Chapter 1: Welcome to the jungle
Chapter 1: Welcome to the jungle
Steven still felt light headed from the blast. As Steven opened his hazel eyes, all he could see were spots. He put his hand over his eyes to make them adjust to the environment around him. His head started to clear up slowly and his first audible thought was ‘Why did I have to go that way?’. He groaned as he tried to get into a sitting position so he could get his bearings. The world around him was dark, but there was enough illumination to see some of his surroundings. He was sitting in some sort of forest, very dense with a massive number of overgrown bushes and vines hanging from the tree branches. As he looked up through a clearing in the canopy, his eyes widened in amazement, the clearest night sky he has seen in a long time was looking down on him. Numerous stars and constellations could be seen, some of them looked familiar, and in the center of it all was a large full moon.
The setting seemed peaceful, but there was a nagging question in the back of Steven’s mind, something he could not put his finger on at that point. Then it came to him, the most important question that could only be said aloud.
“How the crud did I get in a forest!?” Steven exclaimed, as he scratch his straight brown haired head.
It was true, Steven had no recollection of how he got here. The last thing he could remember was walking down a hallway at the university, then a giant explosion happened and now he was here. There was something else that he recalled, like it was a part of some dream. He was falling through blackness; time had no meaning as to how long he had fallen. Then something of red and white came to him and spoke in some weird language that he thought sounded a lot like some sort of Latin. Once the red and white thing finished speaking, it took the form of a white Pegasus crossed with a red mane unicorn and vanished. It was at that moment that he had woken up.
Something about the dream made Steven really nervous. What was that being and what was it trying to say to him? These kinds of questions made Steven’s head hurt a bit, after all he probably suffered a concussion in the explosion. Once his head started to hurt less, he took a quick look around to see if some of his things had come with him. Backpack: check. Binder: check. Wallet: check. Keys: check. I-touch: check. All the things that were with him at the college were all here. As he stood up with his stuff in hand, he looked once more into the night sky. As he gazed into the starry night, he had an uneasy feeling about the moon. It was a moon he could see that, but it was the craters that made him question the status of his mind. The image on the moon was not of the arched rabbit that he would normally see, but of a unicorn. “Great” thought Steven sarcastically, “First the dream with that ‘pega-corn’ and now I am seeing a unicorn in the moon. What next a group of elves coming out to great me?” He chuckled to himself as he waited to see if it would happen.
As he jokingly waited, he noticed a path leading out from the clearing and into the dark forest. Steven hesitated at first because he did not know what would be out there, but he finally steeled his nerves and walked down the path. After a couple of minutes, Steven felt less nervous about walking through these woods in the dark. However, he had a nagging feeling that something or a group of somethings was watching him intently. His paranoia heighted when he heard a twig break to the right of him, he quickly turned and only saw a glimpse of a pair of glowing eyes watching him before they disappeared. “Whatever it was I must have frightened it off,” Steven said quietly to himself. But before moving on, a bush to his left rustled and a more fearless pair of glowing eyes watched him. Steven did not know this, but he was surrounded.
From the bush a large wolf came forth, however it was not like any Steven had ever seen before. The most impactful feature was that it was hairless and seemed to be covered in a root structure. As Steven slowly backed away from this beast, he could see more of them exiting bushes until a whole pack of them were behind the first one. “Tree wolves…heh” though Steven shakily “or to be more accurate ‘timber’ wolves.” The more Steven backed up the more growls came from the Timberwolves. He finally was backed up into a tree, with the timber wolves creating a half circle around him. Steven felt fearful of these beast and their intentions. Was he to be food or was this how they acted around those who tread into their territory? He did not know.
“Oh man, I wished I knew what to do,” Steven said enviously to himself.
Then, a voice, unlike Steven’s internal dialogue, spoke in his head and simple said ‘Run!’ Not wanting to jinx this deus ex machina that has been given to him, he quickly looked to the left and right of the tree. To his right was more forest, but to his left a small unused path that was slightly visible in the dim forest. With a quick glance back at the pack of Timberwolves and a slightly confident smile on his face, he gave a short wave and said “Bye!”
From the tree, Steven flung himself on to the path and ran down it as fast as he could. It took the Timberwolves a second to realize that their prey had gotten away from them before they were chasing him. Steven could hear the yelps and yowls that the pack was making behind him as he tried to stick to the path as best he could. Though the beasts were built for speed, they did not have the stamina needed to chase after such a quick prey. After a while, the alpha timber wolf leads the pack away from Steven and to hunt something less likely to flee as quickly. However, Steven kept on running for a while longer until noises had died down. To be sure he was not being followed he looked back over his shoulder to see that none of the Timberwolves were following him.
Letting out a sigh of relief he turned his head back to the front, only to run smack head first into a tree. As Steven fell to the ground with another concussion coming on, he wondered why the tree made a hollow thud when he hit it. It didn’t matter now as he was passing out.
Just as the world around him started to fade to black, he could have sworn that someone had come up to him and started to talk but his hearing was not willing to pick it up. Now Steven was almost completely unawake, yet he felt like he was being dragged somewhere. However, as he drifted into unconsciousness, he didn’t give the thought a care.
Chapter 2: At the Doorstep of a Shaman
Chapter 2:At the Doorstep of a Shaman
Zecora was having a quiet evening, as she put away the many plants she had gathered during her walk through Everfree forest. Tomorrow she had planned to have Apple Bloom come over and continue as her assistant with potion making. As she put the last of the plants into their respective jars, she heard a very low hum that seemed very far away. Zecora paid no attention to it. The ponies that lived in the town outside of Everfree forest enjoyed during their night time parties and that was probably what she was hearing. However, right before she put the sound out of her mind, a loud ‘whump!’ was echoed through the forest and jangled the bracelets that she wore, then silence.
“That is not the normal din, that I sometimes hear when night begins,” Zecora rhymed to herself.
After a few minutes the sounds of the night returned, and again all seemed well. With the peacefulness restored, Zecora trotted over to the small collection of potion recipe books that she had selected to use from tomorrow. She took one in her mouth over to her reading stand to double check if she had the ingredients on hoof. After flipping through a couple of pages, she heard the howls of the Timberwolves racing through the night air.
“Quite odd this night, what would the Timberwolves be after tonight?” she rhymed silently.
Suddenly, she could hear something huge running through the underbrush and being chased by the Timberwolves. She listened to the beat of the beast’s feet, yet there was something odd about the rhythm of its steps. She knew that the rhythm was for a two-legged animal, but not many of the creatures in Everfree forest could sustain a pace like that on two legs. Then, a load sound came from the side of the hut. For the first time Zecora was scared stiff. She wanted to see what hit her house, yet she was afraid what it could be. She let out a quick small breath and went for the front door. As she opened her door to her hut, she heard something groan to the left side of her hut.
As she navigated in the dim light she saw a large creature that she had never seen before. It had four limbs, but the lower two were longer than its upper two. The shorter limbs had what looked like sticks coming out the ends of them, five on either side. Even in the dim light she could tell that it was very colorful from its skin. Then another groan came from the top of the beast. As she walked up to that part, she saw that the beast had all the parts needed for a face though the nose was not like anything she had seen on any other creatures. She could see that the beast’s eyes were slightly open.
“What are you, coming and crashing out of the blue?’ she rhymed thinking that it would understand.
The creature gave a gurgle and passed out. Zecora sighed to herself, not in sadness but in the work it would take to bring it closer to the light. She had become less afraid of the being due only in part that it was now sleeping. With her mouth, she tried to drag the being, but the weight was too much for one zebra to do.
With a small pause, Zecora remembered the travois that she used to carry supplies and herbs back to her hut. She quickly went back into her house to retrieve it. However, she delayed slightly to remove an old book off the self for later.
Upon returning with the travois, the creature had not moved from the spot which gave her both relief and anxiety. She was worried that it had sustained some injury to its head due to the bruise that had appeared. She had seen such injuries before and they were sometimes fatal if not treated immediately. Thankfully she could see the chest move from its silent breathing.
She positioned the travois on the left of the being and went to the other side to flip the being on to it. With her hind legs, Zecora pushed as gently and forcefully as she could so that the being would flip onto the travois without causing more injury to it. After a few strenuous pushes, she was able to get the being onto the travois. As she hitched herself to the travois, she though that even though this would make it easier to move the being the weight of it would still be a little too much for her. Yet, she knew that if she did not bring it in from the night other creatures of the forest would have their way with it. After several minutes of strain and sweat, she was able to move the heavy being into her house but only as far as pulling it kind of close to her big caldron that sat in the middle of her hut. With the same intensity that she used to get the being onto the travois she safely and carefully flipped it face side up. Once she situated it in a comfortable lying down position, she put the travois away and balanced the book on her head and went back to the being that she had brought into her home.
As she flipped through the old book she taken from the shelf, calligraphic ink images of monsters filled each page.
“If you are truly a beast, you should be in here at least,” She said to her unconscious guest.
She flipped back and forth through the crinkly pages of the bestiary but none of the ferocious monsters came close to her guest. Many of the more rare monsters such as goblins, trolls and orcs had the capacity for bipedal movement but they were uglier than this being seemed to be. Her eyes started to lower as the night wore on and with a quite yawn she knew that sleep was needed.
“Though you are still a mystery to me, in the morning we shall see, how you act towards me,” She said sleepily to her resting guest.
She got up and returned the book before trotting to her curtain door , which lead to her beckoning bed. After settling in, she released the fire flies from the lantern and drifted to sleep.