“Wha…? What do you mean, Lucy?” Wendy stuttered. “There’s twelve of us in total. Surely I’m the fifth to be transformed – not the sixth!”
Lucy bit her lip, and then she gestured to someone in the shadows to step forward. “See for yourself, Wendy. It must’ve been about the same time.”
“It’s always been a pair at a time…,” Ben muttered aloud, rubbing his chin. “One human – and one horse. As if the…magic…needs the balance, in order to work.”
Another, naked, female centaur – unfamiliar to Wendy’s eyes – trotted out into the light of the burning fire. She was a brunette, with short hair on her head. But like all of the other centaurs created thus far, she had half-horse ears, and a mane running down the human part of her spine. She shivered a bit, not used to having part of her body being hairless. But below her human waist, the well-groomed brown coat was unchanged. That, and her Texan-accented voice, gave her identity away.
“Well… Gosh, Wendy! Now we’re like…sisters?” she said, attempting to get to grips with the English language.
“June!?” Wendy gasped.
The other centauress nodded – then she stepped right up to Wendy with her four hooves, and cautiously hugged her with her new arms. Wendy embraced her former horse in return, as the rest of the party looked on, smiling at the display of affection. Whilst all of them were essentially thinking the same thing. What was the bizarre sequence of events all leading to?
And the still-unchanged were all thinking another thought – when would it be their turn to be painfully forced to leave humanity, or horsehood, behind?
Amongst the gathering, Luke and Snow were standing side by side, with Snow leaning her head between the neck and shoulder of her former owner. They were holding onto each other, in mutual support.
“Don’t worry, Snow. I will teach you all about having human intelligence, speaking, having arms, the lot,” Luke promised her. “I can’t be your owner now – but I can be your teacher and a good friend.”
The ends of the white-haired centauress’ lips flicked upwards. “Thank you, Luke… And I will help you adapt to having the…lower body…of a horse,” she replied. “Maybe we can race each other, before long?”
“I’d like that.” Luke smiled back.
***
When the dawn arrived, Amanda had the others all gathered round in a conference besides the remains of the camp fire. Aside from the issues at hand – that they were lost in an alien world (though a reassuringly earth-like one), and they were gradually all turning into centaurs, with no way to reverse the changes or return home – there was the problem of food. Berries weren’t enough for all of their stomachs. It had now been confirmed by the transformed humans that the change had left them hungry. Which was not surprising, considering the mass they had gained. Also, the examinations of Ben and Amanda upon all six of the transformed had revealed another fact – without exception, the centaurs now had a doubled number of organs. The horse anatomy was correct and present, up to the base of the equine neck. Same for the human portion of their bodies above their hairless waists. But the two hearts – one horse, one human – felt that they were connected, the centaurs told Amanda and Ben during their examinations. Same for the chests, the stomachs, the digestive systems.
It seemed impossible – just as the transformations had been impossible. And yet, after the pain from the metamorphosis had ended, each new centaur had recovered and now felt strong. And good.
The stream water was clean. Unpolluted. It had been tested, and was safe for them all to drink. But food was a problem that needed to be resolved. All of the energy bar rations that the equestrian team kept on them at work had now run out.
“We need to find some means of securing food!” Marcus told them. His joker side had disappeared since the start of the bizarre events that had overtaken them all. “We’ve seen birds, rabbits, and other animal life – but we have no means of hunting them, apart from one knife. And I don’t think it’s good enough for us centaurs to chase after game and bash them to death with our hooves!”
June nodded to that.
“Indeed. There must be someone else around…, who can help us, surely…?” It was Lightning who now spoke. He was Lucy’s horse. He too had begun the first signs of the change – gaining a voice and human intelligence.
“I agree. Why would a magical force – for want of a better explanation – bring us here, only to abandon us as newly-formed, and clueless, centaurs having to fend for ourselves?” Ben reasoned. He was talking more than usual. Lucy gave him a curious, but admiring, look. It was as if dealing with a mysterious puzzle to solve had brought him out of his shell, she decided.
“So… We need to search for a settlement, some sign of habitation. But we’ve not even seen any smoke from another fire. No roads. No movement from anything else, apart from animals,” Amanda summed up the situation. “And we need to stick together, for now.”
“We cannot…set out blindly…with no…supplies,” Bolt, Ben’s horse, spoken slowly and carefully, trying to get used to his new form of communication.
“Follow the stream.” Daisy gave her opinion, her voice more practiced than Bolt’s. “We need to stay…close to water.”
“We have two streams close by,” Amanda pointed out. “At least the sun here still seems to rise in the east, and set in the west. I suggest we follow the nearer stream downriver…”
“No,” Wendy butted in, opening her eyes as if awakening from a trance. Midnight, laying on the grass besides her, had just done the same, the remaining humans noticed. “We need to follow the stream that’s to the south of us.”
“She is right,” Midnight declared in his smooth, cultured voice.
Amanda looked quizzically at the Native American-turned-centauress and her new mate. Since their…coupling…the pair had been calm, but were never far apart from each other – and they had a tendency to hold each other’s hands when walking together. “How do you know?” she asked.
Midnight shrugged his shoulder muscles. “We just do. Wendy and I cannot explain it.”
Amanda glanced around at the others. Then she nodded. “Let’s act on your intuition, in that case, Wendy and Midnight. We set off together in fifteen minutes, folks. Make yourselves ready by then, everyone!”
***
After an hour of following the southern stream downriver underneath a blue sky of dotted white clouds, as they kept together, the group of twelve came across a set of abandoned fields. Excited by discovering some form of civilisation, they progressed further. Beyond the overgrown fields of wheat and corn, and still situated next to the widening stream, was a village of wide, house-like structures – with wooden ceilings set about four metres above ground level, complete with chimneys. All of the houses had wide doors and large, deserted rooms. No one living, or dead, was present.
It was clear who had lived here, though. The furniture consisted of low wooden tables, and beds of straw. There were even some walk-in wardrobes with clothes on wooden shelves. Jerkins, shirts, tunics. But no hats, or legwear, or underwear…
“This was a village where centaurs lived,” Ben concluded sagely.
Marcus’ hand brushed at the cobwebs and dust in the kitchen area of the house they were in. “And they’ve not been here for several years, it seems! What happened to them?
Meanwhile, also with them, Lucy was rummaging through the panty and kitchen drawers. “At least they left us plenty of nuts and dried fruit,” she observed. “It all counts to keeping us fed – especially since some of us now need to eat more.”
At that stage, Amanda walked in, carrying a pair of loaded crossbows. She smiled. “Heads up, guys. We’ve found what appears to be the village’s armoury! There’s some bows and arrows, spears, and more. We can go hunting for some of those plentiful rabbits!”
***
Under Amanda’s leadership, the group got themselves organised into groups. On one edge of the village, there was a shooting range – with circular wooden target boards set up on the far side of a fenced-off enclosure. There, the still-human trio of Amanda, Ben, and Lucy trained themselves with the crossbows – whilst Luke, Marcus, and Wendy got to practice using the bows and arrows.
With that phase of action sorted, Amanda walked over to Wendy and looked up to the now-taller female. “Okay, Wendy. You seem to be good at this. You scored the most bullseyes with the arrows.”
Wendy smiled. “What can I say? I practised as a girl. My family taught me, back in Colorado.”
Amanda nodded. “Some of us need to get hunting, whilst the light is still good. Meanwhile, I want you to stay here and teach Snow and June how to handle coordination with their arms. If they’re up to it, teach them how to shoot too!”
“Alright, boss. And I can teach Midnight too…”
Amanda gave her centauress friend a meaningful look. “No! Midnight is going to be my mount, whilst I oversee the hunting party.”
“What!? B-but… Midnight… He is…my mate now! I want him close by…”
“And I don’t want you and your new boyfriend to get up any more horseplay whilst we’ve got work to do, Wendy. We’re trying to stay alive! That’s why you are teaching just the former mares. Oh… And one more thing?”
“Um. Yes…?”
“Teach Snow and June how to cover their chests up, with the clothes we’re found. Thanks.” Amanda then headed off, leaving Wendy to roll her eyes and sigh…