Gus looked over Shawn’s prone form as he felt knots form in his throat and stomach. He himself had reacted rather well, this being one of his top five impossible dreams, even if the impossibility had made him freak out. But Shawn would be freaked out and majorly ticked off. So it was as if approaching a bomb that Burton Guster formulated his approach.
He soon scrapped all but a few key steps. After all, no plan survives contact with the enemy. Shawn was his best friend, of course, but he could be very… spontaneous. All Gus could really “plan” was whether to wait until Shawn woke up.
Seizing the timeline, Gus shook the roan’s shoulder. “Shawn?” He heard a grunt. Before Shawn could assert his agency, Gus amended, “Shawn, don’t wake up.”
Shawn could only mumble. “Mff. Um, a little late for that.”
“If you wake up—when you completely wake up—you’re going to panic. That’s the last thing we need; I’m trying to let you panic as slowly as possible.”
“Whatever, man.” Shawn rolled from his back to his side, away from Gus. “Lemme sleep.”
“Yes, exactly!” whispered Gus excitedly, overjoyed that the plan hadn’t fled for the hills. “And don’t open your eyes!”
Shawn almost did open his eyes. He realized he hadn’t rolled over on a bed, or a couch, or even a floor. He felt the ground again, with his hand. “Dude, is this grass?”
Gus stalled with the briefest of silences. “Yes.”
Shawn listened. “Is that a river?”
“Yes.”
And was Shawn making stuff up, or did his torso feel longer? “What did you do last night?”
“Wait a minute,” Gus said defensively. “That’s—um… well, that’s two questions. I don’t know what happened, and I definitely don’t know whose fault it is.”
Shawn wasn’t awake enough to argue with that. “Alright then, one at a time. I think I’m smelling… horses. Are there horses here?”
That took Gus by surprise. Shawn wasn’t the one with the Super Smeller. Still, it wasn’t as if Shawn had put a clothespin on his nose when they solved that jockey’s death. “Yes, but they’re actually ponies.”
Shawn shook his mis-weighted head. “Ugh. Fine, ponies. Can you get the ponies out of here?”
“No, Shawn,” intoned Gus despite himself. “You are the ponies.”
Shawn rolled to his back again. “And then Shawn was a stallion!” he narrated triumphantly, raising a fist in the air.
Gus chuckled nervously. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you got it.”
And then Shawn got it. Or at least, he put one and one together. My body feels weird, and Gus said I was a ponies…pony? He made a guess, and popped open one eye. And he saw…
…well, pretty much what he’d guessed. Brilliant blue sky, a couple puffy clouds, and in the foreground, a tall reddish-brown stump. Shawn wiggled his raised arm, and he saw the stump wiggling. He made to bring his fist nearer his face, and the stump craned around on several joints. It looked like this was one of Shawn’s new pony legs. Just to be sure, he poked it with his other front pony hoof. Not much to it; there was a hard hoof and a spongy center. “Huh,” he finally said.
Gus let out a sigh of relief. “So far, so good.” He breathed deeply. “Shawn, I actually know a… a bit more about what’s going on than I’d care to admit, but I’m gonna try not to hold back. I’ll answer any questions that I know how.”
“Why are we palette-swapped?”
Gus looked, and now saw Shawn was looking back at him. “…What?” Shawn had a dark brown body and a black mane. Gus turned his head backward and flicked his tail. It was a distressingly familiar other shade of brown. Unbelieving, he sprinted to the river and looked at his reflection.
Before 1962, Crayola distributed boxes of crayons that included a color called “flesh.” That year, however, was in the dead center of the African-American Civil Rights Movement, and it was noted that this color resembled the skin tone only of Caucasians. The subsequent name change was such that now, Gus saw his close-cut raw umber mane atop what could only be called a “peach” coat.
He screeched like a girl, flapping his wings to escape the reflection, ultimately tumbling hooves-over-head backward onto the ground.
Shawn watched his friend’s reaction with comfortable familiarity. “Well!” He flicked his black tail. “The more things change, huh?”
Gus shot a look that could make a raincloud sleet itself.
------- “I Know, You Know” by The Friendly Indians Arrangement for eight singers by Prawo Jazdy
(Instrumentals use same instruments as “My Little Pony.” The theme is entirely in D Major, rather than G.)
TWILIGHT: In between the lines, there's a lot of obscurity
PINKIE: I'm not inclined to resign to maturity
RARITY: If it's all right, then you're all wrong
RAINBOW: But why bounce around to the same darn song?
APPLEJACK: You'd rather run when you can't crawl
PSYCH and TAN: I know, you know
PSYCH: That I'm not telling the truth
PSYCH and TAN: I know, you know
TAN: They just don't have any proof
PSYCH: Embrace the deception
TAN: Learn how to bend
_my little PONY___ __Friendship is Magic_
PSYCH and TAN: Your worst inhibition's gonna— (Instruments cut out)
Crossover between "Friendship is Magic" and "Psych." This and the first chapter or two set up our humans in Equestria as characters; the explanation is not for a while.
Hmm. I have colors in the Word document. I wonder how hard it will be to put them back. ETA: The original document has a couple highlights. which I don't think are available here. I also have to manually reinsert the italics (here and in later chapters).
