I hear a string of unintelligible words followed by the slamming of a door and the unmistakable pop of alcohol. In retrospect I probably shouldn’t have bought so many, but I had gotten her favourite. I get up and sigh. I guess I better address the situation that is my roommate.

I get out of bed and am met with a not-so-pleasant surprise. I have no feet. They’re just gone. All I see is the tough nail like substance that is a pony’s hoof. Giving a sigh of defeat I rise out of bed to meet another hectic day. By now I figured that I was a pony, or at least turning into one, and frankly, I no longer cared. In fact I was feeling a bit more comfortable with it. I stand up and look down to see what new things had gone on during the night. So far it looks the same; except for my feet/hooves I still have my tail, my longish hair and the cutie mark thing.

“Shadow! Um, we have to talk!” I hear Fireball yell from downstairs. I open my mouth to reply when I feel my tongue explore my mouth. All my teeth are flat. I groan in frustration as I realize that ponies are herbivores.

I wonder what’s up with Fireball. Does it have to do with that stream of obscenities I heard earlier? Is she hurt or in trouble? I reach the bottom the stairs to find her standing there. Wait… her? Oh shit! “Hey um…” My voice cracks.

“First, I'm a damn girl now. Second, do I need to pull down my pants and show you or do you take my word for it?” I take a good look at her and see she has more feminine facial features. “Well?”

“Um…” I cough nervously. “I believe you.”

Her face remains serious. “Good, because now I'm going to drink myself under the table and hope that when I wake up this’ll just be a nightmare.” She walked off in the direction of the kitchen.

A picture passes through my mind of Fireball, drunk, running around outside showing off to the whole world that we were freaks. The thought produced a prevailing emotion at the idea of being carted off to a lab or somewhere to be dissected. I jumped off the last few stairs and sprinted as best I could towards to the kitchen. I realized too late my folly as I came crashing to meet the hardwood floor in a less civilized manner.

Well it seems that hooves are of no use when walking on hardwood floor; well running at least, I hadn’t tried walking yet. I lay on the floor, partially stunned by my fall and tried to talk through the pain. Fireball hurried over, beer in hand, to survey the damage. "You alright?"

My spine still hurt from its collision but I weakly reached out for the beer in her hand. Hopefully she might catch on.

She looked at the beverage she was holding and laughed heartily. "Silly, beer isn't a good pain suppressant; you need something a bit stronger." I felt like face palming again.

The pain was starting to wear off now maybe I can talk. I opened my mouth and forced words out. "No… beer…"

Her smiling face turned into a frown. "What do you mean 'no beer'?" I saw a bit of flames dance in her eyes. "You think I'm going to go crazy don'tcha? Well I'll tell you something. I'm going through a crisis right now. I'm now a bucking woman AND turning into a pony. I need my medication!" She fumed.

I silently chastised myself for my mistrust. This was a loyal friend that had saved my life on some occasions; certainly she could handle the alcohol. "Sorry, I don't know what I was thinking; I'm a bit stressed out by the current events as well."

She offered her hand to help me and I accepted it. She pulled me to my feet and smiled. "No worries I understand. With A person with a track record such as mine I would be a little cautious as well." She slapped me on the back. "We're royal guards we were trained to combat odd situations!"

Her smile was infectious. "Yeah, it's not like things could get any worse."

A loud banging erupted from the front door. "Open up! I know you freaks are in there! You might as well open for me; I've already called the police!"

Fireball just glared at me. "You just HAD to say it, didn't you?" She hissed quietly.

“It’s your fault for wearing your tail out in public!” I whispered back. I walked over to my door and looked through the peephole to see if I could identify the intruder. “Oh Luna, why did it have to be him?”

“Open the damn door you horse freaks!” the figure shouted through the door.

“What? Who is it?” She asked, a bit worried.

“It’s my crazy neighbor who pretty much believes in every urban legend ever created. He is never going to leave us alone until he is proved wrong.” My voice dropped to a mutter. “And sometimes not even then.”

“Well it’s not like we can prove him wrong, we’re pretty much ponies now. We could ditch the house and try to get out of town.” He walked away from the door and beckoned me to do as well. Well buck, I hope our entire conversation wasn’t overheard.

“Well that is a possibility. I know my truck has a full tank of gas and we could probably siphon some more into containers from your car. Good thing you parked it in my garage last night. It could definitely get us at least halfway to Canada if we wanted.” I paused, trying to think of a good place that we could camp out till this was over and done. “Hey where is your computer, Google maps has yet to fail me in traveling matters.”

“S’over in the living room where it has been for quite a while.” He replied kind of slurred.

“Well while I'm doing this why don’t you pack up some other stuff before my crazy flank of a neighbor gets it into his head to do something else?” I opened up the computer, once again unlocked. Should really get him to create a password or some other locking device on this.

Pulling up Google maps I found Pampa TX and looked around for any other towns. I knew there was a small town to the north called ‘Perryton’ so checked with that first. Wait what was that? I thought I heard faint sirens in the distance. “OH SHIT FIREBALL THAT BUCKER WASN'T KIDDING!” The sirens were steadily growing louder. Perryton will have to do I guess. I grabbed the computer and stuffed it into his bag. The computer would be of use until were ponies, hopefully somebody would buy it or something.

I took one last look around my house before heading into the kitchen to see Fireball was heading for the garage door.

There was loud banging on our door and a commanding voice rang from it. “Residents, we have a report of a mutant horse people being housed in here. If that is you, please open the door and surrender yourselves.”

“Like buck we will, most likely send us off to a damn lab.” I whispered. The last thing we wanted was for them to be pushed to get in and me mouthing off to them would not help at all. “Come on; get into the truck.” He grabbed what he had and made off with it.

I was about to leave as well before I remembered something important. I ran quickly up the stairs, making sure not to make any sound at all. Under my bed was the strong fireproof box that kept most of my valuables. I quickly grabbed it and the key I kept under the mattress and hurried back downstairs.

Fireball was waiting by the back door, holding it open so as not to make any noise. “Shadow, what the buck are you doing man, we have to go. As much as I’ve wanted to run from the cops in real life, I aint looking forward to being shipped off to a lab.”

“Sorry, I had to get this, couldn’t leave without it.” He looked at the box, confused, but shrugged his shoulders and motioned to the garage. As if to finalize our departure I turned off the lights and sighed. I would probably never see this house again.

My truck was packed full, front and back, of everything we needed. Hopefully we wouldn’t have to worry about making pit stops or whatever.

Looking at the current situation I was glad I decided to park the truck in backwards when I put it into the garage. Opening the door would take too much time and besides, I wasn’t going to see the house again, why should I care what happens? I watched Fireball drop a beer can in the recycle bin and go to the driver’s side door. “Please man, can I drive? You never let me drive and this is like my one chance to get some ‘On the run’ action!” I hesitated.

“Well for one your drunk.” I started.

“Bah, I’ve got a partial immunity from years of drinking, I think I can handle a few beers.” She stated a matter-of-factly.

“You really want to don’t you?” She shook her head animatedly. “Fine you can drive.” I climbed into the passenger side.

She started to reach for the garage door opener but I shooed her hand away. She grinned maliciously, “I was hoping you would do that.” She inserted the keys and revved the engine. Oh Luna, how in the world are we going to get out of this? I think hear some yelling coming from outside. Must be my ears because I'm pretty sure I shouldn’t be able to hear anything over the engine.

Much to my chagrin she slammed on the gas and crashed through my garage door and into the street. There was a screech of tires as she swerved around police cars. Then to add insult to injury she took one hand flicked off the officers standing on the front porch. If this keeps up I'm going to have a handprint on my head from all her antics.

I can’t believe Fireball’s driving. We left more than just a few skid marks on our exit from the neighborhood. And of course the police officers were trained to respond to this sort of thing and were on our tail a few moments after he got onto the road so that didn’t help at all.

Thankfully my truck was the heavy-duty kind and was the king of traction. We managed to gain some ground after each turn but lost some during the straight ways.

Fireball of course was enjoying herself fully. She whooped and occasionally made obscene gestures out the window at the car following us.

“Fireball.” She didn’t respond. “Fireball.” Same results. “Fireball!” I shouted. That got her attention. “Your phone has internet right?” She nodded. “Well can I have it?” She nodded again.

The tires screeched as we went into another sharp turn. Thankfully not many people were driving at this time and we didn’t accidentally cause a wreck. “Aren’t you going to give it to me?”

Apparently this actually warranted a response unlike the last few questions. “I'm a little busy right now, it’s in my back right pocket just grab it.” I hesitated again. “What? Oh, you’re uncomfortable with that? You baby. You’re decent, but a baby. Just reach back there and grab it.”

I reached and dug into her pocket for her phone. She raised her butt up a little and my hand went inside the pocket a little easier. As I grasped the device I sought her tail brushed against my arm. My mind immediately went back to the dream I had. I heard a voice faintly saying, “Come on Shadow, you know you want to do more. Take me in all I am. Shadowwww, come on shadowwww…” “Shadow! Equestria to Shadow! WAKE UP DAMMIT!” My body shifted to the right as the truck lurched to the left. I shook my head in confusion, trying to draw myself away from the seductive form of Fireball in my head.

“Yo, Shadow, what the hay happened? You grabbed the phone and were just about to pull it out then just froze up.” She sounded concerned.

“It’s nothing.” She can’t know; she doesn’t need to know. I looked up and saw her looking at me with a look of concern. I smiled softly, and then out of the corner of my eye saw a tree. “WOAH! Keep your eyes on the road!”

She swerved to avoid the tree and resumed driving. “Oops. Well on another note; you were out for a good minute or so. You missed some great action. I took this really tight turn, and of course I nailed it, might have left a centimeter or two of rubber on the pavement, but I nailed it. Anyways, Smokey back there couldn’t take it and ended up skidding out of control. HA HA. Oh man, well, long story short we no longer have a tail.” She looked back at her butt. “Oh wait, yes we do. BWAHAHA. That was funny!” The truck started to drift into the left hand lane.

“Fireball, are you sober?” She looked a bit loopy and I wanted to make totally sure.

“Sober? Hay, I had another 3 beers while you were looking at the compooter. Ha pooter.” I suddenly did not feel safe in this truck anymore.

“Do you want me to drive? Or do you feel confident enough to do it?” I asked cautiously.

“Of course I feel up to it! I'm the only one who can outrun Smokey anyways.” Eh, I trust her enough; maybe it would be better if I handled directions anyways.

“Wait, who is Smokey?” I'm pretty sure it’s slang for something but I didn’t know what.

She snickered. “Heh, Smokey is da… erm… the police, yeah. Ya never heard the po-po being called ‘bears’?” I shook my head. “Well plug my phone into yer stereo thingy and find ‘Convoy’ on my music playlist thing.” I did as she asked and sat back to listen to the song.

We managed to make it to interstate 70 and continued north. I noticed that Fireball was starting to act a bit more civilized than before. I made sure that she stayed below the speed limit, no sense in giving the police a reason to pull us over considering the mess we made. Thirty minutes in however we had a problem. Fireball decided to take a nap.

Getting her out of the car, carrying her to the other side of it, then dumping her back into it was not a fun process. You’d think that because she is a girl she would be lighter, nope. It was a good workout transferring her from the driver’s side to the passenger’s side; one that I will never willingly do again. Luna, she was heavy! Of course I’ll never say this out loud; I like my face in its proper shape thank you.

Unfortunately around the same time I found out that we had been reported. Thankfully though the cop car driving past us did not take any notice to the black truck sitting on the side of the road. From that point onward I was exceptionally careful to watch for roadside police cars.

In the movies the bad guy is usually doing his best to get away from the scene of the crime, speeding in excess and making sharp turns. I was riding on the hope that the cops were stereotypes and assumed the same thing. There was also the fact that we had only avoided the law not any other crime, but I figured that after the show we put on they went back and listened to my damn neighbor a little more sincerely.

I started the engine and eased back onto the highway, pulling out a bag of chips and slowly munching on them. For some reason they made my brain a little foggy however so I stopped.

The highway was empty mostly, except for the occasional speedster that roared past us. That made the encounters with the law a little more uncomfortable. My heart beat faster and my hands clenched every time I pulled off to the side to let a cop roar by, the siren piercing the cab to shriek in my ears.

Eventually we reached the border of Perryton, Fireball had managed to claw her way out of her alcohol induced sleep but wasn’t quite sober yet so I'm not going to allow her behind the wheel.

Besides the occasional car or cop the trip had been very uneventful. Knowing my luck, however, that wouldn’t last long. Before we entered the town, which was a stupid thing to do, I looked for a side road to pull off onto so we could settle down and discuss our options. A few seconds later I saw a hospital sign and started to panic, hospitals mean people; people mean more chances of being discovered. Thankfully a side road opened up about half a mile from the hospital.

I slowed down in preparation to pull onto the side road. It was a tiny little thing, but it would have to do. I drove for about another 10-15 minutes, making sure that I was well away from the highway so we would avoid suspicion.

A few minutes after I was satisfied with the distance I had put between us and the danger, I parked in a small inlet to hide the truck in. Which reminds me, we had forgotten to siphon the gas out of Fireball’s car. At the thought I lost my temper. “Luna dammit! Why did this have to happen! My life was going great! Now all this pony shit comes and ruins it!” I kicked the truck in frustration. “Oh, Luna… what has my life come too?” I suddenly felt very drained. It was the middle of the afternoon and I felt as if I hadn’t had sleep in at least a day. I yawned loudly, loud enough for my passenger to hear from his side of the truck.

“You tired? I think in my stupor I, for some reason, grabbed a sleeping bag in your garage, you could use that if you wanted to. She grabbed said item and walked over to me, stumbling a little from the late effects of the alcohol. “Here, you lay down,” She looked around at the surrounding countryside. “somewhere, and I’ll keep watch, can’t let myself become rusty at my job now can I?”

I spread the bag out on the trunk of the truck, which had a covering over it. She put her arms up on the side of it and looked at me. “You get some sleep now ya hear? Don’t wantcha acting like your drunk when ya aint. Be an insult to the word ‘drunk’.” She brushed her hair out of her face, giving me a look at something I had not noticed before.

My eyes fluttered and I yawned deeply again. “You… you… you have a hooorrrnnnn…” The last of my sentence slurred as sleep overtook me. Next Chapter: Failure to protect Estimated time remaining: 2 Hours, 40 Minutes