The Roommate

by totallynotabrony

Pensacola: Fan Mail

It was a beautiful day and I was stuck indoors with scratches on my arms and a thin layer of bodily fluids spread around the room.

This was normal.

Some cats required more anesthetic than others, and you had to be careful not to overdo it. Sometimes they reacted differently. Sometimes I just got it wrong. Whatever happened, sometimes they woke up on the operating table. Fortunately, the patients couldn’t file a complaint, but that didn’t make it any less nerve-wracking for both of us.

I finished up and paused to blow a few loose hairs out of my face and wipe my forehead on the shoulders of my scrubs. I was trying to wipe off sweat, mostly. It was partially the stress of the last few minutes, and partially the dying air conditioner that I hadn’t gotten fixed yet.

You think twice when the money’s coming from your account.

At least this was the last patient of the day. I transferred the still-comatose cat to a holding cage and cleaned up my workspace. Fortunately, there were no complications. I put on a white lab coat and went back out to the front room. A woman and a little girl were waiting. I didn’t have a secretary, so the two of them had been left alone with the few chairs and old pamphlets.

“Okay,” I said, “Mr. Paws is resting now. I’ll watch him overnight and he’ll be good as new tomorrow. You can come by at noon.”

“Thanks, Doctor Denise!” said the little girl, grinning with gap teeth. She and her mother headed for the door. I turned around, but paused when I heard her her exclaim, “Look mom, a pony!”

“She’s not my doctor,” Rainbow Dash was quick to point out. “Just my roommate.”

After graduating college and veterinary school, I needed a place to practice. I’d managed to find the clinic of a retiring vet in Pensacola, Florida to take over. It was a nice little place, a couple of blocks from the beach and just west of the bridge that spanned three miles across the bay. It was always fair weather and warm. I inherited a ton of customers. The problem was, I still had to pay off all the student loans and mortgage debt I’d incurred to get to this point. At least there was a loft on the second floor so I didn’t also have to pay rent.

And then, my old college roommate came to town. Rainbow was still pursuing her dreams of being a fighter pilot, and the Navy pilot school was in Pensacola. She tossed me a little money to share the premises and the two of us lived the bachelorette life together, both too preoccupied with career goals to do much else. Maybe a win for feminism. Mostly just convenient.

Rainbow came through the door, passing the departing customers. She wore a green flight suit custom tailored for her. She was carrying a few things. I saw a slight wrinkle in her nose, but she nodded and headed for the door marked Private, behind which were the stairs to the upper floor. Pony senses were better than human, and she spent as little time as possible on the ground floor. I’d just gotten immune to the smells.

I finished up a few things, locked the front door, and went upstairs myself, pausing on a rubber mat to strip my shoes and outer clothing, grabbing house clothes.

“You got some mail,” said Rainbow as I came into the room, gesturing to the table.

“Does it look like a bill?”

“Yeah.” She turned and picked up something else. “I got some sort of weird package.”

I came over and glanced at it. It was a cube of brown cardboard a couple of inches on each side. There was no return address.

“I’m not sure if there’s anything inside,” she said, holding it up and shaking it. “It’s really light.”

She reached for the pocket of her flight suit and pulled out a folding knife clipped there. I don’t know what she needed a knife for, but apparently all the cool pilots carried them. She manipulated it carefully with her hooves, opening the blade.

I’d noticed that Rainbow’s fine motor control had gotten better since I’d known her. Pony-made things were designed for hooves and the switch to Earth had forced her to improve her skill, learning to deal with things designed for fingers. She still used the dexterity enhancers sometimes, occasionally upgraded when a new model came out.

She slit the tape on the package and opened the box. Both of us leaned forward to look inside.

It exploded in our faces.

---

I don’t know how long I was out. When my eyes opened, I was staring at the ceiling. I took a moment to blink. Something seemed to be wrong with my eyes, a slight difference in how colors were presented. I tried to clear my vision with more blinks, but it wasn’t going away. I looked at my nose. Blue?

My body didn’t want to bend like it usually did, and that only fueled my rising panic. I managed to flop a little, and turned my head.

My eyes met those of a woman lying on the floor beside me who seemed to be going through the same struggles.

“Denise, what the hell?” she said.

“R-rainbow?”

“Yes!”

“That was clearly magic that did-” I gestured at her with what I realized was a foreleg covered in smooth blue hair “-this!”

“No shit!” She managed to sit up by scootching her way up the table leg.

Strange as it was, a detached part of my mind noticed that I was being out-cursed by someone who was until recently a magical flying pony. Rainbow had apparently taken to heart swearing like a sailor.

“Who would do this?” I rolled over, but must have done it wrong because a pain went through my back. Adjusting position, I felt something come out from under my side. Glancing back, I saw the mussed feathers from the wing that had been trapped.

“Mail us a curse?” She flailed, knocking the cardboard box off the table and onto the floor between us. I could see that it was empty, now.

“I didn’t even know this was possible,” I muttered from my position on the floor.

“Me neither,” muttered Rainbow. “I’m no expert or anything, but this is serious magic.”

We looked at each other again. “Twilight,” we said at the same time.

Of course, calling the smartest magical expert we knew was easier said than done in a situation like this. Suddenly finding yourself in a different body was jarring enough, but it came with so many other little problems. Namely, if I was in Rainbow’s body, what pronoun was I supposed to use? This was her body, but while I was in it should I say “mine” or “hers” even though “I” was “me?” I felt like there was a Beatles song about this.

I decided to follow the path of least resistance. I could usually trust Rainbow to do the same, so hopefully it wouldn’t cause problems.

Both of us flopped for a couple of minutes. I managed to get up on all four hooves, but was having trouble getting the wings to fold. The clothes also felt really weird. I would think everything should fit well, considering the custom spec, but being covered in a coat of hair was a feeling I was completely unused to.

That’s not to mention the carefree mane that I had to keep brushing out of my eyes. “You need a haircut.”

“You need fewer fingers and toes.”

“Don’t walk on them. The mammal bone structure is roughly the same, but elongated in equines. Hooves are like fingernails, and fetlocks are like finger bones.”

Meanwhile, I was going through the reverse of that. It felt like I was standing on my nails, except I only had four instead of twenty. It didn’t hurt, I just wasn’t used to it.

“This is going to be hard enough to balance upright without even a tail,” she said. “I don’t even know how your heart keeps blood all the way up in your brain.”

“Every human does it.”

“I meant you. I know you don’t work out.”

Ouch. Worse, I couldn’t really retort with something about her because I had a better grasp of anatomy and already knew the exact function of the equine system.

Rainbow had made it upright but was still leaning against the table. All of a sudden, her sock feet went out from under her and she thudded to the floor.

“Yeah,” I said, “cotton on linoleum. Not a winning combination.”

“Then why do you walk around with socks all the time?” she grunted, pulling herself up again.

“It’s just like walking on ice; you stiffen your legs a little bit and take shorter steps.” I took a couple of stiff steps of my own towards her. As I got closer, she put her hand on top my head to help herself up. I wasn’t expecting it, but managed to keep my neck straight and support her.

“Huh,” she said, pausing when fully upright again. Her hand remained on top my head, just resting there. The fingers began to wiggle.

I rolled my eyes upward - they seemed to have a greater range of motion than before - to find her grinning. Her stroking picked up speed.

“Are you finished?” I asked.

She paused, and then sheepishly took her hand away. “What can I say? Hooves and a tortoise for a pet don’t really lead to much petting sensation.”

She took a small step back from the table and stood straighter. She swayed, but managed to stand without assistance.
I lifted my forehooves to mock applaud, but forgot that I needed to stand on them and faceplanted.

Rainbow laughed, but managed to stay standing.

“It’s your body,” I said, picking myself up.

“Falling on my face is hardly the worst thing I’ve ever done to it,” she said.

“Well, not that I’m trying.” I shifted my weight and managed to pick up just one hoof. I pointed it at her. “And you be careful, too.”

“Sure,” she said, taking a couple of steps.

She reached her fingers out for a pen lying on the table but apparently put too much effort into the gesture and banged her knuckles into the edge of the wood.

“Ponyfeathers,” she gasped, cradling her hand to her chest. “I forgot to compensate for your arms being so long. You really are like a mon-”

She stopped abruptly. “Sorry, that slur just kind of slipped out.”

“Ape, technically,” I said. “But I don’t really mind. Heck, it’s you now, so you can say that.”

“Well, there are some really disgusting parts of the internet that I don’t really want to reference,” she said.

I tilted my head and my ears adjusted themselves. Huh, neat. “What parts?”

“There are...human hate groups.”

“Oh.”

She shook her head. “But I don’t go there because that kind of thing could affect my security clearance.”

Her eyes popped wide open. “Ohmygosh! What am I going to do? The Navy’s not going to let me fly a plane like this!”

“Uh...weren’t fighter jets designed for humans?”

She reconsidered. “Okay, I guess...what if that means I have a better shot at finishing the program now?”

“You arent keeping my body.”

“Okay, yeah, I wasn’t planning on it.” She looked down at her feet. I wondered if she would be fascinated by the new perspective caused by gaining a couple feet in height, but then remembered that heights were nothing new to her. “Anyway, we need to talk to Twilight.”

Her bedroom was closer, so we went for her laptop. Actually pulling up Skype and making a call when neither of us were used to our limbs was the hard part.

Twilight answered, distracted with some book and still actively typing with her magic on the computer as the webcam turned on. “Hello?”

“Uh, hey Twilight,” said Rainbow.

“Oh, hello you two,” she said, sparing us a glance. “Sorry, I’m a little busy right now, but we can talk while I work.”

“Something really weird happened,” I said. “There was this box in the mail and…”

“It had some sort of body switching spell inside,” said Rainbow.

“Okay,” said Twilight, still reading.

A second passed.

“We’ve been body switched!” said Rainbow.

Twilight snapped to attention. She stared into the camera, eyes cutting back and forth between us on the screen.

“Denise?”

“Yes,” I said.

“Rainbow?”

“Yeah.”

Twilight blinked. “I’ll be right there.” The call cut off.

The two of us leaned back from the computer. Rainbow took a step back, checked behind her to see how close she was to her bed, and sat down.

She fell right through the enchanted cloud mattress and landed on the floor with a thump.

“Ugh!” She got up, rubbing her backside.

But that meant…

I stuck out a hoof to touch the CloudBed, imported from Equestria, and found that there was actually some substance there. Without further hesitation, I climbed on. It was kind of like a water bed, but softer and less sloshy.

Wearing a sour look, Rainbow sat down in the chair in front of the computer.

A moment passed in silence.

“Okay,” I said. “Twilight will fix this.”

“Yeah,” Rainbow agreed.

I pondered on our voices. While I knew you don’t sound the same to yourself as you do to other people - like hearing a recording of your voice - I didn’t think I was perfectly mimicking Rainbow’s usual speaking tone. I guessed some of that was due to to my own speech patterns trying to work with her body’s vocal chords.

As I was ruminating on that, something else came to me. I crossed my eyes.

“What?” Rainbow said.

“I just realized you don’t have any whiskers. Do you trim them or something?”

“Most people don’t even notice,” she said. “You didn’t.”

True. I should have known.

“But ponies trim their whiskers short for a lot of reasons,” she went on. “No prickly kisses. Less drag. Because some celebrity is doing it.”

“Fornicating, fighting, and fame. Got it.”

She laughed. “I can handle them later, or if you think it’s going to be a problem, I can show you how to trim them now. I have some clippers.”

“I have clippers.”

“We both know where those have been.”

True. I should have known. A lot of stuff around a vet’s office can also be found in a bathroom, and the two shouldn’t be confused.

A few minutes later, someone rang the doorbell. The two of us glanced at each other and got up to make the walk down to the front door.

“What do we do if it’s not Twilight?” she asked, getting to the apartment door.

“I guess we’ll figure it out.” I reached up, but wasn’t sure how I was going to turn the doorknob with a hoof. Rainbow grabbed it and managed to open it.

Then we were faced with the stairs.

I first tried to turn around, subconsciously not wanting to go down headfirst, but there wasn’t room while standing next to Rainbow and I didn’t want to look silly.

That was probably the most frivolous concern I’d had all day, especially considering it wasn’t my body. I carefully headed down the stairs.

Behind me, Rainbow was having problems of her own. Fortunately, the stairwell was narrow enough for her to brace against both walls.

We made it down to the ground floor and I caught a whiff of the clinic through Rainbow’s nose. It smelled largely the same, but stronger. Okay, I kind of understood her aversion now.

At the front door, I realized I was too short to see through the peephole and let Rainbow take it. “I don’t see anyone.”

“Could it be a purple unicorn about my height?”

“Twilight?” Rainbow called.

“It’s me!” Twilight replied.

Rainbow opened the door and Twilight bustled in, apparently too distracted to remember to back up in order to be seen through a human peephole.

I knew she lived close to the dimensional doorways and had some sort of diplomatic fast-pass. Still, it was a surprise when she showed up only twenty minutes after the call.

“Look at the two of you,” she said. “Oh, this is bad.”

Not what I wanted to hear.

“You said it came in the mail?” she said. “Show me.”

Rainbow and I looked back up the stairs we had just descended and reluctantly began to climb again. Twilight hurried ahead of us.

“Seriously, Denise,” Rainbow panted as we reached the top. “Cardio.”

“Breathe more,” I replied. “From the diaphragm.”

Twilight snatched up the cardboard box with her magic and inspected it from all angles. “Something about the magical signature feels familiar. I’m going to have to run some tests.” She started muttering to herself, taking notes with a small pad of paper.

A couple of minutes passed before Rainbow coughed. “So...what do you think?”

“I can get you back in the right bodies,” said Twilight. “It might take a couple of days.”

“We both have to go to work on Monday,” Rainbow pointed out. “If I’m not back in my own body, the military is going to ask questions. I could lose my chance to be a pilot! I could get kicked out! I...I guess Denise would also have problems.”

“Right,” I added.

“Okay, okay, I’ll see what I can do,” said Twilight. She looked back and forth between the two of us. “Just…”

Twilight looked for a moment like she was going to say a pun, but instead shook her head and said, “Take care.” She walked out, leaving me, my body, and Rainbow.

Comments

[Phantom Night]

Woah, an update!!!

[readsponies]

I totally forgot about this story until something referred to it and I reread it...last night. And today it updates for the first time in five years? Weird.

[Prism Break]

Holy crap five years later and it returns!?

[Morphy]

I want to say it but I won't... (still a new record to me of delay between chapters)

Now, the package; it smacks of poison joke or something from Discord in a ham (or possibly cotton candy) fisted attempt at letting these to see if the grass is really greener on the other side of the fence.

[djthomp]

Now here's a story I kind of only barely remember. This new arc sounds fun though, I blame either Discord or Pinkie. Maybe both.

[BleedingRaindrops]

Holy--I thought this was complete.

[Lithl]

8945904
It was. tnab decided to add to it instead of making a sequel.

[BleedingRaindrops]

8946019
Huh. Well I'm not complaining.

[Dan]

8945499
https://www.amazon.com/Musubi-gabo-Certifed-Safety-Approved/dp/B01LZMBBAX
unclejerryskitchen.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/Video_Thumbnail-1024x1024.jpg

[Dan]

[Norwegian boy]

8945567
I blame both.

[Luminous Lead]

Oh nice, a revival! And with a twist too!

[Illumynarty]

Yes! I love body swapping :P