Chapter 12
"Now look here," I said angrily. "I know I'm sick but dead in a month sick? That's impossible."
"I'm really sorry Hail Storm," Cadance said. "The damage that has been done so far is serious, once your organs start to fail, without magic, we can't do anything about it."
"No... just... no. I can't accept this," I said shaking my head.
I heard a quiet sob and saw tears dripping down Golden Dawn's face out of the corner of my eye. There was an ache in the pit of my stomach and the sound of her cries made it grow. I wanted to reach out, to comfort her and tell her everything would be okay, but I didn't have the strength. If I tried to face her now, if I looked her in the eye, I'd fall apart.
"I... I need to... go," I said, stepping up and backing away from the table.
I slowly plodded across the room in a daze of confusion. I wasn't really paying attention to where I was going until I found myself sitting down on one of the small couches lined up near the window. I glanced back at the table across the room, none of the ponies had followed me and most were awkwardly avoiding my gaze except for Golden Dawn, who was staring right at me, her eyes wet with tears.
I blinked back some of my own, it was all I could do to keep them from pouring out. The anguish on Golden's face matched my own feelings perfectly. Seeing her like that stung at my heart and I forced myself to turn around, unable to keep looking at her. Not even the terrifying drop on the other side of the large pane of glass in front of me was enough to distract me from the thoughts running around in my head.
What the fuck! I can't be dying. this is bullshit. I thought to myself.
People my age don't think about their own death, not usually anyways. Before my dad, I hadn't lost anyone close to me since my grandparents died when I was a kid. In fact neither of my parents were all that old. I hadn't even thought about their time being limited until then my dad showed up and everything changed. His death hung grimly in my mind, and for the first time I was forcing myself to think about not only my own mortality but how I had lost him.
I had never really had time to grieve. Oh sure, there was the funeral itself but right after that I was on the road. The trip to Wyoming had been more than just me going out there to pick up some things. It served as a distraction, something to do instead of sitting at home, alone. The truth of it had hit me a few times, like when I found those notes while I was packing things up, but then I ended up in Equestria and everything had been thrown into chaos. I didn't have time to think about my dad, I had to concentrate on getting home.
Canterlot and the Princesses were supposed to be my ticket to doing that, but now, not only could they not get me home, but they were telling me I wasn't going to last much longer myself.
I'll be gone, just like dad... No, worse. No one will even know what happened to me.
I thought about his funeral, it had been so empty. A handful of family members and people he hadn't spoken to in years. Would mine be like that? Who would show up? My old college roommate maybe, he was one of the few I still had kept in touch with after graduating, but I hadn't seen him since he had moved across the country. My mother? If she could put down the bottle long enough, she might even say something. Maybe a co-worker or two. My life was as much of a mess as my dad's had been. I had kept to myself, ignoring everyone and now I was being told that it might be too late to do anything about it. That I was going to die alone on an alien world.
There was a sound of hoofsteps behind me and the next thing I knew there was a wing squeezing me tightly.
No, not friendless, and not alone.
She didn't say anything, she just sat down next to me on the bench and held on tight. I leaned up against her, resting my head against her shoulder. We sat there for what seemed like an eternity, neither of us saying a word.
I spoke up, my voice barely a whisper, "Thank you Golden..."
"Hail..." she started to say.
I put my hand over her mouth, "Thank you for being my friend, it took me getting thrown into another universe to realize I needed one. No matter what happens, I'm glad I met you."
"You're not giving up are you?" she asked quietly.
I said nothing as I took a minute mull over her question, it felt like I was and the idea of giving up sickened me. I hadn't given up when I was marching through the desert, why was this hitting me so hard now? I kicked myself mentally, there was really only one thing for me to do, and it wasn't throwing in the towel. I was going to treat this like any other hard situation I got myself into, stubbornly push through it as best as I could.
"No, I'm not. We're going to figure this out," I said, defying the fate that had been handed to me. With new determination I pulled myself up and Golden Dawn and I returned to the table of ponies.
"For now, let's put the death thing to the side. I get that this is a serious situation but what I don't understand right now I feel better than I have since I first woke up in the Badlands." I said as I took my seat.
"Most of that is due to the elixir you are taking. As your body starts to build up a tolerance, your earlier symptoms will return and they will only get worse," Cadance said.
"You said the stuff in the IV bag was some kind of painkiller, I've been on painkillers before they don't hide symptoms completely."
"No, but this is more than just a simple drug, It is magically enhanced to more completely hide your symptoms. Twilight came up with the enchantment, it is specifically designed to both to work inside the suppression field of your cell and do as little damage to your body as possible."
"Wait a minute, you just told me how bad magic is for me and you're giving me some sort of magical super drug? Are you insane!?" I shouted.
"I'll take it from here Cadance," Twilight said. "Hail Storm, the suppression field isn't perfect, no field is. There is no location in this universe where you can avoid magic entirely, it's in the air, the food, even us ponies. You're always going to be exposed to some level of magic, no matter where you go. What's important is both the type of magic you are exposed to and the amount. Cadance told you we took some blood samples and ran a scan right?"
"Yeah, she mentioned that." I said.
"We've been going over the results of that scan, and running tests on the blood samples. We don't have a full understanding yet, but different types of magic interact with your body different ways. Some types of magic do minimal harm, some are quite dangerous, and some don't seem to cause any negative reaction at all. We used that information to make the enchantment on your medicine as benign as possible."
Multiple types of magic, this was news to me. "There's more than one type of magic?" I asked in confusion.
"Of course, it's far from a perfect analogy but think of the EM spectrum, just like there are differences between radio waves, visible light and x-rays, there are also different kinds of magic with varying energy levels. They interact with your body in different way, some do you no harm, while others can cause massive damage."
"So like exposing myself to a powerful spell would be like getting hit with a big burst of gamma rays, while a weaker spell might just be like shining a flashlight at me?"
"Sort of, for example if I tried to teleport with you, it would probably liquefy your insides, but you could keep taking that elixir for months without the enchantment building up toxic levels of magic. However, it isn't directly related to the strength of the magic. I don't know if anypony told you this but in Equestria, friendship is magic. That isn't just a cute saying, or a nice philosophy. It is literally true. The bonds of friendship are one of the most powerful magics known to ponykind," Twilight said, looking at Rainbow Dash with a smile.
"Yep, Twilight here led me and some other ponies to defeat Nightmare Moon! And we totally kicked Discord's butt, back when he was being a jerk." Rainbow Dash said, puffing up with pride.
"He doesn't know who they are Rainbow," Twilight said with a smile. She turned back to me, her face growing more serious. "Rainbow is right though, together, my friends and I have fought off some of the most powerful threats to Equestria, by channeling our friendship through the Elements of Harmony. If there was a simple relationship between power and damage done to you, then your friendship with Golden Dawn would have killed you already."
"That's a cheery thought," I said sarcastically. "Become friends and instantly keel over dead."
"I'm glad that didn't happen," Golden Dawn said, putting her hoof on my hand.
"Me too."
"Actually, during our studies, we actually found something interesting. The magic of friendship is not only not harmful to you, but it might even be reducing the damage done by other types of magics. Acting as a sort of barrier, partially shielding you from the full effects."
"Is that helpful?" I asked. "Can you use it to stop me from getting worse?"
"I'm not sure, it's one of the avenues we're exploring. We're going to keep working on this Hail Storm," Twilight said. "For now, try not to stress yourself out over it."
I had more questions, but the sound of a door opening interrupted my train of thought. Two ponies pushed a large cart filled with silver domed plates into the room. Judging from the delicious smells that followed those ponies in, breakfast had arrived. My stomach rumbled, reminding me how long it had been since I had eaten. The fact that I wasn't feeling nauseous at all, only reinforced my desire for some food. Any further investigation could wait.
One by one the plates were passed out, and as the lids lifted the smells of freshly baked goods filled the air. There were pancakes, waffles, muffins, and bread and they all looked and smelt wonderful. Then one of the dishes, a smaller one, was set down directly in front of me. The pony lifted the lid and there sat the most beautiful thing I had seen since I had arrived in Equestria.
"Is this...?"
"I think it's called maple cured bacon," Twilight said, scrunching her nose. "I know humans eat meat so I had the palace chef pull something off the menu that some of thestrals in the Lunar Guard like to eat," Twilight said.
There were six strips and they appeared to be perfectly cooked. I picked one up and took a bite, savoring the flavor. It had just the right amount of crispness, whatever pony had cooked this, he or she knew what they were doing.
"Oh god, this is so good," I said, drool dribbling down my chin. "I can't think of a better way of distracting me from the earlier bad news."
"I thought that might help, I remember my friends through the mirror portal raving about how incredible bacon was, personally I thought it was okay but I guess it's different if you grew up eating it."
"Wait, you've eaten meat before?" Rainbow Dash said, staring at Twilight.
"Not before going to the human world, it was kind of an accident the first time. I had no idea that humans were meat eaters and we had something called sloppy joes for lunch. It wasn't till I took a bite that I found out it had meat in it."
"Well nuts to that, if you've tried meat before I've got to too," Rainbow said.
"Well you have to ask Hail Storm, it was made for him and there's not much of it." Twilight said.
"Uh sure, who am I to deny the magic of bacon to someone," I said, offering Rainbow the plate.
"It's magical?" Rainbow Dash said, as I passed her the plate.
"No it isn't," Twilight said, raising an eyebrow. "That's actually the other reason I had it prepared. Food grown in Equestria is saturated in earth pony magic. Golden Dawn mentioned you'd often feel sick after eating. That's the reason. This bacon is imported from griffon lands. Their food isn't completely devoid of magic, but there's less in it."
"I didn't mean it was literally magical, just that it tastes amazing," I said, rolling my eyes. "Wait... hold on, should I not eat anything else then? If the other food is making me sick..."
"There's enough residual magic in the food to make your stomach hurt, but it shouldn't be doing long term damage. The elixir should prevent that reaction for now, if that stops working, we can try to feed you only imported food, but even that has some magic in it," Twilight said.
Rainbow Dash broke one of the strips in half and picked up one portion with her hoof. She stared at it for a minute before popping it into her mouth and chewing slowly. She swallowed a moment later.
"Not bad, but I don't see what all the fuss is about," she said coolly, but I thought I caught her eyeing another piece.
"Cadance? Golden? Either of you want some?" I asked holding the plate out.
Cadance turned a paler shade of pink and politely declined; Golden looked at it her eyes unsure. Finally she took the other half of Rainbow's piece and took an experimental nibble before spitting it out.
"You don't like the bacon?" I asked.
"No," she said, taking a large gulp from her water.
"I don't think we can be friends anymore," I said trying to put on my best serious frown but a moment later the facade cracked as it turned into a smile.
I finished off the rest of the bacon, except for a slice I put on Rainbow's plate. She said nothing but gave me a smile. After I finished eating the rest of my food, I turned to Twilight.
"So Twilight, you've already told me how hard it will be to actually send me home, but what I don't get is how did I end up here in the first place?"
"We aren't completely sure but we think we have an idea. Is it true you found some confetti near where you first entered Equestria?"
"Um, yeah... but... how did you know that and why is that important?" I asked.
"I told her," Golden Dawn said. "Twilight was very insistent that even the smallest detail could be important."
"And I was right! In this case it was very important. The timing of you arriving here matches up with an incident with a being called Discord. Discord is... well he's the embodiment of chaos, he is incredibly powerful but also very unreliable. He opened a portal to... somewhere, there was an accident, the portal came into contact with magical artifact, lost stability and shattered. The shards of his portal broke apart into confetti when they dissipated. We think you came through the one of the portal shards, we had thought them all destroyed but we must have missed one."
"But why confetti?" I was still confused. "That doesn't even make sense."
"Discord is... the king of not making sense," Rainbow Dash said through a mouth full of pancakes.
"So, I wasn't brought here on purpose?" I asked. "That seems... wrong."
"Not to our knowledge, but we haven't been able to check with Discord since the incident, he's... missing," Twilight said, her ears going flat.
"Could he have ended up on Earth?" Golden Dawn asked.
"Possibly, but we can't be sure," Twilight said. "Do you think you were brought here on purpose Hail Storm?"
"Well, maybe not on purpose, but if it was by accident, why am I able to understand Equestrian? I figured whatever or whoever had brought me here knew I wouldn't be able to, so they gave me the ability to do so. The way you're describing it, it sounds like I just had the bad luck to fall through a portal."
"So, we're not actually sure. It may have been bad luck or it might not have. There's a number of rather unusual circumstances around how you got here and your current state. Throw in how random Discord generally acts, and it makes it very hard to know if he brought you here on purpose or not," Twilight said.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"As far as I could tell, Discord's portal was very similar to the portal spell that the mirror portal I talked about earlier uses, except it was sustained with chaos magic. As I mentioned, the mirror portal was created by a pony named Star Swirl. He went through great pains to make sure that any travel through it would be safe for ponies. The spell that powers the mirror will scan both it's current location, Equestria, and the end point, the human dimension I visited. It will then make adaptations to any ponies that travel through it, changing their form to allow them to safely exist in on the human world. In addition there is a translation spell cast which allows communication with the humans on the other side." Twilight said.
"So, that sounds kind of like what happened to me, except clearly it didn't make any changes to me to make your magic filled universe safe for me," I said.
"The thing is, it took Star Swirl months to create all the spells that power that portal and set them up to work together. Discord generally doesn't put that much thought into his magic. It's much more... chaotic... more random," Twilight said. "You are right though, translation spells generally need to be tailored for the languages that are being translated for them to work optimally. If he was using the same spell the mirror uses, it would mean Discord would have to have known about your species and crafted a spell that translates English to Equestrian."
"What about when you went through the mirror portal?" Rainbow Dash asked. "Didn't that let you speak English?"
"There's no guarantee that the English of that universe is the same as English in Hail's universe, it could be, or it might not be. The thing is, Discord's spell is working differently than any translation spell I'm familiar with."
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"You've lost the ability to understand your native language. That's unusual. On top of that, entering that cell would normally break the translation spell until it was re-cast. Instead, it just stops working while you are inside and then resumes working after you come out. I don't know if your lost ability to speak English is because of a problem with the spell, or if Discord's translation spell just works differently than the one I'm familiar with, and until I can scan that spell, I won't be able to find out how it isn't broken by the suppression field," Twilight said.
"Is there any way to find out why he can't understand English?" Golden Dawn asked.
"Yes, the same scan I was just talking about. Normally, it would be easy enough to analyze the active spells on your body, determine which one is the translation spell and then figure out how it works. In fact under normal circumstances, I wouldn't even bother, except to satiate my own curiosity. I'd just start from scratch and work with Hail getting the base spell tweaked until it could handle his language. It isn't a hard process, it just takes a few days of work."
"The more you talk, more I'm thinking Discord pulled me here on purpose. Or at least, pulled a human from Earth," I said.
"You're not wrong, the chances of all this happening the way it happened by accident seem very unlikely. On the other hand, if Discord was planning for a human to come to Equestria, he did a bad job at it,"
"You mean how magic is hurting Hail?" Golden Dawn asked.
"Exactly, dimensional travel is dangerous. Real dangerous. It takes a very high level understanding of magic to create a portal that is safe for ponies to use. Just breaching the barrier between our dimension and another involves huge amounts of magic that cause cause catastrophic results if the spell is miscast and that's just the first step. Not every dimension is conducive to pony life, many are downright hostile to it. I don't mean from the inhabitants either, though that can happen. I mean the nature of the universe does not allow ponies to exist. For example, there could be a dimension where the magical energies that exist in every pony can't function and tear themselves apart, violently," Twilight said.
"Which is why Star Swirl took so long in making that mirror?" Golden Dawn asked.
"Correct, sometimes magic can be used to counter the danger, by adapting a pony to survive in the other dimension, but sometimes it just isn't possible. For safe travel you have to be able to detect whether or not it's ok for a pony to enter the other dimension, and if it isn't, to take the proper precautions. Two things stand out about this. First, if Discord knew a human was coming here, he didn't plan his spell very well, since Hail is suffering from exposure to magic. Secondly, planning ahead just doesn't seem like Discord's style."
"Wouldn't he be worried about popping into a dimension that was lethal to him?" I asked
"Discord? Think about consequences? That's rich," Rainbow Dash said with a laugh.
Twilight nodded in agreement.
"Discord is very much a 'live in the moment' type of being, I've never known him to plan anything. Even so, it is unlikely he'd have anything to worry about. Discord isn't a physical being like you or I. Discord is the embodiment of chaos itself. If there's one multi-universal constant, it's chaos. I think he could survive anywhere."
"So, this brings us back full circle. If he intended for Hail, or some other human to come here, he didn't try to give them any resistance to magic, but if he didn't plan this, then how did Hail Storm end up with a translation spell on him?" Golden Dawn asked.
"Yep, that's why we're so confused. If it had been random chance, it would be unlikely that going through Discord's portal would have also cast a translation spell tailored for Hail Storm's language. If he had planned it though, you would think he would have built in some sort of adaptation spell so when Hail Storm came through he wouldn't end up being slowly poisoned by magic."
"Not if he didn't care if I die," I said.
"Discord is..." Twilight stated to say.
"Crazy, loony, insane, bonkers," Rainbow Dash said, interrupting Twilight.
"Yes, those things do describe him, but more importantly, he's a trickster, but he isn't cruel. I've never known him to purposely kill anypony," Twilight said. "I don't think he'd have brought you here if he thought you'd die. In any case, I'd really like to get a closer look at that translation spell he cast on you, it might give me a better idea on the magic you were exposed to when you went through the portal. For now though, I need to come up with a better way of doing that, right now the normal method is too dangerous."
"Because that would be exposing me to extra magic, right?" I asked.
"Exactly. Speaking of which, we should really be getting you back to the cell. I hate to make you go so soon but delaying will only accelerate your deterioration," Twilight said.
We headed down, deeper into the castle, back to the dungeon and my cell. Twilight promised that I could come out again for another hour or two after dinner. She said that she would post a guard outside the cell and if I needed anything I could step out and ask, but I should avoid leaving as much as possible. Golden Dawn asked if she could go with me to which Cadance said that was fine.
"You understand as long as Hail Storm is in the cell, you won't be able to talk to him?" she asked.
"I know but I can't just leave him down there alone all day," Golden said.
Of course as soon as we stepped into the cell, I tried to talk to Golden Dawn but she only responded in the same gibberish that Cadance had spoke in the day before. What was worse is that I could see the effect that the suppression field was having on her. The hairs on her back stood on edge, her eyes darted back and forth nervously and every few minute her wings would twitch. In an attempt to pass the time, I tried to teach her some very basic English, but I could tell that she was very distracted.
I got up and walked out of the cell, Golden Dawn followed, the moment she stepped outside, I saw her body relax. The guard standing outside of the room looked at me but I waved him off.
"You can't stay in there," I said "You've been on edge the whole time, I don't know what it feels like to have your magic suppressed but I can tell it isn't good for you."
"I can't just leave you to sit in that room alone, all day long," Golden Dawn said with a sigh.
"What if you sat just outside the room? It's not like I can talk to you either way, I'm pretty sure we can leave the door open."
"That wouldn't be a problem," the guard said, overhearing our conversation.
"Though we still have nothing to do," I said. "I wish I had some books to read, or a game to play or something."
"That's a great idea!" Golden said, leaping up into the air at my statement.
"Huh?"
"A game to play, we can take that table in your room, stick it between the door. I can go find some games and we can play them." she said with a smile.
"Hmm, that would be better than sitting here waiting. Though it would have to be a game that doesn't require reading or talking."
"I'm sure I can find something that will work, I'll be back in a bit, I'll go ask Twilight where I can get some games, if she doesn't have any I'll take a trip into lower Canterlot and buy something." Golden said, flying down the corridor. I went back into the cell, sat down on the couch and waited for her to get back.
An hour later, I heard the door at the far end of the hall open up. I looked and saw Golden Dawn flying towards me carrying a large box. I took one of the chairs and brought it out into the hallway so I could talk.
"Did you find anything?"
"Yeah! Twilight thought it was a great idea, she used to play checkers and chess with Princess Celestia when she was a filly so she found Celestia's copies and lent them to me. We uh, should be careful with them, Especially the chess set, it looks really fancy."
"Checkers and chess? That's odd, those are human games, I wonder if they play the same," I said.
It turned out that they both did. I moved the table right outside the door and pulled my chair up to it on the inside of the cell. The checkers set was pretty normal, if a bit fancy, with a wooden board that had intricate carvings running along the side. The pieces were gold and silver instead of red and black and judging by the weight of each token, I think that they were actual gold and silver. We played a number of games before we switched to chess.
My jaw dropped when Golden Dawn pulled out the chess set. The board was made up of a golden frame, inlaid with very expensive looking stone squares. The pieces themselves were solid gold and platinum, studded with various gems. The detail on each piece was amazing, right down to the feathers on the pegasus knights and the spirals on the unicorn and alicorn horns.
Now I knew the rules of chess, but I never got really into it. I was at best, an average player. Golden and I had roughly a 50-50 win ratio in checkers, so I went in expecting something similar with chess.
Nope.
She destroyed me, every... single... time.
They weren't even close games, by the time the fifth game rolled around, I had pretty much had it. I took one last look over the board, she was going to mate me in three moves and there wasn't a damned thing I could do about it. I toppled my king, stood up and moved the table out of the way so I could walk out into the hall.
"Well that didn't go so well for me," I said giving her a bit of a glare.
"Sorry," she said sheepishly. "My dad taught me to play. He uh... was Equestria's grand master from 4840 - 4842."
"How wonderful for him," I said, faking annoyance. "Still though, thanks for sticking around. I think I'm going to lay down for a while, try to take a nap. Why don't you go enjoy the castle or something. I don't want you stuck here all day."
"Are you sure?" Golden asked.
"Yeah, getting a little tired,” I said. I was, but more importantly I was starting to feel awful and I didn’t want her around if it got much worse. The elixir was starting to wear off and I wasn't due for my next dose for another hour at least.
"Alright, I'll see if I can find anymore games for us to play," Golden said before taking off.
I stretched out on the bed trying to get comfortable, but no matter how hard I tried, sleep evaded me. Everything I had learned since waking up in the castle was running around in my skull, and now that my brain wasn't otherwise engaged, it was busy trying to process everything. What scared me the most was my survival was completely dependent on the success of Twilight and Cadance. I didn't know anything about magic or inter-dimensional travel. Even the human part of this, me, I didn't have nearly enough medical knowledge to offer any real assistance. My fate was entirely in their hands... er hooves... horns? In any case, the lack of control was deeply unsettling.
Eventually Golden Dawn returned with lunch and a bunch of new games, right after Cadance had brought me another vial of the elixir and lunch. I chomped down a peanut butter sandwich while she went over the games; some of them I recognized, others were completely new to me. We started with the pony equivalent of connect four and then moved on from there. Before I knew it, more than half the day was over and Twilight and Cadance had arrived. I stepped out into the hall so I could talk with them.
"We need to run a few more tests," Twilight said with a slight frown.
"Did you find something?" I asked warily.
"Nothing new, I'm afraid, the blood samples we took earlier have degraded beyond usability from magical contamination, we need fresh ones and a few other samples as well."
I followed them through the castle until we came to an examination room. Cadance had me lay down on a bed; a few moments later a purple unicorn doctor came into the room. He introduced himself as Steady Beat. Where Dusty Heart was clearly an old country doctor, Steady Beat had all the makings of a pony of modern medicine
Beneath his lab coat was an expensive looking suit, complete with tie. A stethoscope hung around his neck, along with a bag with a red cross on it. He pulled a syringe from the bag and told me that he needed to take some blood. After he was finished, he gave me a cup and asked for a urine sample. The ponies left the room to give me some privacy and I filled it up. Steady Beat came back, retrieved the cup and left with Cadance, leaving only Twilight and Golden Dawn.
"They're going to go run some more tests on that, but I need to run another scan on you..." she said. "This... isn't going to feel very pleasant."
Her horn lit up and my body was covered in a glowing field of magenta. My skin felt dry and hot, like I had been sitting out in the sun too long. Worse, I could feel the heat inside me as well. It grew in intensity until I felt like every part of me was on fire. Tears streamed down my face as I struggled to hold back a cry. Golden Dawn reached over with a wing and gently rubbed it across my forehead, I did my best to give her a smile before a surge of pain caused me to yell out again.
"I'm sorry," Twilight said resting a wing on my shoulder. "I know it hurts but I am getting a lot of useful information from this."
A moment later the light from Twilight's horn cut out abruptly and the pain began to fade away.
The next few days went pretty much the same. For breakfast I would join Twilight, Cadance and Golden Dawn for a meal outside of the cell. After breakfast I'd head back to my room and spend all day there, playing games with Golden Dawn.
The worst part was as long as I was in that room, I couldn’t even talk with her. Sometimes, when I was feeling too sick to concentrate on a game, I’d push the table out of the way and go sit in the hallway with her. She always protest, saying it was going to make me get worse quicker, but she never forced me back in. Instead she’d curl up on the floor and let me lean up against her and we’d just talk for hours. Twilight caught me once and scolded me, but I could tell that her heart wasn’t in it. She didn’t want to condemn what might be my last few weeks to sitting in a cell, unable to even communicate with the best friend I had in years.
At dinner time, I’d head up into the castle with Golden Dawn to have dinner. Sometime we ate with Twilight and Cadance other times we ate alone. The only other interruptions to my days were the excursions to Steady Beat's office for my daily battery of tests. Each time the number of tests and the number of ponies that came to check up on me grew, until we had to move to a larger room just to fit them all. By the evening, I'd be head back to my cell where I'd meet up with Golden Dawn for a while before she went to sleep elsewhere. At first she tried to stay with me, but when I saw her reaction to the suppression field, I insisted that she go get some good sleep somewhere else. Twilight kept a guard posted to watch over me in case I needed something, while she went off to sleep in one of the castle's many guest rooms.
I met a couple more of Twilight's friends during this time, the first was white unicorn named Rarity. Rarity ran a small boutique in Ponyville and seemed very interesting in my clothing. When she found out that humans wore clothing all the time and I only had a few days worth with me, she looked distraught. She took some measurements and promised that when she returned to Ponyville she'd make me some new things to wear. Extra clothes was the last thing on my mind, but she seemed so happy talking about it that I didn't bother trying try to talk her out of it.
The day after I met Rarity, a pink explosion bust out of nowhere, shoved a cupcake in my mouth and then proceeded to give me a great big hug, nearly knocking over the chess set. Golden Dawn, who had been just about to move her queen, steadied the table. The look on her face told me she was as confused as I felt. Neither of us had seen the pink pony approach and between the table with the chess board and Golden sitting on the other side of it, the only entrance to the cell was completely blocked. We moved everything out of the way and stepped out into the hall where the crazed pony introduced herself as my new friend Pinkie Pie. A moment later a flustered looking Twilight opened the door at the far end of the hall and hurried over to us.
"Pinkie, you were supposed to wait for me," she said, panting heavily.
"I know but I wanted to go meet my new friends..."
"Hal Storm." I said, rolling my eyes, "and Golden Dawn."
"My new friends Hail Storm and Goldie" Pinkie said with a smile. Then her eyes lit up as if she had forgotten something, she reached into her mane and somehow pulled out another cupcake. A second later later Golden got the same treatment that I had received back in the cell. I thought about complaining but the cupcake was just too tasty. Judging by how quickly Golden was scarfing hers down, she must have agreed.
It didn't take me long to learn that this completely bonkers behavior was just considered typical Pinkie Pie. Her outgoing personality took a little getting used to but her happy demeanor and genuine desire to become friends helped smooth over some of the craziness. Dinner that evening consisted of a light meal followed by a storm of deserts, most of them made by Pinkie herself, brought up from a shop in Ponyville that she worked in. Pinkie regaled us with tales of adventures that she and Twilight had been on before Twilight became a princess. Some of them sounded so fantastic that I was sure she must have exaggerated the real events but she promised me, giving her word with a cute little rhyme, that they were all 100% true. I remained out of the cell perhaps a few more hours than I should have and when I finally returned I wasn't feeling very well.
I mentioned it to Twilight and she informed me that my body was starting to build up a tolerance to the medicine I was taking. She had already tweaked the enchantment as much as she could and the only way to increase its potency would make it unsafe for me to use.
The days flew by and the amount of time I had to spend with Golden Dawn steadily declined as more and more of my free time was taken up with an ever increasing number of tests. It had been nearly two weeks since I had arrived at the castle and as far as I could tell, no real progress has been made. Worse still, I was no longer showing any response to taking the enchanted drug that Twilight had prepared for me. My headaches had returned in full force and I was having trouble holding down any food. Twilight tried to keep my spirits up but I could tell that she was worried herself. The medical staff themselves were hard to read, but as I continued to meet with Twilight, each time she looked just a little more tired, a little more strained.
As my condition worsened I talked to Golden Dawn in private, I didn't want her to have to watch me slowly deteriorate and tried to convince her to return to Hoofston, but she refused.
“No,” she said sternly.
“But what if I…”
A hoof slapped me across the face before I could finish the sentence.
“You WILL get better Hail Storm,” she said. There was a trickle of moisture in her eyes. “Don’t even think about giving up.”
“I’m not… I just, I don’t want you to have to watch this,” I said, slumping over.
The next thing I knew, she had me in a hug, her head buried in my chest.
"I'm not going anywhere until you are better," she said resolutely. The strength in her voice let me know that it was pointless to argue.
I was having trouble getting out of bed each morning and no matter how much I slept, I always felt exhausted. My skin had started to turn pale and the last time I had taken a shower, I had found clumps of hair in the drain. I was forced to give up my morning meals with my friends as the number of tests increased. When I inquired about the progress in finding a way to cure me, Twilight informed me that though they had a number of theories, nothing concrete had come up yet.
Eventually even the testing started to dwindle which was just as well as I was having problems even getting out of bed. I slept most of the day away, waking up only to nibble on some food and then struggle to keep it down. Golden Dawn moved her chair into my cell, right against my bed. I'd find myself waking up with her wing around me, tears staining her muzzle. I tried once more to get her to go but she wouldn't listen. I didn't want to admit it but I knew things were looking bleak.
Things went from bad to worse when I had a heart attack during one of my examinations. I didn't even realize it was happening, everything had been hurting for so long that I hadn't noticed the pain in my chest. I remember hearing Twilight yell something and everything went fuzzy as I started to pass out. I woke up to Twilight standing over me holding a defibrillator and an intense fire in my chest.
I went back to my cell after Twilight revived me. Against my protests, Golden Dawn elected to stay with me that night. She followed me into the room and helped me into the bed. Then she pushed the couch up next to me and curled up into an adorable ball. I reached an arm out and rested it on her back. She reached out with a wing, draping it across my chest. The hours passed slowly but I eventually fell asleep.
I was jolted awake as I heard the door to the cell fly open. A disheveled looking Twilight stood directly in front of the bed I was in, her eyes were bloodshot, as if she had been up all night, but her expression was calm.
"We need to go," Twilight said, her voice shaky.
"What's going on?" Golden asked. "Do you to talk to Hail Storm? I can help you get him out of the cell."
"No... I understood her question." I said with a bit of confusion.
"I dispelled the suppression field, can you walk?" Twilight asked, looking at me.
"Not very well, what's going on?"
"You need to come with me if you want to live," Twilight said.
"Did you figure something out, can you cure him?" Golden Dawn asked.
"No, not exactly, the damage to Hail Storm's body is too severe to cure without magic and the magic to cure him would kill him," Twilight said.
"Then what's going on?" Golden Dawn asked as I struggled to get out of bed.
"All I can offer is a chance, but we should hurry, the weaker Hail Storm is the less it is likely that he will survive it," Twilight said.
Golden helped me out of bed, while Twilight urged us to hurry. When it was clear that I wasn't able to move fast enough, Golden Dawn lifted me up and placed me on her back. She was a little short compared to the horses I had ridden on before, and I'd never ridden one without a saddle, but unlike a normal horse she was actually concerned with keeping me from falling off. Somehow, likely though the impressive balance I'd seen ponies use to carry things on their back before, she managed to keep me from slipping as we galloped down the hall, following Twilight as she twisted and turned through hallway after hallway until we finally arrived at a large door.
Twilight opened the door, revealing what looked like a small study. Books lined the walls and at a small desk a huge pile of scrolls reached toward the high ceiling. The only thing else in the room was a large mirror on a very fancy pedestal. The frame of the mirror was encrusted in red jewels and resembled an archway made up of an upside-down horseshoe. Twilight headed for the mirror and Golden Dawn followed.
"This is the mirror I told you about, the one that took me to the human world, I had it shipped here from the Crystal Empire after you showed up," Twilight said.
"I don't understand, are you going to send me there?" Whatever Twilight's plan was, I wasn't following it.
"No, I've been trying but I can't open the portal to that world right now, our universes have drifted too far apart for a stable connection to be made. It's only fair that I go over my plan first, let's get Hail Storm in that chair over there."
Twilight floated the chair behind the desk over to us and Golden got me sitting in it.
"I've been trying to figure out the adaptation part of the portal spell since I first learned about you but as I said I was unable to find a copy of the spell in the archives. The enchantment on this mirror consists of two major parts. First is the spell that pierces the dimensional barrier and opens the portal from our world to the next. The other part is the adaptation spell. Both spells are extremely complex, rivaling the one that I used that granted me these," Twilight said flapping her wings.
"Of the two parts, the adaptation spell is more complex and unfortunately the surviving notes only briefly touch up upon it, so figuring out how it worked has taken me a great deal of time. My hope had been if I could determine how it made changes to a body that passed through the portal, I'd be able create a spell that used a similar process to change Hail Storm's body enough that magic was no longer deadly."
"Ok, I'm following that," I said, Golden Dawn nodded as well.
"The problem is, like I said, it's a very complex spell. I still don't understand enough to reproduce it, but I have an idea. I have been able to learn enough about the dimensional gateway and I think I can change the location and shift the mirror to point at a different dimension."
"So you can send me home?"
"No, well maybe, if we knew where your home was, but I don't. In fact I don't even know yet how to locate your dimension. I haven't gotten that far yet, but I might be able to point this portal at our own dimension."
"What good would that do?" Golden Dawn asked. "If I'm understanding you correctly, it sounds like he's just step through and come out the other side."
"That's exactly what would happen... I hope. But there's more to it. If I can get the portal to open, and Hail Storm steps through it, the adaptation spell should try to change him."
"And that will cure me?" I asked.
Before Twilight answer the question, Princess Cadance stepped into the room, her lips turned downward in a deep frown.
"No Hail Storm, in all likelihood, it will kill you," she said sadly.
Before Cadance could say anymore, Twilight spoke up again.
"I won't lie to you Hail Storm, this is risky, very risky. There are a number of problems. The amount of magic the portal will expose you to is high, if you were still healthy it might not be a problem but in your condition it could kill you."
"The portal I took here didn't seem to do any serious harm," I said.
"Discord's portal worked similar to this one, but it was cast with chaos magic. As far as I can tell, you're actually far less vulnerable to chaos magic than the magic used to create the mirror," Twilight said.
"Can you make a portal with chaos magic?" I asked.
"No, I can't. The best I can do is try to simulate chaos magic and use that to power the mirror instead of the normal magic. Discord's magic and pony magic are just too different for me to create actual chaos magic. Besides that, the portal spell isn't designed to link up to the same dimension, I think it will just dump you on the other side of the mirror, but there's a chance you could end up at a random spot almost anywhere."
"Could it be worse than popping up in the middle of the Badlands? I survived that," I said with a weak chuckle.
"Er... yes, when I said random spot anywhere, I meant anywhere in the universe. Given that most of the universe is empty space, you'd more than likely appear in hard vacuum, but if you did find yourself on Equus, you could find yourself materializing inside the planet instead of on its surface..."
"So yeah, a bit worse than a desert," I said with a gulp.
"Even if you end up on the other side of the portal, and the adaptation spell works, you still won't be healed," Cadance said. "And even if Twilight powers the portal with her simulated chaos magic, it's still going to do more damage to you if you go through it. It might even cause enough damage that we might not be able to fix it, even with a powerful healing spells."
"What kind of odds are we talking about here?" I asked.
"That you'll end up in the other side of the portal, at least 80%, that I'm sure of," Twilight said.
"That's not too bad, what about adaptation spell?"
"If it doesn't kill you outright, it's pretty much guaranteed to work, maybe a 20% chance to survive the the portal itself. I can't speak for healing the damage after, there's too many factors to make an accurate prediction," Cadance said. She saw me wince at her statement and gave me a sad look. "I told Twilight that I didn't want to try this, it's too risky."
Golden Dawn had remained silent during the explanation, but now she spoke up, her voice strong and unwavering.
"I think you are forgetting something, Hail Storm's chance of survival is zero if we don't do something. He's dying right now and this is the only thing you've been able to come up with, will he last long enough for you to figure something else out?"
"Golden Dawn is right," I said pulling myself up off the chair. "In any case, it's my life, and I really don't want to die waiting for a better solution. I’d rather go out trying something. Shouldn't I get to choose if I want to take the risk or not?"
Cadance sighed and then nodded slowly, "Very well, since you are aware of all the risks and it is your life that is on the line, I will not stand against your decision."
"I do have one question though," I said while pulling myself up and out of my chair. "You keep saying that this adaptation spell will change me. What exactly is it going to do?"
"That's the one part of this whole thing I can answer with absolute certainty," Twilight said with a small grin.
"And...?"
Her ears flattened out and she scratched at the floor a hoof as she gave me an innocent smile. "It will turn you into a pony."
"What?"
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But he will be alive, Sooooooooooooooooo...
Here's hoping that he some how is able to return.
At the very least, he can start a relationship with Golden Dawn
also..... DAMN YOU CLIFFHANGERS!
8022697
Fixed, thanks!
8022558
Who's to say he couldn't have as a human?
8022741
Fair Point, fair point.
But, it might be a bit awkward for him.
BUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUT, you are the writer and not me. I leave his fate and love in your hands.
8022741 then i shall wait
impatiently thenI wonder what kind of pony he shall become, my hope is pegasus XD
mostly because i like pegasi and as far as I've seen there aren't really many human turned pegasus stories around
8022752
Heh, it definitely could be awkward, no argument there.
8022880 Hmmm....
Ways to make it really awkward for Harold:
Earth pony--not so much.
(rest of Equestria: "oh--futa!")
Unicorn--a little bit, but too cliche.
Pegasus--Other than Rainbow will be trying to teach a "new flying buddy" and getting between Harold and Golden Dawn.
Alicorn--yeah...this could be awkward. Has to be a Red & Black alicorn for maximum effect, though.
Griffon--meh. Unless he comes out as a clone of Gilda, then Awkward Factor Five! And it'll be Seven when Rainbow sees him.
Minotaur--Hmm...getting there.
Dragon--Stu Alert!
Diamond Dog--Yuck.
Just plain dog--Are you kidding?
Yak--okay, that's just ick.
Naga--no, wait...that's the other story.
Changeling--Bingo!
A Blank Flank Foal--NEW MEMBER OF THE CMC! YAY!!
8023135
DING! DING! DING! WE HAVE A WINNER!
Of course that will be really awkward since all alicorns are female.
Next chapter: Introducing Equestria's newest royalty. The Princess of Firearms: Hail Storm
8023192 Awesome! Looking forward to it
8023201
Just in case anyone takes my previous post seriously, please don't.
8023205 but... But... But.... I WANT a princess or a prince of firearms!
8023205 Ah...I see....
So, "Gilda-clone" is still in the running?
Found a mistake:
once your organ start to fail,
*organs
Well, dang, I was hoping they could send him to the other "Earth" to be treated there by "human" medical experts, in a low-magic environment... And then when he's fully restored to health, they return him to Equestria and ...he turns into a pony... Oops!
8024436
I'm kind of the opposite, HiE stories where the human gets turned into a pony is pretty much my favorite sub-genre. I've wanted to write one since before I started writing. I just didn't want to jump in to one of those until I had a few stories under my belt. My hope was that my writing would improve enough to pull off at least a decent one.
I figured I'd see at least a few responses about that choice for this story. I get some people just don't care for human -> pony transformations. With any luck, I'll change your and other readers minds who don't normally care for those types of stories.
Either way, thanks for sticking with the story so far, and I really do hope you continue to enjoy it.
8025222
Heh, that's actually a pretty interesting way of solving the problem.
I could see it having its own issues though. Presumably medical treatment of the sort Hail would need would be expensive and it's unlikely he'd be able pay for it. Plus the damage (at least based on pony medical science) was rather extensive, it might not be able to be fixed by normal means.
Still, it's a kinda cool twist on how to deal with the problem.
8025019
Fixed!
Next chapter is just twilight saying "well fuck" and the story being tagged complete
8025264
As long as you don't go the black and red alicorn route I usually don't mind the pony transformation
8028519
If my chapter releases had gotten behind, and I had one coming out on April 1st, I actually had considered doing that.
8028637
So a purple and gold alicorn is okay?
Really though, I'm not doing that. I was a big fan of when Celestia and Luna were the only alicorns, I can't imagine I'll ever introduce new ones in any of my stories.
Though I have read one fic that pulled off an alicorn transformation quite well. The Dream of Many.
Fantastic story.
Well, that escalated quickly.
But, seriously, if you must turn the man into a pony, make him a Pegasus. The name "Hail Storm" absolutely screams for a Pegasus. That, and Golden would be able to help him with adapting. Now, whether or not he remains a he, I leave alone.
I want to say I don't mind this happening and I'd happily read on, but sadly I'll probably stop reading this now. I'll just mentally alter the plot of this story so that he died and didn't get resuscitated haha. It was a fun story and you're a good writer, but I don't have the free time that I used to and I just don't enjoy human turned pony stories I'm afraid.
I know this is stupid but I wish I'd know these things would crop up before I start reading, it kind of feels like a wasted investment of my time, but I'm aware it's my own stubbornness to read h->p stories stopping me. I sensed this was coming after the blog post anyway so not too shocking, and I knew it was on the table for quite a while based on his illness. I wish there were spoiler tags for this particular plot point I could view at my own risk of spoiling the story but it's a stupid idea really.
Anyway I wish you all the best with the story, I won't try and persuade you of anything as it's your story and you've done a good job so far, but I'm too aware of the sunk cost fallacy to keep reading what I most likely won't enjoy just because I've already read so much of it. Most people in the comments seem quite happy anyway, keep at it and I'm sure you'll end up with a great story. dont downvote me pls
8030407
That's fair, I completely understand that human -> pony stories are not for everyone. I figured at least some of my readers would not care for it. Unfortunately, to mangle a quote, you can't please all of the people all of the time. I've got a pretty solid plan for TRM and its sequel and Hail ending up as a pony fits that plan so there's no going back at this point. Thanks for reading this far and I appreciate the feedback. Maybe someday, if you ever change your mind, you can come back and finish the story. At least then you won't have wait for chapter updates.
8030594 No worries. I agree with you anyway, like I said I wouldn't try to persuade you otherwise as it's not my story, God knows I'm a terrible writer anyway. At the end of the day it's just something I'm personally not open to and that's my problem really.
There's a chance I could eventually come back to stories like these, I've left quite a few stories half way through over this issue. When I first started reading fimfiction in 2012 I detested the thought of HiE in general, whereas now I only ever read HiE, even if I only HiE tailored to my tastes. So if I'm still here in 2 years or so my tastes could have changed again and I'll be happy to finish this story, you never know. Anyway like I said, keep at it. I enjoyed the story up to now and you have solid, likeable characters, I was surprised this story didn't attract more attention than it did, especially as you update regularly which is great.
Best of luck with it!
8030658
I had the good fortune of stumbling on what (I think) is one of the best HiE stories (where the human turns pony) around as the 2nd pony fanfic I ever read. Right after I finished Fallout: Equestria, I found Project: Sunflower It's (at this point in time) actually the top rated human fix on FimFiction, so there's a good chance you are aware of it. If you are not, I highly recommend it as an example of a Human -> Pony story done well. It certainly blows anything I've ever written out of the water.
i.imgur.com/blk3X3X.png The secret is I wrote the whole thing already (as a first draft type thing). The 1 chapter per week updates allow me to do clean up / polish work instead of writing a whole chapter a week.
8030703 Yes I have heard of Project Sunflower, I've trawled this site enough times looking for new and interesting stories I might like to read and that has popped up a lot but I've never thought to read it, if I ever start to dabble in human-turned-pony stories I'll take your recommendation and read that first.
Also that's a good way of working on the story, I wish more stories were like this, the amount that are left unfinished that show great potential is such a shame. It's tough though, my problem is that I can come up with a good story, a good plot line, but I struggle fleshing it out and getting it down in prose. Right, I'll leave you be now and stop clogging up your comments section, if you write a straight up HiE story I'll be sure to give it a read. Goodbye!
at righty than.
I am thinking pegasus.
I mean, it makes sense online most human turned ponies. Though I was hoping they could just keep him human. Good chapter otherwise:
Called it!
Springing this sort of shit on unsuspecting readers only after they’ve read 110,000+ words should be a fucking crime.
8167217
Oh man this is a real bummer. That's it for me I really enjoyed the story so far it is well written and interesting but I just can't get to like transformation stories. Anyway keep it going.
terminator reference?
Look on the bright side, man - without the drugs they're supplying you, you'd likely be either a) already dead, or b) in considerable agony. Radiation poisoning is not a nice way to go - I would even propose that it's one of, if not the worst - ways to go.
You know how your body rots and falls apart after you die? Well... in the case of radiation poisoning, that basically happens while you're still alive, and it's essentially what kills you. Radiation destroys cells from the inside out, and it rips DNA to shreds. Breakdown of tissues follows, much like what would happen while rotting - except you're not being broken down by bacteria, but rather by high-energy "nuclear bullets".
Think of it like a machine gun, except with bullets sized for individual cells and a much higher fire rate: eventually you'll get enough of them that the body as a whole won't be able to go on. It's much the same on large scale, with extinction - after you kill off a certain percentage of a population, it just won't recover (without outside effort) regardless of how hard it tries to.
In fact, a month is kinda the upper end of "best-case scenario" when it comes to stuff like this. Typical timeframes are usually within 2 weeks (or perhaps a month spent in agony (or in a medical coma) in a hospital).
I'm thinking that's not how Discord operates at all. It's not like he'd construct a spell to exact specifications, select a target, evaluate and judge. No, he's interacting with his magic more like you would with a puppy - he gathered up some chaos magic, gave it a basic set of constraints (like "sapient, interesting, problematic, chaotic") and told it to go fetch.
Hal here just ended up being the nearest match, for whatever definitions of "nearest" and "match".
In a sense, you could propose two types of magic: process-oriented (like Twilight's, or Star Swirl's; generally "pony magic"), and goal-oriented (like Discord's). The fact that the portal increased size to accomodate the truck clearly showcases this - any process-oriented magical spell would just fizzle out, but this particular construct drew additional energy to match.