Shame and guilt washes through my body as I thrash futilely against my bonds. As I scream in self-disgust and fear, I care nothing for the agony I’m causing myself. Compared to what I’ve been through—the mental strife and disarray of it all—the physical pain of broken and battered limbs is nothing. Yet without this pain, what am I?

In between my frenzied shouts of pain and despair, I can loosely make out bits of conversation around me. The voices are completely indistinct to my ringing ears; just one pony could be speaking, or all of them together could be speaking. That much doesn’t matter so much as what is being said.

“Is he having another episode?” one pony asks.

“Se can’t be! She has too many antipsychotics in her system!” another cries out.

The more I scream, the clearer the past two days become in my mind. No longer am I seeing just flashes of images and feelings, but entire days on a nigh endless loop instead. The longer it goes on, the more violent my struggles against the bonds become. When the days begin asserting themselves several times per second, my struggles peak, and the bonds tear, setting me free. Just as suddenly as the images begin, they stop, as does my screaming.

Through my tear-stained eyes, I see the two unicorns present the hospital room lighting their horns in preparation of a spell of some sort. I can even hear the doctor speaking. “Candy, honey, go to the nurse’s station and get Nurse Tender and one of the orderlies,” she says in a tone that betrays her calm expression. “Remember to bring one of the stronger sedatives.”

Even as she says this, however, I struggle to roll my body over and hide myself beneath the pillow. It’s not the easiest thing to do when one of your forelimbs is encased in a device designed to keep it from moving or being flexed, and it really is just as painful as you might imagine. Still, after a bit of spastic flailing of an encapsulated limb and some tears, I have a pillow safely over my head and a blanket drawn over my body.

It’s kind of foolish to think that being covered in a blanket and having a pillow covering my head could bring you safety, but it does. I think it’s the the likeness of the warm embrace of the womb that instills this sense of safety. Nopony can hurt me here! Given what I’ve put myself through, I don’t know why anypony would want to put me through more than I’ve already been. It’s as safe a place as any to cry, and that’s what I intend on doing

The room around me remains silent—apart from me sobbing like a child—for a long while. The echo of approaching hooves alerts me to the approach of Forceps’ reinforcements—the nurse and orderly presumably here to wrestle and drug me and force me into stronger restraints. It’s only natural that they would do that; it’s certainly what would happen in a hospital on Earth.

Much to my surprise, the assault never comes. Instead defense comes from a rather unexpected source. “I’m terribly sorry, Nurse Tender, and you as well Stronghoof; my call for your aid was perhaps made in haste,” admits Doctor Forceps. “It would seem the appearance of her guests induced the resurgence of repressed memories, causing a panic attack. Once she was able to ‘hide’ herself, she calmed right down.”

The doctor’s words seem to assuage the tense air in the room. Over my sobbing, I hear two sets of retreating hoofsteps. The fact that I’m not about to be tackled, wrestled and drugged is only somewhat comforting. I’d still be alone for a while. Given that I just flipped the hay out, however, I don’t think that they’ll be likely to leave me all on my own now that I’m effectively free.

“Doc, if it’s possible, I’d like to get some time to myself,” I whimper hoarsely from beneath the pillow. “I know you’re not likely to leave me on my own, but I’d really like if my... friends came back in a bit. I really need to sort through the mess that is my mind.”

Somepony in the room—I can’t tell who—releases a sigh of what sounds like relief upon my use of the word friends. To be honest, I’m not sure if I even have the right to call them my friends after what I put them through. That somepony seems pleased with my choice of words eases my pain a bit, but still...

“Well, girls, you heard her,” the good doctor says after a few moments of silence. “I haven’t the slightest idea what the poor mare has gone through, but she sincerely sounds like she needs some space.”

“He, doctor,” Twilight verbally counters. “His mind is male, he’s just in somepony else’s body right—”

With a hitching sigh, I peek out slightly from beneath the pillow. “No Twilight; it’s alright,” I murmur in a manner rivals Fluttershy in softness. “With all the magic my real body absorbed, I don’t doubt that the sex-change spell is permanent now. I can accept that now. I have to.”

From beneath the pillow, I can just make out Twilight’s face. Given how she looked when she came in, I could never have thought she could look more upset. It isn’t like I’m admitting defeat; I’m just being a realist. You should understand that more than anypony, Twilight.

“Alright, out with you! Shoo!” Candy quickly interjects before the conversation can draw on any further. “If it’s alright with you, Momma, I’ll stand watch in case she needs anything.”

Startled by Candy’s straightforward manner, Lyra, Bon-Bon and Twilight put up no struggle as the young pegasus herds them out of the doorway. It’s almost comical the way she pushes the Lyra out with her forehead. Given momentary time alone with the doctor, I look to her with sudden worry.

“Hey Doc?”

She turns to me with only momentary hesitation. “Yes, Soren?” I’m kinda thankful that her gaze isn’t some cold analytical stare, like I’m some puzzle to be solved. To her, even just being ‘another patient’, I’m still a pony. “Are you in pain?”

Beneath the pillow I shake my head no. “No more than I ought to be in given the stupid stunt I just pulled!” I mutter weakly. “I just had a question... Two days ago, I went into estrus, but I’m not feeling the symptoms any longer. I was unfortunately involved in a drunken tryst that first night... if you get my meaning. I guess what I’m trying to ask is—”

“‘Am I pregnant, or did my estrus end early because of stress?’” she finishes my question understandingly. There’s no judgement in her voice, despite having heard that I am in a borrowed body and possibly pregnant. “Unfortunately, dear, a mare’s estrus cycle doesn’t just stop like that. If it would ease your mind, I can perform a relatively simple spell that will be able to tell us whether or not there is in fact a fertilized embryo inside you.”

“Please, do it...”

A half hour elapses before my mind has cooled down from smoldering wreckage to warm crater. Have I mentioned just how much thinking hurts sometimes? Seriously, try imagining how messed up a family dynamic is when the mother of a foal was not occupying her own body at the time of conception, her marefriend was temporarily made a stallion who bedded the pony occupying the mother’s body at the time in a drunken threesome. My brain literally drives itself in circles trying to figure out what part—if any—I play in the long run.

Candy, for all her youthful enthusiasm, is doing a very good job of keeping her distance. It could be that she doesn’t know whether to congratulate me or feel sorry for me. She unfortunately ended up on the wrong end of me talking aloud to myself. The things she’s heard would make her toes curl, if she had any.

At last, though, I think I’m ready to confront Lyra and Bon-Bon. With a forlorn sigh, I look to the door. “Candy, I think I’m ready to see my guests.” My tone is nearly completely flat. “If you could, I’d like to see Lyra and Bon-Bon, before seeing Twilight. There are still some things I need to get into words before I see her.”

Giving me a hesitant look, the aspiring nurse flicks her ears nervously. “You don’t have to see your friends if you aren’t up to it.” Her tone is almost pitying. “In fact, I insist that you tell me now whether or not you’re really ready, or I’ll send them away for the day!”

I don’t think my frown could possibly contain any more contempt at that moment. You don’t mess with a mare when she’s trying to confront her demons... especially when her demons no longer have a penis or fingers! Luna preserve me; I’m supposed to be healing, not being tormented in as many ways as possible. “I’m fine, really!”

She doesn’t seem impressed by my resolve, but nonetheless trots out through the door. Even as Lyra and Bon-Bon enter, I feel a twinge of apprehension, but it’s easy enough to clamp down on it. This is something I need to do, otherwise this... insanity is going to drag on. It is bad enough that they both look at me as though their minds aren’t decided as to whether or not I am dangerous.

“Soren, liste—” Lyra begins.

“You don’t need to apologize this very moment, Lyra.” I shift beneath my bedding before tossing the pillow off of my head and attempting to roll over. Thankfully, Candy is there this time to help me, and the experience is nowhere near as agonizing as it was before. “You don’t have to say anything right now. I just want to... talk at you, I guess. Will the two of you listen?”

I only wait long enough to catch their nods before continuing. “Let me start by saying you ruined my life, Lyra, make no mistake about that.” My voice is cold as ice, and even Candy flinches at my tone. “Despite my isolation and joblessness, I was quite content in my life before you came along with your overeager use of magic and human obsession. That is a life of normalcy that I can never go back to, even if my body could somehow become human again. I’m loyal to my friends, but this is something I can never forgive you for.”

Bon-Bon looks as though she’s about to make some sort of condemnatory comment in Lyra’s defense, but I silence that with a click of my tongue. “In spite of all that has happened and all you put me through, you’ve still been there for me.” I soften my icy glare. “Even if Bon-Bon told you that you should take responsibility for your actions, I know deep inside—because I know you almost as well as myself at this point—that you were going to do the right thing in the end anyway.

“Yeah, we had our share of right kerfuffles, but you tried to make things right.” In spite of myself, a smile tugs at the corners of my mouth. “It is because of what you’ve done—to and for me—that I’m not holding anything against you. No—not even that illicit drunken rendezvous.” My vision darts to the cream mare before I nod in her direction. “I’m not even angry, Bon-Bon. We were all drunk, not just me.”

I sigh, looking away from them all. “I’m just sorry you had to see me really lose it yesterday.”

All at once, another presence joins me on the hospital bed. At first I’m convinced by the brush of a feather that the young CNA is going to adjust my IV lead or something, but then a gray pegasus throws herself on me in a hug. When I turn my head enough to see Lyra, I’m surprised to see that she is practically crying all over my bandaged shoulder.

“You stupid jerk!” she cries, hitting my chest weakly with one forehoof. “You scared me half to death when you ran off, and... and...” Looking up at me with those teary eyes like she is, I can’t help but feel bad. “When we heard somepony had wandered into town, banged up and bloody looking to duel Twilight... I’d thought the worst had happened when I saw you.”

There’s a sudden groan from the bed as Bon-Bon climbs up on the bed. The larger mare pulls Lyra off of me, pressing the smaller pegasus’s back into her belly in an almost motherly looking hug. “Heartstrings, baby, the worst did happen,” she coos into Lyra’s ear. “H—she had a nervous breakdown, and fought like a cornered beast. If not for the Princesses, she may very well have killed Twilight!”

The look on Bon-Bon’s face betrays the reassuring tone of her voice. It’s clear that she’s not completely comfortable with me after seeing me like that. I really don’t blame her. There’s a certain off-putting factor when you account for the fact that this raging psycho is occupying her lover’s body.

Eager to change the subject away from my earlier psychosis, I let out a heavy breath before smearing a smug look on my face. “So... About the other night...” It amazes me how a gray pony and a cream pony can visibly pale at the drop of a hat. “Wild night, huh?”

“Soren, I said I was sorry, and I gave you my word I wouldn’t do anything to breach your trust again,” Lyra says anxiously. Bon-Bon doesn’t say anything, having gone from pale to beet red so suddenly. Someone definitely remembers what happened in more vivid detail than I. “What more do I have to do to make this up to you?”

“I wonder...” Making a show of tapping a hoof against my chin, my knowing eyes dart over to Candy. Knowing what I’m doing, she returns a playful smile. “I suppose if anything, you two should have fun while you can.”

“What?” croaks Bon-Bon.

Leaning forward, I rest my hoof on Lyra’s forehooves. “Let’s just say that so long as nothing bad happens, the two of you aren’t going to be getting a lot of restful nights.”

“What is that supposed to—oh!” It’s cute how a couple can have a revelation in stereo. Just watching that realization dawning on their faces is almost worth it. Their expressions shift from bewilderment to recognition, and then to worry. It’s so adorable!

Lyra takes her reaction one step further when her expression becomes one of glee. “Bon-Bon! Did you hear that?” She squirms out from beneath her lover before turning and pressing her—my—lips firmly against Bon-Bon’s. “Oh Bonnie! We’re going to have a foal!” she exclaims headily as the two part.

For all the preparing I did for this, I am totally mistaken in having thought that facing Twilight would be awkward. It’s nearly impossible, as it turns out. Every time I look to her to speak, a lump forms in my throat. How could I have thought I was ready to face her so soon? Just yesterday I had a makeshift knife ready to pierce her brain stem, for crying out loud!

It doesn’t help in the least that Twilight basically hasn’t said a single thing since I called her back in. In all honesty, it wouldn’t surprise me that I broke her. Or maybe she thinks she broke me? “Twilight, if you’re worrying that you broke me, don’t.” Oh horseapples! Did I say that without even realizing? “I broke me. Nopony else.”

Finally, I bring myself to looking directly at her. Something about her expression is seriously scaring me. It’s not the crazy ‘I snapped and am now going to hex a doll’ look or even the defeated ‘I’ve failed and now my friends hate each other’ look; what I am seeing is a devastating mix of these two looks. Her mane is disheveled, and she’s just staring at the floor looking like she wants nothing more than to find some dark place to lay down and die. What, did she go stew in what she’d done after being sent out?

I really know that feeling, so the least I can do is attempt to assuage it. “Look... I may have said some really terrible things, Twilight.” That has her attention. Her chin raises ever so slightly, and her ears have pricked forward. Her gaze remains locked on the floor. “You’ve read those psychology textbooks front to back—I know you have. You should know better than anypony that I wasn’t in the right state of mind to be making any of those accusations, let alone have any real meaning behind it.”

Breaking her gaze with the floor, she looks at me. “But... my neglect—” Darn it... I really got to you back then... didn’t I, Twilight? Dear Celestia, this is aggravating me. Given my mental state, I’m the one who should be so darned sorrowful and blaming myself for the loss of the foal, not her!

“Sod your darned neglect, Twilight!” I interrupt, raising my voice more than I ever intended. “You did nothing wrong! Yes, it was a mistake the cost a life, but you know what? It’s not your fault, or Lyra’s fault. It’s nopony’s fault! Tragedies happen!”

“But—”

“NO!” I swat the call button off of my bed. “You do not get to lump the blame on yourself. Nopony could have predicted what happened to Pound.” I begin trembling, not only because I’m seriously worried for her own state of mind, but because I’m realizing painful things. “I should probably be thanking you, darn you!”

Her attention is fully on me now. Some of her misery even seems to be slipping away, only to be replaced with confusion. “Say you hadn’t bound me to the confines of Ponyville or placing a taboo on the Everfree or whatever it was that you did.” I look at her very seriously, tears rimming my eyes. “What would have happened?”

Twilight looks at me in plaintive consideration. I can almost hear her wondering what any of that has to do with things. “You would have gone into the Everfree after Pound.”

I slap my good hoof against my thigh. “That’s right!” I cry emphatically. “What would have happened? Nopony can be sure whether or not I could have saved him, but I know for a fact that I wouldn’t have succeeded. The cartoon can show me all sorts of scary and dangerous beasts in the Everfree, but nothing compares to things in real life. I’d be just another casualty of causality if I’d gone in there.”

“Still, you were so angry at me!” She seems genuinely confused now. “How can you be so casual about this now?”

I let out a shuddering sigh. Yeah, anger was very present when I attacked her verbally, and even more so in the duel. At that time, I was angry because I blamed her out of grief. There still is a bit of anger there... I mean, the least they could have done was tell me that I was bound to Ponyville. “I still am a bit angry, at both you and Lyra,” I whisper with a sniffle. “If you’d just told me that you were going to bind me to ponyville for my own safety, I would have gone to get help instead of trying to corral the poor foal myself.”

“Soren, I’m sorry.” For the first time since Twilight got here, she doesn’t look completely miserable. If anything, she looks slightly relieved. “I truly am.”

“I know you are, Twilight. For what it is worth, I’m sorry too.” I look away again. “I can’t forgive you for the scar in my soul, and I know that you can’t forgive me for almost killing you. We all have our sins to live with though.”

Letting out a small giggle, I look back to her. “To answer your other question,” I say with a laugh, reclining back onto my pillow. “I can be so casual about this now because it’s all I can do not to lose my mind again.”

It’s a sobering statement for both of us. It’s very true though. Time and time again, I’ve allowed myself to cool down if nothing less than to keep me from doing something stupid like canicide. It’s almost necessary when your genetic stock includes somepony who has anger issues. It’s a wonder I didn’t become violently angry once during my stay outside of my little episode.

I wonder silently to myself when the Princesses specialist is to arrive. It is well into the afternoon now, and still there is no sign of interruption. Could their specialist have been delayed? Or are they listening even now, trying from afar to gauge my reactions ahead of time? For that matter, what sort of specialist are they? Now I’m really—a knocking at the door interrupts my train of thought.

“I hope our presence is not an unwelcome one.”

Author's Notes:

Nothing to see here. I honestly can't say that I can think of anything to note about this chapter...

Well, except maybe that I've literally been hesitating on the Twilight scene for a few days after writing the second paragraph. For the longest while, I wasn't exactly sure how I wanted this to go. I wouldn't write it any other way, however. I really wouldn't.

Re-edited 12 July 2017