Aaron wasn't completely friendless looking back on it.

He enjoyed the company of himself.

Now that wasn't on his mind at the moment. What was on his mind was his dreams. He was enthralled by his dreams, good or bad. He wasn't a lucid dreamer, but at some level, knew he was going to like what he saw. It was like seeing a movie. And today's release in the blackout theater was a multitude of colors and shapes. A lava lamp scene here and there, mostly filler. Then came the good part. Where he kissed the girl of his dreams...and that was the sign for, "I must be dreaming."

He never thought too much about love or companionship. Do good to others yes. Do real good, no. The thought wasn't appalling or truly unpleasant. It wasn't his thing was all. And so he floated about in his mind. Or that is what he liked to think of it as. He never knew what exactly was going on. So he speculated. As best he could. Riding roller coasters in the sky distracts you often times.

His dreams were of little consequence to the ones that dragged him back to a nearby cottage. The quaint, foliage ridden cottage was full of the small animals that carried the unconscious body of the strange being before her. They were all quite tired from lugging the heavy thing. Anything they could do for the quiet yellow pegasus, made up for their momentary displeasure. That is, most of them.

A small white rabbit made its displeasure known to his caretaker with a thump of his foot and a glare from his beady eyes.

"Angel...we couldn't leave the poor thing out there..." the pony softly said to the rabbit.

He gave her a push of his eyebrows and crossed his arms.

"That is...um...for the moment...but...it needs some help right now...of course he won't stay too long..." She mumbled to the rabbit brushing aside her pink hair.

The rabbit called Angel had certainly asserted his authority he had over the pegasus. Most of the other animals rolled their eyes and sighed a little. As if to say, "There he goes again...pushing his weight."

He gave them a smug look, which turned to a sour face as the shy pony poked at the being on the floor.

"Oh Angel...he looks like he could use some medical attention...he looks a little pale...and he feels really cold for some reason..." she hopped over the thing nervously and headed for the door. "Angel, darlings, I will be back soon...I am going to be right back with Nurse Redheart...that is...if she doesn't mind..." she pondered to herself for a moment and then flew off from there.

Angel turned to the thing in front of him and sighed. He was going to be looking after it for the little while his caretaker was gone. He smiled and turned to the other animals, hoping they would stay with him.

To his chagrin, they had all scattered.

He huffed to himself, as if to say, "Damn you all."

The pony had landed at her destination a short time later, and quietly trotted into the building. There weren't many going in and out. The thought of few ponies there was something she could give a small smile about. The smile was caught by the attention of who she was looking for. The nurse had a white coat of fur and a red cross on both sides of her flank. She gave a nod to the yellow pegasus as she approached her.

"Hello Fluttershy. Is there anything I can help you with?" she asked kindly.

"Well...that is if you don't mind." She grinned nervously. "You see...I found...this...thing...in the woods..."

The nurse gave a small sigh and patted Fluttershy on the back after she adjusted her small white hat and fluffed her light pink hair a little with her hooves.

"Now Fluttershy...I told you many times..."

She opened her mouth in protest, "Yes Nurse Redheart...but-"

"This isn't a veterinary clinic..."

"I know Nurse Redheart and-"

"This place for ponies who are ill and in need of medical treatment..."

"Of course Nurse Redheart but-"

She scooted Fluttershy back to the entrance and gave her a smile, "Now run along Ms. Shy, I need to attend to other patients."

Fluttershy simply nodded and quietly trotted away. "That didn't help much...oh! Maybe Zecora could help! She knows all about the weird things...I think..." She quietly flew away towards her friend who lived deeper in the woods known as Evertree Forest. A zebra from a distant land she had claimed at one time, she was very helpful in times of distress when the solutions requires some out of the box thinking. She specialized in remedies from her homeland and would often be found singing a tune while she worked on her many hobbies. Speaking in her native accent was not all, she also spoke her every sentence with rhymes, so this greeting to Fluttershy, was not at all unexpected.

"Hello little pony, how are you today? Care to come in? Although the weather is splendid, wouldn't you say?"

Fluttershy nodded shyly with a blush and stepped into the hut. "Yes um..."

"Your face tells me you are in somewhat of a rush, so please speak your mind, do not blush."

"There is a...creature...a poor thing...it is in need of some care...and I-"

Zecora hushed her with her hoof and nodded. "An unknown thing, in need of care? Let us go and see how it fares." She went to a cupboard, among her various ceremonial decor, and pulled out a full saddle bag with her teeth, filled with who knew what. It made glass noises, indicating it was filled with ready made potions or herbal remedies as she was known for. She slipped it on and motioned Fluttershy with her hoof out the door.

"Lead the way, for I know not where it may lay."

Fluttershy nodded and began her flight towards her cottage, with Zecora following behind.

Angel did not enjoy the company of this thing lying on the floor. He couldn't stand it. All it did was breathe small breaths and take up space. It certainly didn't look too injured. A little on the stiff side, but no one would know the difference unless a closer inspection was taken. Of course, he said none of those things. If he could talk, he would have said, "What a drag."

And then it started to open its eyes.

Angel fixed that real quick with the cooking pan he had kept close for such an occasion.

Fluttershy and Zecora came into the cottage where the thing still lay, out cold. Fluttershy raised her eyebrow at the red lump on the thing's head.

"Oh...how did this happen...Angel?" She looked to her rabbit companion. "Do you know how this happened?"

Angel shrugged and shook his head.

Zecora was quick to pull out a vial of herbs from her bag she had settled on the floor next to its head. With little difficulty, she popped off the cork and applied them to the lump. "Dear Fluttershy, if its not too much trouble, can you wet me a cloth on the double! This lump is a small thing, nothing to worry about, but the other affliction won't soon fizzle out!"

Fluttershy wet a cloth as fast she could and placed it over the herbs as was instructed. And for the next half hour, after stripping off its clothing, Zecora and Fluttershy applied various remedies from the bag to the unconscious creature. The cottage smelled of nature already, and now it smelled as if spring had bloomed for a second time, as they were in the season already. Zecora and Fluttershy had some difficulty lifting the thing to Zecora's hut, as she had more in mind in terms of care that her bag was not ready for.

The thing lay at rest, its breathing brought back to normal from the various stews set around it in a corner of her hut. She hummed to herself as the last bit was ready and brought it to its lips. "Kindest pony come back again, maybe find out more about this creature from the librarian?"

Fluttershy nodded and flew away from her hut, but not before thanking her with a soft spoken tone.

It was around this moment that his eyes fluttered open again. But this time, he felt warmth spreading through his body and it was more to the task of moving on command. Only slightly so.

The first thing he noticed was he was no longer outside. The second was that the room smelled like food. And the third was the zebra standing over him with the various jewelry strung about it.

"...a zebra? But my favorite animals are reptiles." It wasn't much of a statement. He was sure he was dead. In some kind of heaven or another. Or perhaps his collective thoughts were strewn about the world...as floating bits of matter...able to view the wonders of the universe.

"I see you are up, but do not try, it is best to let rest rather than cry."

"Cry?" He immediately discarded the rhyming zebra's words and tried to move. He did in fact tear up from pain and lie back down.

"...you can talk." Was his next realization.

She simply nodded.

"I must be dead. Zebras can't talk. Much less like a medicine man."

"You know my race? Quite curious indeed, here I also thought you knew nothing of my creed. But man I am not, pony as you can see. Care for some tea?" She held a cup between her hooves with a pleasant smelling scent coming from it.

"...thanks."

Now to be clear, he thought the whole thing was insane. Even as he drank the tea and the zebra sat near him humming with a smile on her face. What his explanation for the whole thing was: "I read a lot of fiction. And now its playing with my head."
He stood by the explanation, even as the whole room and the zebra were clearly not part of a lucid dream. Even though he was now fully aware he was no longer asleep.

She then made it painfully obvious that it wasn't so. She had asked to feel around his chest for a thorough examination of her work. He nodded. And it was then he saw his clothes, save for his checkered boxers, were gone.

"Where are my clothes?"

"The clothing you seek is in a pile quite near to your head, do not worry, we left that last shred." She giggled a little and continued her examination of her work. The creams were gone, and his body left off the faint odor of a job well done.

"It appears that my work has finished itself, the remedies I gave you seemed to have-"

"Remedies?"

She coughed a little, not being interrupted too often while she was talking. It was a small inconvenience to her.

"As you stated yourself, only a while ago, I am a healer, no?"

He nodded and finally asked an important question: "What is your name?"

She laughed. "I had wondered if you would ever ask, my name is Zecora, and you know of my tasks."

"Rhyming and healing. Well seeing how rude I have been, my name is Aaron. A human." he gave her a goofy face.

Zecora laughed a little harder. "A human you say? That race I do not know, but your joke is taken well, for one who felt like snow."

He had a flashback at that moment. A realization. "I was in a snowstorm...and...I ended up in a...forest..."

"The woods, of course...A pony named Fluttershy had taken you from there my- you aren't a horse." She giggled a little more from that.

"I see you aren't used to seeing things like me...does that mean you have never seen my kind before?" He was worried that he would miss out on his pie. It was quite a stupid thing to worry for. Aaron knew that.

"Do not worry, for if I am right, Fluttershy is in a hurry."

"For what?" He asked.

Fluttershy had gone to visit her dear friend Twilight Sparkle, a purple unicorn pony who was quite literate and well versed in the learned arts. She lived in the town of PonyVille, in the tree house of a library. She had command over magic, as all unicorns did, and it was quite useful for the minute tasks that hooves and a strong mouth could not preform. The unicorn at that moment was exasperated from the yellow ponie's request.

"It walks on two legs, no claws, no sharp teeth, no scales, no feathers, no tail, no snout, no fur-"

She was interrupted with a small cough from the yellow pony.

The unicorn sighed, "Some fur...This is insane! There isn't such a thing in Equestria! I have studied every book in the library! And I have read every book. Including all the ones on species. Both here, and in the royal library in Canterlot."

A small purple dragon with green, rounded spikes along his head and down to the end of his tail nodded a little tired. "Twilight is right. Are you sure it wasn't a monkey that lost its tail? Or an ape?"

Fluttershy mumbled, "N-no not quite...you can check for yourself at Zecora's."

Twilight facehoofed. "...its at Zecora's hut?"

She gave a small nod.

Twilight sighed and motioned to the dragon, "Come on Spike, we better go and see what this mystery animal is."

The dragon gave a small sigh. "I know its going to be something stupid."

Twilight was slightly curious at what kind of creature Fluttershy did not know. Then she looked back to an incident to the small winged balls of fluff known as Parasprites. "Let's hope it isn't like that..." She mumbled to herself.

Around this time, Aaron and Zecora had familiarized themselves with each other. He was over the initial shock of the talking animal thing. But what he wasn't over, was the realization he wasn't in Kansas. Or his home. Or his world. Not anymore.

"Now fitting together all your rhyming...quite skillfully if I may say so, I am in a land called Equestria...ruled by two Princesses...who control the time of day, as well as the stars, and everyone- er- pony, can talk?"

She gave a simple nod to the now upright Aaron.

"Magic, pegasi, and god like animal royalty." He wasn't completely okay with that. He wasn't okay that he had talked to someone- pony, so much without caring either. He didn't like talking to people. Much less talking to horses. It wasn't that he wasn't thankful for everything they had done for him. He just couldn't stand so much...attention. And what killed him even more was that he had so much more to ask. He loved to learn. But not so much when it required help. It ate at him. Aaron was faced with a dilemma he hadn't anticipated, and it involved interacting with others. Zecora picked up on his uneasy feelings and gave him an assuring nuzzle.

"It seems much is on your head, I will leave you to your bed." Zecora went out the front door on that note.

Aaron sighed a little. "...this is really happening..." The understatement of the year in his book, but it was all he could really say.

"...what happened earlier?" His thoughts drifted back to the snowstorm. "It might just be possible...that I was caught up in a...supernatural storm...and it brought me here..." He didn't think it was possible. He didn't have anything else to go on however. "How do I get back now?" He wasn't one for being homesick, and the thought of exploring an unknown world...one as magical as this one was proving to be, was incredible to say the least...but he wondered nonetheless.

Twilight rolled her large purple eyes as she trotted towards the hut. "Why do I have to do this right after Winter Wrap Up...I didn't do that much but I am pretty tired like everyone else..."

She took note of Zecora who was already talking to Fluttershy who seemed ecstatic. For a shy pony anyway.

"Twilight!" She called softly, "Apparently the thing is a he and is feeling much better. Oh...and he is a hyoooman."

Hyoooman? She thought that was a silly sounding name for a species. "Alright, I'll take it that it can speak Equestrian?" she asked Zecora.

"Our language he does speak, although his mood now is rather bleak." Zecora nodded.

"Hmm..." she turned to a panting Spike who had just caught up. "Spike, I'd like you to write a letter. I packed a scroll and quill for the very occasion."

The purple dragon caught his breath and sighed. "Alright Twilight." He pulled out the scroll and wet the end of the quill with his lizard tongue. "I'm ready."

"Dear Princess Celestia..."

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