A Chance At Life

Chapter III: Lost and Found.

"We should leave. Now."

The Everfree was pretty much exactly what you'd expect. Dark, eerie, most likely full of things that were out for your blood. Sure, it was easy to say it, but to actually witness it was a completely different story. It lived up to its name though; there were plenty of trees in every direction. They surrounded us, blocking out the sun's rays like a shield. Honestly, it scared me. Not the dark, but the realization that we could be ambushed at any time by the forest inhabitants. Probably explained why I was being held in a magical bubble by the only unicorn with us, Ruby. Laser was right in front of us, occasionally glancing back at me with a glare that promised death once we got out of this goddess-forsaken forest. We'd stopped more than once when there was a distorted growling coming from ahead of us, making my mane stand on end. After the last encounter, there was a long moment of silence before Ruby decided to speak up.

"So.. Of all the things you could have freaked out over, you chose a spider?" He looked at me, half amused and half pissed off. I didn't even dignify that with a response, maybe because I was too busy covering my face in embarrassment. In my defense, it was a big spider, probably bigger than my head!

"Hardly even the size of your hoof, at that.." Okay, maybe I overreacted, but it was still big! It was certainly a surprise to find out, and as soon as I realized that I'd crushed a creature from my nightmares, I'd promptly freaked out. Ruby had to seal me in a bubble just to get me to calm down, and even then I'd been hyperventilating. I was ready for anything, but spiders crossed the line.

I shuddered, just saying the word 'spider' was creeping me out. Making a mental note to bleach my brain once we escaped (IF we escaped, right?) I focused on where we were. There wasn't much of a change in scenery other than the trees, which had thickened and made the path even more narrow. This also meant that my round fortress was smacking into branches, forcing Ruby to stop and put his concentration on keeping me in the air. The bubble itself was.. soft? I didn't really know how to describe it better than that. There wasn't much room to move around in though; I could hardly move my head to see where we were going. As comfortable as it was to not have to walk, I was tired of being floated around like a rag doll. With a grin, I raised my hoof, tapping the wall.

*tap tap*

*tap tap tap*

A few more taps, and I finally got Ruby's attention. He stopped, floating me beside him. "What is it?" He looked strained; clearly it was taking a lot of energy to keep me in the air.

"Put me down." He gave me a flat look at that, then shook his head and resumed walking. Well, two can play this game. I lifted my hoof.

*tap*

*tap tap*

*taptaptaptap*

His eye twitched in annoyance, I was making progress. We stopped again and he turned to face me. I hid my smirk, opting instead to give him the most innocent smile I could. "It wasn't me, it was the muffin mare!"

"Derpy doesn't even-" He caught my smirk and facehoofed. "You're terrible at jokes."

"As if you could do any better." I tapped the bubble again. "So, freedom?"

"I don't think so." At my disapproving look, he continued. "If you can't even handle a spider, then how do you expect to deal with whatever else is in here?" Well played, but I wasn't giving up that easily. I made sure he was looking at me before raising my hoof again.

"Don't-"

*TAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAP*

"STOP-"

*TAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAPTAP*

"ALRIGHT! FINE!" Suddenly, Ruby's horn stopped glowing as the magic failed to find a source. This gave my body plenty of time to introduce itself to the ground.

*THUD* "Ow.." I could hear him laughing, that little bastard. Spitting out the dirt in my mouth, I was finally able to stand on my own. A small part of me already regretted it, wishing that I'd stayed in the safety of Ruby's magic. Looking to my right, I saw Laser watching me, laughing. I'd kill them both and say it was an accident, I swore I would, nopony could doubt it. My revenge plan in motion, I turned my head and spotted Ruby messing with.. were those flowers? This rescue mission had officially gotten strange.

"I've never seen a plant like this before.. Fascinating." Looking closer, neither had I. The plant, which was actually a bundle of tinier ones, glowed a bright blue, illuminating the dirt around it.

"What the hell..?" I'd seen plenty of plants before, but none of them GLOWED. This was definitely foreign, maybe it only grew in the forest?  Wonder what else was around here..

While I was lost in thought, Ruby had chosen to uproot the bundle with his magic, hovering it in his face. "Hm.. Maybe we can bring these back to Appleoosa for analysis. I'd love to find out what causes the glowing effect, and why it grows so far out here. Maybe it's a form of elemental magic.." He rambled on, not realizing that I didn't have a clue what he was talking about. At the moment I was preoccupied with more important things anyway. Like why a butterfly was on my nose.. I scrunched up my face, it didn't move. I shook my head a bit, it clung to me like glue. Didn't it understand that I was a force to be feared? I- the destroyer of all things evil, the element of heroism, the savior of ponykind, the-

I sneezed. My heroic banter was immediately silenced as the demon insect flew off, landing on a nearby tree. Huzzah! Take that, criminal! I raised my head, proud of my victory. The pride was instantly shattered when I felt something sliding down my nose- EW.

I hadn't seen Ruby look when I wiped my nose on my hoof. I also didn't see him grimace as I scuffed my hoof in the dirt to remove the snot. I did, however, hear him when I licked the same hoof.

"What the hell is wrong with you..?" I looked at his disgusted expression and flushed red, embarrassment was turning into a thing for me lately.

"Uh... Bless you?" I said dumbly. Hoof, meet face. Please, feel free to remove the idiot part of my brain, I won't stop you. Moving my hoof, I saw Ruby staring at me. On the plus side, he no longer looked ready to throw up. For now, all I saw was confusion.

"I.. Thank you?" He looked down, and I could hear him muttering. "Of all the ponies I had to meet.." Ouch. Love you too Ruby. This was going to be a tough friendship. He looked up again, giving an awkward little cough. "So.." He got up."We should get moving. Where's Laser?" We both looked around; Laser was nowhere to be found.

"Dude, where are you?" There was no answer, save for the rustling of leaves as they moved with the wind. That was never a good sign.

"Maybe he went on ahead to see if he could find anything?" I shrugged, at the moment it was the only option we could go with. Ruby led the way as we walked, a little ball in front of him lighting up our path. The sun was lowering and I wasn't sure how much time we had before we were plunged into darkness. I shuddered; we really didn't need to be out here at night, and neither did the ones we'd come to save. Ruby rounded a corner, going through a particularly thick patch of trees. I followed.

"Laser?" No response. I frowned, something was very wrong here. We kept moving, the path was long gone, all we could do was move forward and hope for the best. My brain had other ideas, forcing me to question myself. What if something had grabbed him? What if he abandoned us? What if-

A twig snapped in front of us. We stopped and Ruby waved his magical lightbulb around us. I hadn't noticed it before, but he was sweating. His horn flickered for a moment while his legs wobbled, he was fighting just to stand up.

"Ruby? What's wrong?" The light was dimming, and fast.

"M-my magic..." That was all he could choke out before the light went out completely. He coughed, collapsing to the ground. I wasn't sure what had happened, but I ran to his side.

"Ruby! Are you okay?!" Stupid question of the day goes to Razor. His breathing was heavy, he was very far from okay. No injuries were visible, so what had happened? From the way he was shaking, he was lucky to even be conscious. I looked at the sky and sighed, It wasn't night just yet, but without any source of light it would be considerably harder to find anything at this point. I looked down just in time to catch him trying to tell me something.

"Burn..out.."  Burnout? What the hell did that mean? Ruby didn't look like he could stand, yet alone move. Time to improvise. I slowly nudged my way under him and hefted him unto my back. Not too heavy, but I didn't plan on carrying him forever. We still had to find Laser, the mare, and hopefully, the cattle. Easy, right? The dark side of my mind casually replied with a flat 'no', but I wasn't listening to it just yet. I held on to that hope as I moved forward, looking around for any clue of where we were headed. Another twig snapped, this time behind me. Whatever it was, it was toying with us.

And then, suddenly, something was pulling at my back. Ruby hadn't moved, likely unconscious. I turned around.

A pair of red eyes stared back at me, locked in a frown. I felt like I was looking into hell itself and one wrong move would be the last thing I did.  Its body was a shadow, blending in with the darkness around us. I froze, and I didn't dare blink. Neither did it. I tried to move back; it followed me. Could I run? How fast was it? Would I get away? The questions stopped at one realization; this was it, I was going to die. Shame, I hadn't even been able to meet that mare from the market. I closed my eyes..

And then it spoke. By the goddesses, it spoke. I couldn't make out the words, but I could bet that they revolved around murder. I opened my eyes and stepped back, it didn't follow. Instead, the creature tilted its head, inspecting me. And then it spoke again.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" I was being asked that a lot lately. Wait.. I recognized that voice.

"L-laser?" The 'creature' moved closer and indeed, it was my brother. I'd gotten overly-dramatic for nothing. I would have facehoofed if it wasn't for Ruby, couldn't risk knocking him off. Instead, I simply sighed and laughed at my stupidity.

"What happened to Ruby?" He said, a touch of concern in his voice. I glanced over my shoulder, Ruby was still out cold. At least he was breathing.

I turned to Laser. "No clue. He said something about burnout then.. passed out." I shrugged slightly, judging by Laser's expression, he was just as confused as I was. One thing was certain though, Ruby needed help, and we couldn't get any out in this forest. We had to hurry up or this would all be for nothing.

Laser was glaring at me. "We should leave. Now. This was a bad idea in the first place." My eyes widened as he spoke.

"What? No! We still have to help them!" He couldn't be serious, it was why we were here! We couldn't just leave!

He shook his head. "Face it, they're either dead or too far gone. We can't help." A small part of me wanted to agree, to get out of this dammed forest and back to my comfy bed, but I couldn't. We'd made it too far, I wasn't backing out now.

"Go if you want, take Ruby with you. I'm staying here. I can't just leave her." And then I stopped. Her. That was it, wasn't it? It wasn't about the cows, I'd hardly even thought of looking for them. It was the mare, the one who had tried to help. The one who was probably dead because I..we were too slow. It made me feel selfish. I was so eager to help a pony I'd never met just because she was one of us. The animals were secondary, just because they weren't the same species. Was this really how I felt? Non-ponies were just dead weight? It made me feel sick of myself. I frowned.

Laser spoke up. "No. I'm not leaving you here, you're my brother." And if I wasn't? Would he have left? I hoped not, I prayed he was better than that. But now I had to make a choice; leave or stay. Leave, and I could go home, forget everything that had happened, and go back to my normal life. Stay, and I may find her, or the animals. Then we'd have to bring her.. them, back. Hopefully all alive. Only one downside, something else could find us first. Decisions, decisions..

I turned and started walking. I'd be dammed if I left anypony behind. Laser sighed and followed, wondered how long that would last.

~ ~ ~

A few minutes had gone by, and we still hadn't had any luck. Ruby had stirred once, pushing me to look harder for any sign of the missing group. Things weren't easy, we'd lost the track hours ago, along with the hoof imprints in the dirt. At this point, we'd have to wing our way out of here-

"AHHHHHH!!"

"Holy fuck!" My fur was standing on end, whoever or whatever had screamed was extremely close by. I looked at Laser and bolted towards the source. There, in a clearing, was the mare. Her coat was a dark grey along with her mane, which covered her only visible eye. Two dead cows were behind her, fresh blood oozing out of gashes on their sides. Circling her were a pack of wolves; four in all, but something was.. Off. Their fur was all brown, and it looked.. wooden. Looking closer, those were definitely leaves coming out of their skin. The tails were no different, ending in little branches with the same blue plants Ruby and I had seen. They were getting closer to her as she screamed again.

Laser flew past me, racing towards her. One of the wolves spotted him and leaped into the air, tackling him to the ground.  There was an odd ripping sound, a pop, and a buck's yelp of pain. "LASER!" I moved towards him as he kicked the wolf off, slowly standing up. His right wing was bent at an uneven angle, bleeding heavily. The wolf he'd kicked away had gotten back up, feathers and blood around it's mouth. The rest had noticed us as well and abandoned the mare, striding towards us instead. Things were going downhill fast!

Two of them lunged at me. I acted on impulse, flinging Ruby off and praying to Luna they didn't notice him. One managed to sink his teeth into my front hoof, making me cry out and fall over. The second leaped over him and lunged for my neck, going in for the kill. I moved just in time and he slammed into the dirt, snarling. I tried to force my hoof from the first one's mouth, all that did was make it bite harder. I couldn't see Laser, but I hoped he was faring better than I was. I tried to stand, but they were having none of that. The second wolf smacked me with his tail, giving me a faceful of the blueish flower. Instantly, my face felt itchy, like something was trying to claw its way out of my eye. All I could do was scream.

And the the mare practically tackled the one who had hit me, throwing it down with so much force I could swear I heard bones crack. That left the one sinking its teeth into my hoof. I out all the strength I could into my right hoof, hitting the wooden monstrosity right in its eye. I heard a whine; it hadn't let go yet, but it loosened its jaw enough for me to push it away and free myself. I staggered to my hooves, careful not to put any pressure on my left one as blood seeped out of the wound. Laser was fighting two of them on his own, barely keeping them at bay. Scratches were visible across his face and torso, he wouldn't last longer. The charcoal colored mare was actually doing better than both of us, she was barely injured as she held the wolf who'd lunged for my neck in her hooves. With a roar, she tossed it at the pair closing in on Laser, causing all of them to fall over and roll back. That left.. Aw fuck. I raised my one good hoof just in time to block the remaining wolf's bite, at the cost of my mobility. It pulled back and I fell over, faceplanting into the dirt. Then, it did the worst thing possible.

It twisted my hoof, an audible snap signifying it was broken.

I screamed as pain I didn't know was possible washed over me, my entire body refusing to move. The wolf twisted again, bending my hoof in an unnatural angle as a fresh wave of pain overcame me.  I could't move, everything hurt. Just when I thought things could get worse, there was a sharp 'crack!' and the wolf flew back, slamming into a tree. Laser stood beside me, his hoof outstretched as a scowl stretched across his face.

My vision was blurring, a dark cloud slowly forming over me. I heard someone talking. They sounded panicked. I felt a hoof smack my face, along with more shouting. Why were they yelling? Oh well, I'll just... take a.. nap...

The loss of blood and the shock finally got to me, and I passed out.