• Published 14th Nov 2012
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Guided Rhythm - Valshe



What would you do if you woke up and found yourself transformed into a famous DJ?

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Small, White, and Can't Fight

Chapter 9: Small, White, and Can’t Fight
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I drifted into the place between sleep and wakefulness to someone yelling, but in my half-asleep state, I decided to just keep my eyes closed. I wanted to sleep for about another fifteen minutes. Then I heard the clopping of hooves heading towards the door, but soon heard a startled yelp as I heard Merille’s voice.

“Hey, everyone else is up already. We were wondering if you wanted to come get some breakfast with us.”

Since I figured I wasn’t going to get any more sleep, I decided to wake up. Also, my stomach was growling now, and the mention of breakfast made me excited. “Breakfast! So, where we going? Waffle House? IHOP?”

“Gah!’ I heard a startled voice shout beside me. I quickly turned to see that Zecora was trying to regain her composure. “I’m glad you are now awake, but must every morning start with a headache.”

When she asked if every morning would start with a headache, an idea came to me. It’s not everyday you would wake up as a talking technicolor horse that can use magic. I thought that an event like this deserved to be immortalized in an epic photo album. Ideas come to me at the weirdest of times. “Hey... I just got a great idea. How about we start taking pictures while we’re on this road trip! Breakfast can wait a bit.”

Zecora put a hoof to her chin as she began to speak her thoughts. “Pictures of all four of us? I guess its not too much of a fuss.”

Serah clopped her hooves together, “That sounds like a fun idea! It isn’t often that someone goes across the country.”

“I have journeyed across the country plenty of times,” said Trixie, “though I suppose a record of our exploits would do no harm.”

I had quickly turned to Merille and asked, “You got your phone with you, right?”He nodded a bit, “Could you take a photo of us four sitting on the bed?” I quickly got up on the bed and took a seat.

Serah giggled a bit as she happily climbed up on the bed, back legs kicking for a few moments as she pulled herself up from the edge.

“So, if I may?” Zecora asked aloud, “Is this spot ok?” Redheart simply nodded and grinned.

“On the bed?” Trixie asked, raising a hoof and scrunching up her face.

I rolled my eyes a bit as I grabbed her with my magic. “Yes, on the bed!”

“Aye!” yipped Trixie as she bounced onto the mattress, landing softly next to me.

Taking a quick glance at Trixie, I threw a hoof over her shoulder. “Come on, Trixie, smile for the camera!”

There was a quick flash as Merille snapped the picture. He took a quick look at it and said, “It came out good, but for some reason, the colors of the room changed to blue.” He flipped the phone over to show us, and, true to his word, the colors of the picture were quite different from that of the actual room.

“Well, we are all travelling to New York to stop Discord, maybe he thought such a simple parlour trick would frighten us?” Trixie suggested, pulling herself out of my grip and hopping off the bed.

It sounded reasonable, knowing Discord, he’d do anything from small pranks to worldwide catastrophes. Though he would have to do a lot more to scare us off, like a producing a group of insane bikers. Something like that might deter us, but the chances of that happening were pretty damn low.

I hopped off of the bed and started to head towards the door. “Now, with that out of the way, how’s about we get some food?”

“Hmmm...” Trixie smacked her lips together. “Breakfast does sound like an amazing idea right now.” She stretched, yawned, then tensed as she glanced over at the night stand. “What time is it? The clock appears to be missing.”

Everyone else looked at to where the clock once was.That was odd, what could have happened to it? I pondered it for a bit before my stomach reminded me that I was hungry. “That’s weird. Oh well. I’m too hungry to care.”

Zecora looked right at me and raised an eyebrow. “Hmm.? Don't you recall? The changes you installed...” She trailed off for some reason.

I just continued to look at her confused, “What are you talking about? I don’t know how to install anything unless it deals with a computer.” I giggled a bit as she was stumbling a bit on her words, “You must have had one odd dream.”

“Oh....” Zecora made a faux grin and rubbed the back of her head. “I guess that’s easier to accept. I... might have broken it as I slept...”

Hearing that made me laugh a bit, the thought of the sage-like Zecora kicking things in her sleep sounded hilarious to me. “Wow Zeccy, I had no idea you would break things as you sleep. Anyway, let’s get some breakfast. I’m starving!”

It wasn't long afterwards that we found ourselves packing our things and making our way back to Luis’ Prius. We needed to get to New York as soon as possible, so we rushed a lot of things headed off to the car with bags not fully zipped.

Standing next to the Prius was Luis, Snips, and Snails. Luis was putting the two colts in the trunk as we arrived. He looked over to us and asked, “You all ready to go? We’re going to head over to the nearby Waffle House.”

“I am prepared!” Trixie shouted from inside the car. “Onward, driver!”

A quick drive across the two city lights and we found ourselves at the small diner. As I stepped out of the car, I took a look at the sign. The “W” and “U” were broken off, so it made it look like it said “Affle Hose.” I thought that was kind of funny. It gave the place character. Overall, I had a good feeling about this place. I giggled at the sign a bit before Trixie magicked the door open. The moment I stepped through the door people stared at us. I gave a friendly wave to the other customers.

Trixie stepped up to the counter, stares following her intently as she reared up and leaned her fore hooves against the counter. “Ahem,” yes, she actually said ‘ahem’. She floated her hat above the counter and waved it at one of the cashiers. “Excuse me, I’d like to order some food.”

The cashier looked down to see who or what waved the hat. I guessed by his surprised look, he had never seen a pony yet. “Uh, Sure ma’am. Is the others behind you with you as well?”

“Yes, they are,” Trixie answered, ignoring the confused overtones of the cashier. “I’ll have a double waffle and some apple juice.”

I hurried next to Trixie and placed my order, “Cheese omelette, with toast and hash browns! And some good ol’ fashioned OJ as my drink!”

I took a quick look at Zecora, who was kind of frozen in place. With my magic, I dragged her to the cashier’s counter. She began to look at the menu and cringed each time in which (I assumed) a meat-based product appeared.

After looking through it for about a minute, she said quietly,“I think, just... some pecan pancakes would be fine? That is, if no one would mind.”

The cashier gave me a funny look before he added it all into the register. The rest of the group ordered, and we seated ourselves in two adjacent booths. Merille, myself, Redheart and Zecora sat at one while Trixie, Snips, Snails, and Luis sat at the other. In a few minutes our orders were brought to us, and I was left to stare at my plate of the cheese omelette, toast, hash browns, and bacon. Oh bacon, how I missed thee so. Sadly, with mine newest form, I shan’t be able to taste what was once the sweet nectar of the gods.

“Why would they give me meat, that I can't even eat.” Zecora groaned as she pushed the plate away.

With a forlorn feel, I handed my side dish of bacon to Merille. “Here, you’ll love it more than I will.”

When everyone handed Merille the bacon, he looked at the food with a disgusted look. That was odd of him, as two of his favorite foods were bacon and nutella. “Hey, Merille, you don’t feel too good? You look like you’re about to—” That’s when I saw it... His hair, which was formerly blonde, was now navy blue. “WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO YOUR HAIR!?”

After cringing a bit at my sudden amplification of the volume of my voice, Zecora looked at Merille and gawked at his hair. “I.. er.. don't mean to stare, but why’d you dye your hair?”

Merille continued to look at us with a confused expression when Trixie’s head poked over the edge of her booth, head hovering over his hair. She nodded at the hair and smiled. “Excellent choice in hair color if I do say so myself,” she said, pointing at her cornflower coat as she spoke.

Snips poked his head out from the edge of the booth, and as he saw Merille’s abnormal color change, he visibly paled. “El Discord ha llegado para ti!”

The smile on Trixie’s face fell off as her pupils narrowed. “We need to go, now.”

Sure, Discord might have had something to do with a hair dye, but I was still hungry. “But I’m still eating here!”

Trixie jumped out of her booth seat. Horn glowing, a levitated Snails floated behind her as she stared daggers at me. “Now!”

Well, I didn’t want to start another fight, so I gave in. I took the food in a magic grip, not the dishes, just the food, and hopped out of the booth.

Zecora looked at Trixie, confused by the show mare’s panic. “But its barely even noon.” She asked lightly. “Why must we leave so soon?”

Merille took a quick look at his reflection in the window, and immediately started to freak out. “What the... WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING!? We’re definitely leaving. Now that I’m turning into Sonic the Hedgehog.”

I giggled to myself a bit. That was pretty funny. Of course he’d crack some joke out of it.

Zecora covered her ears at the now blue-haired human’s outburst. “Ok, ok we’ll go.” She mumbled. “Just please, enough yelling though.” She sighed as she left the waffles behind and followed Trixie towards the door.

I watched the show mare curiously as she walked towards the front door. Something definitely had spooked her bad, and it didn't seem to be Merille’s hair. What was it that spooked her so badly?

Snips, still floating in Trixie’s magic, turned to look at Merille. “Madre de dios...”

“Pablo, not helping,” Trixie hissed. Her face brightened, smiling to all the people in the Waffle House staring at the spectacle. “Hello, good morning, wonderfully humid this morning, isn’t it?” She put Snips on the ground and braced her hooves against the door, pushing it open. She held it open, waving her hoof to usher us back towards the car.

After signaling us to follow, I took a quick glance to Serah, who shrugged. Though after following me out, she shouted, “The car! It’s being vandalized by thugs!”

I quickly turned to see who was trying to destroy the Prius.

And then my food fell from my magical grip.

There were five masked men relieving their pent up anger on our car. I watched as one of them took a metal bat and swung it at a window, shattering it. Even though they wore masks, the group still had the hats which identified what hate group they belonged to.

PAPA

Zecora took cover behind me as I began to seethe with anger. I couldn’t believe it. I wanted to just stay out of trouble today, on Halloween no less! I was just about ready to lunge at them, when I heard a voice in my head.

“Hey, those guys look dangerous. Let me take over, I’ll be able to take them down.” It was Vinyl, who was able to hear and see the chaos.

I just got angrier the more those vandals were messing up the car, one of them taking out Luis’s GPS and promptly breaking it.

I started growling now, that was the last straw. “No Vinyl. This is personal now.”

One of the humans, a skinny and spry-looking goon with gaunt features, went slack-jawed as his eyes passed over us. “Holy! You weren’t kidding! It’s a swarm of them! A pack!”

“Uh...” Snails stepped forward, holding a hoof to his chin. “Actually, we’re more of a herd?”

I suddenly heard Vinyl make a gagging sound, probably slack-jawed now, “Please tell me that I didn’t hear what I think I heard.”

The PAPA goon stepped forward, leaning down towards Snails. A light-blue glow surrounded his tail, and he was pulled back with a yelp as the human tried to snatch him up.

Snails floated mid-air beside Trixie, who scowled. “Hands off the crazed fanboy!” she called.

That guy was about to hurt a kid. Add to the fact that they are causing a shit-ton of damage to the car, our only means of transportation, made me go straight to attack mode. “You fuckers are gonna pay for messing up my friend’s car!”

I was just about to grab him, but then one of those guys grabbed me mid-step. I tried to think fast, but all I got was a quick hoof to the forehead as he quickly flung me to the now-broken car door. I felt my head smash whatever glass was left on the window before hitting the ground.

“You see what happened!? If only you let me take over, you wouldn’t have gotten your ass kicked so badly!” yelled Vinyl. In hindsight, I should have listened to her, but I let my anger get the best of me.



And right then and there, I learned my lesson that I should never count my chickens before they hatch, as the metal bat rolled off of the car and hit me right on the horn and temple.“Less okay...”

“Vinyl!” I heard a voice call out. I couldn’t tell who yelled it, as there was now a constant ringing sound in my head and because my glasses fell off of my face, everything was a bit blurry.

I soon felt myself being dragged behind the car, and I see a white and pink blur standing right in front of me. I rubbed my eyes and everything started to clear up a bit. Serah was standing before me, the trunk was now open as she grabbed a small first-aid kit.

I could hear screaming and yelling as Serah began to tend to my wounds. She looked at me with a worried expression. “Never do something as stupid as that again! You had us all scared!”

My head was spinning as I tried to make sense of what had happened. One moment, I was with the group staring in horror. The next, I was now behind the car with a possible concussion. Serah quickly galloped towards Merille, whom she told to put me in the car. As I was lifted up and placed in the back seat, I heard yelling and screaming from quite a bit of people and ponies, though I couldn’t see what was going on.

When I was placed in the car, Serah followed me inside with my glasses placed on her head. She brought the small first-aid kit with her as well as she continued to check my head.

“You have a small cut right here next to your horn. Luckily it isn’t anything major. You got really lucky, as that impact looked very scary. Though don’t do anything rash, as you might have a concussion.”

I couldn’t look Serah in the eyes, as I knew I had screwed up badly. I shouldn’t have acted so rash, and there I was paying the price with a head injury.

Soon, we heard a roar of a car as Luis pumped his fist in triumph. “Yes! Got it running, now let’s get the rest of the group and floor it out of here.”

He ran off and signaled for everyone else. He pointed to the Prius and said, “We got the car ready to go. Redheart’s looking over Vinyl’s injury. Just pile in the back seat, we don't have time to put everyone where they’re supposed to be.”

After we all quickly piled into the car, positioning ourselves amongst the torn cushions, Luis almost floored it as we left the Waffle House, though it took a few tries. The damage must have been really bad. It was a miracle that the car even started up.

Snails was pressed right next to Trixie, examining her hoof. “Is there a chip? I need to know if there’s a chip. What about my horn? If I damaged my horn protecting you...” She turned to Serah, who was applying a small bandage to my head. “Is it alright?”

Serah took a quick once-over at Trixie and said, “Yes. You’re alright. I can tell just by looking at you.”

All of that whining was really making my head hurt. She really needed to shut up for a bit. “Could you can it, Trixie? My head’s already hurting as it is.”

“No talent you said. Hmph!” Trixie turned her nose up. “Went charging into a fight and got knocked out instantly!”

I had opened my mouth to respond, but was quickly cut off by Merille. “Something’s really bothering my rump. I just can’t seem to get comfortable.” He kept on shifting around, trying to get comfortable, but each position only made him look even more uncomfortable. “God damn. Did those guys mess up the seats that bad?”

“It was totally awesome!” Snails yelled, pressing towards myself and Redheart. “The PAPA hit you like ‘Busch!’ Then Zecora was like ‘Dios es mio!’ but then she totally kicked their flanks!”

Zecora blushed deeply at the praise, then quickly turned away. “All I did was a buck, it was just simple luck.”

Really? So the once timid Zecora actually kicked some ass? I thought to myself as I looked over to her.

Soon enough, Merille kept complaining, “Really man this is very aggravating I...” He stopped for a moment as he stared slack-jawed at something, “have a tail now...”

Trixie’s ears twitched for a moment. “What!? That’s impossible, you’re awake!”

Merille simply held up a fluff of his tail to show it to us. “It’s Discord. You think he’d have a set of rules to go by? Ever thought he’s doing this just to fuck with us?”

Trixie stared, slack-jawed as the coarse, navy-blue hairs swayed a bit as Merille moved the tail. “It’s a-a... It’s a-it’s a-it’s a...” Her mouth flexed up and down as she kept mouthing the two words silently.

If Merille was transforming, then I guessed it spread like a virus. A sickness that causes people to turn into pastel colored talking horses. That caused me to chuckle a bit. “So, Merille caught a case of the pony, eh? Not really all that surprising to be honest. I kinda saw it coming.”

“Well, it could be worse,” piped up Trixie.

“How could this become any worse?” Zecora asked, her voice full of wonder and some frustration. “It’s starting to look more like a curse...”

It was then that I heard Vinyl’s voice in my head, “Now why do I think that something cliche is going to happen now?”

“No, a curse would be turning into short, white, and Little-Miss Can’t Fight here,” Trixie replied, pointing a hoof at me. There was a choking sound from the engine as Luis pulled to into a parking lot. Trixie winced. “Or that could happen.”

“Called it,” said Vinyl while laughing.

I looked out the window to see where we stopped at. It was a run-down bar full of Harleys in the front lot. To sum it up real quick, it was a real life Salty Spitoon.

Luis put both hands on his forehead in frustration. “Looks like she’s dead. Guess we have no choice but to ask for help. If it wasn’t for those damn vandals, we’d be halfway to Tennessee by now.”

“What!?” came a simultaneous exclamation from both myself and Serah.

With some protest from Serah, I climbed over to face Luis, “So you mean we’re stuck here!?” I pointed my hoof out of the window. “Here!? At a run-down bar?”

Zecora peered out the smashed car window at the bar. “Can't you try starting it up again? Surely we can't stop at this bikers’ den.”

The door opened and Trixie squeezed past Zecora. “Come on, one of us needs to call for a tow truck or taxi.”

Luis stepped out of the Prius before pulling a cell phone out of his pocket, “No worries. I’ll just make the call for a tow truck.”

He held the phone to his ear as he waited for a few moments. Not much longer later, he held the phone away from his ear as he turned towards us. “Damn. No signal.”

Zecora gave an audible sigh as she hopped out shortly behind Trixie. “This may be hard to construe, but what is it you plan to do?”

“Well,” said Trixie, “We’ll just have to hope there’s a phone...” She pointed to the bar with a hoof. “In there.”

Luis nodded his head in agreement as he turned towards the bar, but soon went wide-eyed as he said, “Hey Merille! Don’t go in just yet!”

Trixie face-hoofed and sighed. “Alright, we need to get this done soon.” She trotted past me and towards the door. “Luis, Zecora, find Merille while I get a phone. Redheart, make sure Vinyl doesn’t hurt herself anymore.”

The gravel crunched as Snips and Snails walked by Trixie, hooves moving in controlled motion in an attempt at stealth to no doubt follow their idol.

Trixie spun on her hooves and looked at the two colts. “You two,” she said to them. They perked up, listening attentively. Trixie’s head bobbed slightly as her face scrunched up in thought. “Keep watch.”

Both the brothers’ ears visibly drooped as they heard Trixie’s command, but they obeyed as they sulked back to mine and Serah’s side by the broken down car. I watched as the group of Zecora, Trixie, and Luis entered the bar.

After they entered the bar, I turned to Serah and said, “Hopefully, they won’t have any problems in there.”

She nodded as she hopped out of the car. “Yeah. We’ve all had enough drama for one day, even though it’s still morning.”

I followed her as I felt my hooves touch the gravel. I lifted my hoof up to head to prod a bit at my injury, but was quickly stopped by Serah. “Don’t do that, it won’t help your wound.”

I giggled a bit as I quickly brought my hoof back down. “Sorry. Sometimes, I just can’t help it.”

As Serah finished scolding me a bit, I heard a groan coming from behind me. I turned around to see Snails whining.

“What’s taking them so long?” Snails said, spinning around in circles.

“Easy brother,” responded Snips.

“But what if something happened to them? We should check.” Snails started for the door but Snips clamped down on the orange colt’s tail.

“Mm mm,” Snips grunted. “You’re not going in the bar, too young.” He spat out the tail. “Besides, we’re supposed to keep watch, right?” Snips was left with a light cloud of dust as Snails trotted to the door and used his mouth to open the door, leaving a drop of saliva on it.

Snips moaned in agitation and followed suit, sliding in through the door just as it swung shut. After seeing that, I tried to hurry and follow them inside, but I heard the roar of an engine pull in to the lot. I turned around to see a biker park an old van. He opened the back doors, pulled out a Harley, placed it next to the long row of other bikes, and start walking towards the bar door, but he stopped and stared right at me.

“Just what in the bloody hell are you supposed to be?” he asked, raising an eyebrow at me.

I gave a nervous laugh and weak smile as I said, “Well. Where do I begin? As you can see, I am a talking, oddly colored horse who happens to be associated with electronica music.”

I looked behind the guy and saw Serah frozen in place, apparently stymied by the appearance of the biker. He saw me turn my head towards Serah and the now broken Prius.

He gestured towards Serah and asked, “She with you?”

I nodded nervously. “Yeah, so is the Prius. But it got fucked up this morning. Some thugs messed it up pretty badly.”

He put a hand to his chin before asking, “Wait... So that’s why news reporters are swarming the Waffle House right now? Because those dudes that got arrested messed up a car? That ain’t cool man.”

Something told me that this guy wasn’t going to kill us, in fact, something told me that he actually might help us. It was the same feeling that I got with Tom Baker and Jonathan back in Mississippi.

I calmed down as I approached the Prius, signaling the biker to follow. “Yeah man, I mean, look at this. Though here’s what I don’t get... They said they want to stop the ponies from spreading, yet we’re going to New York to stop a guy named Discord, who is the one behind all of this.”

He took a look at the car before looking to his van. “You know, I can help you with that.” He broke the lock on the trunk of the Prius. “Let’s put all of your stuff in my van.”

Serah, who had finally broke from her trance grabbed me by the shoulders and yelled, “Are you insane!? You trust some random biker...”

She was cut off by the biker, who was putting some bags in the van. “Just sayin’... My name’s George.”

Serah gave an annoyed grunt before continuing, “You trust George to help us out? Someone whom you met for a total of three minutes!?”

I shrugged her off as I said, “Don’t worry. I got a good feeling about him. I don’t think that he’ll hurt us at all. Besides, it’s a free ride. Better than being stuck paying an unknown amount of money for a trashed Prius and be stranded here in Alabama.”

She groaned in agreement as she picked up a couple of bags with her mouth and dropped it in the van. As we finished putting the bags in the van, a biker burst from the bar doors and ran to George.

“Dude, there are some horse freaks in there causing a riot!” He looked past George and saw us. “What are those things doing with you?”

George looked back to myself and Redheart, “These two? Don’t worry. They’re cool. Believe it or not, they actually used to ride with us.” I saw the look on his face, he was obviously lying, just to try and make sure that this second biker wouldn’t hurt us.

The second biker’s jaw dropped, obviously buying it. “So that’s what happened to—”

He was cut off as Zecora, Luis, and Merille burst through the doors. Zecora was being carried by Luis and Merille now sported feathery pegasus wings.

Zecora fidgeted around as she asked, “What happened to our friends? I thought they were on our back end.” She kept glancing back to the bar doors with a frightened look on her face.

The door burst open again, and Snips and Snail tumbled out end-over-end as Trixie galloped out behind them. As the bar door slammed shut, she immediately glared over at Merille. “What were you thinking!? You just plunked us right into the middle of a bar brawl!”

Before Merille could even have a chance to respond, the second biker banged a metal pipe against the van to get their attention. “I hope you know you’ve just been green-lighted. You know what that means?” He said in a menacing tone.

Before he could say another word, George punched that second biker dead on in the face. The guy was down in a single hit. George turned back to me and gave me a thumbs up.

Zecora stared wide-eyed at me. “What in Equestria was that about?”

I hopped over the downed biker and looked up to George. “Thanks George. Now, how about helping us with getting out of here?”

The biker shook his head and reached into his pocket. “No, I gotta stay here and try to keep them from following right away.” He pulled out a set of keys and tossed them to me, which I caught with my magic.

I looked at Luis with a huge grin on my face and tossed the keys to him, “I’ll tell you all the story later, but for now, we need you to drive as fast as possible.”

Luis slid the door open, and we clambered inside, grateful for the extra room that it provided. As Luis turned the key in the ignition, bringing the engine to a roaring start, George yelled out. “Go, little ponies! This is no place for you.” We sped out of the driveway, several of us still panting from the excitement.

Not long after we were back on the road, we heard Luis say, “Hey guys, looks like we’re getting one more surprise today. Looks like we now finally know who the hell Merille became.”

We all looked over the seat and found what was once Merille, now fast-asleep in the passenger seat. His pants were now way too baggy for him, and his shoes now lay on the floor of the van. His skin was now covered with blue fur, and was now the size of the rest of us. Sure enough, sitting in the passenger seat was now a pegasus pony who looked very familiar.

“Uhhh...” Snails worked his jaw for a moment, no doubt contemplating the situation for all it was worth. “Soarin?”