The Silent Killer of The Everfree Forest

I looked on as the rainbow haired pegasi flew directly towards us.

“Hey guys. I think there’s something in this bush,” she said.

“Duncan, go out and distract them,” I whispered to Duncan.

“There’s something over here, guys! I just heard it!” she yelled back at her friends.

“Then get away from it, Rainbow!” The lavender purple pony shouted. She had both wings and a horn. I hazarded a guess at her being the alicorn pony.

“Well, whatever it is, it talked! I think it’s a pony!” Rainbow yelled out.

Duncan walked straight out after that, startling the six ponies.

“Twilight, dear, if I may… what in the name of Equestria is that!?” a white, well-groomed unicorn shouted.

“I think Fluttershy’s the only one that can answer that. Rainbow, get back here!” Twilight commanded.

“Calm down, egghead. I think this’s a dog,” Rainbow replied, petting Duncan’s head. Duncan barked happily in response.

“That’s a strange looking dog. I’ve never seen a dog made of leaves before,” a soft-sounding lemon yellow pegasi whispered. Honestly, I don’t know how I heard her.

“Ooh! Ooh! Maybe we can throw a “new doggy breed party”!” a pink pony with poofy hair exclaimed.

I couldn’t take this anymore. I slowly got up from my hiding space, dragging the cubs with me. Soft Soil followed me and we slowly stalked towards an opening in the castle wall. I ran in and whistled so that Duncan would follow me. Unfortunately, when Duncan ran towards us, the rainbow-maned pony followed him. The pegasus caught eye of me and froze in mid-air, only her wings moving to ensure that she stayed airborne. I held still, unsure of what action to take next.

“Uh…. Hi,” I said, before striking her in the side of the head. The blow knocked the pony out, and I continued running, picking up the cubs and Soft Soil as I ran. All four creatures plus my gear was an unimaginably heavy load. I heard voices behind me; someone was trying to chase me, but ultimately failing when they realized that their friend needed them. Duncan was hot on my heels keeping the ponies in check.

“Soft Soil, we need to somewhere to hide! Do you know anywhere else other than the forest!?” I yelled.

“EEEP!” Soft Soil squeaked.

I could hear the sound of flapping wings growing closer and louder.

“C’mon Soft, we need to get out of here!” I yelled again as the flapping grew louder.

“There’s a cave! That way!” she yelled, pointing towards the exit.

I made my way towards it, only to be tackled halfway out the exit by a pink and yellow blur.

“Let her go!” a harsh -- but sweet -- voice called. The voice scared me, despite its gentle tone.

My glance upwards was met by a pair of turquoise eyes. Angry turquoise eyes. Duncan got into a pouncing position, while I slowly pulled out my battle hawk and got ready to hit it against her skull.

Duncan beat me to the blow and grabbed the pony by the throat, slamming her into the wall. We could hear the distinct sound of bones snapping as her back and head made contact with the cobblestone wall.

“She’ll be fine… I hope,” I muttered, getting up and running towards the forest again.

Something grabbed my backpack, making me fall flat on my back. Dazed, I stood up and whirled about and found myself facing the small group of ponies. The lavender one shot something at me from its horn, but the beam had no effect.

I stared her down and saw her eyes widen. I glanced to the left just in time to notice the orange pony running towards me. We made brief eye contact as she reared herself up and kicked me in the chest, sending me flying. In all honesty, it didn’t hurt as much as you’d expect. It was like a 15 year old boy punching you, thanks to my bulletproof vest.

I got up, but noticed that the cubs had been knocked out of my hands, as well as Soft Soil. One of the cubs had its stinger forced into the orange pony's flank. I rushed to the pony’s side and I did something that may -- or may not have -- warped my relationship with this pony forever. I grabbed her flank and started sucking out as much blood as I possibly could.

After several seconds of sucking in and spitting out, I felt something slam into my side.

Now this one hurt like a bitch. It hit me square in the top corner of my head and made me feel as if I was in bootcamp again, training in hand to hand combat with the other cadets, except this cadet was a body builder.

I got up and saw that the rainbow pony had slammed into me. Honestly, the only thing that kept me from completely shattering my skull was the helmet I had planted on my head. The last thing I saw before going into darkness was the purple pony rushing over to me and doing something with her horn as Duncan did his best to try and protect the filly and the cubs, growling and barking furiously.

-unknown time, date, and location-

An all-too-familiar sound woke me up: an incessant beeping. I flickered my eyes open and found myself in a small bed. It was too small for me by at least a foot.

I stood, stretched, and cracked my back as I did so. I scanned the room and found that none of my gear was near me… and that I was bare ass naked in the middle of the room.

“Dammit,” I cursed, looking around the room for anything to cover my shame.

Unfortunately for me, I found nothing. Something did catch my attention though. There was a door next to my bed. Close, but not too close.

I walked towards the door, but stopped when I noticed a small aura surrounding it. It was incredibly faint; barely noticeable to the naked eyes, but it was there.

I grabbed the door knob and found that the door wouldn't budge. Pressing harder, I felt like the biggest idiot in the world when I realized that you were supposed to pull instead of push. So I pulled and found all of my gear inside the small closet, minus my knife and battle hawk.

“Crap, I needed those,” I swore grabbing my gear and setting it on the bed. Hardly a second after I set my gear on the bed the door handle moved and the lavender winged unicorn came in. I had only spent about ten seconds opening and gathering my stuff, so I was surprised to find them here so quickly. She was flanked by two guards, both carrying spears.

We stayed frozen for several seconds, looking each other dead in the eyes. No one dared to move.

I slowly grabbed my boxers from the bed and put them on, never breaking eye contact. They stayed quiet as I pulled on my trousers; they stayed silent and stared at me as I pulled on the trousers to my ghillie suit. I slipped on my tee, my kevlar, my molle vest and finally the top of the suit. Once I finished dressing, the helmet that stood atop my head slightly obscured my face from noticeability. I grabbed all my gear very slowly as the tension rose to heights where you can just… feel it, as if it were a physical form.

I walked slowly towards the trio, and decided to try and NOT fuck up on anything.

“Uhhh… excuse me?” I looked like a total dumbass, but I didn’t want to get through them by force.

“HALT!” the largest of the three shouted. It was obviously a male’s voice.

“Ok, ok, calm down.” I walked back a bit. “I don’t want any trouble, buddy.”

“Yeah, me neither,” another guard growled, this one’s voice obviously feminine. Her coat was a white hue, and she had a tatoo on her flank (like all the other adult ponies I've met) of a large magical blast. The colors were pure aqua blue, and a deep and dark red.

“Uhh... yeah… You see here, I kinda gotta go-” I tried, but was interrupted by Twilight.

“I’m sorry, but you cannot go. You’re facing charges from several different ponies,” she replied, a little irritation slipping into her voice.

“What? What the fuck am I being charged with!?” I yelled.

“Well, you molested Applejack, you’re facing fillynapping charges, assault charges from Fluttershy and more assault charges from Rainbow Dash,” the mare accused, more irritated than before.

The guards had taken this time to bring out some handcuffs from the bags on their flanks. I took this time to pull out my iPod. I tried pressing its play button, in hopes that it was turned on. It wasn’t.

Damn. That complicates things. I thought.

Looking up, I found that one of the guards was rushing me. I twisted to the side in order to avoid the spear. The blade barely scratched my ghillie suit, I pulled back the mares head and body and held my Baretta to her head.

“Stay back, or I swear I’ll blow her head off!” I yelled, looking at the iPod on the ground.

The guards stopped and shut up, fearing that I’d follow through with my threat. Twilight had started charging something in her horn which I easily put a stop to.

“You. Twilight. Give me that iPod on the ground,” I said calmly as she started charging her horn again. “Without your horn!” I yelled.

She stayed silent as she grasped it in one wing and set it down on the bed. I wrapped my arms around the mare’s throat and squeezed slightly.

I grabbed the ipod and unlocked it. I saw the two guard ponies stare at me with a wonder-filled hate as I held the poor mare by the throat. That’s when I felt it, the mare bit my arm. I dropped her the instance she did, but kicked her in the ribs and held my foot on her back to keep her from moving.

“Damn it!You ponies are starting to piss me off!” I exclaimed, finding the app I wanted. “Eat dog whistle, you assholes!” I yelled, pressing the high frequency dog whistle, sending all the ponies in the room into a shocked state as they fell to the ground in pain.

I took this opportunity to run out of the room and into the hospital ward. Everypony was freaking out as I passed. I ran into several guards but ran down a different hall each time I did.

“I swear! This hospital’s a fucking maze!” I cursed as I continued. Eventually I found a window on the second floor and opened it. Looking down, I noticed that I was only about 8 feet off the ground. I jumped, hit the ground, rolled, and then ran it off. I had no idea where I was going. I just knew I had to get as far away as I could from the hospital.

Many of the guards would try and intercept my path but evading them was easy: a quick jump for the regular and unicorns and a sidestep for the pegasi. Eventually I saw something jetting straight for me. It was the rainbow pony from before!

“Damn it!” I yelled, running into an alleyway and through a small maze of an alleyway. I saw that the pony had since left. Once I ran around the corner, I felt something hit me in the chest and knock me onto my back.

“Oh no you don’t!” I heard whatever was on my chest say.

“Ugh... get off of me!” I shouted, pushing the pony off of me and standing up, cracking my back. Looking at the pony, I noticed she was the same pony as before. Her mouth was agape and her eyes wide.

“You know, you’re not that smart. I beat you last time, and I could easily do it again.” I ran after I finished and headed straight for a small cottage outside of the town.

“It’s right next to the forest, maybe they’ll give me some food or I’ll get an animal to eat or something,” I thought out-loud, running directly towards it. I could now hear voices heading towards me from behind. “I’ll just leave them a little present for them,” I said, looking behind me. I saw that there were 10 of them. 5 were covered with armor and held spears at their sides, and the others were the same ponies as before. I grabbed a concussion grenade from my molle vest, and pulled the metal ring. Once I made it halfway through, I dropped the concussion and continued to run. I waited only a few seconds before I heard the explosion. I heard some pained shouting behind me as I ran into the pathway leading to the house. A familiar voice sounded from inside the house.

“-but I’m not little! Even he knew I could take care of myself!” Soft Soil shouted.

“Oh, I-I’m sorry, but I can’t. You’re not small, but you aren’t big enough to go out by yourself,” a soft, soothing voice replied.

“Then let me take Duncan! He’ll protect me!” Soft Soil shouted again. Duncan barked in agreement.

“Oh, no. I’m sorry but I can’t let you. He’s twice your size, and even bigger than I am,” the soft voice replied.

I’m done with this. I knocked on the door and waited for a response. “Oh, that must be Rainbow Dash. She promised to help me around the house since... well... you know. Could you please open the door?”

“Fine,” I heard an agitated Soft Soil say.

I waited for a few seconds before Soft Soil opened the door.

“Hi Rainbow Da-” she didn’t finish her sentence when she saw me. Instead she just jumped me, hugging me forcefully. “I knew you’d come back to get us!”

“Who’s at the door, Soft Soil?” the soft voice asked.

“You’ll see,” Soft Soil replied, “C’mon in, we can pick up the others and leave.”

“Oh no, it isn’t “it”, is it?” the soft voice queried, a bit of fear in its voice.

“You know, it’s not nice to refer to people as, “it” right?” I asked, walking in and seeing the butter-colored pony in a wheel chair. I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of guilt.

“Eeep!” I heard her reply, covering her face with a broken hoof.

“Oh, calm down. It wasn’t my fault Duncan attacked you. You attacked me. C’mon Duncan, lets go,” I replied as Duncan got up -- still in his ghillie suit -- and walked over to us. He dropped to the ground and let Soft Soil get on his back.

“Just where do you think you’re going!?” I turned to find that the ponies had recovered from their daze and were now standing at the door way. The armored ponies had raised their spears towards me.

“Drop the weapons and release the hostages!” one of the armored ponies demanded.

“What hostages!?” I yelled, raising my M40A5 up to the air. “This one let me in,” I said, gesturing to Soft Soil. “This other one is my dog and she’s just been taking care of them for me!”

“I said drop the weapon!” the same guard yelled.

“I have a better idea. How about I leave with Soft Soil, Duncan, and my three manticore cubs?” I asked, putting my M40A5 on my back and pulling out my Beretta. “I don’t want to have to hurt you guys.”

“Please! What can YOU do to US!?” another guard scoffed.

“Uhh, actually-” the white mare from the hospital tried to explain, but I cut her off.

“Fine, you wanna be a smartass, I’ll treat you like a smartass,” I said, raising my Beretta and firing two shots off into the ceiling before running into the kitchen, grabbing a large kitchen knife and running out the backdoor. Once outside I ran, and opened a small fence containing the three cubs who ran out with me immediately. The six of us then took off towards the forest.

We heard shouts coming from behind us as we entered the forest and ran deep into the woods. We could hear the clang of armor approaching us with great speed. They were closing in fast when I noticed a large golden chariot-like vehicle approaching from the sky.

“This day just keeps getting better and better!” I yelled as a large winged unicorn stepped out of the chariot.

“Guards! Seize it!” I heard her yell.

“Great,” I muttered sarcastically, running into the brush. We could hear the stomping of the guards behind us as we ran. They were closing in and we knew it.