The Jump

by Glimglam

I: The Hop

From a young age, Octavia knew that all ponies were special in their own way. Unique, even. And that was perfectly fine. Normal.

Well understood was the fact that no two ponies were exactly alike, and for every genius, there was an idiot. For every exceptionally talented individual, there was one gifted with incompetence. For every pony that roused audiences with grace and splendor, there was one that dwelled alone and in silence.

And now and then, you had those who raised a sun or blew up a giant tree or something. Unusual, but otherwise natural.

These were things Octavia consistently had to remind herself more and more of these days, it seemed. And not for any particularly strong reason. No, not at all. These were perfectly normal things to dwell on. Everypony was unique, and special in their own way, and that was perfectly normal.

The fact that she awoke to discover she’d inexplicably grown a shark tail was completely irrelevant.

This is fine, she told herself, doing her best to ignore the bizarre, alien sensations of the long, gray appendage now replacing her once cute, fluffy tail. I am perfectly content with what is currently transpiring. Nothing about this is at all out of the ordinary.

She forced herself to smile, gazing into the mirror. Two rows of triangular, serrated teeth smiled back.

“Perfectly fine.”

Octavia turned and left the bathroom, her jaw still frozen in its brilliantly toothy display.

“Could not possibly be any more fine.”

She disregarded the tail, swaying about as she paced her bedroom. That dorsal fin she could feel jutting sharply out of her back? No, perfectly normal. Irrelevant was the fact that, the night prior, such features did not exist on her form. These things just happen.

Why, if it ever were more fine, I would go broke.

A mere dream. A random magical mishap — surely a clumsy unicorn accidentally hexed her at some point during the day, and it would soon wear off. Failing that, an act of Celestia herself, as a joke. A drunken hallucination. Someone slipped Poison Joke into her meals. A virus. Ninjas.

Second puberty, perhaps? Ponies get those, right?

She paused, resting a hoof on her mouth with a thoughtful hum. Surely her mother would have told her about such a thing at some point, wouldn’t she?

Octavia frowned and shook her head of the thought. No, no, it had to have all been her imagination. Perhaps stranger things have happened before, but now? To her, a simple earth pony? It escaped her comprehension. Nothing about it made sense.

But, obviously, everything was fine. It wasn’t real, after all. Why would it make sense? The realization struck her like lightning.

She almost laughed out loud. “What a dream indeed,” said Octavia, shaking her head and glancing back at the aquatic tail with a bemused expression. “I almost have to give it credit for how convincing it was. All that denial, that self-reassurance. Hah. Tremendous.”

The earth-bound mare turned to head back into the bathroom, gazing at her altered reflection in the mirror and flashing a knowing smirk at it. “Well played, oh subconscious mind of mine. Hah, to think, me, turning into...” She shook her head again, a chuckle escaping her throat. “Well, never mind that, now. Soon I will be awake, and this bizarre occurrence will be forever forgotten.”

She looked herself over in the mirror once more, tilting her head askew and running a hoof through her black, silky mane. Almost a shame, she inwardly mused, letting her tail sway. There is a certain elegance to the look, I confess. Certainly not one I would want to tout around in public. Yet, different though it is, one can still clearly see and feel “me” in it...

Octavia hummed, then shrugged, trotting out of the room once more. Not like it mattered much now, did it?

Everything was fine.

Yet, there was the matter of her obvious dream-state, which had yet to break. Even now, after having clearly written off this bizarre morning as being part of one already. The mare let out a dismissive “hmph”, cantering out of her room and down the stairwell. It would surely end sooner or later.

Entering the main room of her home as she came off the stairs, Octavia caught sight of — and sighed audibly at — another mare whom she shared her current house with. She could spot that white coat and messy bright-blue mane from a mile away. The mare known as DJ PON-3 to most (and Vinyl Scratch to others) was hunched over her workstation, busying herself with the sound equipment as usual.

No idea why I’m dreaming about her as well, but, I suppose I shall ‘roll’ with it.

The shades-wearing mare had to have heard Octavia coming down the stairs, as she very briefly glanced up at her as she approached. As usual, she said nothing, offering merely a wave of the hoof before looking down again.

Octavia rolled her eyes and smirked, walking past her toward the cupboards on the deejay’s ‘side’ of the room.

“A fine ‘how-do-you-do’ as well,” the gray mare said rather cheerfully, flicking her tail around as she dug through them. “For being in a dream, I must say, you are surprisingly... normal. I’m almost disappointed, honestly.”

Raising an eyebrow, Vinyl looked up again and turned toward her, mouth open and poised to reply. But no reply came, as she found herself staring, dumbfounded, at the shark-like tail and dorsal fin adorning her housemate’s body. Whom, at the moment, had her head and forelegs stuck into the open doors of her snack cupboards, rummaging through it.

Octavia must have noticed Vinyl’s lack of a response, as she eventually removed her head from them and turned to look at her, a bag of chips gripped tight in her sharp-toothed maw.

“Whffh?” she mumbled, staring back at the bespectacled mare with a raised brow of her own. She spat it out onto the floor, allowing herself the freedom to speak clearly once more. “Can’t a mare help herself to some treats, in the sanctity of my own imagination?”

No reply from Vinyl, still staring.

Silence prevailed between them for some time, before the pieces eventually clicked in Octavia’s head. “Oh, what, this? These?” she inquired, gesturing to the tail and her teeth, and letting out a laugh. “Well, I’m very sure you’d be curious about that. Perfectly natural. Obviously, I’m turning into a fish! A shark, specifically. What else could it possibly be?”

Vinyl re-adjusted her glasses, which had nearly slid off her muzzle by this point.

“Not that it matters in the slightest,” she continued, letting out another laugh — albeit a somewhat weaker, faltering one, under the duress of their mutual staring contest. “Because, well... this is all a dream! And why am I telling you this, anyway? I don’t know! I’m simply awaiting the moment I awaken from this troubled slumber of mine.”

The deejay’s hanging jaw of shock was replaced by a furrowed brow and frown, clearly concerned. She opened her mouth to speak, but was swiftly interrupted.

“A-and what else could it be? No pony I’ve ever known went to bed as one thing and woke up as another. Preposterous. The mere idea!”

She chuckled again, grinning a rather forced grin as she plopped her haunches onto the floor and started freely diving into the chips she had taken out, munching away noisily on them. Vinyl could only watch, blank and unsure, as her friend uncharacteristically indulged in junk food.

Rather bad-tasting junk food at that, Octavia herself noted.

But she ate anyway, if only because it could have helped to speed along her (hopefully imminent) awakening.

“Mmmmh! Mhs mh gufh!” she mumbled, her words indecipherable through mouthfuls of salt and starch. Curse my traitorous brain, why will it not wake and spare me this embarrassment?

Octavia grumbled impatiently, but continued her ‘feast’ unabated. Part of her wondered how Vinyl could stomach this garbage.

“Mmmh hmmf fu—MMH!”

Pain suddenly shot through her mouth, just as her teeth accidentally bite down into her tongue instead of—

Wait.

Pain?

She opened her mouth, the soreness of her tongue almost inexplicably vanishing in significance as the implications dawned on her.

Oh. Oh, no. I’d completely... oh no.

Of all the things she had considered. Of all the possible ways to ASSURE herself of the fact that she was dreaming. Of all the protocols and procedures to follow that she burned into her mind since she was a mere foal. Of all those and more, she had forgotten the single most important thing:

She never pinched herself.

The realization, coupled with the incredulous look Vinyl was giving her, was enough to set Octavia’s rapidly-crumbling world crashing down onto her all at once.

Everything was not fine.

Comments

[Son of Sun]

This is fine, she told herself, doing her best to ignore the bizarre, alien sensations of the long, gray appendage now replacing her once cute, fluffy tail. I am perfectly content with what is currently transpiring. Nothing about this is at all out of the ordinary.