Lyra and Bon Bon Visit Wales
Admiral Biscuit

“Oh come on, Bons. It’ll be fun.”

Bon Bon rolled her eyes. Lyra’s ideas of ‘fun’ were often anything but, and this idea—not that she’d been paying full attention—seemed a real doozy. Sundays were for sleeping in and lazing around the house, not haring around Celestia-knows-where with some crazy new spell Princess Twilight Sparkle had come up with.

“Tell me again about how this is more fun than snuggling under the covers until ten, eating a late breakfast, and then looking at the dust-bunnies under the couch, deciding to ignore them, and reading a good book instead?” She tugged the oven door open and slid a baking-sheet full of confections into the oven, before turning to glare at her housemate.

“We can do that any Sunday,” Lyra replied. “This is a . . . well, not once-in-a-lifetime chance, but it’s not something that comes along too often.”

“And Twilight offered it to you why?” Bon Bon stepped on the bellows a little too hard, before willing herself back under control.

“‘Cause she’s gotta do some kind of . . . princess stuff. Plus, she knew I might be interested. You know, because of. . . .”

“Yes, your strange obsession with humans. I know, I know.”

“It’s not like that,” Lyra said. “Well, okay, it is like that. But Twilight already visited one human world, and it turns out that there’s dozens—maybe hundreds—more. Why shouldn’t I get to visit one? Why shouldn’t everypony visit one?”

“First, because I’d rather spend Sunday at home,” Bon Bon muttered. “Doing the same thing I do every Sunday. I like a routine.” She began scrubbing the dregs of a chocolate fondue out of a pot. “If I wanted impulsive, I’d’ve moved in with Pinkie Pie.”

“Who was the impulsive one last Sunday?”

Bon Bon’s face colored. “That was different! That was—” She turned to face Lyra. “—well, okay. That was pretty impulsive. I bet you didn’t know you could bend that way.”

“So, come on! Say you’ll do this for me.”

Bon Bon sighed. “Are you making puppy-dog eyes at me?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, fine. It’s just one day, right? And it’s perfectly safe?”

Lyra nodded. “Just one day, and Princess Twilight herself assured me that there was no possible way the spell could malfunction. She improved the mirror portal spell—she adjusted the thaumic properties and chronological-delay of the layered components in order to—”

“By carefully controlling the acidity, the reaction rate can be adjusted. . . .” Bon Bon began.

Lyra rolled her eyes. “Okay, fine. Simple explanation, the spell now allows us a little time to practice before we get to the human world. Twilight said that adapting to a new form took a bit—you know, on top of everything else—and may have marked her as an outsider, if she was witnessed.”

Bon Bon nodded absently and set the pan on the drying rack. “And when, precisely, are you planning on doing this?”

“Tomorrow!” Lyra squealed. “Isn’t that exciting?”

“Impulsive,” Bon Bon muttered. “Crazy and impulsive.” She gave Lyra a quick peck on the cheek.

The sun had barely cracked the horizon when an insistent hoof-prodding finally roused Bon Bon. She rubbed the sleep out of her eyes before blearily focusing on the maniac face of her marefriend. “So, are you ready?”

Bon Bon looked over at the clock. “It’s six a.m. Six in the bloody a.m. On a Sunday. I’m not ready for anything yet.” She rolled towards the wall and pulled the covers over her head.

Lyra’s face fell. “But we only get one day! And it’s already passing! We . . . we could be there by now!”

Getting no response from Bon Bon, Lyra went around to the foot of the bed and stuck her head under the comforter. With a bit of wriggling, she wormed her way upwards, then stuck her nose into a very sensitive part of Bon Bon’s anatomy.

“Gah!” Bon Bon pushed the covers down. “Did you stick your muzzle in ice? I swear, sometimes you’re as bad as a foal on Hearth’s Warming. All right, all right, I’m up. You can stop now.” She lifted the comforter and glared down at Lyra. “Really, you could have gone to sleep sooner.”

“I thought you liked—”

“I’m not complaining, I’m just saying.” Bon Bon stretched and slid out of bed. This was the worst part of a morning, in her opinion. Her stomach was empty and her bladder full, and the warmth of the bed was replaced by the chill morning air. Any possibility of a quick roll in the hay was gone the moment her hooves touched the floor. She shuffled off to the bathroom to perform her morning ablutions.

“Don’t worry too much about grooming,” Lyra called after her. “The spell’s gonna change most everything, so don’t waste your time.”

“Okay,” Bon Bon called.

“I made breakfast.” Lyra looked towards the kitchen, where a faint haze could still be seen drifting along the ceiling. “It’s . . . cereal and milk.”

Bon Bon flushed the toilet and regarded herself in the mirror. “Weren’t you planning to make pancakes?” She poked at her mane—spell or no, she was going to brush out some of the tangles, and maybe a quick shower.

“Uh . . . there wasn’t enough flour?”

“There’s a new bag in the pantry, you know.”

“Not anymore,” Lyra muttered, shoving the empty bag deeper in the trash can. “Too late, I already poured the milk,” she called up the stairs.

Bon Bon rolled her eyes, before a small smile crossed her lips. Lyra was a terrible cook—all unicorns seemed to be—and she could smell the faint acrid odor of smoke. No doubt the ex-pancakes were charred pucks on the cast-iron pan. She’d told Lyra, again and again, that making the stove hotter didn’t cook the food faster . . . but it was nice of her to try. Especially since she’d failed so many times. “I wasn’t in the mood for pancakes anyway,” she lied. “Cereal’s fine.” She shook her head, making sure her curls settled just right. Lyra had an easy enough time in the morning; her windblown look came about naturally. Bon Bon wasn’t so lucky; her mane turned into a rat’s nest every night.

Bon Bon wiped her face with a washcloth, the cold water finally jerking her into a state of awareness. It felt weird to be skipping a shower, but it was a Sunday, so that was all right. She glanced in the mirror one more time, making sure that she was reasonably well-composed, and trotted down the stairs.

As she munched on her soggy cereal, Lyra briefed her on the days’ events.

“So, first, the spell’s going to make us look like natives,” Lyra said enthusiastically. “That means bipedal, with arms and hands and legs and feet and stuff.” She paused to bite a piece of toast. “And it’ll make us speak the local language, too. But it doesn’t always translate the idioms right, so we’ve got to watch for that.”

“Idioms?”

“Yeah, that’s like when you say one thing but mean another. Like, I don’t know. ‘A watched pot never boils,’ that’s an idiom. I think. Anyway, that shouldn’t really be a problem. We’ll have a bit of time to adapt to our new bodies before the spell sends us where we’re going. It’s—” She squinted at the scroll. “—ah, called Gwynedd. We’re going to a beach there, ‘cause that seemed like a fun thing to do on a Sunday. Just relax on the sand, maybe play in the water some if we can swim. I’m pretty sure bipeds can swim. I think Twilight said she saw Spike swim in lava once, so bipeds can probably swim. Or at least wade. And, it’s a good way to just observe people without . . . um—”

“Being in a social situation?” Bon Bon suggested.

“Yes! Being in a social situation. All we have to do is lay on a blanket and watch. If we want to interact with the locals, we can. If not, we can just relax, and watch them. It’ll be pretty much like sleeping in. In fact, if my research is right, somepeople just like to laze around on the beach.”

“Somepeople?”

“That’s what they say. Instead of ‘somepony.’ They call themselves ‘people,’ but I don’t know why.”

“I suppose it’s too much to expect logic from a species with a place named ‘Gwynedd,’” Bon Bon mumbled.

“Well, they have funny people-puns for the names of their places,” Lyra said. “Gwynedd is part of Wales.”

“Whales? That’s a dumb name.”

“It’s on the ocean,” Lyra explained. “So, the name makes sense. Kind of. See, they divide up regions like we do, so Wales is part of the United Kingdom—they call it that because everypeople there lives in harmony—and Gwynedd is part of Wales.” She looked down at the scroll. “The beach has a name, too. Where was it? Well, I’ll find it later. Are you done with breakfast?”

Bon Bon nodded. She picked up her bowl and took it over to the sink, then turned on the water.

“You don’t have to wash it now,” Lyra protested. “It’ll be there when you get back.”

“I hate a messy kitchen,” Bon Bon reminded her. “It won’t take long to wash the breakfast dishes and maybe sweep the floor—”

“I’ll do it when we get back! All of it!”

“All of it?” Bon Bon’s eyes narrowed. “While wearing a Prench maid’s outfit?”

“Ah—” Lyra looked around the kitchen as if somepony would spring to her aid. When nopony came, she sighed. “All of it. Cross my heart, hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye.”

“In my Prench maid’s outfit,” Bon Bon reminded her.

“Yes, in your Prench maid’s outfit.”

Bon Bon grinned and shut off the water. “Okay. Bring it on.”

She’d been magicked by Lyra more times than she could count. The first time had been weird—it was back when Lyra was still doing dueling, and she’d been practicing offensive spells. Since then, their relationship had moved far beyond that, to the point that Bon Bon had become almost blase to being the target of a spell. Instinctively, she knew that there were unicorn spells which could do all kinds of horrible things to her, but she knew that Lyra wouldn’t cast such a spell. Yet, the thought that she could was always thrilling.

For all that, this spell felt different. From the very moment she felt the first tendrils of magical possibilities twining over her body, to the familiar glow of Lyra’s horn, there was a subtle difference in the field, and Bon Bon had time to suck one breath over her teeth before the aura spun around her, and then she was in the strange not-space where the magic lived.

Princess Twilight says it’s safe, she thought, but she also remembered fighting Big Mac for a stupid doll (and that memory was locked away in a special place in her mind, where it was only examined when Lyra was not around . . . he’d had her tail in his mouth and sometimes she wondered what he might have done next to get the doll) because occasionally Twilight went off the deep end, Celestia’s favorite student or not. Still, Lyra had undoubtedly reviewed the spell for safety.

A moment later, she was sprawled across the floor, her whole body reporting that something was wrong. As much as it pained her to admit it, this was not an unusual feeling; some of Lyra’s more . . . creative spells had had that effect on her.

She blinked, trying to get the dancing lights out of her vision. She had the feeling that something was profoundly different, more so than anything she’d ever felt before. Her joints and muscles felt weird, like after a day spent in bed, or drinking a whole bottle of Berry Punch’s plum brandy.

Lyra was also stretched across the floor, and she didn’t look right at all. Even though the bright motes darting across her vision, she could already see that her marefriend no longer bore the beautiful seafoam coat nor windblown mane that she’d had a moment ago; instead, she’d turned an ugly tannish color, her head topped with a messy mop of straw-blonde hair. More disturbingly, her horn appeared to have gone missing.

Bon Bon glanced down at her own forelegs, stretched out in front of her. They had been replaced by pale sticks, ending in some kind of weird talon. She flexed her new digits experimentally. It was like she had five hooves on the end of each leg, all working separately. That was freaky.

She clenched them together and got her legs moved around under herself, ignoring the nagging warnings from her brain that things were not right at all. She’d had that feeling before, and it was best to just tell her brain to shut up. This magic would pass, sooner or later, and she’d be back to normal; right now, the key was to not think too hard and everything would work like it was supposed to.

She finally got to her not-hooves, and decided that having a moment to sit and take stock of the situation would be the best idea. She dropped to her rump, causing more strange new sensations to assault her mind. Bon Bon glanced back, noticing that her tail had gone missing. So that’s why Lyra said not to spend too much time in the bathroom grooming, she thought. Unbidden, her eyes rolled upward, and instead of the normal curls of bubblegum mane at the very top of her vision, boring brown bangs greeted her. A second later, her missing muzzle registered; it had been replaced by an ugly beak. She crossed her eyes, trying to get a better look at it.

I think I should probably scream now, her brain advised. Ignoring it, she looked over at her marefriend for support. For the first time, she actually noticed Lyra; the unicorn had been transformed into a lanky tan blob with curves in all the wrong places.

“Lyra,” she croaked.

The blob nodded. She was getting to her not-hooves, too.

“The Prench maid outfit.”

“I know.” Lyra plopped down on her rear and was looking at her new body with a sense of wonder. Bon Bon couldn’t blame her; the new talons were kind of fascinating. “Well, that seems to have worked.”

“If you say so.” Bon Bon lifted a forelimb—arm—and studied it. “Where in Tartarus did my coat go?”

“They don’t have coats,” Lyra informed her. “Or tails. Or horns.” She crossed her eyes and looked up. “That’s going to take some getting used to.”

“It’s only a day, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, I can do this.” Bon Bon looked down at her new talons. “What do you call these?” She wiggled the digits.

“Hands, Bons. They’re called hands.”

“Oh yeah. You mentioned those already.” She watched with an amused smile on her face as Lyra struggled to her feet. The former unicorn wasn’t completely fur-less; sparse, barely-visible hair covered her arms and legs, with thick coarse patches on her groin and under her arms. At least Lyra still has her cutie mark. If that had been missing, Bon Bon probably would have screamed.

Bon Bon looked down at her hip, pleased to see that her three treats were still present, and then her eyes focused on a pair of mounds across her ribcage. With a frown, she took the right one in her hand and bounced it up and down slightly before glaring at Lyra, who had a much smaller pair. The small, rosy nipple at the peak of each made it obvious what they were, but why in Equestria were hers so big?

“Lyra?”

“Yes?”

“Why does it look like I’m about to drop a foal?” She bounced her breast absently, grimacing at the strange sensation. “If this spell made me pregnant, I'm going to murder Twilight. How am I supposed to move around with these things jiggling all the time?”

“Uh, well, Twilight said that the mammary glands were up on the chest of people, instead of by the hind legs, and said that they called them ‘boobs.’ She said that’s normal.”

“Yours are normal; mine look more like udders.”

“They come in different sizes, I guess.” Lyra looked down at her own chest, grabbing one of her own breasts and examining it before looking back up at Bon Bon. “I think they’re supposed to be more attractive if they’re bigger.” She stumbled over to Bon Bon and examined her chest critically. The former earth pony glared at her.

“Attractive to a cow, maybe.” Bon Bon let her hand fall, frowning as her breast swayed back and forth before coming to a stop. “I’ll be happy when these things are gone and my coat’s back. It’s too cold to be bare-skinned.”

“I can get a blanket,” Lyra offered. “Oh! There’s one with the picnic stuff! I’d better grab that; we could be transported any time now. You ought to try stand up; that’s how people get around.”

Bon Bon nodded and struggled to her feet. Her new body seemed to work pretty well in an upright position, but she kept trying to move her tail for balance, and it wasn’t there at all. That was almost as disconcerting as her lack of hooves.

Lyra draped a plaid blanket over her shoulders, and Bon Bon clutched it closed with one of her new hands. She looked down at it gripping the rough fabric—that was one useful thing she could do with hands, at least.

The wool felt scratchy on her skin, yet oddly pleasurable. She rolled her shoulders around, feeling the fabric slip across her back and rump. Lyra was right; the blanket was quickly warming her up, but she shouldn’t have needed it—it wasn’t all that cold.

She watched as Lyra puttered around the room, stuffing more food into the picnic basket. Her marefriend got to her hands and knees and reached under the counter, clinking bottles together as she tried to find a suitable beverage for their beach trip. Seeing her bare backside wiggling around, Bon Bon had to suppress an urge to slap her ass to get her back for the cold-muzzle-under-the-tail this morning, but it would have been too much effort to stumble across the room; she instead settled on simply enjoying the view—at least that part of their new anatomy had stayed basically the same. Finally, Lyra emerged, clutching a magnum of white wine. “I knew this was still down here,” she mumbled, scooting back far enough that she could stand without banging her head on the counter.

“You could have packed that last night,” Bon Bon told her. “Since the spell could take us to Whales at any time.”

“I meant to,” Lyra said. “But I just got to reading some of Twilight’s notes on the world where she went, and what the customs where, how we’d fit in, and all that. There was one more thing Twilight said we should know.” She absently scratched her bare belly, derailing her train of thought. “Oh, that’s nice. Try scratching yourself with your own hands.”

Bon Bon reached under the blanket and ran her new fingers lightly across her side. “It’s kind of like being gently bitten,” she said. “I like it. Maybe this new form isn’t so bad.”

“I’ve got food, and Bon Bon’s wearing the blanket,” Lyra muttered to herself. “I got the wine, but there was something else we’d need in the human world. Something important. Let’s see, we’re going to a beach. . . .”

With a sudden magenta flash, both former ponies vanished from the kitchen of their house.

Author's Notes:

What could Lyra have forgotten? Stay tuned!

If any of my readers are from Wales or speak Welsh, drop me a line.