"Hi, it's me again, Cheryl. It's been another three days. I'm still stuck in here, in my apartment, but since my last entry, things have been going even wierder. The voices outside have stopped. There seems like there's no-one in the entire building now. No-one answers at all when I call out to them... I am starting to get seriously wierded out now. It's like the sense of placitude I'd built up before, as I changed, is dying away."

"I stll can't get out of my apartment. The boards are so solid that not even a good solid kick from my rear hoofs will even make them come the slightest bit loose. Even the windows here are mostly fixed solid, after they put air conditioning in five years ago."

"The thing is... I'm not sure if what I'm finding out is real... or I am going crazy. This morning, after smacking a hoof into my coffee table for the umpteenth time, I swore out loud and I wished to high heaven that I could see what was going on in my apartment... Then as I fumed harder than I'd ever done before becoming a pony, I felt a sensation from my horn, as if it was heating up a little. For the first time since I was nineteen... I saw a light. I ... SAW... a light! A glowing ball of energy that floated up from my horn... which I also could see! It was like my horn was a neon outline, and it sat there at the top of my vision, as this ball of light glowed. I tried to watch it, but when I focussed on it, it seemed to move... until it hit a wall. It slid along the wall to the corner, and I could almost feel it rolling onto the edge of the corner moulding. As it traced its way up the moulding... I could barely believe what happened. I still can barely believe what... I saw!"

"Over the course of twenty minutes... I directed this ball of light over every surface in the lounge room... and it traced an image of it into my mind, as if it was a tracer pen on one of those old CAD programs. Eventually, I could see all around me a three-dimensional image of my lounge room and everything in it... well, almost everything. I could see the picture frames, but the pictures in them weren't showing. I could see my television, but the images on it I still couldn't see, of course. But it was like the image was right in my mind. It vanished when I closed my eyelids, but came back, even if I turned around with my eyes shut. I guess I went a little hysterical for a minute or two, because... I still can't believe I did this... I bounced all around the room, laughing almost crazily. But I was doing something that had been denied me for years! I. CAN. SEE!!!"

"Even now, sitting here and saying this... I am still feeling the urge to squee and bounce in my chair. Eventually I learned how to put out more than one light-tracer, and I went over my entire apartment with them. It's not perfect, but it is so far above what I have had to live with for the last six years, that... it's good enough for the moment. It's made moving around in my little place so much easier, especially after I traced myself as well... The craziest thing is... I can see myself in a mirror. I don't know how the... how this thing really works, but when I stand in front of a mirror, I can see the reflection of my outline. And I really am a pony. I'm about four-and-a-half feet tall, four legs with hoofs, a long, straight tail and a long, straight mane with fringe and bangs, and what have to be the biggest eyes on a land mammal... that don't work. :P "

"I can see my horn now. It's not quite as big as I thought it was. It's not quite as wide at its base as my nose is, and it stands up just a little higher than my ears do. Oh, that's another thing. My ears are a lot bigger now, and my hearing has improved way beyond even how sensitive it was before I changed into... a unicorn. I have big eyelashes too, and my mane looks... well, more like hair in one way than a horse's mane. I guess it must be the way it's draped.. I kinda like it. I used to have short, curly hair that never grew long. I do like the look I have now a lot more. If it flares out, like hair does, I can almost see every strand lit up like it's made from neon fibres. Yeah... My face... what of it I can see, definitely does not look like any real-world horse I know. My eyes are MASSIVE! And my face is definitely orientated more towards the foreward view like a human's face is, more than a horse's, which has two sides and a small overlap at the front. And my front hoofs can turn and move about in ways no normal horse's forelegs can, as if they'd been given the dexterity of human wrists and forearms. Huh... maybe that's right. Maybe I am a hybridised equine-human. Definitely not bipedal, though. I can walk on my hind hoofs, but not for very long. I'm definitely orientated towards the Quadruped."

"I guess the only thing missing... is color. All of the outlines are in neon gold. The rest is just the normal black I used to see for six years, since my sight completely shut down. But I do remember colors. I don't know how accurate my memories are, but I can remember them, at least. Now if I can figure out how to fill in the black areas with color, then maybe I might be seeing things as close to the way I used to be able to when I could see like everyone else."

"And there it is again... I swear that I'm hearing the craziest things from outside my apartment. There's no sounds of human activity at all in the corridor, even the Pakistani voices have stopped. But I can hear... a chicken. I would swear on a stack of bibles that I can hear a chicken outside my apartment, moving up and down the corridor. Sometimes I can even hear the flapping of wings. But what the scariest thing is... if I move to the door and listen carefully, it approaches, pecks at the barrier, then it... it hisses at me, like a cat or a snake. It seems to know I'm in here, and it seems frustrated that it can't get to me. How wierd is that?"

"My phones are still out. I've tried contacting the phone companies over the Net, but it's really hard trying to do so when you can't see the screen. My audio interface is good, but it's not perfect. My document reader is good, too. I've managed to get my power and water switched over to auto-payments for the moment (I usually love to get out and pay them manually. It kept me from being a hermit... not like I have any choice now). I've even managed to master using the mouse with my new 'fingers'. With the new 'tracing' thing I have, I can see them now. They're strange to look at when they've been traced: not truly like the fingers I remember seeing, but there's still four of them and a thumb, which is good. And they do seem to 'retract' (if that's the right word for what they do) when I put my hoofs to the floor. No toes on my back hoofs, though, I found out when brushing my teeth this morning. I nearly skidded backwards on the tiled floor in the bathroom, but my front hoofs managed to grip the sink and keep me from faceplanting on the sink. I have to be more aware of my posture and stance when standing on my hind legs."

"There have been a smaller number of stories on the net and news about people turning into ponies, like I have, but they seem to be dwindling. But it's not like the stories' are just dying off as people get used to it. I can't even find references to stories or articles that were published before the present day. The net 'chatter' over it is also disappearing, as if it's being removed or censored. Even the 'Are you a pony?' style netgroups are fading away. I mean, you'd think people who've had this happen to them would be talking about it more. It can't be something that people around them are just saying 'Oh, you're a pony now? Okay.' and just ignoring it... Gods-damn it! This is one time in my life that I really NEED to be able to see what the hell's going on out in the world... and I can't. I spent a good half-hour kicking those damned boards across my doorway this afternoon, in sheer frustration. I managed to do it without hurting my hoofs or legs (a positive), I'm getting a lot better at doing it, too (another positive), I didn't budge them at all (sigh, a negative), but I think I scared that fucking chicken into flying off down the other end of the corridor, and maybe even down the stairs (a REAL positive!). Really. I mean, who keeps a chicken in an apartment building? It had to be the Pakistanis. Everyone else knows pets like that are verboten in the apartments here. Mr Askersley would have a screaming fit if he found you with a chicken in your apartment. Budgies and canaries, okay, but a chicken? He'd catch it and roast it."

"Mmm... found and opened a packet of that dried seaweed snacks you can get from some asian stores. The smell is wonderful and the taste! But I had one huge problem. One of the sheets got stuck along the top of my tongue, and it wouldn't peel off! That's another thing: my tongue is different than before as well. Obviously I have no trouble talking with it, but it kinda feels funny... or it did. And the only thing I have had trouble with when using my new fingers are scissors. I fumble badly when trying to use them, especially small pairs. Maybe they can't flex the same way... no, it's the 'palm' of my new 'hand', or my hoof. It's inflexible, so it can't close like my human hand could. So while I can use bigger pairs of scissors or shears, the smaller ones won't close completely, because I don't have the flexibility there to use them... or I haven't got the knack of it, yet. Maybe that's the problem. Still, it beats trying to use my teeth for everything... which I still do, occasionally. I'm sanitising everything that I may have to carry in my mouth. Really, I mean, yuck! But I do what I have to do. Which reminds me, where did I put that other tube of toothpaste?"

Author's Notes:

Okay! We see Cheryl's dilemma and transformation progressing...