"So, I don't know how I did -that-," I coughed uneasily, "but I couldn't get my magic to connect to the air and... well, it just loaded up on my horn until it got painful."
"You have too few magic users in your world," Spritelight snorted, regaining her composure. "That must be it; nopony is using the latent magical energy your world builds up on its own, so when somepony attuned to it starts to use it they get overwhelmed. It's the only explanation."
Josey's pupils grew to their regular size again and she tilted her head at Spritelight. "Yet you haven't felt anything off about the magic in this world since you arrived here?"
"I'm not attuned to," Spritelight started.
"Aren't you though?" Josey cut into the excuse. "You went around for months transforming people into ponies. Wouldn't that get you more attuned to this world from one day to the next?"
"Well, I did have a nasty headache throughout," the unicorn defended herself. "It could have been caused by something like that..."
I reached up to rub at the left side of my horn. "So too much magic around us? Not my fault?"
"Oh no, you're not evading the blame for that hole in the sky that easily," Spritelight decided, turning on me again.
Josey sighed and flopped her left wing over the other's head, obscuring her view.
"Ignore Spritelight for a moment. What you said; you couldn't find your magic connect? Our magic is an energy; you just have to excite the atoms, so to speak," the Alicorn explained to me.
"I told her that," Spritelight protested from under the other's wing, trying to find her way out. "In any case, we should get airborne soon. Take your wing off me already."
"She didn't say anything about exciting atoms though," I pointed out, "but I'm honestly too tired to try again for now..."
"That's fine, I'll fill the balloon with Sprite here," Josey trusted to me, finally pulling her wing up from the unicorn again. "Let's get back to it."
Rainbow and Turkey had picked themselves up as well and had wandered on over.
"I'm on it, Turkey can take care of April for a moment," the blue pegasus with rainbow hair decided before zooming off to redo the ropes which had become entangled again from the pressure wave.
Turkey approached me carefully, looking at me with some worry on her face. "I'm so glad I'm not a unicorn... how do you deal with that amount of force?"
I looked her over, her mane, coat, and wings as drenched by the blood rain as my own mane and fur.
"Same to you with the wings, I guess," I threw back, stifling a yawn a moment later. "I don't know, I just follow their instructions. It's a lot of grasping at straws, honestly."
"You could have said you're just winging it, like me?" Turkey suggested. "It would have been a good pun."
"I've had two hours of sleep last night, if that much," I reminded her. "Thinking is not in the cards right now."
"Right, sorry," the pegasus apologized. "There's a lot of faking involved, isn't there? This whole thing, I mean?"
I stared up in her rose coloured eyes. "Faking?"
"The whole 'doing okay' thing. You're not, I can see that," Turkey pressed.
"Oh," I returned. I looked down at my forehooves, firmly planted on the wet rooftop. "I guess it's... a lot."
"I know what you mean," the other pony offered in empathy. "Then again, I am older than you and have had more time to think about my place in life. This... is turning a new leaf for me, and I can't look a gift horse in the mouth."
My right ear flicked at the pun, and when I turned my eyes up to face her again she was all smiles.
"Pony," I corrected her, motioning my head in Josey's direction. "She's more like a horse than the both of us stacked on top of one another."
"As long as I'm on top when we try; I'm lighter than you," Turkey offered back with a grin. "You're right, though. I would have expected to be taller than, what, two... three feet?"
"Roughly. I haven't had a measuring tape on han... hoof," I caught myself.
"Yeah, they're some getting used to. I have to say the wings are not as bothersome as I thought they would be. Even if I have to take care to preen them regularly," the pegasus suggested.
"How does it feel?" I asked, motioning at the nearest edge of the rooftop and the empty sky past it.
"It feels stupid," Turkey started, her expression turning to a more serious one. "Like, you're basically constantly falling. Pull your wings in and you'll dive. Tilt them this way or that and you'll turn in the sky or crash into something. It's stupid."
I looked down again. "Oh, I'm sorry to..."
"But also? I'm a goddamned pegasus mare! I can fly to my heart's content and... well," her voice softened to a conspiratorial whisper, "I didn't used to be a girl before, but I can't say I hate that either."
"Right," I started, my brain slow to respond. "...how did that work exactly?"
"What do you mean?" the pegasus wondered, tilting her head slightly. "We both transformed much the same way; we met Spritelight, she sent her magic into us, and we became the ponies we truly were inside of ourselves all along. What part confuses you?"
"You used to be a guy?" I pointed out.
"Yes, what about it?" Turkey asked, sitting her rump down in a pool of red water.
"You can't tell me you were a girl inside all along? That's not right. God doesn't make mistakes," I put forward, knowing how my parents thought about those things.
"Well, God didn't cast magic upon me, now did she? That was Spritelight. If it was God's plan to have me walk around as a dusty old human guy, then I'm sure she would have interfered already," Turkey reasoned.
She turned her head up to look at the sky above. "So far all I see from God's side is a whole lot of nothing. Those light beams up there pouring in through the hole in the meat? That was you, not some faceless deity."
I looked up at the hole as well, noting the burnt edges were slowly healing and growing closer together again.
Turkey put her attention back to me. "All I've seen from God throughout my life was a whole lot of neglect. Spritelight has taken me under her proverbial wing ever since we met. I trust in her explanation of how her magic works."
I scrunched up my nose, my ears moving a bit on my head as I turned it back down to face the pegasus before me.
She was right, in a way; God had not spoken to me or shown any sign that He cared about me all through my life going to church with my parents, praying at bedtime, or even here at the boarding school.
I had been slowly sliding down a slope going from little princess who was given everything she could possibly ask for to moody teenager they'd rather get rid of.
I prayed so much for my parents to understand me and the things I asked of them, but to no avail; I still ended up getting whisked away to this boarding school.
Religion had done nothing for me so far, nor for the rest of my family who had been praying for their own private reasons.
On the flip side, Spritelight and Josey had thrown my world entirely upside down; transforming myself and everyone I knew into ponies as they had.
They showed fantastical abilities I could have only dreamt witnessing or being able to use myself before my transformation.
And Josey especially did so with a caring smile, speaking for her good nature and loving heart. Spritelight was more dismissive, but still tried.
I could see where Turkey was coming from, and that scared me. It reminded me of the warnings of the devil coming in many guises to make you stray from your path.
"It's a bit of humanity you're clinging to, isn't it?" Turkey asked, noticing my expression as I was deeply in thought.
"Sorry, what is?" I asked, snapped out of my ponderings.
"Your religion. You probably grew up in a religious household so you don't want to betray your folks, am I right?" the pegasus pressed.
"No, I mean... Yes, but my parents put me in here to get rid of me anyway, it's not like I owe them anything," I threw back.
Turkey's ears drooped and she shook her head slowly. "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. I'm sure they tried their best in their own way... I mean, I'm sure you're getting a decent education here that will last you through your life?"
"What good is that education going to do me as a pony?" I returned.
Turkey stretched her wings out and shrugged. "I don't know, maybe there's a way for us to go to that Equestria Spritelight has been talking about, live the rest of our lives there? Maybe we'd find a spot here to live as ponies? Maybe we'll get turned back eventually... I don't know the future. You might find more use for your education than you think right now."
"That's not very helpful," I snorted.
"At least I'm trying to look forward, that's something," the pegasus decided, looking me straight in the eyes. "You shouldn't worry so much."
"If there's something to your belief in God, then hang on to it. If you don't have that, hang on to something else," she decided, then winked at me. "Just don't hang on to me while I'm in flight; I have enough trouble as it is keeping up with Dash over there without someone else weighing me down more."
I glanced over to where Rainbow Dash was, noting the balloon was almost fully inflated now and the ropes dangling down from it to the basket were pulling taut.
Rainbow was flying around the balloon, poking it with her hooves to get the air to smoothen the bladder out properly while Spritelight and Josey continued filling the thing with warm air from below.
"Oh, well, it looks like I'll be sharing a basket with Spritelight anyway," I returned to Turkey, leaning into the joke now we were off the subject of religion. "No hanging off you yet."
"Yeah, pulling that rope is enough of a strain as it is. I'm fine with that. Josey's larger wings and Rainbow Dash's experience just makes me the weakest link is all," Turkey chuckled.
"You keep up well enough," Josey finally piped up, giving a smile in the pegasus' direction. "I'm cheating by being an Alicorn, I'm sure."
"I'm just glad I don't have to try to keep up with you flyers," Spritelight remarked, the glow of her horn pulling away. "You can do the last bit right Josey?"
"Yep," the princess agreed. "You and April should get in the basket and get comfortable. It's a few hours flight still. I had expected the wall of flesh to be here by now, but it looks like we can take it a little slower and still arrive in time."
"Not too slow, I hope. We don't know where that mana well is for you to tap in to. We might find it at the bottom of a cavern or something," the unicorn pointed out before turning toward me and Turkey.
"Are you both also ready to go? No charge in your horn which you need to shoot up at the sky again? Your wings doing okay Turkey dear?" Spritelight wondered, addressing us in turn.
"I'm ready to fly at a moment's notice," Turkey agreed, getting up on all fours.
I followed suit and shook my head at Spritelight, deliberately turning my head in her direction.
"Nope, my horn is all empty. I just have a very minor existential crisis thanks to a certain pegasus, that's all," I joked, glancing at Turkey.
"Turkey said nothing wrong; I stood right here listening with a half ear," Spritelight decided. "Your religion is backwards compared to what we have in Equestria. We at least know our Gods; they walk among us. Can you say the same?"
"Spritelight, come on now," Josey protested. "Just because someone believes something you don't doesn't mean you have to be nasty like that."
"You've seen the other Princesses and Discord. Am I wrong?" Spritelight threw back. "We can reach them and ask them for help any time. Praying to something that might or might not be there is ridiculous."
"If she needs her faith to feel good about life and her place within it, then I think she should hold onto it," Turkey threw in the mix. "I spoke before my turn earlier. I'm sure that God is looking down upon April if she needs her."
"Him, The Lord," I mumbled. "I don't know why you keep saying her and she."
"I honestly love the idea of a Mother Gaia protecting the Earth and us upon it," Turkey revealed. "I'm sorry, this is what I mean with speaking before my turn."
"Yes, remind me to teach you some manners when this is all over and done with," Spritelight chuckled. "I'm abducting you to Equestria no matter what happens, just so you know."
"Well, that's my future sorted," Turkey laughed brightly. "We'll see what happens."
I glanced between the pair of them again. "You're acting like an old couple and it's both endearing and concerning."
"Why concerning?" asked Turkey, while Spritelight at the same time went "Why endearing?"
They stared at one another, then laughed at the different priorities between them.
"That's why," I pointed out.
"Okay, okay, let's get in the basket already, you two," Josey interjected. "The balloon's about ready to take it up in the air."
"Yes, let's," Spritelight agreed, moving toward the basket before me. "Can you climb in yourself or do I need to lift you?"
I felt my ears flatten against my head at the joke, but as I approached the basket it looked like an ordeal to get in on my own. "I guess I could use a boost..."
Light blue magic enveloped me and lifted me from the ground, most of the lift centering itself around my chest, and I was unceremoniously dropped into the basket a moment after.
Spritelight lifted herself on over immediately after and settled next to me in the somewhat cramped basket, her right hip pressing against my left.
"Passengers loaded up, let's take flight!" she called out to the flying team.
