Catch Me

by Hazel Mee

1 - Laura's Fall

"Tom?"

Laura prodded the inert lump of fiancee that lurked beneath the blankets and whined, "Thooomaaas… Wakey wakey."

Thomas groaned and rolled over, blinked at her with sleep bleary eyes as she struggled into a sports top. He yawned and asked, "How can you be so bloody chipper this early in the morning?"

She giggled and leaned down to kiss him, doing her best to ignore his morning breath. His neatly trimmed whiskers brushed against her upper lip and made her giggle against his lips. Breathlessly she whispered, "It's just one of my many, many fine qualities that you secretly admire."

Thomas' hand caressed up her side, leaving goosebumps in its wake and cupped one of her pert breasts, warming it through the stretchy, pink bra. "Mmmm… one of the many, yes. I especially love these two. Very high quality."

After another lingering kiss, Laura bounced up off of the bed and into the narrow aisle that ran down the centre of their rental caravan. She snagged a pair of dark red capri pants off of a hanger and slipped a slim, muscular leg into them. They were in dire need of a wash, like all of their clothing. Two weeks on the road—stopping only to camp, take in some of the Maritime's most touristy destinations, and climb some spectacular rock faces—hadn't left much time for housekeeping. Though the little camper van was superior to living out of a car's boot and pitching a tent, its limited luxuries didn't include a washing machine.

While considering which of her slightly manky smelling long-sleeved cardigans to wear, Laura kicked the wooden cabinet beneath the caravan's bed. "Come on, Major Tom! Up and at 'em. You promised me one last climb before Saint John." They would return the caravan today and be on a flight home to England by dinner-time.

"That was before you crushed my hips last night", Thomas moaned pitifully.

She relented on the kicking when he finally sat up, yawned and stretched. Laura paused in her dressing to admire the muscles moving under his pale skin. Because Thomas' idea of a good workout was swimming laps, he had very broad shoulders and a lean build. Laura was happy that he wasn't religious about it and didn't shave off the dusting of black hair on his chest and those deliciously broad shoulders. But daily dips in a chlorinated pool were hard on his curly, black hair. She always made sure to use her floral scented conditioner on it whenever they showered together, despite his complaints. It felt so much nicer afterwards and she always caught him running his fingers through it when he thought she wasn't looking.

Right now though, his bed-head just looked in desperate need of a wash as he scrubbed long, powerful fingers through it. He muttered, "Death by snu-snu?"

Laura snickered and replied, "Death by snu-snu."

"Is the tea on?"

"Nope! Dine after climb, ok?"

Thomas sighed dramatically, scooted over to the edge of the bed and stood up. "You're a wicked girl. Dragging your poor man out of the best sleep of his life and you don't even have the kettle on?"

Laura grimaced, which Thomas claimed made her nose wrinkle in the cutest way, and said, "I can't work that bloody gas hob. Maybe you can brew up for us when we get back, love?"

She stepped into the tiny washroom and stood in front of the caravan's equally tiny mirror to put her hair up. She didn't bother to brush the long, blond strands, so there would be hellish tangles to brush out, but that was a worry for later. For now, she bundled it together into a simple ponytail and pulled it through a pink, sparkly scrunchy to hold it in place. When she popped back into the corridor she found Thomas struggling in the narrow space to get into his cargo pants.

He grumbled, "This is how it's going to be from now on isn't it? Me, the downtrodden house-husband while you jet off to The Lakes to get your thrills?"

Laura laughed and grabbed one of his T-shirts to throw at his head. "Come off it, you twit! Let's gooo already! The sun's almost up."

"What!? The bloody sun's not even up yet?"

More petulant whining, gropey snuggles, and promises of oral sex (which Laura wasn't really keen on) were needed to keep Thomas from reneging on his early-morning-climb promise and crawling back into bed. A half hour or so later, they were finally out of the caravan and into the nippy New Brunswick morning. It was almost too chilly for what little Laura was wearing but the quick, uphill hike through a pine forest to the cliff face warmed her up. Since it was her last climb, Laura picked her favourite one of the three they had done since arriving at the Cochrane Lane Cliffs two days ago. This section of dark grey cliff was popular, with white blobs going all the way up showing where hundreds of chalk coated hands had left their marks.

Peering up between the cliff and the trees, Laura could see a blanket of grey clouds that grew brighter as the sun rose. It looked like the last day of their Canadian adventure would be a damp one, but there should be time for this quick morning workout and to pack away their rented climbing gear before it really started to pour.

Laura clipped her climbing harness to the belay rope and looked over to where Thomas stood near the edge of the forest. He already had the rope wrapped around his back and was taking up the slack.

"Ready?"

He yawned and gave her a nod. "All set. Just a half hour up and then you'll come back down so we can eat?"

"Hell, yes! I'm starving too."

The lowest part of the climb wasn't much of a challenge but as she climbed higher Laura dipped her hands into the chalk bag on her waist, rubbed it into her fingers and then realised she'd forgotten to take her beautiful engagement ring off. She cursed quietly, "Oh, bugger."

She wasn't in a position to take it off, not easily and not without risk of dropping it, so she decided to keep it on. She wasn't going to climb much further and would be careful not to scratch it.

"Everything ok, hon?" Thomas shouted up from almost a hundred feet below, his voice echoing strangely off of the stone in front of her nose.

She panted for a moment and shouted down, "Yes! Just catching my breath, love." No need to upset him about the ring. The chalk powder would wash off and he'd never know she'd messed up. Having caught her breath she continued the ascent, now with the added complication of keeping her left-hand ring-finger from rubbing against the abrasive stone. She grunted and swung her left leg up to the next toe-hold, her thighs and calves strained to take her weight and support it on the small bumps under her toes. She pushed her lean body up and reached with her left hand for thin, horizontal crease in the rock…

There was a bright flash of light.

Laura stared at the spot she had been reaching for and saw her precious engagement ring, floating in the air beyond the empty cuff of her knitted cardigan. The beautiful, little diamond caught the bright sunlight and sparkled while the gold band's shine was muted by a thin coat of white chalk. The rock face fell away from her and began whipping past. Orange and red hair fluttered and blew across her eyes. Just as she wondered why the belay rope hadn't caught her, she hit something, ass first. It gave under her weight and she rolled and flopped onto her back, her arms flailing as the springy something rebounded and shoved her back up again. She screamed in terror, but as the elastic bouncing, up and down, subsided her high-pitched screams turned into manic laughter.

After a few seconds her laughter died down into panting giggles and she rolled onto her side. She blinked her eyes a few times and shook her head to try and shift the weirdly bright orange hair away from her face. Was that her hair? Orange? She couldn't imagine how her hair would have turned such a vivid orange. Didn't your hair turn white when you were terrified? She spat out a few strands, turned her head to look around and felt a sudden horror that made her skin prickle. Her neck felt completely wrong! She had easily arched her head way past where it should be able to go. Laura froze, holding her head in place, fearing she had broken bones, torn tendons, maybe spine damage!

She hesitantly called out, "T-Tom?"

Something was wrong with her voice! It was higher in pitch than normal and had a weird timbre, maybe something had broken in her voice box? But it didn't hurt. Laura closed her eyes, inhaled deeply as she could without moving her body and called, "Thooomaaas?!"

She heard nothing but birdsong and pine tree needles rustling in the breeze.

"What the fuck?"

She inhaled deeply and screamed, "THOMAAAAAAS?!"

There was still no reply and she lay there for a few minutes trying to figure out what was happening. She'd fallen from the cliff. Landed on… She glanced down, trying to see through the orange hair what she was lying on. The hair had very clearly defined crimson streaks through it. Beneath her was a net of woven rope. Bright pink rope. She looked up the cliff face and could see where she'd fallen from, it wasn't very far, maybe twenty or thirty feet. Laura raised her head and slowly turned it from side to side, and it felt fine. Weirdly flexible but her neck didn't seem to be broken. She wiggled each arm and though they felt stiff she could feel and move them. Deciding that her neck probably wasn't broken, she tried moving her right leg and though it also felt stiff she could move it and feel it moving. Then something long and skinny twitched against her ass!

There was a snake or something in the back of her pants! She yelped and flailed her arms, trying to reach the top of her capri pants, but her arms weren't bending properly and her hands felt weird. The sleeves of her cardigan were pulled down over her hands but it felt like she'd broken them, though they didn't hurt—nothing really hurt—she just couldn't feel anything but the middle finger of each hand.

And there was a God damned snake in her pants!

After a few minutes of useless flailing around on the bouncy rope platform, she screamed in frustration. A sort of scream anyway. What came out of her mouth was a long, loud squeal that ended in a surprised whinny.

She lay there for a few moments, eyes wide as she panted, shocked by the noise she had made. The snake-thing twitched a few more times and the realisation slowly crept in that she was the one making it twitch. Laura could feel it. Could feel an extra limb back there on her derriere. Twitch, twitch, twitching. She could feel it moving against her butt cheeks, but could also feel her butt cheeks with whatever it was! And then she felt her ears move. They had folded flat when she screamed and she distinctly felt a weird rotating sensation on either side of her head as they stood up. Her hair stood on end and she shuddered.

Laura squeezed her eyes shut and lay still on the net. She tried to avoid moving because everything felt wrong when she moved and it was making her queasy. After a few minutes, her breathing slowed and deepened as the calm breeze, the sound of pine trees rustling, and distant bird song helped her to relax. Her ears twitched and rotated in a slightly sickening way whenever a nearby bird yelled at its neighbours.

Logical thought wasn't really Laura's forte. She thought of herself as an artist, or a writer, amateur potter, some kind of creative person anyway. But right now she needed to focus and think through what was happening to her if she was to have any chance to make sense of it.

Slowly opening her eyes she looked at her weird hair. Alright. Somehow her hair had changed from blond to this vivid orange with crimson streaks. Her ears moved much more than they should. She had grown a… something on her ass, and her hands felt weird. Right. She decided to focus on what was going on with her hands. Hands were extremely important when you were halfway up a bloody cliff.

With her heart pounding in her chest, she tried to push the cardigan's sleeve on her right arm up using her left… middle finger. When that didn't work she used her teeth, biting the upper part of the sleeve and pushing her arm down while yanking back with her head. Something was weird with her nose too, but she ignored it for now and after a couple of bites and pulls a shiny, grey lump popped out of the knitted cuff of her cardigan.

"Oh, my Goooood…"

Laura lay that way for quite a while, staring at her… She could only think of it as a 'hoof', where her hand used to be. Childhood dabbling in riding classes left little doubt in her mind that she was looking at a horse's foot. And it was undeniably her hoof. Fingernail. Whatever the hell it was. She could wiggle it and it felt like wiggling her middle finger. She wiggled her left 'middle finger' and watched the hoof-shaped bulge wrapped in that sleeve move.

Struggling to be logical, she tried to think of explanations for why this was happening to her.

Dreaming? Maybe, but if it was a dream it was the longest, most vivid and complex dream she could remember having. Usually, she didn't dream at all or they were just fragmented images. If it was a falling dream she should have woken up when she landed in the net, right? So probably not a dream. Unless she'd fallen, hit her head and was in a coma? Dreaming this nonsense while her body wasted away in a hospital bed? Could she have fallen and died? This was not the afterlife they'd taught her about as a kid, back when mum had taken her to C of E services. Did you end up with horse hooves in the Afterlife? Laura doubted it, much as she doubted everything they'd tried to teach her at church.

After pondering it for a while she decided that it didn't matter why this was happening. Just that it was happening and she could either lie here, trying not to move or freak out for the rest of her life, or afterlife, or until she woke up… Or she could get on with it. Whatever 'it' was.

Wiggling and flailing her limbs she rolled over onto her right side, then bit and tugged her other sleeve up and exposed another grey hoof. Her hooves. Looking at her left hoof caused a sudden memory flash of her engagement ring, floating in the air as she'd started to fall.

"Jesus Christ! My ring!"

Kicking her legs and flailing her arms, Laura tried to roll over onto her belly but her capri pants were tangled up around her legs. Grunting with effort she curled up on her side and tried to reach her legs with her hands to try and pull the red, fabric pant legs up and over what she suspected would be yet more hooves. It wasn't easy, especially with the loose climbing harness flopping around her waist and thighs as she struggled, but somehow the hand-hooves managed to grip the fabric. She bunched up the fabric and sure enough, there were two more grey hooves where her feet used to be. Wiggling her hind hooves felt really strange. Not like wiggling her big toe but like moving all of the little toes that used to be next to the big one. The sensation of moving a big toe was just… gone.

With a few more grunts of effort she managed to roll over onto her belly, which was made more complicated by her hooves trying to slip through gaps in the springy net. Once she was upright she shook her head to get her long hair out of her face; luckily the breeze co-operated.

She was lying on a large net woven of slightly stretchy, bright pink climbing rope. Someone had obviously set this up to catch her; there were chromed braces bolted onto the cliff and suspension ropes above her that kept the net in place. At the edge of the net, dangling next to the cliff face, was a tent. She recognised it from rock climbing magazines as an expensive Portaledge shelter, which she recalled consisted of a folding aluminium shelf with a tent you could attach to the top of it, all suspended from ropes anchored to the cliff above.

She glanced down through the net and saw that she was at least one hundred feet from the boulder strewn foot of the cliff. Laura whimpered. Not because of the height, she didn't mind heights, but because she knew there was no chance she'd ever see her ring again. Not unless she woke up anyway. She wondered if she'd ever see Thomas again. There was no sign of him down there, where she'd last seen him by the edge of the forest.

She sobbed and her eyes welled up with tears as an intense pain and pressure filled her chest. Laura hung her head and had what her mother would have called 'a good cry'. Confusion, frustration, feeling abandoned and afraid. It was a painful cry. A sobbing, sniffling breakdown with tears dripping from her cheeks and snot dribbling from her nose. But it helped. She felt a little better as it wound down, a bit more relaxed if tired and wrung out.

She rubbed at her nose, or tried to anyway, and ended up clouting herself with a surprisingly hard hoof. Wincing at the pain she gasped a short laugh at the mild pain and her own clumsiness. Rubbing the snot off of what felt like a strangely gigantic nose with her cardigan sleeve, Laura wished she had a proper hankey or even some paper towels. She snorted and snuffled, swallowed a lot of mucous and wiping her damp face turned into rubbing a hand… hoof… over her head. The fleshy part behind the hard hoof was quite sensitive and she felt around, trying to figure out what she looked like.

Her head was surprisingly human-like. Mostly round, unlike a proper horse's long head, and her snout was small, more like a pug dog than a horse. With her tongue she felt rows of flat teeth at the front, a slight gap where there should be pointed canines, and then rows of molars running down the sides. She closed her eyes and gently ran a hoof over her face. Her eye felt huge! She ran the hoof over one of those ears that wiggled and rotated so unsettlingly and then up onto the top of her head where she felt a slightly stiff crest of mane hair.

Laura imagined that she looked like a child's drawing of a baby horse, all big head and big eyes. No proper horse was flexible enough to run one of its hooves up over its own head like this! She sighed and set her hoof back down onto the web of ropes and lay there for a few minutes, feeling physically and mentally exhausted.

The light was getting reddish and dimmer. Laura realised that the sun was starting to set, even though it had been morning only a few… How long had it been anyway? She didn't think that it had been more than an hour since she landed on the net. Regardless, it was probably a bad idea to be lying here after sunset as the air was already feeling a bit cool.

Time to investigate the tent then.

Gritting her strange teeth and pursing her lips, Laura struggled to control her unfamiliar legs and arms. She didn't try to stand. That would have been foolish even with her actual arms and legs. Instead, she crawled, pushing with her legs and awkwardly trying to hook her finger-hooves into the webbing to pull herself forward. After a few minutes of struggle, she made it to the tent's zippered door. It was huge! The tent was much taller than it should be, based on what she remembered from marketing brochure photos of happy, handsome climbers bedding down in one. She fumbled at the zipper, which had a large plastic tag attached to it with a carabiner. Flipping it over she saw something that made her gasp.

'LAURA' was written on it. Or rather it had been written on a card which was then heat sealed inside the plastic name badge.

"Thomas!"

It had to have been Thomas who set up the net to catch her and this tent. Had to be! Her mood rebounded from what had been tears only a few minutes ago to relief and joy! Thomas was alive and even if he wasn't here, he was taking care of her. He'd saved her life! She closed her eyes and muttered, "Thank you. Thank you. Thank you." Though she couldn't say if she were thanking Thomas or a God she didn't believe in, she was grateful anyway.

Laura smiled and wiped a soggy cardigan sleeve against her cheek, then tried to grab a hold of the slick plastic name tag with one of her hooves. She was still lying on her belly and could only press a hoof down onto it or flip at it uselessly with the tip of her hoof. She sighed and crawled forward until her front hooves were resting on the steady aluminium shelf and used her lips to grab the name tag. With a jerk of her too-flexible neck, she tugged the zipper up a few inches. She pushed herself forward with her legs and pushed down with her arms, like doing a push-up, and dragged the zipper a few more inches.

She was surprised by how strong her arms seemed to be, but even rising up as high as she could she only got the zipper partly raised, opening up a small flap on one side. It was enough for her to nuzzle her head inside.

The front half of the tent was empty, just the tent fabric resting on the shelf underneath. In the dimming sunset light, Laura saw three bags in the rear of the tent. One was a large duffle bag and beside it were two of what looked like children's backpacks made of neon pink fabric and with Dora the Explorer graphics splashed all over them. On top of the bags were a rolled up blue foam camping mattress and a sleeping bag in its stuff sack.

Pushing and pulling, Laura forced her strange body the rest of the way into the tent.

"Please tell me you left me some water and food, Thomas." She still hadn't had breakfast and was parched and starving!

She crawled over to the pile of supplies and clumsily used her arms to grasp and roll the sleeping mat and bag down onto the floor. Another helpful plastic tag on the green duffle bag made it relatively easy to unzip. Inside she found three metal bottles, bags of what looked like dehydrated camping food, another bag of black, rip-stop nylon with a red cross on it, some boxes and on top of it all a three-ring binder with her name written on the cover.

Using her mouth she picked up the binder and tossed it on the floor with a jerk of her neck, before diving back in to retrieve one of the aluminium bottles. It was quite a struggle to get it open. She had to sit up, bracing her back against the bags and wedging the bottle between her thighs, holding it upright with her arms so she could twist the cap off with her teeth. Sitting like this made the— it could only be a tail—it made her tail hurt. Inside the bottle was water! It was warm and tasted of metal, but she felt ever so much better after a few sips.

It was difficult work, drinking. Laura had to set the bottle on the 'floor' of the tent, grab the bottle neck in her mouth and lean it a little sideways to get water to flow into her mouth. She was very careful not to knock it over. Getting the screw-on cap back on was much more difficult than getting it off.

She dug around in the dehydrated food and managed to tear open a mylar bag of dehydrated apple slices. She scarfed down most of them and had to struggle with the bottle again to get another drink to wash the dry lump down her throat. She felt much better, not as exhausted and freaked out, anyway. The apples had tasted very, very good!

As the sunlight dimmed an LED light at the peak of the tent started to glow, filling it with a cool white light. Laura looked up at it and figured that it must be solar powered, though she couldn't see any sign of a solar panel on the dangling lamp. It did give her enough light to struggle through getting the foam mattress unrolled and the sleeping bag extracted from its stuff sack, though both of them ended up with a fair bit of spit on them. She crawled onto them and tried to get comfortable. She liked to sleep on her back, limbs spread out all over, much to Thomas' amusement and annoyance. But now lying on her back put an uncomfortable strain on her spine and legs, and her arms kind of curled up to her chest rather than sprawling out. The damn climbing harness digging into her lower back and thighs didn't help either.

Laura flopped onto her left side and lay there for a few minutes, staring at her dimly lit hooves. She wasn't really sleepy, but she was mentally exhausted and could feel a nap coming on. First though, she decided, she was going to get out of the climbing harness and the snot crusted cardigan.

It was quite a struggle, especially the climbing harness. She ended up having to strip out of her capri pants as well just to get it over her hips. In a way, it was fortunate that she seemed to be much smaller now than she had been, as the baggy clothing was easier to remove than it could have been. As she stripped down her tail popped free from the pants and panties and it felt like a muscle cramp finally being relieved. In the dim LED light she had a hard time seeing what her tail looked like. She could move it freely now and flipped the long, striped hair around while trying to get used to the weird sensation.

Deciding to leave the sports bra for now, as it would certainly be a struggle to get out of, Laura nuzzled open the sleeping bag and crawled inside.

As she dozed off she wondered if she would fall asleep here and wake up in a hospital bed with tubes up her nose and Thomas holding her hand.

---

Laura awoke from a dream about climbing stairs in Quebec City. She'd been chasing someone past the picturesque shops and cafes, probably Thomas but she couldn't remember. It was completely dark now and she could hear a gentle wind rustling through trees. She blinked her eyes and licked her dry lips, then reached up a hand to rub her eyes.

Klonk!

"Fuck! Shitting piss!"

She groaned and more gently reached again to lightly rub her sore eyebrow with what she now remembered was a hard hoof. Laura groaned and whispered, "Jesus Christ, so this isn't a sodding dream."

She was thirsty and hungry again. She would have killed for a cup of tea and a plate of bacon, eggs, beans and toast. Flailing her arms and legs she wiggled her way out of the sleeping bag and sat up. It felt surprisingly natural to sit on her bum with her new, horsey-like legs tucked up and leaning forward with what felt like her middle-finger tips supporting her shoulders. She looked around and blinked a few times. She was effectively blind, there just wasn't enough light to see anything now that the LED light's battery had run out. But she could smell. Closing her eyes she lifted her nose up and sniffed at the air, which made a rather wet snuffling noise.

Pine trees. Dirt. A lot of different plants. Something musky that reminded her of her mum's old golden retriever. Apples. Paper. Aluminium. There were many other smells that she couldn't put a name to, but there were certainly a lot more individual odours than she had ever been able to smell before.

She could also hear a lot more than she had before. The sensation of her now longer ears moving around on the sides of her head was still disturbing. Sometimes they would move on their own, in reflex to a sudden sound. Like that very high pitched cheeping that shot past as something flew by the tent. But she could also make them move, changing the focus of her hearing. She could practically hear the shape of the tent from the light rustling sounds of the fabric moving in the breeze.

She twitched her tail, making it thump against the aluminium platform. Twitch, thump. Twitch, thump. That was such a strange sensation it made the hair on the back of her too-long neck stand on end.

Worried that she was starting to freak herself out, Laura decided to try and find something to eat. She vaguely stumbled to her feet… hooves… and wobbled the short distance to where she thought the duffle bag was. On the way, she managed to kick over the bottle of water that she'd left out and nearly fell on her face. Fortunately, it didn't go far and she was easily able to track its location with her freakish new ears.

After nosing around in the bags of dry food she detected the smell of bananas and pulled that bag out with her mouth. Awkwardly gripping it between her furry wrists she managed to tear the top off with her teeth and the rich smell of banana chips filled the tent. She nosed the bag open and used her lips and tongue to snatch up a couple of them.

"Mmmf! Oh! So good…" she moaned as she chewed. They tasted a little off, perhaps stale, but that didn't matter. They were sweet!

After eating half the bag she carefully inserted it back into the food pile and crawled over to where the water bottle had rolled. Working carefully she opened it and drank, only spilling a little onto the sleeping bag.

Laura set the bottle to one side and belched, almost clobbering herself with a hoof again as she tried to cover her mouth. She snorted in amusement at how her polite manners were pretty much useless given that there was no one else around. Who expected a horse to have good table manners anyway? For a while she sat in the dark tent, wondering what to do. She was wide awake and had no desire to sleep.

"Might as well get out of this bloody bra, I guess." She'd noticed a distinct lack of jiggle on her chest and if she was really a small horse now her 'girls' wouldn't be on her chest any more would they?

It was quite a struggle to get the stretchy sports bra; wiggling it over her head while shoving at the inside with her hooves. She spent a few minutes rolling on the sleeping bag to deal with the itchies that she only felt once it was off. Laura lay on her side and sighed heavily, causing a strange rumble and low whinny to come out of her mouth. Despite how bizarre this all was, she quickly grew bored. She wished that the LED light was still lit or that she had a torch so she could look through the binder that had her name on it. Maybe Thomas had packed a torch but she didn't want to try looking for it in the dark, not with these clumsy hooves. Most likely she'd have to find it by feel using her lips and that would mean getting spit all over everything. Ugh.

So with nothing else to do, Laura whiled away some time getting used to her strange body. She practised standing up, sitting, lying down and walking the few paces she could manage inside the confines of the tent. In a way, it was easier to do this in the pitch dark, with nothing to go on other than what it felt like her body was doing. After what was probably a couple of hours of self-investigation and movement practice, she flopped down onto the sleeping bag and tried lying on her belly. She found that her legs naturally settled into place but it took a couple of experiments to find a comfortable position for her arms; eventually settling on tucking them up against her chest, rather like a loafing cat.

Laura hoped it wouldn't be too much longer until dawn as she was going to need to pee soon and she imagined that would involve going out onto the net and hanging her ass over the edge. Not something she wanted to do in the dark… or at all, really.

It felt like only a moment later that she awoke with a start and realised that she could see. She must have nodded off and now her bladder was making no bones about it. It was time to perform a high-wire urinary act.

Out of the warm tent into a chilly grey morning, she slowly crawled onto the rope net. She went as far from the tent as she could manage, about six feet, and wiggled around until her bum was hanging over the edge of the net. As she relaxed her bladder she felt her tail start to lift a little and frantically wagged it to one side, getting it out of the way just before the stream shot out. She hummed quietly. Her body was weird and it was embarrassing peeing like this, but at least having a good morning slash still felt nicely relaxing.

After she had finished she crawled around to a more comfortable position and watched as the light increased, bringing detail and colour back to the world. Seeing the forest from above was quite breathtaking, especially as it had layers of mist drifting through it this morning. It was a bit like a fairytale. Which she supposed might be appropriate, given that she'd transformed into some kind of talking horse thing.

She could see her new body now and wiggled her finger-hooves. So damn surreal. Turning her head she tried to get a better look at herself and found that she could pretty much turn her head almost all the way around if she twisted her shoulder a little as well. Yes. It was bloody undeniable that she'd turned into some kind of horse. Her hide was a medium grey colour, matching her hooves, and she had a mane and tail of an intense orange with streaks of red running through it. There was a strange tattoo on the side of her butt that looked like a vividly green plant stem with one leaf but instead of a flower, there was a stylised red heart with angled lines through it. It took her a few minutes to recognise that it was supposed to be a red gemstone cut into the shape of a heart.

Laura checked out her other rump cheek and it had the same picture on it. Reaching back with a far-too-flexible arm… fore leg… she rubbed at it. There were no smears so it didn't seem to be painted on.

"Rriiight… Because it's not enough that I'm a freakish, talking horse thing?" She sighed, closed her eyes and leaned up against the cool rock of the cliff. She desperately wished that Thomas was here to hug her and whisper in her ear that everything was going to be alright. Not that he would recognise her, would he? As her mood started to slip she felt the strangest sensation. It was like someone was near her and felt sad for her. Blinking her eyes open she looked around, and sure enough, she was still on her own, hanging off the side of a cliff.

Weird… but, somehow it made her feel a little better. Like being in trouble as a kid and knowing that your mum or dad was coming to find you.

Laura made her way back into the Portaledge tent and dug under the sleeping bag to find the binder that had been in the duffle bag. There was enough light now that she could read and she desperately hoped there was a letter or something from Thomas. She sat down with it between her front hooves and clumsily flipped it open with her nose. Inside were about a dozen printed pages which had been sealed in plastic.

Dearest Laura.

I'm so sorry that I can't be there with you right now. You must be so confused and upset by what has happened to you. I love you. I wish I could do more than just write you this letter. As you might have realised by now, I set up the safety net, tent and some supplies for you. If you're reading this then it worked! God, please let this work.

Right now you are almost certainly a small horse. A 'pony'. The same thing has happened to a lot of other people, including me. I'm now a white unicorn with a purple mane and a yellow dodie¹ for a 'cutie mark'. That's what 'everypony' is calling the pictures on their rumps.

I'll include a document that one of my friends wrote to give to people who've just returned. It will give you some basic info on what the 'Event' is, about your body and also some survival tips. God but I wish I could be there for you when you return, but nopony knows how long it will be before you come back. I'm sorry if all of this is a bit much. Read that guide, it will help!

I've put together some food, a pair of saddlebags (I hope Dora the Explorer is okay. :)) and I've tried to set up a safe place for you in Welsford. There's a rope ladder tied at the end of the platform, untie it and it should drop to the ground so you can climb down. If you have wings DO NOT TRY FLYING! Use the ladder, it's safer until you learn how to fly.

You'll find a map at the back of this book. Take the satellite phone to the house I've marked and charge it up using the solar panels, then dial '0'. That will put you in touch with somepony who can help.

I'm living in what used to be Boston with some friends I've made since I returned. Please come and find me! I love you, Laura.

Your Thomas.

X X X O O O

Laura sat for a few moments, trying to understand everything she'd just read. She read it again. A lot of it seemed like nonsense but the important parts boiled down to; Thomas is alive, he's a unicorn (!?) and is living in Boston. And he wanted her to find him there. Or, wait… no. He said to go to Welsford first. But why wasn't he here right now? It sounded like he 'returned' before she had. How long ago?

Flipping to the back of the book she found a simple hand-drawn map showing where she was at the Cochrane Lane Cliffs and a red line going along several roads, trending north to a small town where one of the house-squares had a red 'X' through it. Laura vaguely recalled Welsford. They had driven through it on their way to the Cliffs and had stopped briefly at the town's only petrol station and market. The 'X' marked house was across the road from that petrol station.

She flipped back to the first page and re-read Thomas' letter again before nosing to the page after the map. In big, bold type at the top of the page it read; Why The F**k Am I A Pony? and Other Important Questions Answered.

Laura couldn't help smirking at the title. At least whoever wrote it had a sense of humour and enough wit to try and relieve tension by starting with a vulgar joke.

The rest of the guide was a pretty straightforward, if unbelievable, explanation of the situation she found herself in. The 'Event' happened when the entire Milky Way galaxy had become poisonous to humans because of a new radiation that everypony (everyone?) was calling 'Magic'. The ponies in another universe 'next door', called 'Equestria', had cast a 'spell' on the world that turned everyone into an Equestrian life form that could survive the 'magic'. Mostly they turned into ponies of three different 'tribes' but there were also some griffins, zebras, dogs, dragons and 'others'. There was a short description of these 'earth pony', 'pegasus' and 'unicorn' tribes.

Laura quickly determined that she was an 'earth pony' since she didn't have wings or a horn. According to the guide, earth ponies didn't cast spells and couldn't fly, but were very strong and excellent farmers. Ugh. Just her luck to 'return' as a bog standard pony. She'd been nothing special before this Event, and she was nothing special now. It figured.

The guide explained that people didn't all become ponies at once, but would be 'returning' for many years to come. It didn't explain why, but she'd experienced it herself so it was probably true. One moment she'd been climbing and the next she'd landed on a structure that had obviously taken Thomas some time to build.

There apparently were some humans who survived the Event unchanged, but the guide didn't give much detail other than it was safest to avoid them. That struck Laura as being very strange but there was no explanation, just 'avoid'. She shuddered, imagining that maybe the last 'true' humans were hunting or experimenting on people who came back as ponies.

There was a list of places where ponies… people… had gathered to create new towns. Alexandria (Paris, Illinois), Ponytown (Toronto, Ontario), Beantown (Boston, Massachusetts), Grand-Sault (Grand Falls, New Brunswick) and a few others. There was a list of radio frequencies for various stations that were broadcasting and a brief guide on using a satellite telephone.

The remaining pages of the guide was a York Notes on wilderness survival, for ponies. What to eat, what to not eat. Where to look for shelter. What kind of animals to watch out for. That kind of thing.

Laura looked at the map in the back for a while, then flipped back to Thomas' letter. She read it yet again, now with a little more understanding of what had happened. Or at least what she'd read had happened anyway, she was sceptical of a lot of it. Magic. Time travel. It was a lot to be asked to believe in with bugger all proof.

One thing she couldn't deny, she was a 'pony' now.

A pony who needed to get to Welsford and make a phone call.

Digging into the duffle bag, Laura grabbed a mylar bag labelled 'Vegetarian Chilli'. It was more-or-less noon after all. She noticed one of the boxes was labelled as being a campground kitchen which included a pot, mug, plate, bowl, utensils and a portable wood stove. She hoped Thomas had included tea bags somewhere. But for now, cold chilli would do.

It took far too much clumsy effort but she got the bag open and poured water into the dry ingredients, which didn't smell promising. Wrinkling her nose, or muzzle, she set it to one side to soak for a while and went back to investigating the contents of the duffle bag. Along with the food and camp kitchen, there was a box labelled 'Iridium 9505A Rental Kit' with the photo of what looked like a very old cell phone on it. Some warm, child-sized clothing that included a sweater, hat and a waterproof windbreaker, but strangely there were no pants. A small First Aid kit. A multi-tool that was a hammer, hatchet and pliers with a slew of other tools folded into the handles. Sure enough, there was a hand-cranked LED light on a headband. There were a few other odds and ends; a whistle, a mylar blanket, a small mirror…

"A mirror!" Laura grabbed the mirror up with one of her hooves, which if she had stopped to think about it would have made her wonder how exactly she had managed it. Instead, she held it up at arm's length and tried to get a good look at herself.

Her face reminded her a little of the photos she'd seen of very young horses. A foal. But with much, much larger eyes. Freakishly large! They were a very intense blue, not the warm brown eyes that she used to complain were boring. These new eyes were intense! Laura blinked a few times and rotated the mirror to see more of her face. Sure enough she had leaf shaped pony ears on either side of her head with a long mane that would have been a mohawk if it were cropped shorter, instead it flopped off to the right side of her head in a wave of orange and crimson.

She was… Cute. Plush toy cute, not the pixie-like, round face that she remembered.

Laura sighed and put the mirror down. Her tummy grumbled so she clumsily crawled over to the chilli to see if it was edible. It was a bit crunchy, but with her new muzzle and very long tongue, she was able to scoop it into her mouth without needing a spoon. She had no idea if she could even use a spoon. The flavour was pretty mediocre and being a few years past date didn't help at all. She hoped it wouldn't make her ill. Having the trots would be especially difficult one hundred feet up in the air.

Laura snickered and licked the last of the not-actually-spicy sauce from her muzzle. The trots. Funny stuff.

She looked around the tent and considered what to do next. She stood up, still wobbling a bit on four legs but she was getting used to that, and the sensation of holding her head cranked way back from what would be comfortable for a human. She slowly walked over to the the pair of children's backpacks and nosed at them. They were unzipped and when she checked inside they were empty. Huh. Thomas must have intended for her to pack them herself for some reason. The shoulder straps had been modified so that they were connected to one another and a padded velcro belt connected them at the bottom.

Saddlebags.

Ok. She'd need to finish looking through the supplies and pack the bags before she could walk to Welsford. That would take a while. Even with a wind-up LED light, she didn't fancy the idea of walking at night. The guide was also pretty clear that travelling at night was a bad idea.

Right then. Time to get packing then.

It kept her a busy through the afternoon. Opening boxes, organising, filling the backpacks, trying them on and then repacking to balance them a little better. After that Laura read through the manual for the satellite phone, then the small manual for the First Aid kit, and then she re-read everything in the binder. By then it was getting late so she ate a dry dinner of fruit and nuts, drank more metallic and tepid water, made use of the *ahem* facilities, and then tried to sort out her clothing.

The sports bra was pointless, she'd found the new location of her breasts exactly where they would be on a horse; between her legs. They were so small, much smaller than her petite A cups had been. But that wasn't a bad thing, she realised, as having even her small girls squeezed down between her thighs all the time wouldn't have been comfortable. The cardigan wasn't too difficult to get into once she had laboriously rolled the sleeves up using her hooves and mouth. Awkward, but do-able. The capri pants were useless. Perhaps if she could cut the legs much shorter and fashion a hole for her tail, but as they were they would just be painful to wear. Fortunately, the cardigan was long and hung back over her rump. It would do for now.

Panties? Not without a tail hole. She stuffed them and the pants into one of the saddlebags along with the knitted hat and rain jacket that Thomas had given her. She didn't want to leave the sweater, but there just wasn't any room for it and it wasn't cold enough for a thick sweater.

Laura finished off the water in the first bottle and tucked it into the saddlebags. She had two left, which should be enough for tomorrow's hike. After that, she'd need to fill the bottles from a creek and use the iodine in the First Aid kit to make it relatively safe to drink. It was starting to get dark so she slid into the sleeping bag and hoped that the weather would be good in the morning.

---

She had a vivid dream about bright colours flickering and a music unlike any she had heard before, but that reminded her a little of wind chimes. Pure, vibrating notes all chiming together in a tinkling harmony that was somehow more beautiful and meaningful than any music she had ever heard before.

Laura's grey muzzle yawned wide and she smacked her lips before crawling out of bed. She was still awkward and a bit clumsy, but she no longer felt like she was going to fall over with every slow step. After a quick breakfast of stale granola bars and water, she bundled up the sleeping bag, only now cluing in that its small size meant that it was made for a child. It was a good thing too since she was going to have to carry it. A couple of loose straps attached it and the sleeping pad to the saddlebags, which she could only hope wasn't getting too heavy for the long walk ahead. She'd packed suitcases and backpacks before, but never something that a horse would carry.

Laura's insides gurgled and she knew that it was time to go. Either she had to be on the ground soon or she'd discover exactly what it was like to poop off a cliff.

Unzipping the door on the other side of the tent was less difficult than opening the first one had been. Probably because Laura was now standing on a relatively stable platform, rather than crawling around on a bouncy net. A couple of days practice using her hooves and mouth probably helped too.

Crouching down she stuck her head out the door and looked around for the ladder. It was attached to the cliff face next to the platform, rolled up like a snail shell. It was made of strong looking plastic-coated wire cable with sturdy, square aluminium rungs. She couldn't imagine how Thomas could have climbed up here to hammer in the bolts into the rock. Magic maybe? He'd written that he had turned into a unicorn after all; the pony tribe that was proficient with magic. She saw that there were two straps wrapped around the ladder with a long metal pin holding them both closed, with another of the big plastic tags attached to the end. Grabbing it with her teeth she pulled and tugged at it until it suddenly slipped free, sending her stumbling back into the tent where she sat down heavily. She missed seeing the ladder fall, but it was very loud! Her ears pinned back against her skull, which helped block out the worst of it.

Crawling up to the edge of the shelf again she looked down as the ladder stopped swinging and settled into place. She gulped and hoped she was ready for this. She loved climbing but had never free climbed much, certainly never this high and never, ever as a bloody horse!

Fine. Right. No point in delaying, it would just give her time to get more anxious.

Laura scooted under the saddlebags, sat up and used her mouth to pull one side of the belt across her belly, pinned it with a hoof and pulled the other side across. She pressed the velcro together with a hoof and then stood up and shook herself, wiggling her hips to check if it was on tight. She sat, tugged the belt open and tried again. Once she was more-or-less satisfied she walked to the edge of the shelf.

She'd have to go out butt first. So she turned around, crouched low and stretched a hoof out and felt around for the ladder. It was nerve wracking, feeling for the rungs with solid chunks of hoof which were effectively numb. Once both of her hind hooves felt stable she let her weight settle onto them and slowly eased herself backwards out of the tent. She then reached behind herself with one of her way too bendy fore legs and found a rung to hook the hoof over. A little more shuffling and sliding and she had all four of them on the ladder.

Laura paused for a moment to catch her breath. But she felt good! That was probably the most difficult part, just step-by-step to the ground now and she didn't feel even a little bit tired yet.

It was still very awkward to reach down with a rear hoof and feel around for a rung, but her fore legs were surprisingly good for hooking over the rungs and supporting her weight. It certainly felt strange, a bit like hanging from just her middle fingers, but they were very strong middle fingers.

About a dozen rungs down she started to run into trouble. The damn saddlebags were slipping despite being so tight that it hurt. They really needed some kind of strap to hook around her shoulders as well. Too late now though, she was committed to getting to the ground, one way or another. A few more rungs and it became obvious that she wasn't going to be able to go on like this, the straps were sliding down around her thighs, making it difficult to move her legs and the top straps were painfully crushing her tail.

She stopped to catch her breath. Fortunately, she didn't feel tired at all and it was with a calm, collected mind that she considered what to do. Laura glanced over her shoulder and saw that she was maybe halfway down with another fifty feet or so to go. Not a chance in Hell she could jump without breaking something. There really wasn't any choice, the saddlebags would have to go.

Bracing her rear hooves and making sure that her right front hoof was solidly hooked over a rung, she slid her left hoof down her chest and tried to reach the belt. It was just barely in reach and it took several tries before she finally slid her hoof under the end of the strap. Straining to keep her hoof in place she wedged the velcro apart, inch by inch. Until it suddenly gave and the saddlebags slipped away. As she hooked her left hoof over the rung again there was a loud crash from below, followed a couple of smaller ones and a bit of tumbling and clanking.

Laura winced and hoped nothing was too badly smashed up.

The rest of the descent was easy, though there was a bit of sliding down the slope once she let go of the ladder. She fell on her face and ended up with a snootful of dirt and dry pine needles. After snorting them out of her nostrils and rubbing the dirt away against a sleeve, she slowly walked around looking for the colourful saddlebags. And thank goodness they were colourful because it made them easy to find.

Taking stock of the damage was depressing. One of the full water bottles had ruptured and soaked everything in its backpack, including the satellite phone, which had come through with just a scuffed case and a small crack in the plastic over the screen. She could only hope that it would still work and that she could make it to town with the remaining bottle of water. She drank what little remained in the broken bottle and abandoned it.

After strapping herself back in she looked around for the trail back to the road, finally spotting a blue blaze marking on one of the trees. It was slow going as she was not used to walking on four legs. It felt like crawling only somehow crawling on her tippy toes and finger tips, while she felt very top heavy and prone to tipping over. There wasn't much sign of the trail that they'd used to hike to the cliff only a few days ago, the underbrush was thick and her shortness made it difficult to spot the trail markings.

She was pushing her way through some brush and spitting leaves out of her mouth when it struck her that they actually tasted pretty damn good! Much better than the freeze dried food she'd been eating while stuck up on the cliff. So she grazed a little as she walked, feeling adventurous even though she had no idea if what she nibbled on would make her sick or not. The guide's list of edible plants was certainly much longer than the poisonous ones.

After far too long a hike she finally stepped out of the underbrush and into a grassy meadow. On the far side, she saw what looked a bit like a small shack, one that was familiar in a queer way. Slowly walking over to it through the chin-high grass she suddenly realised that it was the caravan that she and Thomas had rented!

It was a wreck!

Laura walked slowly around it, pushing grass out of the way to get a good look. It was filthy and rust was everywhere, both plainly visible and bubbling under the paint. The tires were flat and slowly disappearing into the ground. One of the windows was smashed and the door hung open, half torn from its hinges. Any doubts she'd held that a lot of time had passed were gone.

She stopped for a little while to drink some of her last bottle of water. Laura was tempted to go inside and have a look around, but she didn't like the idea of going into an enclosed space that some animal might have made into its den. She strapped the saddlebags on again and started walking down the overgrown dirt road that led to the road to town. She had a house to find and a satellite phone to try.

Hopefully, Thomas would pick up.

Author's Note:

¹ dodie: a baby pacifier

Please PM me if you see any typos or other errors.

Edit: Now with a bunch of fixes courtesy of Cross Lament

Comments

[Zutcha]

Neat. It's been a while since I sat down and read one of these side stories in one sitting. Couldn't put it down.
Imma link this in Starscribe's discord server.

[Hazel Mee]

8393178
I'm glad that you're enjoying it so far, and thank you for linking for me.

[RuinQueenofOblivion]

Well you're off to a good start, I'll keep an eye on this one.

[Starscribe]

Man, it's a pleasure to see such high quality writing in the PaP setting. Keep up the great work!

[SolangeEggbert]

I can only agree - a great start!

[Cross Lament]

Finger-hooves!

[Hazel Mee]

8394228
Thank you!

Hopefully what I have planned for Catch Me will mesh well with what's already written in the PaP verse. I've read all of your stories and a bunch of the Side Stories, so... *fingers crossed*

[Hazel Mee]

8394322
Thank you!

[Hazel Mee]

8394041
Thank you!

I hope you'll enjoy what's coming. (And that I can write it at a reasonably quick pace...)

[Hazel Mee]

8394679
A pony waving one of their fore hooves at you is always going to be 'giving you the finger'. How rude!

[RuinQueenofOblivion]

8395500 yeah, I'm trying my hoof at this kind of story too so I'm reading as much as I can.

[Alkarasu]

Huh, an... hmm... 25AE story? Please, continue.

[Alden MacManx]

Not bad at all. Okay, I'm hooked.

[Detsella Morningdew]

I'm glad that at least one story doesn't shy away from bathroom activities, but the number of times it's mentioned is honestly a bit much, almost as if someone was into it.

Otherwise great story so far. If it doesn't become a recurring problem, I'm sure I'll love it.

[Hazel Mee]

9460669
I'm not 'into' bathroom activities, no.

I've enjoyed watching a lot of tiny house / green-living / homesteading documentaries where dealing with human waste is an important part of building a home away from utilities. I think it's an interesting challenge for low/no-tech once-humans, who no longer have the same anatomy, to have to adapt to.

Thank you for pointing out that I'd mentioned it a few too many times.