Minority

Feather lay in his bed doing nothing.  His time for nothingness was interrupted by somepony knocking on his door.  He didn’t move as Velvet poked her head in the door.  “You ready yet, Feather?” she asked.  When Feather still did nothing, she walked all the way in.

She had a plain saddlebag on her back that looked like it was filled.  Now at Feather’s bed, she started nudging him.  “Feather, get up.”  He rolled over trying to ignore her.  Her horn glowed blue with magic, and not so soon after, so did Feather.

She lifted him off of the ground, and dropped him to the floor in an undignified heap.  He sighed, and got onto his hooves.  “What do you want?” he asked.

“It’s time to go,” she said.  “Orange and Swift are waiting down stairs.  Did you finish packing?”

“Packing what?  All my stuff is at my house.”

“Than your done.  Let’s go.”  She left the room, and Feather followed at a much slower pace.  Swift and Orange were indeed waiting for them at the bottom, each with their own saddlebag.

“Ready?” Swift asked when they were all there.  Velvet and Orange nodded, but Feather only stared at the ground.  Swift didn’t notice, and turned to leave the house.

The outside was what Feather had expected it to be, a forest and a cliff.  The house was built on the edge of a cliff, and the other side was completely surrounded by a forest.  Celestia’s sun was just coming over the horizon, making the sky a bright shade of orange.

Swift pulled out a map, and compass from his saddlebag.  After a quick glance around, he said, “This way.”  He headed off into the forest with the other following him.  Soon the trees had obscured Feather’s view of the house, and the only way out of the forest now was to follow Swift and the others.

After what seemed like hours of walking had only amounted to about a half hour.  Feather didn’t know the others well enough to start small talk, and so they marched on in silence.  Luckily, or unluckily, for Feather, something finally happened to relieve the boredom of the walking.

Feather heard a low growl from behind a bush.  He ignored it, thinking he was hearing thing.  Never the less, it did put him closer to the edge.  It wasn’t long before the manticore slowly, and quietly came out of the bush, stalking a group of four.

The manticore followed them through the forest.  It decided now would be the best time to strike.  It leaned forward onto its front paws.  It sprung forward, letting out a thunderous roar.  Feather turned to see the manticore, midflight, attacking him.  He fell onto his back, but before he could even scream, there were two more hooves in front of him.

Orange had reacted quickly.  He had gotten there just in time to buck the side of the manticore’s head.  The manticore rolled on his back, before righting itself.  It sat on its haunches, trying to close its not lopsided mouth, but couldn’t.  Lifting a paw to examine where Orange had bucked its mouth, the paw shot away, and the manticore whimpered.  Orange had shattered its jaw.

Tears started to form in its eyes.  They shot up and out of each eye, making an arch.  After a few second of crying, it got up and ran off, still sobbing.  Orange still looked at where it ran off to as if it were going to come back.

Feather stared wide-eyed at Orange.  He had never even dreamed of somepony beating manticore it hoof to hoof combat, and especially not it one punch.

As Orange walked past Feather, he said, “Get up.”  Orange hadn’t broken stride and Feather watch him walk by.  The rest of the group started to walk away, leaving Feather on the ground.

Feather realized that they were leaving, and shot up off of the ground.  “Hey, wait up!” he called after them.

The rest of the trip, Feather walked farther behind the group.  He eyed kept an eye on Orange more than he did the path.  If he can beat a manticore in one punch, what can the others do? he thought.  I need to find out more on them.  Orange can punch, but what can the other two do?Feather had stopped walking without noticing, and quickly caught up.

The sun would be setting soon.  If Feather hadn’t been scared of the others than he would have asked when they were stopping.  Feather’s prayers were answered when Swift told them to stop.

“You guys see that shack?”  At the bottom of a hill was a small shack.  “We’ll stop there for the night.”  They started to walk down the hill, and stood before the doors in less than five minutes.

On the out side it looked like something that could fall apart in a second.  However, Swift opened the door to something different.  It was about the size of a studio apartment.  It was rather empty, with only what looked like a manhole cover.  There was heat that kept the room comfortable, and a small closet to put their stuff in.

The group walked in, and set all the stuff down in a corner.  Swift walked up to the cover.  He pressed his hoof against it, and started to vibrate.  He slowly pushed into the cover, and put his whole head in.  Feather, for the second time that day, was scarred stiff.

Feather pulled his head out, and stopped vibrating.  “All right, there’s nopony down there.  We’ll set out in morning, and take the sewers to Canterlot, and meet with the others there.”  Swift looked at Feather, and saw the shocked look on his face.  “What’s wrong with you?”

“How did you…?”

“What, the density shift?”  Feather nodded.  “It comes with the speed.  It hard to do, but worth it.”

It dawned on Feather.  That’s it! he thought.  He has super speed!  Orange has super strength, and Swift has super speed!  He smirked to himself, but Swift didn’t notice.

Velvet pulled out four blankets from the closet and gave one blanket to each pony there.  She lifted Orange’s bag, and pulled out some food.  There was a family size bag of chips; two small bags of trail mix, apples, oranges, and peaches.  She picked out three apples, and an orange.  She tossed an apple to Swift and Feather, an orange to Orange, and kept an apple for herself.

“Thanks,” Orange said.  He started to peel his orange but stopped.  “Hey, these are mine!”  Velvet looked at him and smiled.

“They sure are delicious!”  She took a large bite out of her apple, taunting him.  Orange growled and started to stare down Velvet.

“Shut up, finish your food, and go to sleep,” Swift said.  “We’ve got a lot to do tomorrow.”  Swift, having finished his apple as fast as he could, grabbed his blanket, and found a spot on the floor to sleep on.  After a few minutes, the rest did the same.

~~~~~

Feather woke to the sun shining in his eyes.  He rolled over and tried to go back to sleep, but he was already up.  Sitting up, he rubbed his eyes and took a look around.  The others were sound asleep, and it didn’t seem like they were getting up.

He looked at the door for a second, but lay back down.  Not even a second later, he was back up, staring wide-eyed at the door.  He looked over the room again.  The others wouldn’t wake up for some time, and a thought passed through his head.  He had been kidnapped, and forced to come along.  Now he had a chance to escape.

The blanket fell off his body as he sat up.  He got to his hooves, and crept his way to the door.  Half way there, his hoof came down on a floorboard, and let out a high pitch squeak.

He cringed, but didn’t here anything else.  The others were still asleep.  The rest of the way to the door was quiet.  As he wrapped the door handle in magic, Swift spoke up.

“When are you going?”  Feather hadn’t even heard him wake up.

“No where,” he lied.  “I’m just going for a walk.”

“Don’t.  Wake up the others for me, it’s time to go.”

Feather turned around, and shook Orange and Velvet awake.  Orange got up on the first try.  Velvet rolled over and ignored him.  He shook her again and got a reaction.  She rolled back over, and gave him the evil eye, but slowly started to get up.

Now that everypony was awake, Swift spoke.  “Alright, is everyone ready?”  Nopony answered and took it as a “yes”.  “Than lets go.”  He jammed a crowbar under the manhole.  He pushed down, and it started to come off, but it wasn’t enough.  He pushed again, but made very little progress.

Orange walked up to it, and slammed his hoof down onto the bar.  The cover flew off the hole, and landed with a loud clang.  The bar had gotten wedged in the floor with no hope of getting it out.  Never the less, Swift grabbed the end of the crowbar in his mouth and lifted.  It didn’t budge, and Swift gave up quickly.

Soon they were all down through the manhole and in the sewers.  The only speck of light was coming from the manhole.  Velvet lit up her horn, and the darkness lifted.

The sewer looked like any other sewer.  It was cold, and had a small river of waste flowing next to them.  The top was round, and made out of red brick.  On the other side of the river was a pathway like the one they were standing on.

It wasn’t long till Feather noticed the smell.  “Ugh, what is that smell?”

“What do you think?  We’re in a sewer of all places.  Did you expect the smell of dandelions?” Velvet asked sarcastically.  “Breath through your mouth.  It won’t be quite as bad.”

The group moved along with Velvet leading the way.  The trip was uneventful.  There would be a split every so often, and Swift would tell them which way to go.

The rounded another bend without stopping.  A rat, scared by Velvet’s light, ray past the group.  Feather squealed when it brushed up against his leg.  They others looked at him with deadpan expressions.

“It was just a rat,” said Orange.

“Just a rat?  That thing touched me!  Do you have any idea how many diseases they can carry?” Feather asked.

“It was just a rat.”

Velvet shook her head and started to walk again.  Not wanting to get left in the dark, they others followed.  They continued further into the sewers, but stopped again.

There was an iron door in front of them.  In the center was a wheel to open the door with.  Swift walked up to the door and rapped on it three times, screaming “Barrel!  It’s Swift, let us in!”