The Voyage to Asclepius

I am awoken to the sound of a high pitched chirping. Nothing is in the room, and the fire is already been extinguished. There are still a few table legs, but the vines have been reduced to nothing but ash. The filly is still asleep next to me. Before I nudge her awake, I think I'll take a look outside first. A cute little bird is resting on the window sill outside as I approach it. It's chirp must have been the same one that had woken me up. That flier from last night is caught on some rubble outside the window. I should grab that in case there's some more detail as to where this Caduceus place is.

The wooden table legs are still jammed between the doorhandles. They are easily dislodged, and I slowly open the set of glass doors. The flier flaps in the wind outside, and the rising sun shines down on it. Picking it up, something stands out to me. Nothing on the front side of the flier was out of place, but rather it was the back of the flier that was strange.

On the back was a crude drawing of two decapitated snakes. In the middle of the two snakes was another white pole, but only one snake was wrapped around it. Underneath the drawing were the words: Asclepius Lives. This must be some kind of graffiti, or maybe an attack on these George and Martha ponies. Whatever the case, I won't pay it any more attention than it needs.

Again, that mysterious howl echoes throughout the streets.

In fear of meeting the source of that ominous noise, I trot back inside and wake up the filly, "Come on, let's get going." I whisper to her.

She slowly opens her eyes and moans, "A few more... Minutes..."

I sigh, and then reply, "Fine. I'll pack up our stuff in the meantime."

Then the realization hits me, we don't have anything to carry all of this food in. There are about ten (10) cans of food, and five (5) bottles of water. There's no way we can carry that many provisions on our backs. I trot to the back of the room to see if I somehow missed something that I can use to carry our supplies in.

What I need is a bag or something to miraculously fly through the--

*CRASH*

The glass restaurant doors burst open, and I fall back on my rump. As a loud ear-wrenching roar follows the crash, I cover my ears with my hooves.

*GROOOAAARRR*

After the roar, whatever's in the door begins to make another noise. One I cannot even recreate with my own vocal chords. All I can say is that it is an extremely high pitched noise, and is similar to that of claws on a chalk board. Scratch that, ten (10) claws on a chalk board simultaneously.

*SCREEEEEECH*

It hurts! It's as if the noise it's emitting is making my ears bleed! The noise, and now the smell! Something foul is filling the air, and I don't know what it is. I can't even open my eyes long enough to see what's in the doorway! It seems to be something quite large though. Something large and... Brown?

"Make it stop! Make it stop!" Is all I can think to myself.

I turn to the filly and see if she's alright.

"You've got to be kidding me."

There the filly lays, sound asleep through this teeth-gritting noise!

"Hey! Wake up!" I shout.

She yawns, and wakes up to see a giant brown thing making an awful lot of ear-wrenching noise. After looking at me, and then turning to the doorway again, she grabs one of the empty tin cans beside her.

What is she planning on--

*THWOCK*

She throws the can at the door way, and the noise stops upon collision with whatever's in that door.

This filly is amazing, just who is she?

The loud creature that was stuck between the doors was now whimpering like a sad little puppy. I slowly crept towards the filly, who was now wide awake and staring at me on her side.

After reaching for her arm, I whisper, "What did you do to that thing?!"

"It was being loud. So I made it stop." She replies.

Disturbing. It seems like nothing fazes her.

"Was I too harsh? Should I apologize?" She asks.

Apologize? That thing tried to kill us. If anything, that thing should apologize to us! That is, if it's that intelligent. Well, whatever it was it's still whimpering behind the rubble outside the door. I'll confront this thing, and maybe I can reason with it.

"H-Hello?" I call out to it, while slowly trotting towards the door.

The fearful creature sounds almost like a whining... Dog? I creep around the corner of the door, and see something burying it's entire body into a bunch of logs and twigs. But wait, that wood looks like it's.. Part of the creature?

The filly quickly brushes past me and gallops to the... Wooden creature.

"Hey wait!" I shout, as I try to grab her. She's just out of my reach.

Her nose pokes at the twigs and logs, and they begin to shake. My hoof wraps around her arm, and I yank her back to the door.

Pieces of wood, twigs, logs, and timber become covered in a strange green glow as they begin to levitate in mid-air. Slowly, they connect and form into the shape of a four-legged creature. A dog.

Pointed pieces of wood insert themselves into what looks like the mouth of the creature. With leaves for eyebrows, and a small stump for a neck, the creature stares at me with fierce green glowing eyes.

It's... Facial expression, changed drastically when the filly peeked out from behind me. It snapped from an angry look, to a scared look again. Is it afraid of her? That a tin can couldn't have hurt that much. Could it?

"I-I'm sorry if I hurt you. Um..." She attempts to apologize, but I don't think it cares all that much.

And to my surprise, the dog-like creature backs away. She approaches it calmly, and gets close enough to pet it's head. It begins to pant happily with a smile cracking on it's face.

"Aww... He just wanted a little attention!" She exclaims.

Her ability to switch between split personalities amazes me.

Then, an idea pops into my head, "Hey, what if use this big guy to carry us and our supplies?"

She turns to me, "I'll ask him if it's okay with him."

She'll ask him. Great, I'm accompanied by a wolf whisperer. I'm not going to question it, maybe she does know how to talk to this thing. I hear her talking quietly to it, and it turns to me as if she had instructed it to. It slowly walks towards me, and then... I'm suddenly covered in a cloud of foul stench.

She giggles, and then bursts out laughing.

So this creature has the ability to belch out putrid gas out of it's mouth on command. I don't think I can live with it. But it's the only way I'm getting Caduceus. So I'll suck it up, and hope for the best.

"Heh, cute. Well, it looks like we can carve out an area on his back to make room for the supplies. Maybe there'll be room for us too." I say, thinking of different ways we can use this creature.

"He's not our own personal taxi service you know. And his name is Shrubbery by the way." She explains.

"We're naming him?" I ask, with an unamused face.

"Of course! He's the only other life form we've seen in this place. I think it's only fair." She replies.

"Then how come we don't have names?"

We both stop, and an awkward silence fills the air between us.

"That's right..." She says.

I finish her sentence, "We don't know anything about ourselves. But we..."

"We know everything else. Everything besides our own lives. Oh... We're never going to find out are we?"

I sigh, and then remember something. I remember that there is a way to help us get our memories back. It's close by, I just hope it's still there. I trot past Shrubbery and the filly, and spot the flier; still fluttering in the wind while caught on some rubble. Pulling it out, I show it her.

"Look! There's a place out there that might know who we are! We just have to find it."

She nods, and then agrees with me that it's our best bet. We trot inside, leaving Shrubbery outside. The two of us rush back and forth, tossing cans of food and bottles of water onto the wolf's back. Once all the cans are on his back, I climb on top of him carefully. The twigs are easily removed, and my hooves dig a little nest for the supplies to sit into his back. It doesn't look like he's hurt by this, which makes this a lot easier. I can see that a few large leaves are sticking out of his rear, he won't miss one. They come out easily, and make the perfect roof for the provisions.

"Well, it looks like there's just enough room for the both of us sit on his back." I say pointing to the ration nest, "Alright big guy, stand up and let's see how big you really are."

The wolf rises from it's sitting position. He's twice my height, and about four (4) times my body mass. He's gigantic.

"Shall we be off then?" She asks.

But where do we start? Maybe we should get out of the city first. Then we can see if there's any other cities around.

I climb on Shrubbery first, and then I pull the girl up after. She's sitting near the provisions, and I'm positioned closer to his neck. I can see fine from where I'm sitting, and that's an advantage since I have no idea where I'm going anyways.

"Alright boy, that way!" I yell.

And upon command, he obeys. But he catches us off guard, and we both almost lose our balance. We stabilize ourselves, and the cool windy breeze pushes against us. We're coming to the end of the street, and I can't see anymore buildings past that point.

The wolf runs faster and faster until I am forced to slow him down just a bit.

While looking up at the sky, my back is on the wolf's back, and a storm of thoughts begin raging in my head.

What is Caduceus?

Can it really help us?

What about Asclepius? What is it? And is it relevant to our journey?

How far is this place anyways?

Or maybe... We're standing in Caduceus.

No. I can't think like that. If I do, then I lose my purpose for living. And then she'll lose her hope too.

We finally reach the end of the street, and the city of broken and run-down buildings simply ends. There are no more buildings in front of us. No streets, no streetlights... Nothing. All we see in front of us is a vast, open, empty, lonely desert. Nothing but sand for miles and miles.

My hope begins to fade, but maybe there's something beyond all that sand. Maybe... Maybe... No. Definitely, there's something behind all that sand. I just... I just have to find it. Not just for my sake, but for her's too. I'm doing this for both of us. I don't think I can survive without knowing who I am.

I swear on my life, I will find Caduceus. Even if it kills me.

And with that sandstorm heading our way, I think it just might.