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The Conversion Bureau: Rise Again

by kildeez

Chapter 5: Chapter V: Todd Reborn

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It had been two weeks since Todd’s eyes had suddenly locked on Redheart’s and he’d asked, right in the middle of a spoon feeding, what it was that had his super-hot wife’s bun all frizzled. The pair had made passionate love every night since then, starting right after Todd had taken a few showers to clean off the stench of old urine and rotting food. The last of these showers had been interrupted by its own love-making, a session so intense and so hard that it would cause the couple to develop a shared fetish for shower sex that would stay with them for the rest of their days. Now, Todd sat at the kitchen table, pretending to scan the morning newspaper and occasionally sipping at a plain, black coffee resting by his hooves.

Really, the paper was just for looks so he could sit across from the stained, food-encrusted high chair he had spent a few weeks eating meals in. Currently, he was stuck debating between rinsing it down and saving it in the attic to offload on the next poor sap who had a kid, or just attacking it with a sledgehammer, dousing it with lighter fluid, and burying the remains in the backyard. To him, the chair represented a time when he was something else, something that couldn’t provide for the mare he loved, or make her smile at a whim, or really do much of anything useful besides entertain foals. The mere thought made his teeth clench in a decidedly un-pony way.

Of course, he couldn’t know it then, but the product of one of those love-making sessions growing in his wife’s belly would end this debate far sooner than he would have suspected, and in a little under a year, the chair would find use once more after being modified to support an infant rather than a full-grown stallion. Right now, however, his mind was only on the chair, and how best to make sure it was out of sight and out of mind.

Todd took another sip of his coffee and grimaced at the bitterness, though he welcomed it. Bitterness was good. Bitterness was something Todd the Human could appreciate, and so it could bury Todd the Pony even further into his memories. Todd the Pony was nothing. Todd the Pony was a child. Todd the Pony had nearly cost him everything he held dear…

“Honey?” Redheart’s voice drifted from the kitchen door. “What’s wrong?”

He turned and offered her that same, incredible smile he would use to woo her every day for the rest of their lives. “Nothing, babe.”

“You sure? You look like you’re trying to murder your old chair with your eyes.”

That self-assured smile disappeared into a dark scowl. “Yes. My chair,” Todd sighed, turning back in his seat.

“Oh honey,” and before Todd could even react, her ivory forelegs were draped around his shoulders. “I didn’t mean to open up old wounds…”

“Is it even possible for you to go an entire day without making a medical pun?” He asked, smiling good-naturedly.

“Force of habit,” she snorted, then kissed the side of his neck. “Besides, you love it.”

“I do,” he whispered, grinning as he returned the kiss, then pulled her muzzle towards his. “That I…”

All of a sudden, the sound of stampeding hooves on the wooden staircase ended their moment. Two foals raced in, their little hooves working tirelessly to keep them moving as their giggles and taunts chased them around the table, Todd grabbing his coffee before it could wind up all over the floor.

“Feathers! Spark!” Their mother thundered from the second floor. “What have I told you about running inside!?”

Both foals paused where they stood, freezing instantly. Todd’s eyebrows rose as Blueheart thundered into the kitchen, the stallion watching her grab the little ponies’ attention like a stroke of lightning out of a clear blue sky. Children - at least, the human children he knew - were about as easy to command as a pack of feral rabbits. Either foals were just that easy to control, or Blueheart had just inspired that much fear in her offspring. In light of the way Blueheart’s voice could reach the roar of a Boeing 747 during takeoff when she was truly angry (a talent she’d demonstrated to Todd on more than one occasion), he was leaning in favor of the former.

Both foals seated themselves on the kitchen floor, heads bowed as Blueheart strode in. Her piercing gaze shifted from them to her sister and brother-in-law at the table and back again. “What do we say?” She demanded.

The children didn’t even hesitate: “We’re sorry, Auntie Redheart, Uncle Todd,” they intoned.

“For?” She asked, hooves crossed, eyebrow raised expectedly.

“For…nearly wrecking their house with our hyperactive antics?” Spark offered. Todd hid his smile behind his newspaper. Spark always had been the smarter of the two. He figured he would be getting along just fine with his nephew and niece.

At any rate, the answer satisfied Blueheart and she nodded. “Very good. Now, go gather your things, and if I hear so much as one more peep out of you before our taxi arrives, you’ll be barred from trick-or-treating this Nightmare Night!”

Both foals grew very pale, nodded, and scurried back up the stairs. Bluff or not, their mother had certainly put the fear of (Celestia) GOD in them. At the very least, it had earned the house some peace and quiet.

Blueheart sighed as she turned to the other adults in the house. “I’m sorry about that. Don’t worry, we’ll be out of your manes soon.”

But not soon enough, Todd wanted to joke, though a quick glare from Redheart silenced him before the wisecrack could even make it past his lips. “It’s no trouble, really,” he heard himself say instead. “We know how foals can be.”

“Heheh, yeah…” Blueheart chuckled awkwardly, rubbing one of her forehooves along her leg in a way that her sister knew only too well. It meant she had something to say, but didn’t want all present in the room to hear it. Fortunately, Redheart could be very quick on the uptake.

“I’ll head upstairs and watch them,” she said, trotting out the door. “Celestia knows if they don’t have somepony watching them all the time, they’ll try and pack my boudoir with them!” She followed up with a nonchalant What are ya gonna do? smile and a shrug that was a little too enthusiastic to be convincing before heading upstairs.

Blueheart sighed. “I love her, you know,” she said, still staring out the door. “She’s my sister. I’d do anything to make sure she was safe.”

Todd nodded. “I would say the same.”

“It’s good you said that,” she turned to him, her expression flat and utterly neutral. “I wanted you to know I’m grateful to you for saving my children. I’ll never forget that, and if there’s any way I can pay you back, you just need to name it.”

“Thank you.”

“That being said, don’t think the road ahead will be easy. Even with your abilities and attunement to pure magic, you’re still a Newfoal in a pony’s world, and I still don’t know if that can actually work.”

Todd had a few doubts of his own, but probably not nearly as many as his new sister-in-law. Still, he just nodded his understanding, keeping his face and expression as featureless as possible.

“Not only that, but I want you to know that I’ve heard stories of what some human husbands have done to their wives,” that neutral expression suddenly gained a layer of ice so thick Todd couldn’t help but raise his eyebrows at it again. “I don’t believe you’re like those stallions, and I’m more than willing to give you the benefit of the doubt, but if you ever lay a hoof on her…”

She drew close to him, so that their muzzles were nearly touching, as she completed the threat: “…I’ll tear off your penis and hang it off the tip of your horn, so every time you look at her, you’ll have a set of balls swinging in your face instead.”

The fact that a pony had the nerve to threaten a being who very well could qualify as a demigod surprised Todd, the sheer brutality of the threat nearly knocking him out of his chair. Fortunately, he was able to remain upright and meet the other pony’s gaze as he nodded. “If I ever do that, I’ll save you the time and slice ‘em off myself.”

“Good,” she said with an approving nod, just as her sister arrived carrying several large pieces of luggage in her magic.

“Oh, here…” Todd said quickly, setting his coffee down and leaping to his hooves, where he promptly scooped up the luggage in a single hoof. The foals watched in wide-eyed wonder as he effortlessly navigated the front hallway, enough suitcases to burden a large taxi squeezed beneath one foreleg.

Redheart and Blueheart watched from the kitchen, snickering to each other. “Should we tell them?” Blueheart asked.

“Naahhh, they don’t need to know he’s just borrowing the strength of a dozen of his human buddies in their hivemind just yet,” Redheart replied. “Let them think their Uncle Todd is a superpony for a little while longer.”

“Heh…superpony…” Blueheart snickered. “A Newfoal superpony. Who knew?”

“Yeah,” Redheart sighed, her smile morphing into a cute little frown. “Say, Blueheart, can I ask you something?”

“Always.”

“I’ve just been thinking,” Redheart said, tilting her head in Todd’s direction. “What do you suppose the point of it all was? All the loss and heartbreak, only for it to be reversed right away…why? What would the point be? Why do you suppose any of it happened?”

Blueheart opened her mouth, closed it, opened it again, “You know what? Why don’t we ask a human?”

Redheart smiled and nodded. “That might be best, yes…Todd?” She called out the front door. She had been lost so deeply in her thoughts that it only now occurred to her she hadn’t heard anything from the front in a while. In fact, now that she and Blue weren’t talking, it was actually pretty creepy. “Todd!?”

“Mama!” Feathers gasped as she burst into the kitchen, her hooves waving frantically. “Mr. Todd stopped moving!”

“What!?” Blueheart gasped. “He fainted!?”

“No, he just stopped moving! He set us both down, and now he’s just standing there!” Feathers gasped.

At that, Redheart’s namesake skipped a beat. “No…” she gasped, her head shaking even as she rushed out the door. “No, not again, please not again…”

Next Chapter: Chapter VI: We Are Estimated time remaining: 15 Minutes
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