Doctor Steady Pulse finished filling his fountain pen in my Equestria dreamscape. Carefully he screwed the cap back on to the bottle of black ink. Then he used his levitation to return the bottle to its resting place in his desk drawer. With this task completed he opened a medical folder.
 
All of Celestia’s special operatives had their personal medical records labeled under a number designation instead of their names. Since many of her operatives had special and in some cases unique talents or traits their personal medical records were highly guarded Crown Secrets. Phoenix’s file was 11046.
 
Taking a second to adjusted his glasses slightly the stallion addressed the mare in his best bedside manner. “Okay Phoenix.” He glanced over at the report on his desk. “I see you got in last night at 04:20 hour. After the incident how have you been feeling?”
 
Sitting across from the doctor in a upholstered swivel chair was the mare who had the nickname of Celestia’s Sledgehammer. The unicorn mare finished taking a sip of her coffee then she slowly and deliberately swallowed.
 
“Not too bad doc. For about an hour after the incident I had problems speaking. I let Blood Feather do most of the talking with the local officials then. However by the time we’d returned that was back to normal.”
 
The bone white mare paused and rubbed her front left hoof against part of a new deep scar that went all the way around her neck. The scar was accentuated by large, pinkish areas on the mare’s bone white coat. Her attempts to wash away bloodstains away in the field had been only marginally effective.
 
“Swallowing has taken a bit longer to get sorted out but I was able to eat a small bowl of oatmeal gruel about an hour ago without any problems.”
 
The doctor pursed his lips and noted this in the medical records and journal that was assigned to each operative. With this accomplished he looked at the mare.
 
“Well that’s good to hear Phoenix. If I was speculate I would say that you’re having an easier time dealing with this decapitation because it was clean cut that severed your head.” Discussing medical issues with this mare always had a surreal, macabre quality to it. It often felt more like a coroner’s report.
 
Steady Pulse leaned forward in his chair and gently examined the mare’s new scar with his front hooves. “Yes much better than your last time. Of course last time the manticore tore your head off so it was a much more ragged wound.”
 
He leaned back in his chair causing it to squeak. Quickly he jotted some notes and continued. This was 3rd decapitation he’d dealt with since he’d become her personal doctor. “Okay I need you to sit still please. I’m going to cast a couple of examination spells.”
 
His horn flared and a pale violet glow surrounded Phoenix; it then the shrank until it was only around the new scar. After a couple more seconds it vanished. The doctor smiled and jotted his findings down.
 
“Excellent! Yes, this was a much cleaner decapitation! We will not be required to do any corrective procedures this time.” The Doctor was very happy with this. Unlike the last time when he’d been required to…
 
He shook his head. That surgery still gave him nightmares. Returning his paperwork he continuing filling it out. “Did you lose consciousness during the incident?”
 
“No. Although things started to get blurry until the reattachment happened.”
 
The doctor’s pen danced across the paperwork. “Did the reattachment occur of its own accord or did one of your team members do it for you?”
 
Phoenix took another swig of coffee and stared at the far wall. “No happened by itself.”
 
The older stallion nodded his head. “Okay. Did your head and body fall close to each other or even touching, or was your head thrown some distance from your body as a result of the incident?” It had taken him several of these appointments for him to learn how to treat Phoenix’s visits as mundane checkups.
 
As if anything was mundane about Phoenix.
 
Phoenix shook her head. “Nope! My head landed away from my body.”
 
The doctor made further notations. “Alright. I know this can be tricky to know under the circumstances, but how far would you say your head was thrown?”
 
The mare closed her eyes. For several seconds she was silent as she replayed the incident in her mind. A slight shiver raced through her body. Finally she opened her pale carmine red eyes.
 
“I was in the middle of the room when it happened. My head hit the back wall which was at least 2 yards away.” Her voice had a distant, detached quality to it.
 
Steady Pulse raised an eyebrow. “That is a record for you dear.” He quickly consulted her charts and notes. “That’s easily a foot further than anything we have on record for you.”
 
“Yeah.” The mare finished her coffee and placed the cup on the doctor’s desk.
 
“Once again I know this can be a tricky one to answer, but from the time of decapitation how long did it take before you were aware that reattachment was occurring?”
 
“Almost right away doc. I could see my body from where my head landed. It started flopping toward me within just a few second of the incident. Fortunately the suspects had fled the room immediately so it wasn’t hindered. When it got within couple feet of me the muscle tendrils began connecting things together.”
 
The doctor nodded his head as he wrote. One aspect of the mare’s exceptional regenerative abilities was the ability of her body to mutate and adapt itself’s to aid, assist, and accelerate the healing process. An example was the rapid transformation of muscle tissue into long tendril-like strands that would attempt latch on to severed body parts and pull them toward the main body.
 
“Alright. From that time. How long did it take for the reattachment to be complete?”
 
“About 3 minutes. I started regaining control of gross muscle muscle movement within about 45 seconds, but I couldn’t stand up for at least 3 minutes.”
 
“Can I assume you’ve been very thirsty since then?” Steady Pulse refilled her coffee cup from the carafe on his desk.
 
The mare accepted the refilled cup and took another sip. “Yeah I lost a lot blood so my body has been working overtime since then.”
 
“I hope you had the iron supplements in your gear that I gave you?”
 
“Yeah I took them once I could swallow.” She drank some more coffee. “And I have been drinking almost non stop since.”
 
The stallion took a moment to remove his glasses and clean them before returning the pince-nez to the bridge of his muzzle. He was afraid that he knew the answer to his next question but he asked it.
 
“And did the latest round of experimental painkillers I gave you do anything to help?”  
The mare slowly shook her head.
 
“Damn it!” Cursed the stallion.
 
To be continued.