Magical Medicine

by yellowbastion

Chapter 7 part 1

Officially, you’re not supposed to be here. Unofficially, you have a guest pass for the day. You really should have been in the next town over, preparing to perform a great and wonderful show but you read a worrying article in one of Seaddle’s local newspapers. It was a short story about this expendable doofus, who is one of your closest friends, and how he had landed himself in the hospital, again. Not an unusual thing for him but it was still worrying. So you, being the caring and magnanimous pony that you are, you decided to postpone your show and take a few “personal days” to visit your injured friend in the Ponyville General hospital. You are a very anxious Trixie Lulamoon.

“Anonymous, what in the wide world of sports were you thinking?”

Your closest friend, other than your marefriend Starlight Glimmer, was an alien called a human which appeared in Equestria from another world. He is laying in a medical cot that is too short for his tall frame. His bare feet hung off the end which showed off those odd-shaped nubbins they have. His neck was wrapped in bandages and his mane seemed to be thinner than usual. His face and arms looked to be both more red and more pale at the same time. You’re not a doctor but it looked to you like Anon had taken several lightning bolts to his neck and arm. The burns were red, swollen, and seeping yellow liquids through the bandages that wrapped them. Why he wasn’t sedated you couldn’t even begin to guess. He must be in an unimaginable amount of pain right now. You should remember to ask the nurse if he could get some of the better pain medications. It probably wouldn’t make him feel better but it would at least make feeling awful a lot more enjoyable.

“That the cool glowing green rocks looked cool and would look very cool on me.” Was his off hoofed reply.

“They were clearly dangerous!” You huffed.

“Yeah, yeah. Hindsight is half-a-dozen or whatever. But they were being sold on a string. How the hell should I know. I don’t even know why you’re getting mad at me. I wasn’t the one selling the cursed stones of skin peeling.”

You crossed your hooves over your chest. “That’s not the point. You should have known better. Trixie is very disappointed in you.” You told him.

“In what way should I have known better? I’m the victim here and you’re literally blaming me, the victim. Pretty sure Equestria has laws against that sort of thing.” He replied.

“You know that magic affects you different than a pony. Given your track record with all things magical, you really should be more careful.”

All of which was true. You tried to levitate him once. You inwardly cringe at the memory. It took forever to scrape him off the ceiling of your trailer and you’re still occasionally finding and pulling out bone shards embedded in the walls. To this day you still have nightmares about it that exPrincess Luna can’t make go away.

“Trixie, I bought a necklace from a street vendor. Anywhere else other than Ponyville it would have been fine. And it wasn’t just me. Some other people got hurt by them, too. Tis’ Ponyville. Things like this happen all the time. You know that.”

You frowned. He was right, as he usually was, which you hate. You really, truly did know that these things just keep happening in Ponyville, somehow. This town has been a thorn in your flank from the very first day you arrived. Like with bone shards, it’s the smallest splinters that are the ones that hurt the most. Ponyville has been the place where unspeakable events that you dare not think about have occurred least your mood turn sour. Dumb Twilight and her friendship, and magic, and some other trash, yadda yadda yadda.

“Yes, well…” you pause to take a moment to adjust the clasp of your cape. You were in such a rush to see your friend that you forgot to take it off. It happens more often than you would like. Some might call you impulsive and they may not be entirely wrong. With a hoof you brush a mane curl behind your ear only for it to flop back over your eye. “So, how long until you are allowed to leave?”

“The horse doctor, Doctor Horse or something, says I need a few days of meds to clear out the bone hurting juice.”

He raised an arm and gave it a little shake. The tube attached the the needle stuck in his arm rattled against the metal bed frame. Your eyes followed the tube which was attached the bottom of a clear bag filled with a clear liquid which hung from a stand attached the the side of the bed. Beside that bag was a similarly clear bag of liquid hanging from a hook, ready and waiting to go. Some sort of intravenous drip, you suppose. You were never a fan of hospitals.

“A few days?” It was a relief to hear that the medicine for helping his condition actually worked and didn’t cause horrible mutations or some other such nonsense, “But while you’re in here, who’s looking after your changeling?”

Anon made a noncommittal shrug. “No one? They’re a rational, thinking individual. The doc said they can’t visit me while I’m stuck in here since they’re emotional vampires and all. I’m sure they’ll be totally fine without for me for a few days. What’s the worst that could happen?”

As an optimist, you like to think The Universe didn’t hear him say that, but, having once met the Alicorn avatar of The Universe itself and her proclivity of loitering around under open windows, you know better than that. And you’re in Ponyville of all places. You just hope that some pony other than you has to to clean him off the ceiling next time. Having done it once is more than enough for anypony.

Author's Note:

I swear, this is the last time I'm going to make additions to this chapter.