A/N - Nothing new here, other than that this is the second chapter of my birthday double-update.

I awoke the next morning somewhat disoriented, having momentarily forgotten where I was. My mouth was completely dry, and my tongue felt like it had cracked a little from the dryness. I looked at my surroundings, remembering that I was still in Fluttershy's cottage. I quickly noticed a glass of water on the end table by my head. I sat up slowly, trying not to overexert myself, and picked up the glass of water. I could tell by the feel of the glass that the water was cool, but not ice cold. This was good, as ice cold water would have been painful to drink with my mouth and throat in the condition they were.

I took a drink of the cool water, slowly sipping it to make it last longer and savoring its fresh taste. It was by far better than any water I had ever had on Earth. I only managed to take a few sips before I heard noises coming from the kitchen; it sounded like something sizzling quietly on a skillet and the occasional scrape of a tool to move whatever was cooking. From the smell of it, we were having some kind of eggs and toast for breakfast; and probably tea as well, as I heard the kettle start to whistle.

I decided to see if I could be of any help, but as I went to get up off the small couch, I was reminded of yesterday's events in the form of a sharp, shooting pain from my right hand as I used it to push myself up. I managed to stand without using it with little difficulty, and decided to undo the dressing to see how it was healing. I smirked as I undid the last of the wrap; thinking that some of Zecora's potion must have gotten into my bloodstream, as while the bones still hurt, the skin was completely healed, leaving only barely visible scars.

I walked quietly into the kitchen to see if I could be of any help, waiting until Fluttershy wasn't doing anything near the stove to announce myself in case I startled the timid yellow Pegasus. "Morning Fluttershy." I said quietly, startling her despite my best efforts not to.

"Eep! Oh… Good morning Blake." She said with a smile as she realized who it was. "I didn't expect you to be up so early with everything that happened yesterday."

I smiled at this. "Yeah, I've always been something of an early riser, kinda comes with the territory when you work construction." I said, suddenly remembering my old job and the friends I had made there.

I didn't get long to think about that though, as Fluttershy spoke again, bringing me back to the present. "I was just making breakfast for us, scrambled eggs and wheat toast with jam… Oh dear… I forgot to ask you if you even liked those things. Don't worry, I'll remake you anything you want." She said as she hurriedly moved about the kitchen, looking for something else for me to eat.

I smiled at her caring nature, hoping it wouldn't come back to haunt her. I placed my hand on her shoulder as she passed me, causing her to stop in her tracks "It's ok Fluttershy, I like scrambled eggs and toast in the morning, you don't need to make me something else." She calmed down at this and went back to making breakfast.

"Oh, ok… I'm glad to hear you like them; I wouldn't want to upset you by offering you something you didn't want without even asking." I couldn't help but smile at this as I knelt down and wrapped her up in a hug. "Oh my… Blake, are you feeling alright?"

I nodded, "I'm feeling better than I have for awhile Fluttershy. Where I'm from, the kindness you've shown me is all but unheard of, and I can't tell you how much I appreciate that." I felt her cheeks get hot as she returned my embrace.

We broke the hug soon after, and Fluttershy bade me to wait in the living room while she finished breakfast for the two of us. Soon after I heard the clinking of plates and silverware and went back into the kitchen to help her bring our breakfasts out to her small dining table. Fluttershy had made me a huge plate of scrambled eggs; I would have been surprised if there were less than a dozen eggs worth on my plate. She also gave me a large glass of ice cold milk and a cup of the tea she had made.

I looked at the breakfast she had prepared for me, amazed at her hospitality. She explained that it was to help me recover from the injuries I had received the previous day. While Zecora's potion had healed the soft tissue damage, there were still some lingering effects, mostly weakness from having lost so much blood. The entire breakfast was delicious: the eggs were properly cooked and lightly seasoned, the toast was golden brown and just slightly crunchy, and the jam was strawberry, sweet but not overpowering.

I then turned my attention to her plate and noticed only a small amount of eggs and one piece of toast. "You didn't give me all your food, did you Fluttershy?" She seemed to start a bit at this, like I had caught her doing something.

She smiled at me sheepishly "Oh no, I have chickens out back that give me plenty of eggs. I'm not very hungry when I first wake up, so I usually don't eat very much at breakfast; this is normal for me." I was still skeptical, but I accepted it and decided not to push the issue.

The remainder of breakfast was spent idly chatting; Fluttershy told me that she cared not only for pets, but also for the forest critters that lived near her home. She also told me that the tea she made was a combination of ginger root, rose hip, and ginseng, and that she made herself a cup every morning with breakfast. "So Fluttershy, I've noticed that most of the ponies I've met, save for Scootaloo, have some kind of picture on their flanks. Like how you have those three butterflies with pink wings and teal bodies. Is that some kind of tattoo or something?"

She had a confused look "I'm not sure I've ever heard of a 'tattoo' before. As for the pictures, they're called Cutie Marks, and they represent a pony's unique talent. Everypony gets one eventually, it appears on its own when that pony realizes what their special talent is. Mine represents my love of animals."

I nodded, not sure I fully understood, but I figured that I would with time. "I see. As for what a tattoo is, it's a type of body art some humans get. It's basically ink that gets imbedded into our skin with small needles to make a permanent picture on our bodies."

Fluttershy gasped when I mentioned needles. "Oh my, doesn't that hurt? How big are the pictures, are they very small, or are they big?" Though she didn't seem thrilled at the idea of needles, she seemed interested.

I shrugged. "They do, but how much depends on where you get it. As for size, they can be any size you want, there are people that have tiny ones in discreet places, like their ankles, and there are others who have almost their entire bodies covered."

We finished breakfast shortly after, and I helped Fluttershy clear the table and wash the dishes. She kept insisting that I didn't need to, and I would simply reply that I wanted to, because I didn't want to be sitting around while she did everything. After breakfast was cleared away, she led me outside and showed me around her cottage, which had quite a few different animal feeders and a large number of birdhouses set up around it. In the back was a fenced I chicken coop with several chickens milling about inside.

Fluttershy went about feeding her animals while I sat back and watched, having become somewhat woozy as I wasn't yet back to full health. She sang a melody while she went about feeding the critters, and I had to admit that she had a beautiful singing voice. We went back inside her cottage when she finished her chores and talked for a bit longer. "I need to go into town for awhile to pick up a few things. I think it would be best if you stayed here for now until you get your strength back… if that's ok with you that is."

I smiled and nodded. "That's fine with me, I agree, I doubt I'm well enough to walk very far right now. You go and take your time; I'll be ok by myself. Oh by the way, what happened to my shirt?" I asked, having just realized that I never put it back on after I was treated.

"Oh, I washed and patched it for you last night. I managed to fix the holes well enough, but I wasn't able to get the blood out… I hope you're not mad." She said with a small frown on her face. "I left it on the dresser upstairs; I thought you might want to take a shower soon."

I perked up at this, a nice hot shower sounded really good right about now. "Thank you Fluttershy. I'm not mad; in fact, I'm flattered that you went through the trouble to do that for me."

She smiled and shook her head at this; "It's the least I could do after it got damaged when you saved me and Scootaloo from those mean ol' timberwolves like that." Well, I couldn't argue with that, and I was grateful for her fixing it, even if she couldn't get the blood out; it was the only shirt I had with me after all. "Blake, why do humans wear clothes?" She caught me off guard with that one.

I thought for a moment before I replied. "Well, there are a few reasons. The first and probably most important being; since we lack a fur coat or any substantial body hair, we're more susceptible to changes in our environment, especially heat and cold." She nodded her understanding and I continued. "The second being a social taboo, it's not acceptable to go out in public without certain parts of their bodies covered."

She looked confused at this, so I explained further. "Humans don't have tails or other means to conceal the more… intimate… portions of our anatomies, so we use clothing to do so instead." She opened her mouth to say something, probably to ask what I meant, when a look of realization came over her and she blushed furiously. Seriously, how do they do that through their fur?

"Oh… I see… Umm, thank you for explaining that Blake; I should probably get going now though. If I don't get to Applejack's stand early enough, she'll run out of apples before I get there."

I nodded. "Ok, go ahead and go, I'll take my shower while you're out." With that, we said our goodbyes and she left to do whatever errands she needed to for the day.

I walked slowly upstairs as I still wasn't fully recovered, though I was much better off than I had been the previous day. I found Fluttershy's bathroom easily and walked in. It was modestly decorated, and had kind of an outdoorsy feel to it, with butterfly stickers on the walls and muted green and brown wallpaper and floor tiles. I turned the water on and set it to the temperature I liked.

The shower itself was uneventful, I hadn't realized how tensed up I was until the hot water started relaxing my body. Fluttershy's selection of cleaning products was fairly large, mostly in the… mane-care department, and all seemed to be floral scented.

I stepped out of the shower and dried myself off. When I was done with that, I used a small towel hanging next to the sink to wipe the fog off of the mirror and took a look at myself for the first time since I came to this world. Everything seemed mostly the same: same sandy brown hair, same tan skin, same chest hair, same muscular frame and same clean shaven face, even though now I had fresh stubble. Even my eyes were the same, a dark blue with gold streaks radiating away from my pupils. I had been told it was something called sectoral heterochromia, but all I really knew or cared about it was that it looked awesome.

Two things I did notice that had changed, the tribal dragon tattoo on my left pectoral and all the old scars I had were now gone. The only scars I had now were the ones I got from fighting those timberwolves. Deciding not to dwell on it too much, I redressed myself and headed back downstairs to see if I could find something to do while I waited for Fluttershy.

When I got downstairs, I found a small white bunny hopping around the living room, and he appeared to be looking for something. He turned around when I reached the bottom of the stairs and hopped over to me. He looked up at me with an irritated expression, but I had no idea what he wanted. "Hey there little fella, didja lose something?"

He hopped over to a table and climbed up it, pointing at a picture of Fluttershy sitting on a patch of grass in front of a log and surrounded by woodland critters. "You want to know where Fluttershy is?" That was the only thing I could think of from that gesture. Fortunately, I was right, and he nodded his head. "She went to the market to pick up a few things; I dunno when she'll be back though." He got that irritated look again when I told him that. It was weird that he could understand me like that.

The little bunny hopped away and out of sight, and I decided to take a better look around the cottage. I hadn't realized it yesterday, but this cottage seemed to be fairly large for something Fluttershy's size to live in; but then again, she was a Pegasus, and this would give her at least some room to fly around inside.

I walked upstairs to check out the bedroom, curious as to how ponies slept. I wasn't incredibly surprised to see a bed, much like one you would see on Earth. The mattress looked to be about the same size as a full-size, and looked like it would fit her comfortably.

I was about to head back down to the living room when I heard the door open. I thought it was Fluttershy returning home until I heard a feminine –if tomboyish- voice call out; "Fluttershy! You home? I got a new trick I wanna show ya!"

Must be a friend of hers; I should probably go introduce myself and let her know that Fluttershy's out right now. I thought. I descended the stairs to see that whoever it was wasn't in the main room, but I could still hear her in the cottage somewhere, probably in the kitchen.

Sure enough, right as I reached the bottom of the stairs, a light blue Pegasus with a rainbow striped mane and tail and bright magenta eyes trotted out of the kitchen. She had a cloud shooting a rainbow colored lightning bolt for a cutie mark. "Huh, guess she's not he-" She stopped mid-sentence when she spotted me.

"Uh, Hi. My name's Blake. Fluttershy's not in right now, dunno when she'll be back." The rainbow-maned Pegasus didn't say anything as she seemed to be looking me over. I nervously smiled at her.

Her expression turned to one of shock, and she took a step back. "All that blood…" Crap, I forgot about the stains on this shirt… "Sharp teeth too…" Her expression turned to one of sadness then rage as she shouted, "You ate Fluttershy, didn't you!?" Before I had a chance to protest, she charged at me with a speed that I wouldn't have been able to dodge away from even if I had been in top condition and tackled me with surprising force, knocking the wind from me.

I landed harshly on the stairs, and looked up to see the light blue Pegasus on top of me, pulling her hoof back as if to punch my face in, which is probably exactly what she intended to do. The door opened, and I heard; "Rainbow Dash? What are you doing?!" This caused the Pegasus on top of me to stop what she was doing and we both looked over at the doorway to see a horrified Fluttershy with bags full of groceries strapped to her sides. "Leave poor Blake alone, he's been through enough!"

Rainbow Dash pulled herself off of me and Fluttershy rushed over to me, still lying on the stairs. "Oh my goodness Blake, are you alright? You aren't hurt again, are you?" I groaned and shook my head in response; I would be sore for a few days, but no actual injuries that I could feel.

Rainbow Dash flew up next to Fluttershy, "Fluttershy, you know this… thing?" I didn't like the way she referred to me, but decided it would be better to let Fluttershy handle correcting her friend.

Fluttershy looked angry when Rainbow Dash said this, "Blake is not a thing!" She shouted; whoa, I wouldn't want to be Rainbow Dash right now if she's that mad. "He's a human and he saved my life!" that one got her attention as her ears drooped to the sides of her head and her jaw dropped for a moment before looking back to me.

She had a shameful look on her face as she said; "Oh my gosh, I-I'm so sorry, I saw all that blood on you and I thought… Does that mean?" I had a feeling I knew what she was asking.

I nodded, "Yup, this is all my blood." I wheezed a little as I said this, my ribs still somewhat aching from being hit by Rainbow Dash then the stairs. "It's cool though, I got healed up by a zebra named Zecora, so aside from being somewhat flimsy from blood loss, I'm pretty much right as rain."

Her jaw dropped again when she heard it was my blood staining my shirt. "I-I heard about what happened from Scootaloo yesterday, but I thought she was making it up… I mean, a weird, talking hairless-ape creature wearing clothes that took out two timberwolves by himself seemed kinda hard to believe at the time." She flew over to me and looked me in the eye. "I didn't hurt you too bad, did I?" she asked, sounding sincerely apologetic.

I smiled and shook my head, "Tell ya what, promise that you'll try to look before you leap next time, and we'll forget it ever happened." She perked right up at this.

"Thanks… uh, Blake?" I nodded, and she smiled. "You're already awesome in my book!" She was suddenly very enthusiastic as she held out a hoof towards me. Apparently guessing correctly what she was going for, I tapped her hoof with my fist in a bro… hoof? "So, you two wanna head to the park and watch me do some awesome tricks?"

I couldn't help but chuckle at her enthusiasm. "Sounds good to me, the park isn't too far." Fluttershy gave me a worried look at this. "Don't worry, I'll be ok for short distances, I donated blood all the time back home, so I know how to manage. Besides, no offense, but I don't do too well being inside for long periods, I need to be out doing something."

Fluttershy nodded reluctantly at this. "Ok, Blake, if you're sure you'll be alright… Rainbow Dash's tricks are always fun to watch." She smiled at this and Rainbow Dash let out a 'woo-hoo' as we set out for the park. I decided to take my shirt off to avoid any more 'incidents'.

The three of us chatted along the way, with Fluttershy walking on my left and Rainbow Dash flying on my right. I had to explain to them what I meant by 'donating blood', which they fortunately took fairly well. I made sure to leave details of how hostile humanity can be out of the conversation though; I didn't want to worry them too much so soon.

Fluttershy packed a small picnic for the three of us, making sure to bring plenty of liquids and fruit for me. It wasn't long before we got to the park, and there were other ponies there as well. They didn't pay much mind to me though, probably because I was with the other two, which put the others at ease.

When we set up the picnic, Rainbow Dash began her routine. I had to admit, she was good, though I couldn't figure out how she made that rainbow streak behind her as she flew. I decided it would be best to not question stuff like that for now; there were already too many other strange things going on, and if I worried about every single one, my head might explode. After about an hour, Rainbow Dash started to run out of tricks and we decided to call it a day; though she promised to cook up some new ones to show us soon.

Rainbow Dash decided to go her own way for now, leaving me and Fluttershy to walk back to her cottage alone. Until I heard a familiar DJ call my name that is… "Hey Blake, how's it hangin?" She said as she caught up to us. She had on a set of packs with her cutie mark on them, which was some kind of musical note.

I smiled at her. "Not too shabby, a few snags here and there, but pretty good overall. How'd the gig go last night?"

She smiled up at me. "Dude, it was awesome! Wish you coulda been there. So, you think you'll be up to meet my friend today?"

I chuckled at that, "Sure, as long as we don't run into anymore timberwolves, I think I'll be ok. Just take it slow on the way, I'm still recovering." I then knelt down and gave Fluttershy a hug. "Thanks for everything… will you be ok going home on your own?"

She smiled and nodded at this. "You're very welcome Blake, I'm just glad you're feeling better. Don't worry about me; I won't be going into the Everfree today, so I'll be alright." With that, we waved each other goodbye, and me and Vinyl made our way to meet this friend of hers.

We were walking through what I guessed was the main thoroughfare of town, when a pink pony with a dark pink… and very poofy… mane and tail with three balloons for a cutie mark suddenly looked over at me. Her sky blue eyes went wide and she hopped up in the air and gasped; then without even touching the ground again, she took off in the opposite direction, leaving a pony-shaped cloud where she had been a moment ago.

Vinyl chuckled and nudged my side with her shoulder, "Looks like you'll be getting a 'Welcome to Ponyville' party tonight dude." I gave her a confused look at this. "That was Pinkie Pie, she's Ponyville's party expert, and she throws a party for every new pony she meets, even if they're only visiting."

I just shook my head and decided not to worry about it for now; instead we kept heading towards where Vinyl's friend was. She led me to a light green house and turned to me when we got to the door. "Here dude, you'll need these." She said as she turned to her pack and pulled out two pairs of noise dampening earmuffs with her magic, passing one to me and putting the other on herself.

Deciding not to question it, I put mine on too. Once I had, she knocked on the door with her hoof and we waited. Moments later, the door opened to reveal a mint-green unicorn with a lighter mint colored mane with a white streak. Her eyes were a gold color. She looked at Vinyl for a moment until Vinyl gestured towards me with her head. She looked at me –more specifically my abdomen- before slowly bringing her gaze up to my face. I smiled and waved, somewhat nervous under her wondering gaze.

Her eyes suddenly widened and she let out what would have been an ear-piercing fangirl squee. Good thing Vinyl had these earmuffs; otherwise I might be deaf for life.

I looked over to Vinyl and she gave me a knowing smile. Her trademark sunglasses were cracked.