Chapter 8

"What if I don't want to be?" Kate asks me, tears openly streaming down her face now.

"I..." I try to speak, but nothing comes out as she pulls away from me.

Abruptly she stands and stalks away from me, her arms wrapped around herself as if she's clutching her humanity to her like a shroud.

"What if I don't want to be a pony? I can't just accept this!" Kate is almost yelling now, our moment of closeness shattered by the fear she is obviously feeling.

"Kate, it's--" I try to say, but she cuts me off with her hand, violently slashing the air.

"No! I can't talk about this right now!" she starts walking away, each step full of anger and fear.

"Kate, where are you going?" I ask, making to follow her.

She turns and stares me down, "I don't know, anywhere but here for right now. I need to be alone." She spins on her heel and starts storming off.

"Wait! Here, take the car. I don't want you walking out there alone," I say, running up to her and pressing the keys into her hand. She stares at me, as if she's expecting a trick.

"Thank you," she finally says, deciding I'm not going to try to stop her. She gets in the car and turns over the engine, revving the engine before spraying the area with gravel as she tears off.

I stand there and watch her until the car passes out of sight, then I hang my head and sigh sadly at our predicament. Maybe having advance warning of the changes isn't as helpful as I thought it would be, I think to myself.

After a few more minutes of introspection I pull out my phone and dial Jim's number. He answers after the third ring and I ask him to come pick me up at the storage unit.

"Why?" he asks. I tell him that I'll explain when he gets here. He accepts my evasion and tells me he'll be here soon.

"Thanks," I say, hanging up.

I set to work, gathering the information I'd found and packing the rest of the boxes away. It doesn't take me very long to clean up, so I have everything locked up and am sitting with my back against the door to the unit when Jim and Sherry pull up in Jim's truck. I wave carelessly to them as they come to a stop.

Jim leans his head out of the window and says, "Um...where is Kate, and where is your car?"

I just shrug and gesture with my hand, indicating everywhere and anywhere. I slowly stand and walk over to the truck and jump in the back, holding tightly to the folders I have in my hands. I lean my head back against the cab of the truck and ignore Jim's questions and wait for him to take us home. He finally gives up and drives out the gate and points the truck towards my home.

Once we reach the house I silently lever myself out of the back of the truck and walk into the house, dropping the folders on the counter in the kitchen as I walk by on my way to my room.

I know that I should say something to Jim and Sherry, but I just can't bring myself to talk right now. They leave me be, sensing my mood and accepting my need to be alone.

What are we going to do? I didn't think it would be easy for her to accept, but I didn't expect her to run away either. I really hope she calms down soon. What about Jim and Sherry? Should I really tell them? How will they take it if I do? How will they take it if I don't? My thoughts continue to get more disjointed from there as I have a bit of a meltdown.

Then the room starts spinning and I fall onto my bed as I pass into unconsciousness...

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I find myself floating in a black void, surrounded by nothingness.

Where am I? Am I dreaming? I wonder, searching in vain for any kind of reference point, or anything at all to see for that matter.

I feel a lurch in my stomach, as if I'm falling, and suddenly find myself staring down at a farm. In the distance I can see a large, glaringly white house adorned with tall columns. Nearer to me, beneath my feat actually as I am floating ghost-like over the landscape, there are people working in the fields.

Peering more closely at the workers in the fields, I can see they are, without exception, very shabbily dressed. Their clothes are torn and fraying, most are ill-fitted. I feel a jolt of shock as I realize that almost all of the people have extremely dark skin... It looks almost like some kind of plantation being worked by slaves. But why am I seeing this? This is distant history, not current events!

My attention is soon drawn towards one of the few fair skinned workers. He is a hulking beast of a man, towering over the others by many inches. On closer inspection he is probably barely into his twenties and his back is covered in ropy scars, as though from many whippings.

As I continue to watch him work I see another man walk into the fields wearing a wide-brimmed hat, with an old fashioned revolver holstered on his hip, carrying a whip leisurely in his hand. When the young man stops to stretch his back the whip immediately snaps out to draw a fresh line on his back. I hear him grunt in pain as he silently stoops back to his work.

Why does this matter? I ask myself, not understanding what I'm seeing. Suddenly I feel the lurch in my stomach again and the scene before me changes. I am still looking down on the farm, but I am much closer to the house. From here I can see the house is much larger than I originally thought, three stories tall with a footprint big enough to hold two of my house with room to spare on all sides.

My attention is drawn towards a flatbed wagon that is approaching the house, pulled by two mangy looking horses. In the back of the wagon I see a young boy chained to the floorboards. I am struck by what I see in his eyes: an inferno worth of rage, tempered with an ocean of determination. I have never seen eyes like that on another human being before.

When the wagon stops in front of the big house the driver dismounts and pulls the blanket from around the boy's shoulders as a well-dressed man strolls from the house to greet him. On the boy's back I can clearly see bright rivulets of blood through the rents in his over-sized shirt. My fists clench in anger and tears form in my eyes at the sight as I realize there is nothing I can do for this boy.

I see money exchange hands between the men and the well-dressed man takes hold of the chain between the boy's wrists, pulling the boy behind him as he walks away.

I feel the lurch in my stomach again as the scene changes yet again.

I see the big man from before, kneeling next to a prone form. Through the gore smeared all over the body, I can see that it is a young, dark-skinned woman lying there.

In the man's eyes I can see a mountain of grief that is shortly consumed by an incomprehensible rage. He stands and turns to the man with the whip, who is standing nearby, and says, "You've killed her!" as he lunges.

By some unholy miracle, the whip-man is able to just barely evade the lunging youth. He slams his fist into the back of the young man's head and steps back, letting fly with the whip, opening a flap of skin on his scalp.

The much bigger man, undeterred by the pain of his torn scalp, turns and leaps at the man with the whip. He catches the smaller man's arm with his left hand and pulls him toward his right fist, which connects with his face.

The whip-man's eyes roll up into his head and he falls to the ground. The youth picks him up and brings his anvil-like fist to bear again on the malingerer's ugly mug. Blood flies from the man's battered lips and his broken nose pours gore like a charnel faucet.

The big man's fist raises three more times before a board is shattered over the back of his skull by another man with a whip hanging at his belt. As the big man falls to the ground, the jackals surround him and begin to hit and kick his unresponsive form.

I feel the now familiar lurch in my stomach and am treated to yet another scene.

This time I see the boy again, a little bit younger, in a small stone hovel, kneeling next to a bed containing a haggard woman's corpse. I see the mountain of grief in his eyes and the tears he cannot keep from falling down his face. His young body is wracked with silent sobs at the loss of what I can only assume is his mother.

The man I remember from the wagon steps forward and, taking the boy by his shoulder, says, "Now her debt falls to you. I'll find a way to make my money from you somehow!"

The boy struggles and manages to yank his shoulder away from the hard-faced man, falling to the floor as he does so. When he stands back up the man backhands him to the floor, saying, "You'll do as you're told, you little bastard. Now come with me."

The boy warily regains his feet and quietly follows the man, but I can see the murder in the boy's eyes.

I feel the lurch once again, but this time I feel a shudder through my soul as my perspective changes. This time I see a familiar scene:

"Get up you lazy piece of shit!" I hear a voice I now recognize say.

I start to stir, only to feel an excruciating pain as I'm kicked in the side by a booted foot.

"I said get up you stupid fuck! Get your ass out of bed now or I'll fucking bust your face in!" the voice yells at me.

I feel my body rise up off the floor, where evidently I've been sleeping. I look down at the floor and see the blanket that had fallen off me when I stood and remember this is where I belong.

I walk out of the shack I've been in and accept the meager piece of bread and cheese shoved into my hands as I walk out to the field.

I look around and see farmland everywhere I look, field after field of corn, and remember that it's my job to start picking, along with the others. I look down at my body and it isn't how I remember it. My skin is loose over my flesh, I can feel that I have strength, but I'm a lot leaner than I remember. I'm wearing little more than rags.

I get to the corn and start picking it, throwing it into baskets that are nearby, one ear at a time. I'm working in a group of about ten people, most of them smaller and frailer looking than me.

As I'm trying to figure out how I got here and how long I've been here, I feel a searing pain on my back and hear the crack of a whip.

"You stupid lazy oaf! Move faster, you fucking moron! If you don't pick up the pace you don't get no lunch or dinner," came the vehement voice from behind me. I don't even bother looking at the man; I just try to pick up the pace.

A few minutes later I stumble and feel the whip again. This time I am angry and turn toward my attacker, a retort upon my lips, but he is having none of it and begins to whip me in a frenzy. I try to raise my hands to protect me, but my body doesn't respond and I fall to the ground. I don't know how many times I am whipped, but it is still going on as I slip into unconsciousness.

I wake after an unknown about of time, my body screaming in pain. I moan and can feel hot tears streaming down my face from the agony.

Suddenly I look up, sensing something awry, and see that my body is enveloped in a purple light. I feel very strange, my pain is stripped away, and as I look at my body it begins to change. I'm floating there, my body changing, when everything goes black again.

Once again I am floating in the black void with nothing around me, but this time it feels different. I look around and see a speck of purple light. Without knowing exactly how, I move closer to the source of the light.

Soon I pass into another scene and I see Twilight Sparkle, her horn alight with her purple magic, massive bright sparks shooting out the tip. She is concentrating intensely, her eyes closed.

Suddenly there is a loud boom and a burst of concussive force as a form surrounded by Twilight's magical aura pops into existence right in front of us.

"Oh no, not again!" she gasps as her eyes become fixed on the very large, well-muscled, midnight-blue earth pony that has emerged from the heart of the blinding magical aura.

The scene fades before me, and I am floating in the void, trying to make sense of all that I have seen. I...no way. Can any of this really be real? I wonder.

Though it seems like a long time, I don't know how long I float in the void pondering what I've seen before I start feeling a sense of dread, deep in my soul. My body starts to shake uncontrollably.

"IRONY!!" the scream comes so loudly in my psyche that I feel it coursing through my body.

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I wake still feeling the scream flood through my body. Kate's in trouble! I don't know how I know this, but I do. I feel it with every fiber of my being.

I leap out of bed. Or at least I try to. Instead of the graceful leap, I end up summersaulting out of the bed and landing on my chin. I shake my head, trying to disperse the stars I am now seeing as a result of my fall. I yell for Jim as I try to ascertain the cause of my fall.

Well shit... I think as I take in my body, which has changed even more while I was unconscious. I'm not quite "full pony", but I'm not really that far off from it either. My hands aren't hooves, yet, but they might as well be. They're useless lumps at the moment. My legs don't want to bend the same way anymore. I can't stand upright on them, I keep falling over. My body is almost completely covered in fur now, though that seems almost inconsequential when compared with the rest of the changes.

How long was I out for? I think to myself, looking at the window and seeing that it is completely dark outside. Fuck, that means I've been asleep for hours! What the hell is wrong with me?!

Jim bursts into the room, almost knocking the door off its hinges. He surveys the room, looking for danger, before he comes over and kneels next to me.

"Irony, are you okay?" he asks as he looks me over for injury.

"Physically, well, my body is even more fucked up than before, but I'm not injured. I can't get up though, my body won't work right. Please help me back onto the bed," I say to him. He helps me get onto the bed, where I lay like an invalid.

"Sherry, it's okay, you can come in now," Jim calls out the door.

"So what was the yelling about? I thought you were being attacked, you sounded, well, afraid," he asks me as Sherry comes through the door and stands next to the bed.

"It's Moon Shadow. I mean Kate! Something is wrong, I'm sure of it!" I say, fear still gripping my heart.

"What do you mean, did she call you?" asks Sherry, looking worried.

"No, at least I don't think so. I haven't checked my phone yet. I just feel that she is in danger," I say.

"Where is your phone?" asks Jim.

"In my pocket, but I can't get it," I say, waving my useless lumps in the air. Jim calmly reaches into my pocket and pulls out my phone.

"You don't have any missed calls or new messages," he says, checking my phone for me.

"Dammit!" I exclaim.

"Slow down, where is Kate? You never explained what happened earlier," Sherry says.

"She and I...kind of had an argument and she took off. I gave her the keys to the car because I didn't want her walking out there alone. That's why I had to call you guys for a ride earlier. Speaking of which, what time is it?" I ask, looking around to see my clock is on the floor where I fell.

"It's almost two in the morning," Jim answers me.

"I was out for over 12 hours?!" I practically shout.

"Yeah. You were out pretty hard, too. We were a little worried because we couldn't wake you up," says Jim, "though we figured you must need it, so we didn't try too hard," he continues.

"What about Kate? Didn't you worry about her when she didn't show up?" I ask, incredulously.

"We were a little worried, but figured that if you weren't worried we shouldn't worry either," Sherry put in, worry showing plain in her eyes now.

"She's in trouble, we need to find her!" I state vehemently.

"How do you know she's in trouble? She's been gone for a long time, but that doesn't mean she's in danger. She might be staying over at another friend's house tonight," Jim says, trying to calm me down.

"Jim, I can't explain how I know; I just know that she is hurt or in danger right now. I feel it in my soul! We must find her!" I say, staring into Jim's eyes with determination.

"How are we going to find her? We have no way of knowing where she went, or what happened to her?" Sherry asks. "Do you want to go to the police?"

I shake my head, "The police won't be able to do anything, she hasn't been gone for even 24 hours yet. Not that I would trust them to find her before something happens."

"What about her phone? Did she have it with her?" Jim asks me.

"Good idea! Yeah, she had it alright. We can trace her using the GPS!" I say, smiling at Jim's idea.

"I'll call Jack again and see if he'll hack into the satellite network and trace her phone for us. We are going to owe him big for this though," Jim says, shaking his head.

"I know, but let me worry about how to pay him back later. If he balks, hint that you have something interesting to share with him, but don't tell him anything," I tell Jim.

"And what is this something interesting that I'm supposed to know?" he asks, though I'm sure he already knows.

I gesture to myself and say, "I think this is pretty interesting. And I'm guessing he doesn't know anything about it, or you would have already shared it with me. Right?"

"Yeah, neither he, nor Tom, knew anything of interest to us about this," Jim replies.

Jim steps aside as he pulls out his phone and dials Jack, having a quiet conversation with him in the corner.

"Irony, I'm so sorry that Kate is missing. We'll do whatever it takes to get her back," Sherry tries to comfort me.

"I just hope we reach her in time," is my response. Sherry just nods quietly.

Jim comes back over and says, "Jack says it'll be no problem. He said it's so easy that he'll do this one gratis."

"Yeah, which means we still owe him a favor, he's just not going to make a big deal of it," I say, knowing how Jack and Tom work.

"True, but like you said, we'll worry about it later. I didn't have to share anything with him, though I wouldn't be surprised if he suspects we're hiding something. He's definitely no dummy," Jim says.

"That much is true. Sometimes he was oblivious, but never a dummy," I say. Just then Jim's phone rings.

"It's Jack," he says, turning away to take the call.

"Okay, great, thanks Jack," I hear Jim say before hanging up again.

"He's got it, he's going to send me a link so we can track her phone from mine," Jim tells me, his phone chiming as it gets the link from Jack.

"Alright! Let's go then!" I say, trying to sit up to get off the bed. Jim gently pushes me back down.

"You aren't fit to go anywhere right now. Let me go see if I can find her. If she's hurt I'll bring her back here or to the hospital. If she's in trouble I'll recon and come back. Hopefully either I'll be back with her soon, or by the time I get back you will be able to come with me to get her out of whatever mess she's found herself in," he says, telling me something I already knew but didn't want to admit to myself.

"Please, Jim, take me with you! Help me get into the back of your truck, I need to be with you when you find her!" I say and he looks at me uncertainly. "What if our situations were reversed? Could you really stay behind if you knew Sherry was in danger?"

He sighs and shakes his head, "No, no I couldn't. Okay, we'll load you into the back of the truck, but you have to stay there okay?"

"Okay, but grab my stuff from the shop so we have it just in case. I want to be prepared for the worst," I say. Jim nods and helps me up and supports my weight as we walk out to his truck. He drops the gate and lifts me up into the back.

He fishes in my pocket for the key to my shop and goes inside, soon returning with an oversized burlap sack stuffed full. He throws it in the truck next to me and I look at him, saying, "What's all this? I meant the AR-15 and camo gear I have in a ruck in the loft."

"I...I don't know what I was thinking. I'll be right back," he says as he hurries back to the shop. I manage to get the bag open with my deformed hands and peer inside.

Why did he bring these? I think as I look. In the bag is the mace, shield, helmets and armor that I showed him yesterday. Maybe he's not thinking straight, I think in confusion at Jim's lack of judgment.

Soon Jim returns with the ruck and AR-15, throwing the ruck in the back with me and putting the AR in the cab with him.

"Ready?" he asks me.

"Are you?" I return, raising my eyebrow questioningly.

He nods and hops in the driver seat, starts the truck and backs it down the drive. We both wave to Sherry as we leave. She waves back and turns to go back into the house.

Jim tears down the road at top speed. After a while on the road I realize I don't know where we're going. I tap on the adjoining window. When he opens it I ask, "Where are we going? How far away?"

"We still have over an hour to go, according to her GPS. I'll stop a ways out and we'll go in incognito, with the lights off and as quietly as this truck can go," he yells back to me.

I nod in reply and hunker down for the long drive as he closes the window again.

After a few minutes of staring out into the darkness, I get a bit restless. To take my mind off my worry I decide to look in the sack again. The only object in the bag that I have any hope at all of putting on is my helmet. After some careful consideration, I am able to use the lumps at the end of my arms to hold the helmet and raise it to my head. It slips on surprisingly easily, and fits better now than it did before. It takes me a few moments to realize why. My lower face now extends in a pony muzzle, something I failed to notice in the panic I'd been feeling since I woke up from my dreams.

I lean my head back against the cab of the pickup, trancing out a little bit as I try not to let my fears overwhelm me. I come back to full awareness when Jim slows and stops the truck. We seem to be in some kind of industrial park. He opens the window so that he can talk to me and says, "We're close now. According to the GPS, she is in a building about two blocks from here. According to the map it's a medium sized warehouse. I wonder what she was doing over here?"

"It doesn't matter, let's go," I say with feeling.

Jim nods and, turning out the lights, continues on slowly to get closer to the warehouse. Once we are within a couple hundred yards, Jim stops again and turns to me, "I don't see anyone keeping a watch or anything, do you?"

"No. I don't see anyone out there. Though I can hear loud noises coming from inside. It sounds like metal grinding or something like it," I tell him.

Jim pulls the camo jacket out of the ruck and says, while slipping it on, "I'll go check things out. I'll keep an open line between us using the headsets of our phones. If you see anyone give a whistle over the line to let me know. I'm going to be running silent, okay?"

I nod and tell him, "Be careful."