All ponies have magical abilities. I know, that's a mundane statement coming from me. But if you would indulge me for a moment, and let me set the stage for what I discovered next, you'll begin to understand why what I just said is so important.

Firstly, we have the Earth ponies. You are the tribe that are able to wield the magic of the earth below your hooves. You are the rock farmers, apple buckers, and crop growers throughout Equestria. It isn't just talent that makes you successful at these important things. Earth pony physiology is tuned to the physical world of plants, minerals, and the like. If you've ever seen a farmer in their field and they have their head down and an ear to the ground, they're not just listening to the soil below. They are bringing their brains closer to their field, and they can learn so much by doing so. Unicorns and Pegasi are unable to do that.

And speaking of the agile Pegasus tribe; you are able to wield the magic of the sky above. It's throughout your entire body, but it is concentrated in your feathers. The flap of a Pegasus wings does more than just move air about. It brings into your control the awesome power of the magical ether that flows through the air we all breathe. It also allows you to sense minute vibrations in the atmosphere, and control the clouds. Lady Fluttershy, the element of kindness herself, is said to have such a sway over animals because she has subconsciously learned to listen to the vibrations they emit, and to respond in kind with calming vibrations from her own wings.

Last but not least, there's the unicorn tribe, of which I am a member. While the Earth and Pegasus ponies can use earth and air magic respectively, they cannot shape the magic itself. Not only are we unicorns able to control magic, but we are able to mold it with time and training through magical spells, to do anything we wish it to do. The focus of this power is within our horns. Through its symmetry and complex internal structure, it is an organic connection we have to the realm of magic. Furthermore, it is a unicorn's unique ability for magic spells that has allowed us to make our own contributions to the betterment of the three unified tribes.

Then, you have the human world. Like I said, ponies have magical abilities. When I emerged from the portal I was no longer a pony. I remembered panicking when I realized my horn was gone, but the consequences of that fact had not truly occurred to me until after Sunset Shimmer introduced herself. The feeling I got in my very core when I realized I could not sense the presence of magic, nor could I talk to it and tell it my will, was a feeling not unlike falling. The magical silence was deafening to me. Something that I always felt in the air around me, coursing through me, had been shut off like a faucet.

Simple mundane tasks like adjusting the pillow underneath my head became confusing obstacles. Adjusting my glasses was something I learned to do quickly after I got them. It only took simple thought and I could do it without even losing concentration on whatever I was doing. Then, there in that hospital bed, it seemed impossible.

After another nurse had left Sunset Shimmer and I alone in the room. Without anything else to do, I lifted my forelegs, then known as my arms, so that I could look at my hands.

Allow me to explain to you what I saw in place of my hooves. You are probably already familiar with the dragons and minotaurs of Equestria and how they're able to grasp things in their claws that a pony's hooves cannot. Being a human meant that my hooves were replaced with similar appendages. My hands were odd looking things, with many joints. I surmised that the human species must have been primate in physiology, and that having these new hands meant that like Princess Twilight's legendary assistant Spike, I would be able to grasp things with ease. It meant that my hands could stand in for my lack of magic, if I could only figure out how to use them.

The range of motion of my hands upon my arms were amazing. I could twist them in different directions and angles. There were five digits on each hand that I had curled up for no reason other than not realizing I could extend them out, and when I did so I breathed, "oh wow."

"Those are your fingers." Sunset noted to me as I inspected them.

Each finger had several joints of its own and I realized I could flex them. Smiling at myself, I reached a hand up for my glasses. I was thankful that my fingers had very short and stubby nails because I ended up jamming one finger up my nose, then up behind my glasses and into an eye, before I managed to push my glasses up sufficiently. I then turned to Sunset Shimmer who was trying to keep from laughing at the spectacle. I narrowed my eyes at her.

She finally chuckled a bit before stopping herself. "S-sorry."

I closed my eyes and looked away from her sharply as I continued to re-adjust my glasses with my clumsy human hands. "This isn't exactly EASY you know. It's not like I was born with these or anything."

"Trust me, You'll get use to them soon enough. It's going to be a maddening couple of days for you, provided you're here that long." Sunset sat down in a chair beside the bed and leaned her head forward to rest in her hand. "But in a realm without magic those things come in real handy, if you'll pardon my pun."

I sighed then smiled. She was only trying to be helpful, I hoped. "Pardoned."

"Princess Twilight took it pretty well. There were a few times I could see in her eyes she was trying to use magic to do something, then she'd have to give up and use her fingers. I on the other hand…had some problems." Sunset finished and seemed to stare off into nothing, as though suddenly reminded of a time she longed not to dwell on.

"Princess Twilight visited this realm?" My ears perked up. I decided to bite on that thread of thought. We both knew Twilight, it seemed. The idea that Twilight had gone through this became a common point between us, something we could use to break the ice.

"Yeah. Actually she visits a lot, now that we are all friends." Sunset smiled at me again, and gave me a chance to take note how genuine her smile was. It wasn't that smug self-centered grin I remembered from my youth. Its sincerity disarmed me, not that I trusted her then.

Everything that Sunset had said to me before she told me who she was had become suspect. One simply doesn't blindly trust somepony who was banished by the princess. To borrow some crude language that I picked up over the years, it took a lot to piss off Princess Celestia

I had claimed earlier to Sunset that I had met her once before, and that is the truth. I truly only met her personally one time, a spring afternoon the day after midterms. She addressed us all rather rudely, and had actually made eye contact with me as she berated us for no good reason. The idea of being addressed by the student of Celestia should have been a big deal. But Sunset made it so unpleasant that we all eventually blocked it out of our mind.

Everyone at Celestia's School who attended at the time knew Sunset Shimmer when she became the Princess' personal student. I recall how much of a braggart she was. She gloated every single day about her achievements. She was distant and made friends with no one.

She claimed we were jealous of her power. Indeed, Sunset Shimmer was powerful and could very well have become what Princess Twilight Sparkle had achieved, had everypony at the school not begun to loathe the pony we called Sludgy Slimeball.

It got worse after she passed her senior mid-term. Her claims of achievement became obsession, until one day, she vanished. Princess Celestia would routinely visit her school, with her protégé by her side. We were all stunned when she visited one bright Monday morning, minus Sunset Shimmer. She said nothing to any of us, greeted none of us. The only thing she did that day was to summon the entire faculty to an impromptu secret meeting in first period, and then gave us the rest of the day off.

The faculty said nothing after that. Rumors started that Sunset had run so far afoul of Celestia that she had been banished to a desolate place far away from Equestria. We had all wondered, just what did Sunset Shimmer do to earn Celestia's wrath, which, at the present time when Sunset noticed the inquisitive look I had been giving her and looked away from me, must have included banishment to the human world.

"Look," Sunset started, unable to make eye contact with me. She sighed. "if it makes you feel any better, I remember you enough to know you attended Celestia's School at the same time I did; and even though I was a senior at the time and you were probably not even in your advanced studies yet, I'm, sorry for the way I treated you and everyone at that school."

"The rumor is you were banished for wronging the princess. We didn't know how or where, well, I guess I know where now. But what did you do?"

"I wasn't banished from Equestria okay, I-," Sunset grimaced. I had hit a nerve I hadn't intended to hit. "I did defy her. I let my curiosity turn into a lust for power, and accused Celestia of holding me back. I didn't listen to her pleas with me to slow down. I began to resent her until she had no choice to banish me from the castle. I knew about the mirror, and took a chance that it would be open. When the guards walked me by the room that held the mirror I snapped."

Sunset stood up and then walked to the curtain to peek out of it, then turned around to look at me. I could see wetness shimmering in her eyes. "After the mid-terms, Celestia showed me that mirror, to teach me a lesson I guess. Instead I became indignant. So while the guards were walking me out, I overpowered them, teleported my saddle bags, and jumped through the mirror."

"You ran away from her." I stated.

"Yeah, yeah I did." She walked towards me. "Moon Dancer, I can only ask two things from you. Your forgiveness for any wrongs I've committed, and that you will attempt to trust me. I'm a different pony now." She held out an arm towards me, hand outstretched. "I can prove it to you."

I looked up from her hand to her face. What choice did I have? I truly had none other than to trust her. After what she had told me, being estranged from Celestia, Lusting over power. Was this all a trick? How did Princess Twilight factor in? Was my friend being duped?

What I did then was a compromise in my own mind. I refused to take Sunset Shimmer's hand in my own, which is what I assumed was a custom of trust among humans. But I did have to offer her a token. I did have to trust her to my wellbeing for the time being so I could figure out what was going on.

I looked away, searching for the words. "I don't know if I can really trust you given everything you just told me. How do I know this isn't some elaborate trick to capture Celestia's crown, or maybe Twilight's?"

"Yeah, um," Sunset began to scratch the back of her head and laughed nervously, "about that. You see, I, ah-"

That was the most inopportune time for the doctor to walk in through the curtains, and he did so with much personal fanfare. "So how's our fantasy novelist doing!?"

"Errr, I…" I paused, then huffed. "Fine…"

"Heh heh." The doctor chuckled, amused at something. He looked through his clipboard. "Sorry, it's not every day I come across seventeen-year-olds writing fantasy novels."

I mouthed the words seventeen under my breath. The portal not only changed my species, it changed my age. I was no longer Twenty-five-year-old Unicorn Moon Dancer. I was a seventeen-year-old filly, or, whatever human's called their female children.

"I have good news for you. I don't see any reason to hold you any longer. Blood work and vitals are normal. Everything else looks good." He turned to Sunset. "Are you her legal guardian?"

Celestia's former student took on that happy go lucky act again and smiled at the doctor. "Yep! Mom and dad are on a business trip. They know all about what happened and that she's okay."

"Good. The nurse will be by shortly with a wheel chair. I do need you to do me a favor okay." I glared at the adults in the room. It was good to know that fillies were invisible when adults where present, even in the human realm, though part of this was an act on Sunset's part, a really good act.

"Anything at all doc, just name it."

The doctor seemed to pause for a moment then said "I need you to wake your sister up every couple-of hours tonight and ask for her name. If she starts to have problems recalling her name, I need you to call the hospital immediately." He finished writing something on a small slip of paper with his hand, an action that looked so comical, yet made sense. "Here's the number to call, and an excuse from school tomorrow, for both of you."

He then addressed me. "And you, young lady, need to stop galloping into statues. You're not a pony, got it?"

"Anything you say doc." I sighed. "Can I get off this bed now?"

-===00 000===-

A strange thing about language in the human realm was that Equestrian and what Human's called English were similar enough that reading, talking, and understanding was not difficult. Strange pronouns like everybody and anybody stood in place of everypony and anypony, and took some getting used to. Humans called themselves people, for instance.

So in the interest of a strange cultural exchange, I will begin using what was common language in the realm I was stuck in. Equestrian words will be dropped in favor of purely English vocabulary. I did find it fascinating, and I believe you will too. And, while Sunset Shimmer and I used Equestrian in our dialogue, it was purely for the benefit of Sunset Shimmer, who seemed to revel in calling herself a pony again.

It was dark by the time Sunset Shimmer wheeled me out of the hospital into the cold night air and what I had learned by reading the signs was called the parking garage. The nurse insisted that I remain in a wheel chair while on hospital grounds. I didn't mind as this is the case in Equestria as well. It allowed me to take in what was going on around me, plus, trying to stand on two legs would have been embarrassing with lots of people around. It dawned upon me though, that I hadn't tried.

Watching all those bi-peds walking around in the hospital was a strange sight for me. They stood tall. One advantage it gave them was that their arms were free to carry items or push things easily while they walked. Sure, it wasn't as efficient as magic, but it helped to assure me that my human body wouldn't prove difficult to survive in.

Despite Sunset's insistence that this world didn't have magic. I noticed by the lighting, the strange machines that the people used, and how the huge glass doors to the outside world opened for us without requiring the use of our own magic, that there had to have been some form of magic at play. It only made sense.

"Blech." I heard Sunset say in revulsion from behind me. She was pushing my wheelchair with one hand, while in the other held a paper that the person (a singular human, like pony) behind a counter gave her when I was officially being discharged. It was a bill for services rendered and she was scowling at it disdainfully.

"So you're telling me the hospitals are not free here, like in Equestria." I said quietly. Fortunately we were alone, but I still chose to speak quietly. It was a forgone conclusion that our true origins were a secret. I wondered how many souls knew the truth though.

"Sadly, yes. This bill's gonna take a while to pay down. We're lucky it's only a minor concussion. That cat scan was expensive though, and I know what's going on in your mind, no cats were involved." Sunset pushed me forward a few more feet then stopped. She then walked around the wheelchair to stand in front of me. "I must ask you again because you didn't get a chance to answer before. Do you trust me?"

I studied Sunset Shimmer's eyes carefully. There was no malice in her eyes. Instead there was sincerity. I was understandably torn though. She did put on a good play for the doctor to convince him I was her sister. Was she playing me right then?

I inhaled a breath. I also had no other choice. "I will go along with you. For now. But you must understand that I only have your word to go by. I don't know if you've truly changed or if this is some kind of trick. It also occurs to me that you don't really know who I am either aside from what you claim Twilight Sparkle told you." I left out the part about seeing Princess Luna in my head and her words about me being safe. I had no way of knowing at the time if that was just a concussion induced hallucination.

"I guess I'll have to accept that. Now, this next part is going to seem difficult, but you're going to have to walk now." Sunset Shimmer adjusted the bag she was wearing, called a backpack. It was like a saddle bag, only it had loops through which she put her arms, and it rest against her back. "Try to stand up, and use me for support if you feel like you're about to fall."

"Okay." I said slowly, then looked up at her. "How do I start."

"Kind of like in Equestria when you get up from a chair. First you lean forward slightly and when you feel your center of gravity over your hooves, which humans call feet by the way, lift yourself up." I did as she said. Standing while in human form turned out to be surprisingly easy. There was also something exhilarating about it. It made me feel higher off the ground, taller. I know I was taller than my pony self, but this was an altogether new experience for me. I smiled.

"Good. Good!" Sunset congratulated me. "Now wait one second, I have to return this wheelchair."

I smiled and nodded. "Okay."

As my then bi-pedal walking instructor walked away from me to return the wheelchair to the hospital, I looked down at my newly named feet, or tried to at least. But I couldn't see past the two mounds of something that were hanging off me and underneath my sweater. I mentally noted to ask Sunset about them later, and then realized I was holding my arms to my sides with the lower arms out in front of me, and my hands were hanging down limp.

I decided to let my hands and my arms drop to my sides, which seemed a more natural stance for human beings from what I had observed in the hospital.

"Okay," Sunset stood beside me and I could feel her warmth. She took one of my arms in hers. "Now we're going to walk nice and slow over to my motorcycle, it's parked right over there."

She pointed to a strange looking bicycle that was sitting yards away to our left, at least it looked somewhat like a bicycle. It had a longer seat made of a black substance, in fact it was mostly black, and had many strange metal components that glistened a diluted silver under the strange yellow lighting of this parking garage. "Ready." I nodded. "Let's go."

"Okay, left foot, right foot, don't pitch forward too much and use your free arm as a balance if you need to." I started forward, left foot, right foot, left foot…

I caught site of a foot as I stepped forward. I had black shoes on my feet. It destroyed my concentration and I stumbled.

"Wo, woah," Sunset caught my weight under my arm and leaned down with me to help me up on my feet. "Don't watch your feet too closely. Try to watch where you're stepping, not as you step there. Ready again?"

"How long did it take you to learn this?" I asked her as we inched closer to her motorcycle.

"I arrived here on a weekend in front of Canterlot High School, so fortunately no one was around to see me stumble around for an hour."

"Canterlot High School?" I asked incredulously, then stumbled slightly but managed to correct myself with Sunset Shimmer's help.

"This world is like a parallel of our own, in many ways. Yet it's different in many ways too."

"How similar? Canterlot doesn't have these, parking garages, nor does it have a Canterlot High School." I asked. This walking on two legs got easier with each step, as if I was somehow unlocking hidden passageways in my brain that contained the vital instructions on how to do so, and those first few steps were the key.

"Believe me," Sunset smiled and shook her head, "you're only scratching the surface."

We arrived at Sunset's motorcycle, and a shrill sound like a wailing banshee erupted from Sunset Shimmer's jacket, it startled me and I jumped back from Sunset. "Eeeeek!" I shrieked.

Sunset's eyes widened at my reaction and she held out a palm. "It's just my Cell phone, it's okay."

"Cell phone?! What in the goddess' name is a Cell phone?" I was about to find out. Sunset pulled a strange looking red rectangular thin box from her jacket. One side had glass with something blue on it that illuminated her face.

She slid a finger across the illuminated side of the box and then held it up to her ear. "Hi Fluttershy." Sunset said, her eyes seemed distant and she turned to stare off deeper into the parking garage.

I shook my head. From within the box itself I could hear the distant voice. "Hi Sunset, is the…." My thoughts drowned out the quiet voice coming out of the box. I recognized that voice. I'd heard it several times in Canterlot, and then again when I emerged in the human realm. It was that girl (human word for filly) whom had asked me who I was and if I was okay before I passed out. She sounded just like a younger Lady Fluttershy, and shared her name.

I watched and listened in fascination. A cell phone was just a way human's had to communicate with people who were farther away. It still didn't explain the startling shriek that I heard. Was Sunset Shimmer talking to a pony or a human named Fluttershy?

"Her name's Moon Dancer and she's doing just fine. You did the right thing…" Sunset looked at me and smiled. "Yes, she's from Equestria, and she's friends with Princess Twilight too. Can you do me a favor. I'm not going to be at school tomorrow so if you could, get my assignments and bring them to me, and if you could bring Rarity along. It's only fitting for the two of you to meet her without her getting all panicky and galloping into a statue."

I heard Fluttershy squeak from the cell phone, laughing. I winced. Yeah, real funny there.

While Sunset finished her conversation with a distant and equally fascinating Fluttershy, I looked down at Sunset's motorcycle. It resembled a bike, though it had lots of metal bits and pieces I was not familiar with. The seat of the bike was long, like it could fit two humans on it. The pedals looked thin and unmovable. The core of the bike was a confusing mess of mechanical bits, and two silvery pipes that flowed from within and off to the back of the bike, beside the back wheel.

Above and in front of the seat were the words Harley Davidson and a pair of stylized wings. Sunset had ended her conversation with Fluttershy and stood beside me. "Moon Dancer, meet Road Runner."

"You named it after the fastest earth stallion in Equestria?" I asked, dumbstruck.

"Well, he is pretty fast."

All thoughts of trust or who I was dealing with lost, I looked at Sunset, my eyebrow arched wildly. "Road Runner? He? Sunset, it isn't a stallion it's a... a…"

"Motorcycle, I know." Sunset laughed and reached down to touch the seat of the bike. "I got him about a year ago. He wasn't running then, so I fixed 'em up myself. He's taught me a lot about gasoline engines and patience." Sunset looked at me. "Oh, silly me. A gasoline engine is, you know what, not important right now. Here." She picked up a black looking helmet and handed it to me. I turned it over in my hands clumsily and nearly dropped it before I figured out I could fit the edges of the helmet between my fingers and the middle of my hand. It seemed similar to something you'd see in Equestria, with only minor differences based on where a human's ears were located among other small things.

Sunset sat down on the motorcycle and gestured behind herself. "Put that on your head and sit behind me. Don't worry, I'll go slow." She pressed a few buttons in front of her on the handle bars, inserted a key, turned it, then stepped down on a lever beneath her foot.

The aforementioned gasoline engine roared to life in a loud pulsing rhythmic series of noises that sounded similar to a colt's hoof knocking on a thin plank of old wood, yet it was mechanical and throaty. The way it echoed off of the walls of the parking garage did nothing to soothe my nerves. It sounded mean and dangerous, nothing like the Road Runner of Equestria. Whatever the two silvery pipes were emitting along with the sound had an oily and sharp smell. I stepped back slightly and stumbled to catch myself from falling back. My fingers where white from gripping the helmet within my hands.

I didn't know what was scarier, that Sunset Shimmer had such an evil sounding mechanical beast that she used as a mode of transportation, or that she was voluntarily straddling it without anything to keep her from falling off the back should it decide to take off without her. Also, she wanted me to sit behind her.

Sunset frowned at my reaction then reached out a hand again. "Trust me?" She said loudly yet pleadingly over the noise. "Please?"

I studied Sunset's stare for a good while, the deep throbbing sound of the engine seemed impatient as it sped up and slowed down in an imperfect rhythm. "Oh dear Celestia." I swore as I put the helmet on. "I hope I know what I'm doing."

"Here, put my book bag on." Sunset offered me her book bag. I stepped forward and took it from her using my fingers again like a clamp.

I wiggled the bag on awkwardly, putting my still odd arms through its two straps. It fell into place behind me and the weight seemed manageable. I then put a leg over the seat behind Sunset. My feet found purchase on two extra pedals that were below me and to the sides of the bike, but I had no idea what to do with my hands.

"Um, what do I do with my arms?"

Sunset turned her head to the side. "Put your arms around me, and don't sit rigid, I need you to lean when I lean okay."

I nodded. "Sure, Okay." I put my arms around Sunset's thin center. I felt both my hands touch and realized I could interlock my fingers, so I did, and pulled myself into an odd embrace with her. "Let's just get this over with." I felt Sunset move and heard what I assumed was a kickstand retracting up. "Where are we going?" I asked.

"My Apartment. You're staying there as long as you need to. You're my guest here, and any friend of Princess Twilight is a friend of mine." Sunset finished. She walked the motorcycle back a few meters.

"You know it's funny." I laughed nervously. "For some reason I thought it would be a library-aaaaaaaaahhhhhh!" My laughing turned to screaming as the engine roared awake and we sped out of the parking garage. Sunset leaned forward and I clung to her for dear life.

This was going to take some getting used to.

-===00 000===-

After the parking garage had disappeared from behind us, and I stopped screaming, I began to take in my surroundings. We were making our way down a tar black road made of another surface that I had never seen before. It looked fresh and recently paved under the overhead lights that lined the road. The light above us, and our shadows, danced with each yellowish light as we passed by it underneath. True to her word, Sunset had settled in to a speed I could at least get used to. Strands of her hair flew into my face occasionally and I had to scrunch my nose to keep from sneezing at the ticklish sensation.

We were not alone on this road as we approached the town ahead. The human world had four wheeled wagons that ran on their own, using a variant of the gasoline engine that powered Sunset's motorcycle, Road Runner. We maintained our pace with the cars, as they were called. Occasionally one would pass us and I'd eye it nervously along with the occupants inside, but Sunset didn't flinch.

"What town is that up ahead?" I asked loudly. The road narrowed and we slowed down at an intersection. Above and facing were a series of red lights. Cars and even another motorcycle started crossing the intersection in front of us.

"Downtown Canterlot."

"Canterlot?" My eyes widened and I shook my head. "How is this Canterlot? Where's the castle? Where are the mountains?"

I could feel Sunset chuckle. "I wondered that myself when I first arrived. Sadly THIS Canterlot isn't the capital of anything. It is the county seat of Equestria County though."

The light above us turned green and we accelerated again through the intersection. I held Sunset a little tighter at the sudden movement. "What about Ponyville?"

"It's south of here by a few miles. As for what they're named after, that's a road we'll cross when we come to it."

"Ooohkay." I pondered Sunset's response then decided to let it go. I watched the buildings closely as we entered downtown Canterlot. The day had long given way to night and the artificial lighting illuminated the buildings strangely in different angles. The lights of this strange town were not the soft yellow lights one could see all across Canterlot of Equestria. This Canterlot had an uneven mix of different kinds of lights. Signs of yellow and blue and green in shop windows clashed with street lighting. Greens and yellows and red mixed with bright front lights of the cars ahead of us as they passed.

There were people walking along the sidewalks going about whatever they were doing. I could see people in shops and restaurants as we passed. The people milling about seemed impeccably dressed and genuinely happy. I smiled at the familiar scene. Had this not been a poor approximation of our Canterlot, and had I not been displaced, and HAD I been a human by birth, this place would have felt comfortably like a home town. I frowned though, this was so obviously not my beloved Canterlot.

Sunset broke the silence. "Canterlot is a very rich community. Lots of very wealthy people live here. Some of them are downright snooty, but others are nice."

I laughed. "Well it's nice to know some things are the same."

We passed another intersection into a street lined with noticeably darker though pleasant buildings. They looked like the townhomes of Canterlot, though the dimensions were different. This was a town built for taller bipeds after all. It made sense. Sunset lowered her speed and Road Runner's engine quieted down. "A lot of these people make a daily commute to Manhattan by train. It's pretty inefficient if you ask me, but this isn't Equestria so I don't complain much about their lifestyle here."

I nodded. Then I noticed her odd choice of city name. "Wait a minute, Manhattan? Don't you mean Manehattan?"

"Nope!" Sunset let the 'p' pop from her lips slightly as she concentrated on the very narrow road and the people cutting across the street ahead. "It's Manhattan. Just like there's a Baltimore, Philadelphia, Las Vegas. It's very weird I know. The similarities and the differences are interesting. I don't know why this world is so parallel to ours but askew at the same time. These Humans are different from us, in so many ways, yet…" Sunset seemed to trail off in thought, then shook her head. "Anyway. We're here."

I looked around us as Sunset slowed the bike down even further. To our left was some more town homes, but to our right was a tantalizing site. It was a two story building, and on the first floor, behind a large storefront window with the name "Books' Books", bathed under warm lighting, were rows and rows of books!

We came to a stop in front of the book store and even though Sunset stopped the engine, I could still hear it's droning thumpy sound in my head. I moved to get off and could feel the heat radiating from the engine as well as very quiet popping and tinkle sounds from metal cooling off. I made a mental note to ask Sunset about those gasoline engines in the future and removed my helmet. I could feel strands of my loose and messy hair fall back into place. I looked at the book store. "You live in a book store." I stated curiously.

"No. I live above it." Sunset pointed to the second story windows above the store. They were dark save for one light coming from behind a white curtain. "I do work in the book store though."

We approached two glass and metal framed doors, Sunset assumed the lead while I walked carefully behind her. Thankfully each step I took seemed more sure than the next, and before long I knew I wouldn't have much trouble walking on two legs. One door led to the bookstore and lots of inviting books beyond. Behind the other, to the right of the first, I could see a darkened set of blue stairs that led up to Sunset's apartment, a small light at its top was the only illumination. It was dull, drab, and completely utilitarian.

My host pulled out a set of keys, and after a few moments of cursing at the obviously stubborn lock that was beyond repair and was in desperate need of replacement, the door opened with a pop, and we walked into the cold stairwell. "Be sure to grab the handrail, these old steps are slippery." She said to me and I nodded, grabbing the handrail for good measure. It's a good thing she did because every fifth or so step was met with my feet trying to slip out from under me.

We finally reached the top of the stairs and Sunset carefully unlocked the door to her apartment. "I apologize for the mess. I don't get many visitors. Not that I'd want them. Anyway. Welcome to my apartment." There was a quiet click as the door unlocked and she pushed the door open then walked in. I followed cautiously and looked around the dark room.

Sunset turned on the lamp resting on a table, and the room bathed in a more natural light that seemed similar to the arcane and natural lighting back home. I looked at her and had to smile at that. I didn't know if it was intentional or not but it seemed fitting for a displaced pony from Equestria to prefer such things.

"The lighting here is odd. My lamps are close enough to the lighting back home so it doesn't bother me." Sunset offered. I didn't answer immediately. Instead I chose to take in the surrounding apartment. The living room of Sunset's apartment had to have been a far cry from what she had been accustomed to in Canterlot, what with being Princess Celestia's estranged pupil.

Beneath our feet was a dull green carpet, darker than fresh spring grass, almost the color of damp grass after a hard rainstorm. It seemed old in places. Humans don't have the same olfactory sense that we Ponies have. The apartment had a faint odor similar to a gas lamp that dissipated almost as soon as we crossed the threshold of the door. The apartment was not at all unpleasant. It was an apartment that had seen many tenants in its old age, and I guessed this building must have been at least as old as the town of Canterlot itself, had I been a human historian, which I was not.

A mismatch of furniture sat around and against the walls. There was a yellow couch along the wall opposite the window at the front of the building. Its cushions seemed plush and well worn. Beside it were two wooden end tables, one of which held a lamp, and the other, a stack of books. In front of the couch sat an equally mismatched coffee table made of a black metal and glass. More books and papers were strewn across its surface, including some things I had never seen before, like a black rectangular box with lots of soft buttons on top of it with letters, numbers, and arrows.

An adjacent wall beside the hallway to the rest of the apartment, sat a tall and very inviting pitch black bookshelf with a healthy assortment of books and a few odd nick knacks. I smiled at that. I knew I wouldn't get bored here; A whole new realm with thousands of books I had never seen or read. I walked in a bit and eyed the last piece of furniture whose function I couldn't even begin to describe. It was another table, gray in color, that sat underneath the window. On top of it was a black rectangular thing, with a black surface that had nothing on it. I could see wires hanging off the back of it and on the floor, and on one corner there was a small red light.

Other than that the walls where white an unadorned. A few of the corners had small cracks in them, a testament to the age of the apartment. Sunset Shimmer must have noticed the distracted wandering of my gaze as I took in her apartment. "Welcome to my home, or, what stands in for my home these days." She removed her backpack and sat it down beside the coffee table, then plopped herself down on the couch to let herself sink in to its cushion.

I walked towards the book shelf and tilted my head to look at the titles of the books. "Exploring America, A Brief History of Time, The Sundance 2015, A Pony Picture Book." I arched an eyebrow. "Pony Picture Book?" I whispered and turned around to ask Sunset what that last book was about, but Sunset had her hands busy going through the contents of her backpack. She finally pulled out a book emblazoned on the cover with her cutie mark, then pulled a pen out of her backpack.

"What's that book for?" I asked.

Sunset looked up. "This is how I communicate with Princess Twilight back in Equestria." It took no time at all for me to make the short distance from the bookshelf to the couch, but almost instantly I was sitting beside Sunset.

"But I thought you said there's no magic here." I shook my head. "Now you tell me you have a book that sends messages to Princess Twilight."

Sunset smiled, and I had to admit her smile was growing on me. Not once did it seem disingenuous. "But I also corrected myself and said there's not much." She held up the book for me to inspect. The glossy paint of her cutie mark reflected slightly in the lamplight. "This is the not much." She clicked the top of the pen and opened the book. "Anything I write in here gets written in a similar book in Twilight's library. The other one used to belong to Princess Celestia." Sunset paused and seemed to pet the page of the opened book slightly, as if any time she recalled the princess was a painful thing. "Celestia gave the book to Twilight a year or so ago. The last time Twilight was here she promised me she'd always keep it in a prominent place so she can keep an eye on it in case I wanted to send her a message. And given recent events I'd imagine she has it by her side right now, so, here goes."

I sat and watched while Sunset Shimmer wrote a long message in the pages of the book. I could see a colorful and altogether impossible spark underneath the pen. Sunset traced beautiful cursive lines along the page, and they shimmered as if the page itself was copying those lines to a different place.

Sunset made it to half a page in her message then closed her eyes, and the book as well. "Now we wait."

An awkward silence fell between us while we waited for Princess Twilight to respond. But my mind would have nothing of silence. I thought back to everything that had happened to me since I awoke that morning, and I hugged myself in a shiver. It was as if the shock of what had happened finally settled in to my brain.

Only that morning I had awakened to my normal life as a graduate student at Celestia's School for Gifted Unicorns. My other classmates and friends had finished their studies and graduated with basic degrees in their chosen fields, I knew early on that I loved studying so much, it only seemed logical to make the most of all the most prestigious school in Equestria had to offer.

But if I really looked back upon that day, and was really honest with myself, I would also have seen a young unicorn mare without a shred of an idea what she wanted to do with her life. I got the highest grades in school, all the professors loved me. Yet, every morning when I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, I could see the listlessness in my eyes. The only constant in my life were my friends and my studies. Other than that, I was a sailboat without a rudder.

My days were the same routine, broken up only by my loving friends, whom I adored greatly. I would lie to myself and to you my dear reader if I said I was content with it. I was indeed happy with my friends. Having a Princess as your friend had its perks as well. It was not my close loved ones that made me unhappy deep down. It was where I was headed. I didn't know. A sailboat without a rudder indeed.

I was unprepared for that perfect yet chaotic storm that awaited me on my walk from the bakery. I would never in a million moons would have expected this to happen to me. It was a crazy, crazy coincidence that had found me sitting in the apartment of the long lost Sunset Shimmer, in a realm that was not Equestria, as we waited for Princess Twilight Sparkle to send us a message from beyond the realm.

"So are you hungry, thirsty, sleepy?" Sunset sat the book on the coffee table and stood up. "Here, let me show you the rest of the apartment." She walked into the small hallway, I got up and followed behind.

The first room to our left was Sunset's bedroom, illuminated comfortably by an old and yellowing lamp on a busy looking metal desk. It was the lamp I saw beyond the curtains when we had first arrived. The only other furniture was a nightstand with a box that had red illuminated numbers on it, like some kind of alarm clock, and a Spartan looking bed with cherry red sheets and some somewhat comfortable looking and equally red pillows. Beside the bed in a corner stood a small black box with knobs and dials. Attached to it and resting against it was something that looked a bit like a guitar, but it was thin and solid looking.

"This is my Bedroom." Sunset offered, stating the obvious to me. I had to fight from rolling my eyes or snorting. It probably wasn't the right time for sarcasm. I instead noted that unlike the living area, the bedroom had pictures and such along the walls of various people along with Sunset herself. They all seemed new and crisp. They surrounded a pennant with the name Canterlot Wondercolts in odd stylized lettering; the C itself was a horseshoe. A large blue poster with messy black copy print was pinned proudly by itself on another wall with one of the humans from the pictures, plus Sunset. The two of them were standing back to back looking towards me from the center of the poster. Each held what looked like the strange guitar that sat in the corner; Sunset's looked exactly like it. The poster heralded The Rainbooms! In Concert at the Canterlot Arena, July 2nd, 2015.

The next room to the right of her bedroom was a cramped Bathroom. Sunset seemed to be proud of that fact as she announced what it was along with its function. It was nice to see that Pony and Human bathrooms were not much different, so aside from how cramped it was, it didn't need much description beyond it's cold white tiles and lack of décor.

That left only the kitchen and more cramped space. It had barely enough room for a green dining room table with shiny metal trim that sat against the wall to our left, three matching green chairs with silvery metal legs were pushed in around it. A simple flower arrangement sat atop the table in a glass vase, an arrangement of dandelions, which upon closer inspection turned out to be fake. A single window led out into a dark night beyond, a glow from a street lamp behind the building reflected off its frame.

A sink, stove, and human equivalent of a refrigerator, and lots of beige cabinets completed the ensemble, and in the center of the kitchen stood Sunset looking at me. She pulled out one of the green chairs from the table and sat down. "Your mind must be going full gallop."

I joined Sunset and sat down at the table. "It's not every day somepony has a portal to another realm fall on them. And this," I waved my hands in front of Sunset for effect. "This is a lot to take in."

"I know."

"I don't get it. Why are you here? The last time I saw you in Equestria you were an unpleasant pony that nopony wanted to be around." Sunset's form seemed to shrink into the chair as I said that. "In the hospital you said you were only banished from the palace, not from our entire world."

"You still don't trust me, do you?" She looked at me. I studied the worried look in Sunset's cyan eyes. She wanted badly for me to trust her.

"I'm not saying I can't trust you, but something just isn't adding up here." I gestured around me. "This entire world is practically a secret from most of Equestria. I've read every single volume on the complete works of Star Swirl as well as Haycarte, multiple times, and they never mentioned anything as strange as this human world. Unless…" I trailed off as I realized I had missed something. There was one legend about the old wizard that seemed to match. My ears perked up as much as they could for being a human. "Is the mirror to this world the same one that Star Swirl the Bearded used to send the Three Sirens away from Canterlot?!"

"Would you believe me if I said we fought and defeated them last year?" Sunset asked.

"I… What?" I narrowed my eyes in disbelief. "You defeated the sirens?"

Sunset Shimmer nodded in excitement. "I did! Actually. My friends, Princess Twilight, and I. WE defeated them. They're powerless now, they live a couple blocks from here. Though they're not exactly the friendly type. I think they're still immortal. It's hard to tell."

I stared silently at my host while I worked through the implications of what she had just told me. I pushed my glasses back up on my nose. Some of Star Swirl's more forbidden texts were locked away deep within the Canterlot palace archives. It was the worst kept secret of Equestria, but a secret nonetheless. "In Star Swirl's old texts, he stated that he couldn't defeat them so he pushed them through a mirror that was really a portal to another universe. Historians have been debating the mirror's existence for a long time, without any context about why it existed or who created it. The only conclusions we've ever been able to make is that the princesses themselves forbade the publishing of certain texts after he died so we will never really know for sure."

"Welcome to the unraveling of history my dear Moon Dancer." Sunset grinned. "Do you like rabbit holes?"

"Well, I'm intrigued." I offered.

"It's easy to see why you're friends with Princess Twilight. You're both inquisitive bookworms."

I snickered. We may have been dabbling in small talk, but it was a welcome time out from all that had happened today.

"To answer your question, about why I haven't returned to Equestria." Sunset looked away from me again and silently rapped a closed hand against the table top while closing her eyes. "There's a lot about me that I'm not proud of. I don't think I'm ready to go back, and…I don't think Equestria is ready for me to come back… Anyway. Have you looked at yourself in a mirror yet?"

I shook my head. "No." I looked at the palms of my hands. "I don't know if I want to either."

"Really, you should, the first times a killer. And you're gonna have to see yourself sooner or later. Why not now?" Sunset stood up from the table, the chair scooted back against the tile slightly and let out a squeak. "The first time I saw myself I was alone. I have to admit I'm a little fascinated with how you'll take it."

I crossed my arms. "Oh so I'm an experiment now?"

"Oh c'mon. You know you wanna see too. Because I said it, it's now eating you up inside." She teased.

I sighed. She had a point. Ever since I arrived through that blasted portal I had yet to see myself, only the other humans around me. I caught glances of myself in reflective surfaces but never really looked. I looked at the table then back up at Sunset. "Alright. For science?" I stood up and offered my hand to Sunset.

"For science." Sunset took my hand and led me to the small bathroom. We both walked in, then turned to face the mirror, and I was awestruck with what I saw.

Staring back at me, behind a pair of thick horn rimmed glasses connected together with the same old plain white tape that I was accustomed to, was me. But it wasn't me either. It felt like I was looking through a funhouse mirror that not only changed my height but my species as well. I blinked in surprise, and moved my mouth to form the word "what" and the form in the mirror did the same thing. It made me feel like I was floating, even though my mind assured me that I was indeed seeing myself in the mirror, the other, deeper part of my brain yelled that this was all wrong.

I will try to describe what I saw in that mirror, and I will refer to her as Moon Dancer, the human so that you can also understand how I felt at the time. She had Dark Purple eyes like me, hidden but brilliant behind her glasses. Her bushy eyebrows were just as surprised as mine. My amaranth, purple and violet mane sat atop her head, the top tied off in a messy bun with a hair tie she had stolen from me, with the rest falling down her back. Some of it had come to rest against her shoulders and it bracketed her face.

Her bangs came down the sides of her face, and out from roughly the middle of each side were two small and unmovable ears. They seemed cute but still alien. She wore my favorite sweater; the one I had put on that morning. Human Moon Dancer wore a skirt the same color as my sweater, with my purple and violet cutie mark stitched into its dark fabric.

I turned and she turned, so I could look at her profile. Her muzzle was flat, with a small nose at the center of her face. Her skin was the color of my fur. I looked down and she did too. I raised my hands to my chest and she did too, at the two strange rounded bumps that I had noticed before. I squeezed at my chest and winced at their sensitivity when I realized they were part of her, to that extension, me. "What are these, I turned and looked at Sunset in the mirror." Strangely her reflection didn't seem so odd, but I was not Sunset Shimmer.

"Those are your breasts." Sunset offered.

I let go and let my hands move up to my mane. "Oh. I uh, see." I blushed. I ran my newly formed fingers through my hair and my reflection did the same. I lifted one hind leg back and up behind me. Human Moon Dancer was more than able to balance with only one foot on the ground. She had on plain looking looking black shoes. There was also a strange though comfortable white fabric between the shoe and my leg. I made a mental note to ask Sunset.

"What do you see?" She asked.

I let my leg drop back to the floor. "It's me, but, it isn't me."

"I know. I've been here for years and I'm only now getting used to the idea that the creature in the mirror is me. I know one day I'll look into this mirror and not even give it a second thought."

I noticed that look again in Sunset's eyes. A far off, wandering look. She had been doing that a lot this night. Saying something and then trailing off. She was giving distant and haunted looks. In my mind's eye I could see Sunset Shimmer as a pony, absent of her scowl and her bad attitude, all alone in an alien world. I realized just how trapped Sunset must have felt. And I was beginning to understand just how much that Sunset Shimmer missed Equestria. "Why don't you go back when Twilight re-opens the portal?" I asked. The reflection in the mirror said this as well, as if mimicking me just for fun. "Just go back and see what happens? I've only known you for a couple hours now, but you seem like a changed pony."

Sunset sighed, the excitement drained from her face. "If only it were that simple." She turned to walk into the living room and plopped back down on the couch, I followed her but didn't sit down right away. Instead I stood there and looked at my hands. The thought of that creature in the mirror being me disturbed me greatly, and I shuddered. It wasn't as if the creature looked bad at all, but she was not a pony. She was not me, and by some strange twist of fate that occurred that morning when a portal mirror fell on me, I was her for the time being. And based on what I had heard about Twilight trying to re-open the portal, it probably wasn't going to be much longer.

I looked up at Sunset just as an aura of light enveloped the book and it wiggled slightly atop Sunset's coffee table. She looked down quickly at the book, picked it up, and then opened it to begin reading. At first she mouthed the words in the book to herself, starting with "Dear Moon Dancer," but as the words wore on, her mouth closed into a straight line. While she read I took the opportunity to sit down on the couch and studied her eyes as she read each line carefully.

Finally, she reached the last sentence and then looked at me apologetically while she held the book between us. "You better read this."

I nodded and took the book from her, studied her form for a few moments then looked down at the pages of the book in front of me as I sat it on my lap.

Dear Moon Dancer

I am so happy to hear that you are out of danger, and that Rarity and Fluttershy were there when you emerged from the portal. Please tell both of them they have my thanks.

Both Princess Celestia and myself offer our apologies. It was our fault the mirror was in that intersection. If it is any consolation, the guards told me what happened, and we are grateful you saved the mirror itself from destruction.

I'm afraid I have some bad news. While the mirror is safely inside the palace now, we have been unable to re-open the portal. We don't know how it opened for you, and the device I created to open the portal with assistance from Celestia's book has stopped working.

We are still trying, but the mirror simply isn't responding to anything we attempt. I'm afraid to say this, I don't want to say it, but you should be prepared for the possibility that you may be stuck there for at least thirty moons until we can figure out what happened.

As for Sunset Shimmer. I can personally vouch for her sincerity and tell you that she's my friend. She's also an invaluable guide in the human realm. You can trust her completely.

Please, take care of yourself. I promise you that we will get you home.

Your friend,
Princess Twilight Sparkle

I closed the book slowly and turned to Sunset Shimmer. I spoke in almost a whisper. "It's safe to say I can trust you now."