We walked down to the medical centre in the castle, with Twilight looking at notes while also not bumping into anyone, and Nathan and Thomas discussing something or the other. I tuned out for a bit, following Twilight. I wasn't exactly sure whether she was still mad at me from earlier. She didn't look like it, but a princess should try to keep her emotions in check.

Shouldn't she?

"Excuse me, Princess?" I asked, gaining her attention. She turned around and gave me this very unimpressed look.

So she is still mad fr-

"I said earlier that just Twilight is fine," she said. "My friends call me Twilight, so there really isn't a reason why you should, either."

I raised my eyebrow in confusion. "You're not mad at us from earlier?"

Her look shifted to that of a soft smile. "Maybe a little, but you weren't actively trying to cause harm, nor were any of my friends or anypony else injured."

I smiled in understanding. Thank fuck she doesn't hold grudges. "Okay, thanks. So what is required of this magic test you were talking about earlier?"

"It's a test based on the influx of magic to the body," Twilight replied. She put the notes back in the satchel she was carrying on her back. "It's to test to see whether magic has any passive effect on you. It happens to everything with magic, but with you, we can't be sure. We need to check, just in case if any of you develop MID."

"MID?" I asked, completely confused as to how I could develop Vascular Dementia from magic.

"Magic Influx Disorder," she replied, unaware I was thinking of something else. "It's a disease that affects the brain's cognitive ability, caused by a massive influx of magic when you're not used to it. Symptoms include nausea, headaches, blackouts, longer response times and concussion. In some severe cases, the damage done can be irreparable, and some ponies, as well as some griffons, two minotaurs and a yak have known to have died from the disease..."

"Well, that's reassuring," I said, with a sarcastic tone and a roll of my eyes to boot. Great, I'm gonna die from a disease that I couldn't get on Earth. Fan-fucking-tastic.

"They only died because they brushed off the symptoms and didn't get medical attention," Twilight refuted. "Most ponies get treated in the first week, and never have to come back to the hospital again. But since you have come from an environment where magic doesn't exist, in theory you're more prone to it than anypony else, and we need to be absolutely sure. Prevention is better than cure, after all."

This sounded scary to me at the time, but I did my best not to show it. "So what kind of tests do we need to do?"

"We need to take a blood test, first of all," Twilight explained. "We need to check the magical flow in your blood, if there is any. If there isn't any, then theoretically, you're either immune to the disease, or you're more likely than anypony to get the disease."

"And how do we tell the difference from there?"

"We'll use a machine to detect background magic. We can then use that do see if magic seeps through your skin. If it doesn't, you're immune. But if your body soaks up the magic, then sooner or later, you'll begin to show the symptoms."

We walked into the medical room, with Twilight opening the door with her magic. She got us to sit over by the bench and then told us to wait there while she went and got a nurse to help out. While we waited, I turned to my mates, both of whom were sitting to my right, with Nathan in the middle and Thomas to the right. "You catch any of that?"

"Aye," Nathan replied. "Why do I get the feeling one of us will get it and the others are gonna be immune tae it?"

"Dunno, but I don't want it either," Thomas added.

"Just wait, we'll see later on."

And on cue, Twilight returns with two nurses, both unicorn mares. One of them pushing two forms of equipment: a box of syringes and a large box type machine. I assumed the latter was for that background magic thing that Twilight was talking about earlier.

I winced at the sight of the former. Not that I would normally have minded injections, but the first, and what I though was last, time I had blood taken was to measure blood pressure when I was 7. And... well...

AAAAAAAAAAARRRRGGGGGHHH!!!

I still remember my mum chuckling from the room after it had been done.

But whatever, we all have our moments.

"Right, the nurses are just going to be setting up in that room there," Twilight explained, as the nurses walked with the equipment to the room that Twilight was pointing at, which was to our left. "We can only do one at a time, unfortunately, as both nurses are required to use the background magic monitor."

Thomas and I both turned to Nathan, who had just turned to me. His face was initially a look of smugness, which then turned into a nervous smile, and then turned to Thomas. When he turned back to look at me again, his face had rearranged to a look of mild horror, and then annoyance.

"Oh, come on," he groaned, with him throwing his arms up in the air like he just didn't care. This had not gone well with him. "Can't one of you two go first!?"

"Nah, ah cannae be arsed," was the response that came from Thomas. Just being the cheeky bastard as always.

I then decided to wind up Nathan. "Awww, what's the matter, Nathan?" I teased. "Don't tell me a thirty-four year old man like yourself is afraid of needles..."

"Shut up!" Nathan replied in slight indignance at my mockery. "Says the one who wants ME to go first!"

"Someone has to," I cheekily responded.

"Come on," Twilight was getting impatient. "Hurry up, Nathan!"

"Fine!" Nathan said, getting off the bench and walking into the room before stopping, and turned to me. "You're next."

"Looking forward to it," I said, being slightly sarcastic. I actually didn't mind it, unlike the wuss who pretends to be a man Nathan. I turned to Nathan, and he looked the same.

Twilight then sat next to us in the space that Nathan had left. "So, what was life like back on Earth for you?"

"Eh, alright I suppose," I replied. "Sure, there were some days in my life where I wished I'd kept sleeping, but, I mean, you have to just get on with it."

She nodded in understanding. "You three close?"

"Yeah," I responded, reminiscing of when we first met. "I first met Thomas when I was in Primary Three, back in 1988. He'd just come into school at that point. He was getting picked on by some P2s, but me and my other buddy Brodie put them in their place. We've been friends for nearly 30 years. We met Nathan in high school, that must have been... what, '95?"

"Nah, it was '96, I think," Thomas corrected me.

"Aye, '96, I was in my fourth year at high school. Thomas in his second year, and Nathan only just came into secondary school-"

"Wait, secondary school?" Twilight asked.

"Yeah. In Scotland, you go to nursery or pre-school slash whatever for two years at 2 or 3 years old. You then start 7 years of primary education, which is a dawdle. You start at either four or five, depending on whether you were born before or after August of the year you start. Then, after that, you do six years of secondary schooling, in which you pick your subjects in the later years and get qualifications in them."

"Which do you have?" Twilight asked.

"I have six Standard grades, in Computing Studies, Physics, Chemistry, English - which is what you'd call Equish - Maths, and Administration. I also have four Highers, in Computing, Maths, Physics and Chemistry. I also did a University degree in Computing, too."

"Sounds impressive," Twilight commented.

"But I certainly didn't manage to do it alone," I added. "Me and my best mate Brodie helped each other, since we were studying the same things. He went off to do computer games development at Uni, but my father was adamant I should do programming for a software company. So I had to do it. But we both went to the same Uni, so it was all good. We were still good friends, even after we went different ways with our jobs."

"What happened to your other friends?"

"Well, there were 8 others I used to hang about with - one got arrested by the police for theft a few years after we left," gaining a disapproving look from Twilight, I continued; "another went to work for Jaguar, another worked for Burton's, another one opened a tech shop, one did some acting, one worked at a supermarket, but got hammered on beer and got alcohol poisoning by drinking 10 bottles of beer in an hour, and died from hypothermia because he couldn't walk home, and the other two joined the army."

"I'm sorry to hear of your supermarket friend, and... Army - like the Royal Guard?"

"Yes, but they're more combat orientated. As they found out the hard way."

"What do you mean?"

"Well," I sighed. "On the 11th of September, 9/11 happened."

"What was that?" Twilight asked, getting out her notepad to write stuff down with her magic.

"It's quite sad, and a bit confusing as well," I said.

"Well, just try and explain it."

"9/11 was the worst terrorist attack ever committed. You know those planes I showed you earlier, particularly the 747?"

"Yeah, the passenger aircraft," Twilight said, beginning to look uneasy. "Why?"

"Two planes of similar size, the 767, were flown into New York's World Trade Centre Twin Towers, as well as the Pentagon, the Headquarters of the United States Department of Defence. Deliberately."

Twilight's face was now displaying both horror and disgust. "That's horrible!"

"There were allegedly people on the planes that took control from the pilots and flew the planes into the towers with passengers on board. There was also a fourth, that was probably intended for the White House, where the US President lives, or it may have been the Capitol, the place where elected Congressmen and Congresswomen gather for discussing legislation and whatever, similar to court here."

"What happened to that one?" Twilight now looking very uneasy.

"The people on the plane tried to take over, and when the terrorists realised they might take control of the plane, despite not being armed, they crashed the plane deliberately. Everybody on board all four planes died, the total death toll was slightly less that 3,000."

"That's horrific!"

"It gets worse," I continued. "The US president at the time, George W. Bush, claimed that Osama bin Laden, leader of Al-Qaeda, was behind the terrorist attacks and that the Taliban, the people who were in charge of Afghanistan at the time, were deliberately hiding him. The Taliban publically condemned the attacks and demanded evidence for bin Laden's involvement. The Taliban and bin Laden were closely allied, so even after the Taliban offered the US to talk, the US invaded Afghanistan, as did the UK.

"In my opinion, the war did more harm than good. That kind of politics is why I generally hate politicians from my world. They say that they have the best interests of the people in mind, but a lot of that goes out the window as soon as they come into power. But anyway, two years later, in 2003, Iraq was accused of having weapons of mass destruction, and Bush invaded Iraq to depose Saddam Hussein, Iraq's dictator, and dispose of the WMD's - which were never really there in the first place."

"That's... disgusting..." Twilight said, with disgust and even a tad of venom in her voice. "But how does this relate to your friends?"

"They joined the Royal Highland Fusiliers in either '98 or '99, and in '03, they were deployed to Iraq as part of the UK's efforts in a war that was wrong to enter in the first place. In 2004, Dennis, one of the two soldiers, came back in crutches, had his leg blown off by a roadside bomb."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Did he recover?"

"Not fully. Although he did eventually adjust to civilian life, he could never recover physically recover from his injuries."

"What happened to the other?"

"It's a bit more complicated. Jock left the army in 2007, but what he'd been through in combat really screwed him over. He wasn't injured, but he was clearly traumatised by what he'd seen - and/or done. His girlfriend had abandoned him after he came back from his final tour, making it worse for him.

"I tried helping him adjust to society again, but he failed to do so and started doing cocaine three months later. I tried contacting him one evening and he wouldn't pick up the phone. I was concerned about his unstable emotions he expressed in the past so I phoned the police over to his house. They informed me that evening that..."

"Yes?" Twilight said, with apprehension in her voice.

"He..." I began, then I looked at the ground, the memory still burned into the back of my mind. I then turned back to Twilight. "...had committed suicide."

Twilight's eyes went wide, as the shock hit her as well. She looked down as well, thinking about something. For what felt like hours, when in reality couldn't have been more than ten seconds, deafening silence took hold, adding to the atmosphere. You could even hear a muffled groan from Nathan in the room from what I presumed was the blood test. Eventually, Twilight spoke.

"I'm sorry."

"Even though the pain is still there, he died 10 years ago, I guess we all have to move on at some point," Thomas had spoken for the first time in a while.

"Yeah," was all I could muster.

"But enough of the sad stuff," Thomas said, trying to lighten the mood. "What have you done in Equestria recently? You know, being a Princess and all."

"Well, I guess I'm still getting used to what I'm supposed to do," Twilight began. "But recently, me and my friends were called to a remote village. Everypony in that village had their cutie marks removed-"

"Cutie marks?" Thomas interrupted, his face distorted in disgust at the name.

"Yeah, cutie marks, how do you not know what they are?"

"Not from this world, Twilight," I reminded her, with a roll of the eyes to make my point.

"Oh yeah, cutie marks appear on a pony's flank whenever they find their special talent or unique characteristic that makes them special," Twilight explained. Twilight then looked very confused. "Wait, humans DON'T get cutie marks?"

"No."

"How do you know what your special talent is, then?"

"You just know, I suppose. I mean, Sébastien Loeb and Colin McRae didn't become rally legends for no reason."

"Hmm... I suppose that makes sense," Twilight said to herself. "Anyway, Everypony had their cutie marks removed and replaced with an equals symbol by a unicorn mare going by the name of Starlight Glimmer."

Somewhat similar to Twilight Sparkle...

"She basically ruled over the ponies in the village with an iron hoof, as she claimed that cutie marks cause arguments and problems, despite her not showing evidence."

"And I take it you stopped her," Thomas commented.

"We did, but not before Starlight tried her brainwashing tactics on us."

"Where is she now?" I asked.

"We don't know," Twilight sighed, slightly disappointed with not catching her. "She ran into a tunnel, and I haven't seen her since. I just hope she realises she's made a mistake before she decides to do something else."

It was at this point that the door opened, with Nathan walking out. He had a smile on his face, which could only mean one thing.

"You're immune?"

"Indeed," Nathan replied with a smirk. "And you're next."

"I don't care," I said with annoyance in my voice. "We'll all have to do it anyway."

I walked past him as he sat where I was sitting before, and I opened the door to the med room. Inside, it was mostly everything white, with a few exceptions. It looked like your usual NHS GP room, except it was more suited for ponies. I sat in the chair that one of the nurses had pointed to.

"How are you feeling at the moment, sir?" one of he nurse asked. If I were to take a guess, this mare looked older than the other nurse, so I assumed she was more experienced and therefore was the one in charge here.

"I'm feeling okay, thank you, ma'am," I replied. "And you can just call me Jack, there's no need to call me sir or anything like that."

"Okay, then... Jack," the nurse said. "There's nothing that feels wrong in any way at all?"

"Well, I don't think I have any of the symptoms Princess Twilight described, so no."

"Well, we still have to be completely sure," the nurse said, before turning to the other nurse. "Nurse Warmheart, if you wouldn't mind."

"Of course, Nurse Coldheart," the younger nurse replied.

At this, I tried to contain my laughter, but to no avail. I giggled out loud, at the irony of two nurses, Warmheart and Coldheart, working together.

"Something funny, Jack?"

I looked down to Nurse Coldheart, and saw that she had a raised eyebrow that was meant to signal, 'What are you laughing at?'

I chuckled again nervously. "It's the irony that two nurses, that have names that end in heart, who work together, have polar opposite names, Cold and Warm."

The younger nurse giggled. "I've never really thought about that before, but now you mention it..." She giggles again for a bit, until Coldheart fake coughs, signalling for her to continue. "Oh, right."

Nurse Warmheart walked over, levitating the necessary equipment to the senior Nurse. Turning and looking at me, Coldheart pointed to my left arm. "If you would lay out... your..." She was obviously struggling for the name. Either Nathan hadn't told her, or she never bothered to ask before.

"Arm," I finished, and laid it down on the table while forming a fist, while not clenching it. It was a bit awkward for me to do, but we all have to do uncomfortable things at times, don't we? Looking at you, Mister Lang.

"Right," Coldheart said to herself as she took the needle from Warmheart's magic. She then turned to me and walked over to my arm, with a disinfectant wipe in her magic. She then did the usual procedure. You know, rub the wipe clockwise, let it dry for 30 seconds or so, etc.

After about two minutes of preparing, Coldheart raised the needle to over the Medial Cubital Vein in my arm, which Nathan had pointed out, when he was getting his blood taken, was the best choice.

"This might sting a little," Nurse Coldheart said, as Nurse Warmheart walked back over to the machine in order to recalibrate it. I looked away, and prepared myself to possibly scream (if she missed the vein somehow and hit a muscle).

I didn't end up doing so, however. The nurse got it spot on, and all I feel is a little prick, as well as a slight sting. After a few seconds, the nurse told me tor relax my arm, and removed the needle. They repeated this process twice, in order to get accurate results. Coldheart bandaged my arm and handed the tubes to Warmheart, who placed them into a machine that I guess was testing the blood for signs of magic.

"In the meantime, can you please step over here," Coldheart directed me to the centre of the room. I got out of the chair and walked over to where the cerulean nurse was pointing to. As I did so, Warmheart spoke.

"I have the results here, Coldheart. They're negative, there's no magic flow at all in any of the samples."

"Thank you, Warmheart. Can you start the monitor procedure, please?"

"Certainly," she replied. The amber coloured nurse walked over to the machine, and pressed a button which did some laser-type configuration.

"Would you stand with your arms apart?" Coldheart asked. I did so, and was asked if I was ready, to which I replied that I was.

Warmheart pressed a button and kept the machine still, while Coldheart was controlling the machine by typing buttons - with the end of her hooves. Seriously, how the fuck do these ponies do this without hands? The laser came on, and pointed straight into my chest, while a second laser (that was invisible to the naked eye) recorded the readings. The laser got more intense, and looked like it was getting brighter. Then it stopped.

After this, the laser spread to a full horizontal line and, starting at my feet, did a full scan of my body. I got this buzzing sensation, but I dismissed this as me feeling things, as the machine made a buzzing noise, which might have been why I felt buzzing. After another few minutes, the scans were done, and the results were printed onto a piece of paper.

The nurses both looked at the results, and a smile of relief had formed on their faces. Warmheart looked up from the piece of paper. "It looks like you're completely immune to magic, too. You're not at any risk of MID, thankfully."

"Thank you," I sighed with relief. "At least that makes two of us."

"You're welcome, Jack," Warmheart replied. "If you'd just go get the other one for us, that would be great."

I thanked them again and left, turning to Thomas. All three on the benches looked up at me upon hearing the door opening. "Are you immune?"

"Yep, and you're up next."

With that, Thomas got up and walked past me into the room I had just been in, as I went to sit down in the spot he was sitting in before.

"So that makes two," Nathan remarked. "Let's see how the other one gets on."

"He'll probably end up being immune, just like us," I replied.

"Well, we need to be absolutely sure," Twilight said. "It's better to be safe rather than sorry, after all."

"In the mean time," I said, looking at Twilight. "I'd like to show you highlights from a sport that some of us humans play, if you're interested."

"A sport? What type?" Twilight asked.

"It's a ball game called Rugby, where players from two separate teams have to get control of a ball that starts at the centre, and get it to the other team's goal, to score what's called a try. I'll let you watch, if you want."

Twilight now had a large smile on her face. "Yeah, I'd like to see what types of sports you humans like to play."

"Alright, I'll just get my phone out, and show you a video of the highlights," I said, while pulling my phone from my pocket. I typed in the password, making sure neither Nathan or Twilight saw the password as it would be bad for me if either found out.

...

Don't give me that look, you'd be pissed as well if someone nicked your phone and took about a trillion photos on it before you noticed.

I scrolled through the Downloads app on my phone, as I had downloaded the video, so I could watch it just in case the internet went down again. Fuck you, British Telecom.

"Ah, here it is," I said before turning the screen and using the case as a rest so we could all watch it. "This was the most recent game where our home team, Scotland, played against Australia, another very good Rugby team."

"So who won that game?"

"Scotland. We've got one of the best rugby teams in the world. We haven't managed to beat the all-blacks, New Zealand's team just yet, but we'll keep trying anyway."

"The rules will be apparent when you watch it," Thomas explained.

https://youtu.be/Gb_-5LyA61I

"So what do you think?"

"It... seems a bit rougher than hoofball that we have here..." Twilight said. "But it also seems very competitive as well. If you introduce it to Equestria, it might catch on."

"I'll probably try to do that while we are here, then," I said, while putting my phone in my pocket. "I was alright when I did it in high school."

"You played it in high school?" Twilight turned to me.

"Yeah, I used to play it in first year through to the end of third year, and it was fun while it lasted. I played in the second row position. I was actually alright at it, but I sprained my ankle and I had to wait before I could play it again. By this point, the exams were coming up so I didn't bother continuing.

"But even though I practised after I had gone to Uni whenever I had the chance, I'll still be a bit rusty."

At this point, Thomas opened the door and walked through with the two nurses. Warmheart took away the equipment that had been used in the test, leaving just Coldheart and Thomas. But the concerning thing about this was the sad look that was clearly visible on Thomas' face, and to a lesser extent, Coldheart's.

Oh, no, I thought at the time. He's not-

"Princess Twilight," Nurse Coldheart started. "As you probably know, both Nathan and Jack are immune to magic, so they can't develop MID. With Thomas, however, we found with the magic monitor that background magic is seeping into his skin, and at an alarming rate too, at least for ponies."

Twilight, Nathan and I all clearly had looks of shock on our faces, as this wasn't really expected.

"How bad is it?" Twilight asked.

"If his body keeps absorbing magical energy at the way he is at the moment, he will die in 72 hours if he doesn't get medical attention."

"What will you need to do?" Nathan asked.

"We will have to see if it is possible to get a magical operation in order to place an anti magic barrier around his body in order to stop magic seeping in," Coldheart explained. "It's only really been able to have been done on unicorn's horns before, but it's not been done on a full size body before, let alone one that's only new to this planet. In the mean time, he'll have to take these every morning when he gets up, and every evening at 6 o'clock in order to get maximum effectiveness," she levitated a box of pills up for us to see.

"He can take these to completely neutralise the effects, but he'll have to take these at those times everyday for the rest of his life-"

Thomas spoke up for the first time since leaving the hospital room. "And I have no objection to that. I'd rather take the pills anyway."

"We'll discuss this later on," Nurse Coldheart said, shooting Thomas a harsh glare, before turning to the Princess. "You said you also wanted to take an anatomy on these three?"

"Yes, I'd like to get a full anatomy of the human body so we can use the medical data in case of any emergencies."

At this point, Nurse Warmheart returned, albeit with a camera and some paper, with a quill being held in her magic this time. "Here's the camera that you wanted, Princess."

"Thank you, Nurse Warmheart," Twilight responded. The fawn nurse bowed and walked away to her previous duties.

"If you would follow us, guys," Twilight said, before turning and entering the room, along with Nurse Coldheart. Reluctantly, we followed suit.

I just hope I can keep my pants on.

Author's Notes:

Sorry for the late update! I originally planned to get this out for Thursday, but then writer's block happened, and I lost quite a bit of the chapter when I forgot to save so I couldn't get it out until today.