Vinyl sat on a chair made of clouds on the patio outside her hotel room, smoking a cigarette in one hoof while holding a drink in the other. She scratched at the tight metal band around her fetlock; sure it kept her from falling to her death, but did it have to be so itchy? It wasn’t important in the grand scheme of things, she supposed. Her eyes flitted between the impossibly floating buildings as she took in the sight of Cloudsdale for the first time. It was gorgeous, provided one didn’t look down or think too hard about how most of the homes had front doors that opened to a thousand foot drop instead of a road.

Two sharp knocks sounded from her door. “Who is it?” Vinyl called over her shoulder. She heard the door creak open behind her.

“It’s me; is it all right if I come in?”

“Sure. I’m out on the patio.”

As she heard Derpy’s hoofsteps approaching from behind, Vinyl thought about how different her friend had become over the past few years. The old Derpy was practically on the tips of her hooves at all times, as though she were always worried about knocking over someone’s favorite vase. The steps crossing her hotel room sounded businesslike. Confident.

“So, how do you like Cloudsdale?” Derpy asked as she fell into a cloud chair next to Vinyl.

“It’s lovely. I wish I could bring Octavia, though, rather than spending all of my time at press interviews, signings, and shows.”

Derpy shrugged, smiling awkwardly. “Hey, there’s always next time, right? Maybe you can come back during your honeymoon.”

“Sounds like a good idea.”

Derpy nodded and pulled out her planner. “We will be here one more day for a show tomorrow night at the Wind Tunnel. Then, we will be heading off to Vanhoover for three shows, five shows in Las Pegasus, the festival in Appleloosa, and the grand finale at the Canterlot Royal Symphony Hall.

“Great. Looking forward to it.” Vinyl sighed, sipping on her drink and taking a pull from her cigarette.

“Are you all right?”

“Honestly? No. I’m not.”

“Is it the stress of the tour?” Derpy asked with an empathetic frown.

Vinyl shook her head.

“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of getting married when we get home,” Derpy said. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you go on about something you want as much as Octavia.”

Vinyl bit her lip and crushed her cigarette out on a cloud coaster, which darkened as it soaked up the smoke. “No, it’s not that. It’s something I’ve been keeping secret.”

“Please don’t tell me you’re hitting up drugs.”

Vinyl raised her eyebrows at Derpy. “Seriously?”

“Hey, I had to ask. You’re the one being cryptic.”

“Well then, to answer your question, no. I am not ‘riding the white pony.’ It’s just something that has been bothering me for the past few months.”

“What is it?”

“Well, you know how I only like mares, right?”

“Of course, ever since I met you when I was in late middle school. I still remember that night you had me hold up a yearbook so you could practice coming out to your classmates.”

“I think there’s more to it than that. I feel I haven’t been keeping true to myself for these past few years, if that makes sense.”

Derpy scratched her chin. “How so?”

“When I am DJ-PON3, I’m not me; I’m just a famous figure made to market and sell records and tickets. This career has given me a lot of money, but all the fame is going to DJ-PON3—a fake name wearing my face.”

“So, you want to be known as Vinyl Scratch rather than DJ-PON3? It’s not usually a commercially wise move for a musician to change their name mid-career, but if it’s really bothering you so much—”

“It’s not just that,” Vinyl interrupted. “I don’t want to be a DJ or any of this. I want to be me.” She paused and set down her drink again, then continued, “Thing is, I have been having... odd feelings for the past few months. I don’t like being DJ-PON3 anymore.” Vinyl sighed, setting her glass down silently. “I don’t even like being myself.”

“What do you mean? What do you want to be, then?”

“A stallion.”

There was a pause. Derpy tried to find words, but nothing would come.

“I don’t understand.”

“I don’t either.”

Derpy tapped her hoof. Vinyl pulled out her pack of cigarettes, shook it to check how many she had left, then pulled one out and stuffed the butt between her lips.

“Hey.”

“Yeah?” Vinyl asked as she lit up.

“Give me one of those.”

Vinyl stared at Derpy. “I thought you didn’t smoke.”

“I don’t. Just — fuck. What are you going to tell Octavia?”

“I don’t know.”

After seeing their friends and buying groceries, Vinyl unlocked the front door of his home and he and Octavia carried their grocery bags into the kitchen.

“We should have bought more beer,” Vinyl said, giving Octavia his best pout.

“Maybe next time.” Octavia smiled, shaking her head as she hefted two bags onto the counter to unpack.

“Need any help?”

“I’m fine. You still need to call the doctor’s office.” She looked over at Vinyl as she closed one of the overhead cabinets.

“Nah, I can do that later. Let me help.” Vinyl picked up a bag filled with produce and hoisted it onto his back.

“Vinyl.” Octavia stopped what she was doing and placed a hoof on his shoulder. “You can do it now,” she said firmly.

“All right, fine.” With a sigh, Vinyl stopped unpacking the bag, walked over to the phone, and pulled out an old address book kept on the table below it. He turned a few pages, found the number for the doctor’s office, and dialed it in.

After a few rings, a mare picked up on the other end.

“Ponyville Doctor’s office. How may I help you?”

“Hello. I would like to make an appointment.”

“What for?”

“What?”

“Oh! I mean, ‘what is the purpose of your appointment today, sir backslash madam?’” the mare asked, adopting a more formal tone. Vinyl realized she was reading from a guide card and bit his lip to keep from giggling. After a moment, he remembered she was expecting an answer.

“Oh. Um... consultation?” Vinyl said the first thing coming to mind.

“Sorry ’bout that. We mostly see the same handful of ponies, so I just assume everyone already knows what I’m talking about. Consultation for what, sug? Anything more specific?”

“Um, consultation for transition?”

“Transition?”

“Well, you know… transition.” Vinyl hinted as hard as he could using tone of voice alone.

“Ooohhhhh. Okay, Doctor Horse recently had one of his patients cancel on him. Would Thursday at eleven be a good time for you?”

“Yeah, sounds great.”

“Can I get a name, sug?”

“Vinyl Scratch.”

“All right, Vinyl. We’ll see you Thursday.”

“Thanks.”

Vinyl hung up the phone and looked at Octavia. She smiled at him.

“Not so hard, was it?” she asked.

“Second time’s the charm, I guess.”

After unpacking groceries and having lunch, Octavia got up from the kitchen table.

“I need to practice. Is it all right if I do so in the living room?”

“Go ahead. I’ll clean up,” Vinyl said, picking up the dishes from the table and placing them in the sink.

Octavia walked over to her cello case. Opening it, she removed her instrument and stood it up, carefully balancing herself on her hind legs to keep her weight off its delicate wooden frame. She ran the bow over the strings several times to make sure everything was in order, then began playing a slow piece that resonated throughout their home.

Vinyl ran the water and listened to her playing while he worked on the dishes. While the piece was slow, each note resonated with somber elegance. “A bit formal for a bakery, don’t you think?” he called, and Octavia paused. “It’s beautiful, but you’re not going to be adding to the ambiance outside of a high society ball.”

The tempo shifted upward, the notes sounding brighter, like a spring morning. A slight bounce entered Octavia’s motions. “You mean like this?”

“Yeah, that’s it! I know that’s how I’d want it to sound whenever I walked into a cake shop.” Vinyl left the dishes to dry and wiped his hooves off on a towel.

Octavia curtseyed, then her bow skidded to a halt. She inhaled sharply, then began running the bow across the cello’s neck feverishly. It took Vinyl a moment to realize it was a riff from an old rock song he used to bother her by playing. Even though she was sweating and breathing heavily by the time she finished, she smiled as though she felt fine. “I shall practice whatever I like, dearest,” she said once she’d caught her breath. After a moment, she began playing another tune.

Vinyl walked into the living room and over to a small bookshelf opposite the piano, carefully picking over the old books until he found one that was hoof-bound. Several of its cover’s edges had worn down and been taped over. He sat in a chair, poring over a few pages as he listened to Octavia play.

The melody was slow and soft, delicate and meandering like dandelion seeds in the breeze. Suddenly, Octavia’s nose tickled horribly. She tried to keep herself from sneezing, but the effort made the bow unsteady against the strings and she had to give in. Vinyl jumped in his chair at the sound.

“Oh dear…” Octavia sniffled.

“Still adjusting to the weather?” Vinyl said, searching for his place in the book.

“I suppose so. I thought I already had,” Octavia groaned.

“I left the allergy medicine you got in the bathroom.”

“Thank you.” Octavia placed the cello against the wall and walked upstairs.

Vinyl got up and went over to the piano, propping up the lid and pulling out the bench. Placing his book on the piano, he sat down. His horn glowed, and he played a few slow scales to warm up. He took a breath, then began to play the slow piece he had been studying.

Upstairs, Octavia’s ears perked at the sound of the piano playing. As she stepped back down to the living room, she found herself looking down at Vinyl. It was strange, seeing him so well-postured and composed. Whenever she’d see him working on his music before, he’d be doing five things at once. Now his attention was solely on the piano.

The song slowed, and Vinyl held the final note as he looked up and smiled at her.

“That was beautiful,” Octavia said as she descended the last steps and walked up beside him. “What was it?”

“Something my mom wrote. She quit playing piano when she got sick, but that didn’t stop her from grabbing a pen in her mouth and writing music.”

“What made you want to play it? You’ve been thinking about her a lot, haven’t you?”

“Well yeah, but it’s not that.”

“Then what?”

“I have someone to listen to me play now.” He winked.

A few days had passed since Octavia and Vinyl moved to Ponyville, and their house was now clean and well-organized. Most of the furniture and decorations had been left behind when Vinyl moved to Manehattan, though it had all been given a thorough cleaning. A few new things had been brought in, of course. A home just wasn’t a home without a proper cello stand.

Octavia had already left to play for the morning crowd at Sugarcube Corner, so Vinyl was alone in the house as he prepared to head out for his appointment. He looked at the clock and powered through the rest of his breakfast and steaming coffee. He got up, threw his jacket on, and walked out the front door, closing and locking it behind him.

Pulling a pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket, he withdrew a single cigarette and lit up on his stoop before stepping onto the dirt and setting off to the doctor’s office.

Vinyl opened the door warily and shuffled up to the reception desk, glancing side to side around the near-empty lobby. A mare sat there, organizing forms and folders. Vinyl cleared his throat and she peeked out around the stack she was holding, immediately setting them down when she saw him.

“Good morning. Do you have an appointment?”

“Um, yeah. Vinyl Scratch for eleven.”

“Okay. Please sign in while I get some forms for you.”

Vinyl picked up a pen with his magic and wrote his name on the sign in sheet, while the mare passed him a stack of several papers.

“We just need you to fill out some basic information on these. Be sure to bring them back up to me when you are done. Do you have any questions?”

“I don’t think so,” Vinyl said, shaking his head. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome!” She smiled, then added “The doctor will be with you soon.”

The mare picked up her folders and forms, shuffling through them slowly. Vinyl sat in a chair near the entrance and began filling out the small novel’s worth of forms he had been given. Outside, the sunflowers flared in full bloom. Instead of city noise, he could hear fillies playing jump rope. A few minutes after Vinyl had finished writing out every possible detail of his personal life and handed the papers over at the desk, a nurse came out from behind a door in the back.

“Vinyl Scratch?”

Vinyl stood up, and she quickly turned towards him.

“Please follow me.”

She led him over to a chair where she motioned for him to sit down.

“So, are you new here?” she said, grabbing a blood pressure cuff.

“Sort of. Actually, I lived here a long time ago. Just moved back recently.”

“Oh, that’s cool. Were you in Mrs. Write’s class?” She wrapped a pad around his foreleg and began pumping it up.

“No.”

“Aww. I bet you’re meeting a lot of people you used to know though, huh?” She squeezed the pump again. Vinyl winced.

“Well, your blood pressure seems okay. Let’s take your weight. Step on the scale, please.”

Vinyl stepped on the scale while the nurse wrote the medical details on her clipboard.

The nurse’s eyes flashed between Vinyl and the reading on the scale. “When was the last time you ate?”

“Breakfast this morning. I know I’m underweight, but this is pretty normal for me. Just got a high metabolism, I guess.”

The nurse thought for a moment, then immediately brightened. “Okay. This way please.”

The two ponies walked into a small office. It was taken up mainly by a large desk with a few chairs around it.

“The doctor will be with you shortly.” The nurse said and left the room, leaving Vinyl alone in the office.

Vinyl sat down, looking around the room. It wasn’t as lifeless as the last one. A stand with a few colorful pamphlets hung on the wall near the corner. A large section of a wall was taken up by an abstract painting that Vinyl thought looked like a mess of shapes.

Five minutes later, the door to the office opened and the doctor walked in.

“Hello. Vinyl Scratch?” he said, extending a hoof.

“Yeah,” Vinyl said, shaking hooves.

“Just making sure. Don’t want to mix up my patients,” he said, placing a folder on his desk and sitting down. “So, you are here about consultation for a transition? Mare to stallion, correct?”

“Um, yes.” Vinyl fidgeted with his hooves. “I know it’s going to take months for you to be able to get me started on anything. I just want to get the ball rolling.”

“Months? Why?”

“Well, that’s what I was told by my last doctor. In Manehattan.”

“Really?” The doctor laughed. “I never thought I’d get to say that we’re more medically advanced than Manehattan here in Ponyville. Not that I’m going to brag about it or anything.” He opened the folder and looked over Vinyl’s records.

Vinyl’s ears perked up. “What are the modern standards?”

“Well, it did used to be true that we had ponies with your condition wait for months before we gave them any medication. I know, I know,” he said, raising his front hooves as if he were heading off an outburst, “‘How could they?’ ‘The horror; the horror!’ Right? It’s just how things were. The prevailing opinion was that we needed to test their commitment to be sure they were serious about their decision. Over time, we found that patients were often depressed, and waiting for their medication only made it worse. Therefore, medical offices like ours now offer informed consent.”

“Informed consent?”

The doctor went over to his filing cabinet and pulled out a stapled stack of pages.

“Yep, that’s the whole story. Here; read over this.” He handed the papers to Vinyl.

Vinyl grabbed them and began reading. The packet went into details of what the drugs would do to him and the possible side effects. The final page was a disclaimer, saying that after signing the contract, he could not take legal action against the doctor.

“So, if I sign this, I can get started?”

“That’s right! You sign that you understand everything you just read and won’t sue me out of my house, and that’s that.”

Vinyl quickly read over the document again, then placed the document down on the desk.

“Can I have a pen, please?”

The doctor pulled out a pen from his jacket and handed it to Vinyl, who grabbed it with his levitation magic. Vinyl quickly signed his name and handed both the pen and document to the doctor.

“Let me write up your prescriptions and you can go along your way,” he pulled out some small pieces of paper and began writing with the same pen in his mouth. Finishing up, he handed a single piece of paper to Vinyl.

“All right. It sounds like you’ve waited long enough, so we’ll be starting you off strong with injectables–”

“Injectables?” Vinyl’s ears pressed back against his head and he seemed to shrink.

“Yes. A series of shots, but not too often. You will be taking them once every three weeks. What’s wrong? Scared of needles?”

Yes. “No!” Vinyl shook his head. “I’m a big, strong stallion, right? I can handle a few needles.”

“Hmm…” The doctor studied Vinyl for a moment. “All right; that’s fantastic! Instructions will be provided with your medication, and I want you to come back here in three months so I can check your levels and make sure you’re still healthy. Any questions?”

Vinyl stared at the doctor blankly, “Thats it?”

“Yep! See you in three months. Call us if anything seems off.”

Vinyl placed the prescription in his jacket pocket and set a tentative appointment for three months later. Walking out of the doctors office, he pulled the paper out of his jacket and looked at it.

The thing he had been waiting for for months was in his hooves.

Vinyl didn’t bother asking for directions to the pharmacy to pick up his prescription. There was only one pharmacy in town: the same one he’d gone to since he was little. A few minutes later, he walked out with a brown bag containing a vial and a rubber-banded bundle of syringes.

Vinyl called out to Octavia as he entered their home and locked the door behind him. Silence. She must still be out. Vinyl carried the bag into the living room and emptied its contents onto the coffee table: a single vial, a bunch of pre-packaged syringes, and a mess of receipts and small papers. Digging through the mess, he found the sheet with directions for injecting himself properly.

It had crude drawings of a pony inserting a needle into their upper leg muscle and step-by-step instructions on prepping the surface, the syringe, and how to avoid accidentally injecting into a vein.

Vinyl looked at the pile of needles and took a breath. He levitated one of the wrapped syringes and tore the paper off of it, then pushed the needle into the vial and extracted exactly his prescribed dosage of the liquid. He checked the level in the syringe, tapped it, and checked it again. Who knew what could happen if he got it wrong?

“Why did it have to be needles?” Vinyl lay on the floor, taking a moment to decide which thigh he felt like injecting. Ever since he’d gotten his new look, his tail had covered his right thigh better, so it would be less obvious there. He rolled onto his side and used his magic to fetch some rubbing alcohol and toilet paper from the bathroom. After soaking the paper with alcohol, he wiped down the selected spot on his leg.

“Just a small prick,” he said to himself. It wasn’t very reassuring. He picked the syringe back up and slowly brought it to his thigh. Vinyl looked away as he pushed the needle through his skin and depressed the plunger. He held it there for a moment. For some reason, needles always felt creepier coming out than going in. He counted to three and pulled the needle out. No blood followed, which meant he’d done it properly. He slapped on a Daring Do adhesive bandage and looked at himself. He still had the same scrawny legs, the same chipped hooves that Octavia kept telling him to get polished, the same clothes that smelled like tobacco no matter what he did.

“I thought I’d at least feel different,” Vinyl sighed.

Octavia stood on a raised dais on the covered patio outside Sugarcube Corner, playing a pleasant mid-tempo melody on her cello for the diners. All of the windows were open to let in the summer breeze, and her music floated along with it. She’d planned on leaving her cello case open for tips, but Lyra had made a proper tip jar by gluing a mason jar to an old podium, presumably because the jar kept falling off.

At the end of her piece, the small group of ponies clapped. She bowed and ended her performance. As she packed up her cello and bow, a unicorn with a blue mane approached her.

“Excuse me, miss?” he said.

Looking up, Octavia saw him standing over her. “Um, yes?”

“I was listening to your performance, and I don’t mean to pry, but I have to ask. Are you a professional? I haven’t met another pony that played cello that well.”

“Not quite. I’ve always planned to be, but I’m just a graduate from Manehattan Conservatory. I wasn’t even the top of my class.”

“Then you must not have applied yourself. Skill like that doesn’t get you average marks.”

Octavia shrugged. “Perhaps not as much as I should have, but why impress the teacher when you plan to impress millions?”

“Do you play with symphonies? Orchestras? Quartets?”

“I have juggled several temporary positions across Manehattan. Other than that, I have unfortunately been going it alone, so to speak. I only moved to town recently. With my fiancé. But I have a few questions of my own. Primarily, who exactly am I telling all this to?”

“Oh, my apologies,” the stallion practically jumped. “Where are my manners? I am Fancy Pants, though my associates simply refer to me as Fancy.” He pulled out a metal case and withdrew a business card, passing it to Octavia.

“Octavia, Octavia Melody.” Not having a fancy card like his, she raised her hoof. Fancy Pants took her hoof in his, then bent down and kissed it.

“Enchanté, Ms. Melody. Your performance was lovely.”

“When you said you hadn’t heard another cellist as good as me, you sounded like you’ve heard tons of them. Do you work in music, sir?”

“Well, you could say that I have friends in the theater,” Fancy said with a wink. “Unfortunately, I have nothing planned at the moment, but is there a way I can contact you? Plenty of productions could use a skilled cellist like yourself.”

“Of course,” Octavia said, keeping her tone even with some effort. She withdrew a notepad and pen from her cello case and wrote down her phone number, then tore it out and passed it to him.

“Thank you.” He said placing the paper in his jacket pocket, “I do hope to see you play in the future, Octavia.” Something else apparently caught his attention and he disappeared into the crowd after a final nod in Octavia’s direction.

Who was that? Octavia thought to herself. She knew his name, but still something seemed strange. Suddenly, she felt someone tapping her shoulder.

“Octavia, who was that?” Vinyl said, raising an eyebrow looking at him walk off.

“Vinyl!” Octavia squeaked. “Hello!” Octavia swallowed hard and regained her composure. “You’re out earlier than expected.”

“Yeah; it was easier than I thought it would be, actually. So, who was that guy?”

“I don’t really know,” Octavia said, shuffling her hooves. “He said he had friends in the theater, so he’s either some very rich, very gay stallion, or–” She looked at his card and her eyes widened. “Oh.”

“What is it?”

“He’s the owner of the Canterlot Royal Symphony Hall.”

“Damn, filly. Today must be our lucky day, huh?”

“Indeed,” Octavia finished packing her case and swung it across her back. “So, I hear you had a good time at the doctor’s?”

“Nobody has a good time at the doctor’s. Buuuuut, it went better than expected.”

“I could use a cup of coffee, actually, if you care to join me. Why can’t businesses start their days at noon like musicians do?” Octavia groaned, stretching out her back.

“Coffee sounds nice.”