After the third knock, Flam magicked the key out of his pocket and let himself in. He hadn’t expected Flim to fall asleep so soon; he must have been more ill than either of them thought. Even with the hallway light on, the hotel room seemed dark and dank, the stale smell of infection hovering in the air. Flam sighed and began filling the kettle.

“Brother?” he called towards the bedroom. “Are you asleep?”

Normally Flim would reply with a snarky ’Why, yes, Flam, I’m sound asleep. Thank you for asking.’ All that came from the cracked door was a grunt.

As he fiddled with the tea bag, waiting for the water to boil, Flam sat himself down on the tiles and thought about his fiancée, sleeping one room down. How much he loved her, and how he hated to see her tears. She had a sister, and yet...

“But you just proposed to me!” she’d screamed. “Shouldn’t I be your one and only?!”

...And yet, when it came down to it, she was a singleton. “Sugarplum, you can’t understand what it’s like to be a twin---“

“Oh, don’t you try that pitiful excuse on me again! You’re twins, but you’re not joined at the hip! He’s a grown stallion, Flam. He can take care of himself.”

“Not if he’s running a fever, Trixie. Come, now---I’ll just go check on him, and I’ll be back before you know it.”

As the conversation rang through his mind, Flam could feel a lump rise in his throat. He hated to admit it, but there was an inkling of truth to what she’d said. If their engagement was to hold this time, he couldn’t be by his brother’s side as much as he wanted anymore.

A startled, muffled cry came from the bedroom, making him jump. He could hear some thrashing; Flim must not be having a restful night. After dunking the tea bag in the boiling water, he arranged the necessary items on the tray---a little pot of milk, a few sugar cubes, a slice of lemon, and a snifter of brandy he’d pulled from his mini-fridge---and pushed his way into the bedroom.

"Flim?”

His brother had only been asleep for a half-hour at most, and yet he was already twisted up in his sheets like a fly in a spider’s web. His eyelids were rustling with a frantic kind of REM sleep.

Flam put the tea tray on the bedside table and nudged his twin's sweaty shoulder. “Flim?”

“Oh, Celestia...” he rasped out.

“Flim?” he said again as he lightly touched his elbow. “Wake up. You’re having a nightmare.”

Even through the thick keratin of his hoof, Flam could feel the heat of fever. No worry; he had prepared for this. He absentmindedly wiped the tip of the thermometer against his vest, and stuck it between Flim’s slack lips.

As his mouth rippled around the intrusion, Flim’s puffy left eye opened a crack. Flam moved so that he was in his brother’s line of vision, and forced a smile. “You keep that in there for a few minutes, okay? I’ll be back.”

As quickly as he could, he rushed to the bathroom and soaked a facecloth in cold water. All thoughts of Trixie’s conniption fit faded away, Flim’s ghastly pallor replacing them in his mind. Flam didn’t believe in intuition, but he somehow just knew that something was seriously wrong.

He rushed back into the bedroom, the soaked washcloth dangling from his hooftip. “C'mon, brother. Let’s get you cooled down, and then you can get some fluids into you.”

All he got was incoherent mumbling, cracked lips moving just enough for the thermometer to fall off onto a cushion.

He picked it up with a hoof while using magic to wipe the cool cloth against Flim's forehead and muzzle. One look at the mercury level, however, and Flam's ears flickered in irritation. He couldn't believe he'd fallen for that stupid joke again.

"Hey!" He cuffed his brother, not enough to leave a mark, but definitely enough that he should have felt it. "I know you're not really asleep!"

His eyes oscillated under the lids. "Brg... ?"

Shaking the thermometer in his face, Flam snapped "Knock it off! I know you held this against the lantern!"

"App... Abljag...?"

That sent a little chill down the back of his neck. Ever since they'd left Ponyville, Flim had insisted that neither of them speak that name out loud again.

"...Brother?" He carefully lifted one sticky eyelid as he rattled the mercury back in place. The instinctive reaction would be to blink and squint the intrusive hoof away, but Flim's iris had slid all the way back up in his skull. He was asleep... so that meant the previous temperature was no prank.

Flam jammed the thermometer back in the slack muzzle, and it slid right back out. For a few tense minutes he sat there holding his brother's jaw shut and counting the fluttering pulse in his jugular. When he looked at the temperature the second time, Flam went nearly as pale as Flim.

"No," he breathed. "That... that's impossible."

“Sure was nice of ‘em, wasn’t it?”

Big Mac nodded slightly, trying not to let the yoke shift around his neck. “Eeyup.”

Applejack glanced back at him, and her smile widened when she saw his. Although her brother had been his usual placid self while loading the gifts into the cart, she’d noticed the brief, faltering look of joy on his face when he’d spotted the stuffed bunny. Not that he’d ever admit it, but she was sure it had reminded him of ‘Snowy’, the little plush rabbit he used to drag around everywhere. He’d always do so by holding its foot in his mouth, mumbling something about ‘luck’. Even as a colt, he’d been so superstitious.

Not that she could blame him---they had both made the unspoken choice to walk the long way around Sweet Apple Acres so that Applejack didn’t have to be anywhere near the quiet, moss-grown field dotted with headstones. Big Mac even made a point of stepping between her and the yew tree. You could never be too careful, after all. “When you’re carrying life, you can’t get too near death,” Ma had said a few times.

“You’ll never guess who gave me that bunny rabbit.”

He tilted his head a bit and raised an eyebrow.

“Discord!”

The hoof he’d been about to place on the ground skipped a bit, and he had to shuffle to keep from tripping. “What?!”

“Yeah, I know. I wasn’t expecting him, either.” She laughed, remembering the look of shock on his face when she’d pecked his cheek. “Gave ‘im a kiss fer his trouble.”

“It’s...” He cautiously eyed the stack of presents. “It’s safe, ain’t it?”

“A’course it is! He wouldn’t booby-trap a toy!”

His mouth pulled around, as if he was trying not to scowl. “You c’n never be too careful when yer with foal.”

She had opened her mouth to answer, but he apparently wasn’t done: “Have you had a craving you couldn’t get lately?”

She sucked her teeth, thinning her lips around them. The only thing she hated more than a stallion asking prying questions about her pregnancy was when he was right. “I don’t see how that’s any business a’yers, unless yer sayin’ you wanna run out an’ get me some groceries.”

“Answer me, AJ.”

Quickly licking up the little slaver that had slid out of the corner of her mouth, she snapped “Yes, okay? Yes! I jes’ ate my weight in party food, but I’m starvin’ an’ all I c’n think about right now is a great, big, sticky bowl a’kimchi! You happy now, Mac?!”

She could tell by the way he bit his lip that he was trying to suppress a smile. “You hate Koltrean food.”

“Not now, I don’t.” Why did he even have to bring it up? “What’s it t’you?”

“Don’t touch yer face, AJ,” he said with a soft but surprising sternness.

“Quit tellin’ me what to do! Y’ain’t my---“

His huge hoof shot out in front of her, and she jolted in place. Since he hadn’t been trying to keep her from tripping, she looked up to his face, puzzled. Once he was sure she was paying attention, he moved his hoof from her barrel to his neck, and inched the yoke back. “See that?”

She just nodded. Of course she saw it---the tiny, smudge-like birthmark on his neck that had always embarrassed him, even though it was barely noticeable.

“If a pregnant mare can’t satisfy a cravin’, it poisons her whole body,” he explained. “Until the cravin’ passes, she can’t touch herself anywhere---or else the foal will end up with a birthmark where her hoof landed.”

“That’s the dumbest thing I ever h---“

“Ma wanted to eat a bunch’a unripe green apples right off the branches, but Pa wouldn’t let her,” he said, his voice low, his eyes darting away. “He said it’d make her sick. So she started scratchin’ her neck.”

“Lemme guess. That’s when she was carryin’ you?”

“Eeyup.”

“Big MacIntosh, I know yer the type who throws salt over his shoulder when he spills it, but even you can’t possibly believe somethin’ as stupid as that! It’s jes’ a silly supersti....”

And that’s when her voice pinched out into a squeak. Her brother seemed confused for a moment, and then he followed her gaze---and he saw it, too.

Perched atop their house was a shadowy figure, craning its sleek head down to the nursery window. Its beak jutted out towards the glass, and it tapped it, as if testing the strength.

Big Mac’s jaw muscles clenched as he tried to speak. “A--Applejack---!”

She gulped, watching the bird. It ruffled a bit, turning to preen at its black feathers, and then took to the air. It was gone in a flash.

There was silence between them for a few moments. Applejack was the first to find her voice. “Was that...”

“I-I did-dn’t see it clear enough.”

And neither had she. They looked at each other, and then back to the nursery window. Because of the distance, she hadn’t been able to see any details, so she couldn’t be sure if it had been a blackbird, the symbol of good luck----or a raven, the symbol of impending death.

Flim screamed, his hide prickling with terror. His hind hooves were skittering for purchase on the mattress, trying frantically to back away from the gross visage beside him. This seemed to amuse the Applejack-thing, who squalled out a laugh; her jaw was chittering around, making her molars clack into her moist, sticky gums. The coverlet was balled up between his shaking hooves, and he clutched it tightly against his chest, as if the scratchy fabric could protect him from whatever entity had taken residence in his dream. “No! No, you’re not dead! You’re not! You can’t be!”

Applejack’s body limply lifted from the bed, the sheets peeling off her back. “How would you know? And why would you care? You left us!”

“T-that’s not---“ His eyes flicked down to her exposed abdomen, and he gulped when he saw a crudely-stitched gash running from her barrel to her deflated teats. “That’s not fair! That’s not fair! You told me to leave! You said---“

Her rump moved into the air, followed by her thighs, and soon she was only barely touching the bed with the tips of her hooves. She’d mercifully turned her head from him to the ceiling, but the eerie smile was still in place. “Life’s not fair, and yet death is the greatest equalizer.”

“But---but if I’d---“

Celestia damn it. She was actually levitating, her spine stiff and her legs dangling. “’If ‘ifs’ and ‘buts’ were candy and nuts...” Her teeth snapped and chattered as the giggled.

Flim trembled, watching her take to the air. The only coherent thought in his now-ragged mind was: How is she flying? There was one answer that seemed rational, given the circumstances:

"P-Princess Luna?" he said with a quaver. "Is that you?"

"I beg your pardon?"

“Luna. Princess Luna. It h-has to be you, your Highness,” he said, slightly emboldened by the hint of surprise on her unnatural face. “And, with all due respect, I have to say that this is in very poor taste.”

Applejack's body stopped hovering, and she shut her husk-like eyelids. Then she let out a nasty laugh that seemed to loop and coil around the room, echoing off the walls.

"First you thought I was Applejack, and now you think I'm Luuuunaaaaaaaaa?"

Flim shuffled backwards until his back bumped against the headboard. Her usual alto had slid down a few octaves, becoming dark and oily in the process. "How---?! Your voice, it..."

"Ahahaha! Oh, I do a good drag, don't I?" the corpse said, striking a pose.

"What...?" He started shaking his head furiously. A stallion? What kind of stallion would have the power to enter somepony's dream?

"A dream? Oh no, you're terribly mistaken. This is no dream."

"Then explain this!" he said, dropping the coverlet that had been around his barrel.

"That? Well, you were trying to be a little brat and dropped a sickle on yourself."

He looked down in surprise. The wound was back, but now the skin that was tugging around the stitches looked pink and puffy. "Wh-what?! It was gone a minute ago!"

"I told you, this isn't a dream. You're not simply in your subconscious; we're in a different plane altogether," the creature said through Applejack's gaping mouth, and it flew a bit closer. Shaking its head, it let out a little tsk of disappointment. "And just look at you! You haven't changed the dressing on that wound in a fortnight, and now you have a nasty infection. I hate to sound like your mother---"

"You leave her out of this!"

It recoiled in mock-shock. "Ooh! Still huffy about that, are we?"

"Just..." He sighed and put his face in his hooves. "Just tell me what's going on. Please."

"Now where's the fun in that?"

Flim grabbed the nearest object---the bedside lantern---and hurled it at the floating corpse as hard as he could. He barely noticed it sailing right through the... was it a ghost? "TELL ME!"

"Very well." Closing the space between them, the thing with Applejack's face smiled and closed her eyes. "You see, Luna comes to good little ponies who need help being rescued from their nightmares."

The eyelids shot open again, and to Flim's horror he found himself looking into two sickly yellow bulbs that could barely be called eyes. Somehow those infected-looking pupils were worse than the empty sockets.

"...I, on the other hand," the voice went on as a cold, clammy hooftip traced down the side of Flim's face, "Come to meddle when somepony's fucked up."

His mind nearly shattered at what happened next. He had no words for what happened to Applejack's front hooves---they just exploded. As fragments of keratin flittered to the floor, a long, scaly talon shot out from her left stump, and a paw from her right.

"And you, Flim Skim, have fucked! Up! Royally!"

The doorknob was clattering as the key was jammed into it. Trixie made a little noise out her snout, halfway between a snort and a whimper. Even though she could have used her magic, she chose to lick her hooftip to turn the page on her magazine---it made her lack of attention toward the stallion at the door more pronounced. She didn’t even bother to turn when she heard the door bang against the wall. “Well. It’s about time you came back.”

“Trixie!”

“Oh, how sweet. You remembered my name,” she spat without looking up. “Considering how eager you were---and always are---to run off and look after Flim, Trixie wouldn’t be surprised if you changed your mind and proposed to him instead!”

But she squealed in surprise when she felt his fetlocks wrap around her ankle. The magazine fluttered to the floor, and she turned her startled gaze down to where Flam was laying prostrate, like a sinner at Heaven’s door. “P-Pookie...?”

He clutched her ankle tight to his chest, his eyes glimmering. “Trixie!” he said hoarsely. “Trixie, please! You have to help me!”

She was already off the couch, and dropped to her knees so that she could pull his heated cheeks up to her face. “What? What is it?!”

“Trixie, he... he’s dying!”

“What?!”

There had only been one other time she’d seen this kind of desperation on Flam’s face, and it terrified her deep down to her core. “Flam---pookie---just breathe! You’re going to give yourself a panic attack---“

But he shook his head out of her grasp, tears and hot snot creasing into his coat. He couldn’t even focus his eyes. “He’s dying! Trixie, he’s dying! You have to help me!”

“What do you mean?”

“Trixie,” he said, and finally looked her in the eyes. The raw panic she saw there was infectious. “We don’t have much time. His temperature is so high he’s going to get brain damage if I---if we---don’t do something, and fast!”

“B-but---“

His voice was so plaintive, and for just a moment, all she could see before her was a petrified little colt. She brought her frogs up to cup his sticky face. “Trixie,” Flam mouthed out, “I-if he dies, I’m going to die, too.”

“Run,” was all she could say. “Just, run. Run to him. The pegasus next door is a nurse---she’ll know what to do.”

He went crashing and stumbling out the door, and Trixie could feel her blood hammering in the little divot between her collarbones. That’s when she knew, when she finally understood---for the first time in her entire life, she realized what true love meant. It meant being so bonded to your mate that you could feel his panic, as if by osmosis. It meant she could feel his heart beating against her own, even when she wasn't holding him close. If Flim meant that much to him, well, she'd just have to learn to make room for him in her heart, because there was no way under Celestia’s sun she was going to let Flam slip away again.

Flim pushed his hooves against the mattress, forcing himself away from the hovering spectre.

"I know what you're thinking," it said through Applejack's mouth. "And don't worry. That puddle you're lying in is actually sweat."

"Who... what are you?" he croaked.

"Well, that depends. Which would you prefer---the traditional-yet-ever-so-cliche 'I go by many names' speech, or should I just cut to the chase?"

"Er... the latter." He looked away. "And please. Please stop posing as Applejack."

"I suppose you're right. I don't have the hips to pull this look off, anyway." The claw reached up to her face, and the talons sunk into her bangs. The visual was bad enough, but it was the squelching, ripping noise that made Flim regret his request; he had his eyes closed by the time her face had peeled away to the muzzle, but he'd seen what looked like antlers pop up when her scalp was torn off. He heard a slap, and realized, bile rising in his throat, that that must have been the sound of her skin as it hit the floor.

"Ooh-hoo, look at your face! Tears! Real tears!" He clasped his talon and paw together over his chest, sarcastically batting his eyelashes. "You actually care about her, don't you?"

Shuddering, Flim pressed his frogs to his eyelids. "What did I ever do to deserve this...?"

"Would you like the answer in essay form, or bullet points?" Something padded and leathery touched his cheek, then seized his jaw, forcing him to turn around. He opened his eyes, because he had a feeling that was inevitable.

He'd heard of Discord, of course, but he'd never seen him in the flesh, as it were. Artists were fond of depicting him, but when it came to cameras, he was strangely elusive. The descriptions Flim had heard made him sound like the kind of stew he ate when the groceries were running out---a bit of this, a little of that---but he had no idea seeing the real thing face-to-face would be so terrifying. It didn't help that he was absent-mindedly wiping Applejack's blood off his snout.

He had to force himself not to look at the shed skin on the floor. "Is she dead or isn't she?"

"As you are, but in her eyes. The waking world sees otherwise."

He fought the urge to punch that snaggle-tooth down his throat. "Dammit, I don't have time for riddles!"

"You're absolutely right. You don't have much time." With a snap of his fingers, the bedroom window creaked open, letting in a blast of cold air. The snow swirled around Discord's neck before settling in the form of a scarf. "This Spring won't bring a baby."

"What?! But..." Pressing his hooves to his temples, he mumbled "But we---she was conceived in the Spring. She has to have a Spring birthday. She..." Slowly, he raised his eyes from his lap. Something was clenching at his stomach, something like a cross between rage and fear. The talk about Applejack’s mortality had been bad enough, but talking about his daughter like that was over the fucking line. "Unless... is she going to die?"

He climbed out of the bed. Now he could feel every slam of his heartbeat, every surge of adrenalin. "Is she going to die? Or are they both dead already?!"

Discord, however, seemed preoccupied with sculpting his own replica out of snow, but Flim got his attention by smashing it into a tiny blizzard. "Answer me!"

"Well! That was rude," he said as he scuffed his hoof over what was left of the snow-creature. "I didn't even get the chance to place the piece de resistance!"

Before Flim could answer, an obscenely-large carrot was wagging in his face.

"And this wasn't going to be his nose."

He smacked it away. "Will you please start making sense?!"

With a laboured sigh, he floated into the air and coiled himself around the bedpost. "Oh, honestly. You ponies are all the same. It's always 'Start making sense, Discord!' 'Use logic, Discord!' 'Don't do that in a public place, Discord!' I have needs too, you know! Ugh." He ran his paw over his antlers. "It's even worse than when I tried to introduce String Theory. Now."

With another snap, he'd conjured a crude figurine in a striped vest. "This is you." Using his opposable tail, he lifted the Applejack-skin-mask off the floor. "This is your beloved." Then he 'walked' the Flim-figurine over to the mask. "You go trot yourself on back to her and tell her what I've told you. And don't think you can do it through a letter! She's been throwing those away, and donating the money you send to... oh, I don't know. Something..." Twirling his talon at the wrist, he searched for the right word with a sneer of disgust. "...noble. Appropriately enough, I think it's orphans."

Like any salespony worth his salt, Flim had a pretty good bullshit detector, and something about what Discord was saying seemed.... off. It almost felt like a set-up, but for what, he couldn't be sure. "If you're so chummy with her, why not tell her yourself?"

"Oh, my, no. It has to come from your lips."

"I don't know what you're trying to get me to do, but I'm not buying it." He tapped his own forehead. "If you really are Discord, why not just bop me between the eyes and brainwash me?"

"That would be a much too vulgar display of power, Flimmy," he sniffed.

"What is the point of all this? What are you getting at? What do you want, my soul?!”

Discord chuckled. “No thank you. If I wanted something shrivelled, black, and slimy, I’d hang around after Celestia visits the Little Fillies’ Room!”

Flim pulled his knees to his barrel, trying to calm his breathing. He wasn’t religious; he never had been, and he refused to let this experience shake his lack of faith. His had been the last generation of ponies to grow up without the Princess of the Night coming to save them from their nightmares, and he certainly didn’t expect her to do him the courtesy now. Even though Discord’s oleaginous scent was in the air, and he could see every jagged detail of his body, he couldn’t believe---couldn’t bring himself to believe---that this was anything other than a dream. A horrid, particularly vivid fever dream, but a dream nonetheless. This all had to be part of his subconscious. It just had to be. No way was he actually stuck in another realm with a mismatched jigsaw creature.

It took him a few seconds to gather his thoughts. If this is my subconscious, then he’s going to play by my rules. "You're trying to make me do the right thing, aren't you?"

When Discord's only reply was to summon a stein of beer, Flim pressed on: "I can't believe it. You. You're trying to make me do what's right? You?"

"Oh, but that's what I love about this situation! There is no 'right'!" Cackling, he began a serpentine slither around the ceiling. "What are you going to do, Flim? Abandon your brother, your loyal brother, your only companion since you were conceived, who's stood by your side despite all the questionable things you've done---or go and rescue the mare you love and your unborn daughter? Which is it, Flim? Either way, you'll be losing part of your family---and, ha ha, you have so pitifully little of it to begin with!"

Flim opened his mouth, but closed it quickly. This ‘Discord’ he’d dreamed up hadn’t mentioned the mare---Connie’s only friend---whom he considered to be an honourary aunt. He licked his lips. An idea was germinating in his head; although Discord seemed to be able to read some of his thoughts, he could feel, in some incorporeal way, that there was a wall in his mind he could hide behind. Only his immediate thoughts had been accessible to this monster---otherwise, he could have easily summoned some of his deeper fears and insecurities just to toy with him. He had made a bedwetting joke, but that could have just been borne of convenience...

Flim swallowed. He’d have to give it a shot. “So... even though you’re taking delight in my predicament, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that it seems like you think one choice is better than the other.”

Discord polished his talons on his chest. “I may, of course, be biased in the matter.”

No shit. For the first time, he forced himself to stare Discord in the eyes for longer than a few seconds. The wall was in place. “I’ve made up my mind.”

“And what are you going to do, then?”

With a shy gesture, he beckoned him closer. Although Discord’s eyebrows furrowed a bit, he took the bait, and tilted his head forward---but wasn’t quite fast enough to pull away before Flim’s fist caught his cheekbone in a solid left hook, sending him flying across the room. “WAUGH!!”

“Hyah!” Flim cried out in triumph, shaking his aching hoof. “Take that, you monstrosity!”

From his sprawled-out position on the floor, Discord peeked at his captive from between his hind legs, swishing his paw around his head to scatter the tweeting birds flying around his temples. "Oh no no no no NO. You did not just do that!" he cried as he rubbed his sore cheek. "I invented the sucker punch!!"

The hackles on the back of his neck were bristling up, and Flim ground his teeth, riding up on his knees. "Fuck you! Get out of my room! Get out of my head, you fucking abomination!"

"You little shit!" He seized Flim by the shoulders and yanked him into the air, rattling his head around. "I came here for a reason, and I don't usually offer ponies that kind of courtesy! The least you could do is listen to me!"

"I have been listening to you," he said through a pained expression.

"I thought you'd be clever enough to read between the lines, but apparently you're just as stupid as the rest of them!"

"Discord?"

"It's Mister Discord to you!"

"...Could you please take your claws out of my shoulder?"

He glanced to his right, and actually gasped. Without any conscious thought on his part, the retractable claws on his lion-appendage had shot out. That only happened when he let his temper get the best of him.

Quickly hiding the look of surprise on his face, he slid them back into their sheaths, letting Flim flop to the floor in the process. "You know, I really don't have time for your shenanigans."

"My shenanigans?!"

"And your daughter's running out of time, too."

Flim looked up from his wounded shoulder, but obscuring Discord's face was what looked like a screen, although it was rippling around the edges. Projected on it in black and white was Applejack, who was lying on her back in the hay. He could only see her from the chest up; her sweaty face was contorted in agony, and she kept opening her mouth in silent screams. She was frantically clutching a hoof, its knobby shape suggesting it was Granny's.

"The baby's coming early. Dangerously early, in fact," he said as he peeked his head over the image. "Applejack's planning on giving birth in that barn---tradition, you know---and a premature foal won't stand a chance, not out in that cold, not without medical attention."

"This... doesn't make any sense," Flim said helplessly. The image of Applejack in labour was making his heart hurt, but he couldn't look away. "Why do I have to tell her? Wouldn't her family rush her to the hospital as soon as she felt the contractions come early? Why---"

Talons pinched his lips shut. "It will all make sense in time. This is something you have to---oops!"

Discord was wiggling his paw in front of his face, and they both seemed equally surprised that it was now translucent. In fact, it was rapidly fading into invisibility.

"Well, speaking of time, it looks like mine's up. You'd better get your shit together, Flim Skim, because when you wake up you'll be in a lot of hot water."

The last thing he heard before Discord vanished was "Strike that---cold water."

Usually the transition from dream to reality came slowly, but this time it felt like a sharp snap, right from that sweat-soaked bed into...

"Whur...?"

Flim smacked his lips a few times and tried to move his head, which made the whole room lurch to the side. He was in a bathtub half-full of icy water---that much he could tell, but he had no idea when or where he was. His knees were quivering so hard they were slamming into each other, and he dreamily tilted his head downward. Sweet Celestia, what the fuck?! It looked like he had seven legs.

"You're awake?!"

Ah. That voice he'd recognize anywhere. The muscles in Flim's face contorted as he tried to smile; he could make out the shape of his twin, but was having trouble figuring out how far away he was. Or how many of them there were. He'd see a fuzzy image of the stallion in front of him for a second, and then it would dissolve back into cream-coloured blurs. He felt like he was in a kaleidoscope.

"Wha... who... how...?"

"Stop! Don't talk," he barked. He was rustling with something, but Flim couldn't even begin to guess at what it was. "You need to save your energy."

He tried to scream when his brother dumped a bucket of ice in the tub, but his throat was so raggedly dry all that came out was a gasp. "Wha...? Ice...? Are... are'y'gon' take my kidneys 'r shomethin'?"

"I said don't talk."

"Wha' hap...pin...?"

A glass of cool juice was shoved at his lips, and Flim gulped down as much as he could.

"You have a fever of a hundred and seven oh five."

"A hunnert an’ seben?"

"Point five," Flam said as he emptied a bottle of rubbing alcohol into the tub.

"Thass... imposs..."

"I checked it three times. It went up every time!"

He coughed. His muscles were beginning to twitch. "Wh... Discord..."

That caught Flam's attention, but only for a moment. "Great. Now you're hallucinating."

"No, he... came... told me..."

"Stop talking!" He dunked a washcloth into the icy water, and then brought it up to rub over his brother's face. "Now, please. Listen to me. You have to stop babbling. You must have had a terrible fever dream, but that's all it was. I have to keep you stable until Trixie gets back with the doctor."

As if on cue, the sound of the front door banging open cut off his next sentence, and Flam yelled "He's in here!" over his shoulder.

Just a fever dream... he thought, wrapping his arms around himself to try to quell the shivering. I can't believe I actually---

That train of thought didn't get a chance to finish. His fetlocks brushed against his shoulder, and he felt the stinging pain of a fresh wound being disturbed. He wasn't aware of the medics rushing in around him, because all he could look at were those strange, bloodless punctures in his skin---right where Discord had clawed him.

Author's Notes:

I rarely laugh while I'm writing, but the thought of John de Lancie in drag cracked me up. XD

(Oh, and 107.5 might not seem dangerously high for a human, but for horses anything above 105 is damage-worthy. Or so Google told me). I stand corrected!

We're in the home stretch now, folks! Feel free to edit/add to the TvTropes page, 'cause there are only a few more chapters (plus a short epilogue and a one-page comic---hopefully) left to go!