revenance_rpg | 5. My Little Bolin

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5. My Little Bolin

WHO: Bolin & OPEN
WHERE: Ponyville
WHAT: Going to explore the world that his friends all talked about.
WHEN: Shortly after the portal opened (and after he's caught up on sleep)
WARNINGS: TBD...

He hadn't been a big fan of the large, metal ship. It wasn't fun to be in a place where you couldn't use your bending and everything was so over his head and scary with the invisible, creature thing attacking at random. It was why Bolin had been so excited to check out Ponyville. He'd heard about it from Luna, Rarity, and others of course and there world hadn't sounded SO bad. In fact, he was kind of looking forward to it. Plus, he knew what to expect since Master Eraqus had gone first.

Although, even if he was ready for it he was still a little nervous. What if it hurt? Or what if once he went there he wouldn't change back? The others had stayed ponies...but then again Bolin supposed they were originally from that world. It hadn't taken him long to decide his curiosity was going to win out and had set out for Ponyville.

And as soon as he was on the other side of the portal tripped over his own hooves and did a rather nice roll across the grass. He eventually came to a stop, Mako Jr. and Pao, chasing after him. Bolin crashed into a nearby tree and fell onto his back, staring up at the gorgeous blue sky. "Ow. Okay, yeah, that's a LOT harder than Rarity and the others make it look."

Pao bent down and nipped at Bolin's ear. "Right, you're right, they were walking on all four hooves all of their lives just like I was walking on two. That makes sense. I just have to practice like anything else." Bolin wiggled and finally rolled over. He was curious as to what kind of pony he looked like. They didn't have ponies where he was from so all he had to go by was what he had seen from Rarity, Luna, Celestia, and Pinkie. Bolin looked over his shoulder and noticed that his body was now a light green color. He had no wings and he couldn't feel a horn on his head so he assumed he was a pony like Pinkie Pie, an earth pony (which made sense to him). He tilted his head a bit more and saw that the mark on his hind quarters consisted of a dark brown earth disk, similar to what he used in the Pro-Bending arena. "Cooool," he marveled.

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It had taken Roxas a long while to get used to walking, but he was managing to wobble from place to place and that was a start. Bouncer would walk beside him sometimes to keep him upright. Flipper wasn't much help in that regard.

However, Roxas had felt he'd had enough of being a pony for one day, and had been starting to head back before he saw someone else shoot out of the portal. Bouncer bounded over to say hi first, leaving Roxas to wobble a bit before toppling over at the unexpected departure of his support. He recovered quickly though.

It took him another minute to figure out who was in front of him but eventually the spirit with the scarf clued him in.

"Bolin?"

Bolin tore his gaze away from his rear end (which in retrospect might have been a pretty odd thing to be staring at) and tilted his head up to see another pony. He hadn't tried standing again mind you, so he did have to look up. At least he hadn't seen Bolin on his back...or so he hoped.

"Yep, it's me, good ole Bolin." He pauses and tilts his head. Unfortunately for Roxas, Bolin is not as good at picking up on clues. "And...you are..."

Roxas had been more focused on going forward, and looking behind wasn't really an option yet. Not until he was a little more steady. It was nice to find a familiar face here, sort of.

"It's me, Roxas. Kinda hard to tell I guess."

"Oh!" He squints at the pony and then slowly starts pushing himself up to his hooves. "Yeah I can see it now. Hey Roxas!" He smiles as he gets back up. His legs are still shaky but he manages to remain standing at least. "Pretty neat, huh? Have you been here long. I haven't actually had a chance to look around yet."

If Roxas were feeling a little more confident, he'd go help but since he's still in the hobbling phase, it wouldn't really help to have both of them fall over.

"I think it's pretty weird, personally. I was just heading out, but I can stick around if you want. This place is kinda homey."

Bolin didn't seem at all phased by Roxas's low enthusiasm. "Well sure it's weird but it can still be fun. Luna and the others told me all kinds of cool things about this place. It can't be that bad." Bolin turned, slowly, towards the village of Ponyville. "The only way to get past the weird is to stick with it. I won't force you or anything, but I at least want to check out the town."

"I guess I'll come with you. There's still nightmares in this place. Bouncer and Flipper had to take care of most of them. I'm still not sure how to fight like this."

Summoning the keyblade had been one thing, using it another. It was amazing how one took hands for granted sometimes.

Pao and Mako Jr perked up at that and Bolin dropped his head at the same time. "Oh man. This place sounded so nice...guess I should have known there would be Nightmares here too." He huffed but quickly perked up again, pawing the ground and decided to start trotting towards the village. "Guess we can only practice that too."

"Something tells me we're not getting away from them anytime soon," Roxas replied, following Bolin at a slow pace. There was no way he was ready to try trotting yet.

"I'm not even sure how ponies fight."

"Welcome to Equestria... or at least, the Ponyville of dreams."

Celestia had taken up a position near the portal for just this sort of occasion, to greet those who found themselves accommodated by the world transition. She smiled down at him as she stepped up.

Way down, since Celestia was titanic compared to the average pony...

Bolin snapped back to attention and tilted his head back to look up...up...up at Celestia. He was still on the ground after all which only further highlighted her, well, height.

He smiled, "Thanks for the welcome! You guys definitely make this whole four legged thing look easy."

"As easy as you make walking on two-legs look," she returned. "I'm glad to see you're taking to this change so well."

After all, some other people were a LOT less happy about it.

"I suppose you have a point there," he replied. Bolin tilted his had slightly and looked down at himself again. "Well, I had a bit of warning from Master Eraqus that this would happen. Besides, all of this is still a dream right? Weirder things happen in dreams than turning into multi-colored ponies. I think it's kind of fun."

"That is true, and yet, it feels real. And many people are not comfortable with their bodies being manipulated or transformed, even temporarily." Which was a shame, she thought privately. What harm could come of it but enlightenment, and an expansion of understanding? She was honestly quite curious, now, what it was like to be human.

Bolin thought about that for a moment. He could understand that he supposed. People were used to their own bodies and having your body changed could be very uncomfortable for some people. He imagined it was a lot like losing your bending to an extent. "It does feel real, I agree, but despite the Nightmares it still hasn't been TOO bad. I think being able to change forms just makes the experience more interesting. Too bad you and the other ponies can't experience the reverse. I wonder why that is."

They'd been to plenty of human worlds by now, hadn't they? He wondered what dictated the change now. "I wonder why we had to change coming here but you didn't change going to other places."

"Master Eraqus and I had some discussion about that, in fact, when I mentioned to him my suspicions that some part of Equestria would appear in dreams. It seems that such transformations are the natural laws of some worlds, but not all." She made a gesture with her wings that could be interpreted as a shrug. "I do wonder if a world will appear where we ponyfolk will appear as humans. I am curious, but I wonder how the others would take it."

"Oh so you thought this might happen? I mean, your world appearing?" Bolin thought about it himself for a moment. He had considered it before, seeing Republic City. All the other places so far had been rather quiet and empty. He wasn't sure how he would feel visiting Republic City if it was like that. He was far too used to the hustle and bustle. Come to think of it, weren't all the worlds so far a home to someone? Roxas had said Twilight Town was important to him, then there was that space ship for all the guys in that weird armor, and now this place. Between himself, Asami, and Lin it was possible that there world might indeed appear soon.

He didn't voice this yet though, wanting to mull it over. "Well, I guess it makes a little sense. You guys have said you didn't even know what humans were before coming to this dream. So I guess it makes sense that we would turn into ponies in your world. I guess that might also factor into other worlds. We don't have ponies in my world...we have animals like Ostrich horses and polar bear dogs. So I wonder if you would change if we went there."

Celestia couldn't read his mind, but her words echoed his thoughts quite naturally. "I have expected it since the Mother of Invention appeared. It has ties to several of the people who have appeared here in the realm of dreams. Knowing that, I surmised that with the arrival of two of my subjects, an Equestrian world was likely to follow."

She was not pleased, mind, that Ponyville had fallen into the dream world, but she believed it to be harmless in the long run, and could be pleased that she was correct. "I suspect, were we to change to fit into another world, that we would change to humans. We are, after all, the primary race of Equestria, its movers and shakers, much as I gather humans tend to be on other worlds."

Namine had stayed away from the Mother of Invention for many of the same reasons Bolin had. While the invisible enemy was there, it was far too dangerous for her to visit. Even without that sort of danger, she had to be on her guard more than others since she couldn't fight as well. Exploring on her own with an unseen, powerful enemy present, she would have needed others to help her. She couldn't ask anyone to put themselves at that kind of risk just so she could look around.

Now that issue seemed to have been resolved, she could go look around more easily. Before that, though, there was an even newer world, which looked relatively safe. Of course, it was also one of those worlds which made humans change form. Being a pony for a little while might be odd, but form changes had never seemed to hurt Sora...

So she cautiously made her way through the portal, Petals and Stormy following her. At least it wasn't a surprise to suddenly find herself a pony. She should have guessed she'd be mostly white, but she couldn't help sighing inwardly.

Before she could think about too much, though, she heard someone else nearby. Apparently she'd arrived not long after Bolin. Taking slow, cautious steps (and stumbling more than once), she made her way over to him. "Hello, Bolin."

By the time Namine was making her way towards him Bolin was working on standing back up. His legs were a bit shaky, much like any new colt trying its legs for the first time, but he was taking it slow and taking a few minutes to adjust. He looked up when he heard a familiar voice, though he still wasn't very good at recognizing people-turned-ponies yet.

"Oh, hello. Getting used to this too, huh?"

New ways of walking took getting used to, which was inconvenient. Namine was moving a lot like a new filly herself. At least she wasn't falling (much) and Stormy helped if she stumbled. It hadn't occurred to her that Bolin couldn't guess who she was just yet.

"Yes, it's not as easy as Rarity and the others make it look."

"I've been looking for her. I thought Rarity might want to see her home again but maybe she wants to make sure her shop in the other world is okay first." Bolin wasn't thinking about it and started pawing at the ground. He tilted his head and smiled, "Oh, but you're a unicorn like her, have you tried any magic yet?"

"She probably does." Namine briefly wondered if Rarity might eventually move back here; it was her home after all. That was a subject for another time, though. For now, she returned Bolin's smile. "Not yet, but I've been getting used to walking this way first."

There was a faint clop of hooves walking at a sedate pace from behind Bolin, accompanied by the happy squeakings of a pricklemane. Someone had arrived a little while earlier, and though her steps were slow, they were far steadier than newer arrivals.

The older pony-bender offered the younger a smile, coming to a halt beside him. Now a charcoal coloured unicorn with a greying mane and tail, Lin still bore the three scars she'd worn for much of her life. She'd expected her cutie mark ('cutie' indeed) to have been the Beifong family crest, and had been surprised instead when it was a larger version of the gold badge for Republic City's Chief of Police.

"This form is certainly preferable to that of an ostrich horse, I have to say."

Meanwhile, Pao was attempting to help Bolin stand again. He was shaky on his hooves, but he could manage to stand after a few seconds of support from the Dream Eater giraffe. It was only after he was on his feet, er, hooves again that he noticed he was no longer alone.

"Chief! You think so? It's not like you've ever been an ostrich horse, right? Although, it's hard to imagine ostrich horses coming in some many colors."

"If you widen your stance a little, you'll find balancing on four feet a little easier. Once you have a solid idea of how it's meant to feel, you'll be able to go from there." Lin had done her share of lrn-2-quadruped, and it didn't hurt to share her knowledge.

Her head shook, short mane bobbing; her tail was trimmed equally short. "No," the mare replied dryly, "Form bending is something reserved for the spirits alone, and I doubt any of those would willingly be a osritch horse. The colours are certainly unique, though." They both still had Earth Kingdom green eyes, however - that hadn't changed, even if they were both very different pony types.

After a pause Bolin shifted his hooves, widening his stance as Lin instructed. He shouldn't have been surprised that it worked, but it did. It probably had something to do with rediscovering his center of gravity. When you were standing on two feet it was a little different.

"And the special markings. Don't forget those."

The metalbender turned her head to look at her own rump sigil: the golden badge of the Republic City police chief. She snorted faintly. She'd half expected her family's crest to have appeared instead.

"I'll have to ask Princess Luna if they're meant to represent something specific." She looked back at him then, and frowned. "Hmm. I guess you don't have magic here." No horn. "Can you still use your bending?"

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5. My Little Bolin

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