The door swings open, somewhat lazily. I enter the bathroom.

My suspicions are correct. What I saw was indeed a bathtub. It appears to be made of something other than porcelain, something that looks too...plushy and absorbent to hold water; and something that is the same material as the rest of the walls, ceilings, floors, and doors I see in the bathroom and that I saw in the bedroom. I look right and see a towel rack, made of the same materials; two multicolored towels hang upon it. Seeing nothing else interesting, I turn to my left. There. A double sink sits on my left, and above it is a large mirror. To make sure it is a mirror, I wave one of my forelegs in front of it, and am rewarded by a reflection of it in the mirror.

I inhale and step forward, then turn my head to my left, staring into my upper-half reflection in the mirror, the bottom half cut off by the sinks. I am not so much shocked by how I fully appear, but by the fact that I recognize what I am.

I am a pony.

A pegasus, to be exact. A pony with wings. A matte black pony with wings. But not your normal pegasus pony, oh, no. My bodily features are shaped to that of a pony from the television show My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. I recognize it so very easily. The design of a body lacking discernible hooves, having large, basically oversized eyes, the style of face used for colts and stallions in the show (which holds a more angular shape than the female model), a darker outline lightly enveloping my body's shape, and the lack of general detail. Everything. No matter how hard I attempt to do so, I cannot shove the thought that I am a pony from MLP:FIM out of my head; no other creature looks like this.

I feel to stunned to comprehend anything I had just realized. I continue to stare at my new form in the mirror. I am a matte black color all over my body; this color is broken up by the hair that sprouts from my head and the back of my neck and my tail in a shaggy manner, which could be considered a shade of black itself. My mane is a dark gray, not a black, like the color a storm cloud holds; there is another color within my mane, an even lighter gray, more comparable to a silver color, except not reflective like silver. This lighter color seems to be centered in my mane, with the darker gray thickly outlining it.

I can see my wings much better now. My left one, which is closest to the mirror, is fully outstretched and is unharmed, only looking a bit ruffled. My right wing is in much worse condition. I can see that it has been wrapped up tightly in medical tape in a half-outstretched position. The taping job does not look professionally done; I assume that the owner of the house I am in (I am almost sure of who it is at this point) did it for me. I recalled my nightmare of falling. Was it a nightmare, truly? Or did I actually crash-land, at this person--no, pony's house? I cringe as I feel some pain radiate from my injured wing, and push the thought away to focus on myself again.

I come to my face, about the only thing I haven't looked at in detail yet. I see that my ears are much larger now, at least in comparison to my body size. I couldn't really notice an improvement in hearing. The only other things that stand out on my face are my eyes. My eyes are absolutely enormous, especially in comparison to body size. I look at my own iris' and see that they are a steel-blue color; I recognize this as my own eye-color. A Scandinavian ancestry had caused me to have a taller height, blondish hair, and the blue eyes I see now as a human. Whenever I had taken off my glasses in front of people, which wasn't often, they would usually comment about how blue my eyes looked. And now, they are glasses-free, crystal-clear, and at least 400% bigger, staring back at me.

I continue to look at myself in the mirror. I glance down a bit, to the bottom of the mirror where it meets the double sinks. I see that I am significantly taller than the sinks. I decide to reach down and see how easy it is to access one of them. I lower my head to just above the sink's level, and find that it is somewhat difficult to do so. I knew this feeling well; it is an aspect of being very tall. At over six and a half feet as a human, reaching sinks had required me to bend over or crouch down. Same with drinking fountains, doorways, urinals, you name it. I could see now that I would meet this problem here; minus urinals. And at least the doorways and ceilings were fairly tall; I had plenty of headroom while standing up.

I wonder how tall I am now, as a pony? Er, a pegasus... That thought led on to a few others. I wonder what system of measurement ponies use? And how big are they in comparison to humans? Earth pony size, or another size entirely? Earth...that's another thing. Measuring myself can wait. How did I end up here, in Equestria? In a house that reminds me of someone, somepony I know all too well...? Maybe the dreams I had...

My thought are cut off by a noise I hear. It sounds like it came from a lower section of the house, like a floor or two down. I freeze, listening. I think that was the sound of something hitting a door. Silence. No...there is a soft thumping noise. It is perfectly in time, like a metronome, thump, thump, thump, thump. It is still quiet, but is getting progressively louder. I turn and walk out of the bathroom, back into the bedroom I was in.

The thumping is very close now. It sounds like it is coming from the centered doorway, now on my right, coming up the stairs from a lower floor. I trot as quietly as I can further into the room, leaning forward to see the doorway. As I near the bed, the center of the room, I can nearly fully see the door. The thumping stops, and I hear a soft whump. I see the door open all the way.

In trots a pony. No, a pegasus, it has wings folded to its sides. A mare judging from the face and smaller build. The pegasus' coat is a light shade of blue, of which I recognize to be cyan blue. A mane about as shaggy as mine, colored in red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple, all neatly in that order on her mane, falls over her right shoulder, her left from my view. Her friendly eyes have irises colored magenta. I instantly recognize her.

She smiles and says, "Hey, you're up!" in a scratchy voice that belongs to only one pegasus.

My jaw drops.