Catastrophic Charm

It was a long rocky drive, but at the rate Big Macintosh was covering ground at the moment, it was only going to take him only a few minutes' worth of fuel to get himself to his destination. He didn't give a damn about the fact that the police could see him drive at that reckless speed and force him to pull over for everyone else's safety.

What was more important now was to see Cheerilee and see if she was alright.

But he had something to do first.

Going off the main road, he set off in the direction of Zecora's hut deep in Everfree Forest. He needed her advice.

As eccentric the local alchemist was, she was the one of the few women whom he could trust without any fear of the possible consequences. After all, she was the one that cured his little sister from the dreaded Cutie Pox. They never met eye-to-eye on a regular basis before, however. He had to remain careful.

If she held feelings like his stalkers had for him, there was no telling what kind of love or wrath she would unleash upon him. Visiting her alone also had unfortunate, sexual implications - if he would refuse her possible advances, she would be able to make all sorts of horrible claims - and nobody would be able to prove her wrong.

The following scandal for everyone involved would shame the Apple family into leaving Ponyville. Although unlikely, this was something that Big Macintosh wished to prevent, but without some spiritual help, his secret, which he considered was more valuable than what could happen in the next minutes or so, would eventually be revealed.

He was faced with a hard choice, that much was sure.

But now was not the time to think about it all.

He had to remain focused whilst driving - otherwise, the results would be messy.

There was a sudden nip in the air as he drove deeper into the forest. The dirt road began alternating between dry and muddy. The slow-moving giant clouds above it shadowed the farther parts of the area. The sun was still high, but unfortunately the light it provided was not enough to pierce the thick grey clouds nor the dull green tree-tops.

The growing darkness ahead made Big Macintosh weary.

Then it rained, making everything darker. He grunted as he slowed the truck's speed.

"Just when visiting Zecora seemed easy to manage..." Mac grumbled.

The blond then rummaged through the glove compartment. In it, he only found a small umbrella and a flash-light. They were better than nothing being used at all. He already had his phone with him in his pocket, but he wanted nothing to do with it. The last time he cared to check, he had about six-hundred thirty-two ignored voice messages.

Most of which came from three certain women.

He remembered the nights he spent deleting the voice messages save the ones which came from friends. The first time he experienced this was disturbing since he listened to all of them; their voices full of emotion yet were dripping in a strange mixture of love and lust - all of which were each begging him to come back to them.

Eventually, this freaked him out to the point that he deleted them as soon as they appeared, but as it turned out, these women had plenty of free time on their hands. At least every five minutes or so - or depending on what kind of day it was - new messages would pop up, only to be then replaced by newer and newer messages.

Mac had given up all hope in deleting all of them. It was unending.

He immediately stopped thinking about it. Though he hated to admit it, he was scared by their senders.

"Why had they turned out like this?" He thought. "Was it because I was nice to them?"

A bright flash of yellow from something on the road up ahead caused him to naturally brake, breaking his thoughts.

And it just happened that he braked on muddy ground. The truck began to skid, then began to swerve, and eventually, it began to spin. Everything became a blur as he lost control, like when he fell from his bed while under the bed sheets earlier that morning, but with an enhanced feeling of nausea and muted horror.

The wind-shield wipers cleared Mac's view long enough for him to see that he was going to crash...

[>!<]

The impact was felt throughout the forest, causing the nearby wildlife to scatter in surprise.

Not far away, Zecora immediately woke up from her nap.

"What the..." She mouthed groggily, before the true nature of the sound finally revealed itself to her. "Huh?"

"A crash?" She asked herself in disbelief before getting her cloak. "And I thought it was Rainbow Dash..."

Putting it on quickly, she rushed out of her door to the pouring rain. Ignoring the pellets of cold water pestering her face, she quickly made her way to the crash site following the direction of the black smoke's origin. The rain made it hard for her to hear and see clearly, but she had to manage for the sake of the person in the accident.

Finally, she made it to the road. She saw a red truck, whose wind-shields were cracked beyond recognition.

The driver's cracked door was hanging ajar - a sign that the impact was strong. Upon closer inspection, she realized that this truck seemed familiar. Seeing the logo on one of the crates in the back, she discovered that it was the Apple family's delivery truck. And she knew that the only person allowed to drive it around was none other than...

The horror of knowing who drove the vehicle then kicked in for Zecora.

"Big Macintosh!" She screamed as her legs sprung forward automatically, hoping that he wasn't hurt badly.

When she reached the door, to her surprise, nobody was there, although there were traces of blood on the seats.

"Oh no..." She murmured in shock. "Please do not let it be so..."

She then looked around. There were no discernible footprints in the mud leading away from the vehicle. And now she felt like she was being watched, but from where? She couldn't care to guess, plus the fact that the man had gone missing after the crash was straining her attention span - where could he had gone?

Rather than risk getting lost while searching for the concussed man, she had to call for help. Although she knew the forest more than anyone else, there were still dangers that lurked within, waiting for unwitting prey. Timberwolves were dangerous, more so in a weather like this. The woman hoped that, wherever Mac went, it wasn't too late.

"Stay put, Mac! With help, I'll come back!" She yelled to her surroundings as she ran to Ponyville's direction.

High above the truck, on a strong tree branch, Fluttershy smiled as she stroked her unconscious ex-boyfriend's hair.

[>!<]

Cheerilee was worriedly thinking about her lover.

It had been a week since she last saw of him - and the feeling in the pit of her stomach wasn't easing itself in the slightest. She glanced at the clock above her apartment door. It was past noon already, and he still hadn't come. She clutched her phone closer to her chest; she had already attempted to call him, but he never picked her call up.

She tried to think about happy things to pre-occupy her mind. Her mind reeled back at the night where she was drunk from drinking with friends at a bar and brought home to her apartment by a half-sober Macintosh. The details were sketchy, but both remembered clearly that they ended up making love under the influence of alcohol.

That night was the same night where she had lost her virginity to him. And she didn't regret it, either. Nor did Mac. Actually, it was the one thing they needed so they could be together at last without any doubt. But after a pregnancy test, it turned out that their fate together was truly sealed - she was pregnant with his child.

It came as a shock to Mac, but to Cheerilee it was more than good news, despite their lines of work and home life. After awkward apologies and arduous talking (in Mac's case) they fully accepted what had happened, and they immediately planned what to do next as an official couple. Although they hadn't told anyone about it yet.

One thing was for certain: he would propose to her in front of everyone. Only then would everyone know.

She blushed at the cute thought. Their decision to make it official would make three young girls extremely happy with the news. But then that feeling in her stomach worsened. Call it her gut feeling, but she felt that her future husband was hiding something from her. That, and she hadn't seen him in a week, caused some internal doubts.

She shook those doubts away. He probably was too busy all week long like the way she was teaching at school.

Maybe that was the cause of his absence. But still, she had sent text messages to him, and so far there was no reply. Was he preparing a surprise? Was he out of town? Was he avoiding her for a reason? So many questions popped up in her head, but all were silenced with her belief that he would remain forever faithful to her.

After all, he was the father of their child. He wouldn't leave them for another woman without a word or reason. She glanced at the clock again. Hopefully he had read the latest text message she sent him and was rushing to her by now. Long, silent moments passed. She sighed sadly, before attempting to call him again.

Her call, once more, wasn't picked up.

"Mac, where are you?" She asked herself mournfully shortly afterwards.