The Shy Knight and the Rainbow Princess!

Chapters

Chapter 1: Peaceful Ponyville.
Chapter 2: Campfire Chat.
Chapter 3: Campfire Chat Continued.
Chapter 4: Woodland Wade.

Chapter 1: Peaceful Ponyville.

Chapter 1: Peaceful Ponyville

Serene was the forest in the early time of daybreak, the faintest rays of sunlight trickling through the thick leaves and foliage to announce day to the area. The nocturnal animals had nestled well into their sleep and the animals of day had risen, having come out of their dens and started their search for food. The air was calm, and aside from bird song the place was quiet; tranquil would best describe the forest at that point and it would have amazed any pony that the much feared and dreaded Everfree Forest could ever have such a moment.

Then a sound disrupted that serene, calm, quiet tranquillity. It was a buzzing sound but not a loud one like that of a chainsaw’s, but soft, as if the sound was far away and muffled. Along with the sound though came another disruption, an array of vibrant yet sickly colours appearing on a tree. The colours of dull green and dull yellow and dull every colour of the rainbow swirled upon the tree like a whirlpool, the plant life seemingly unaffected by this occurrence.

Then from the swirl of colours came darkness. Three large figures of contrasting sizes cloaked in black cloaks came forth. The shortest figure walked ahead on all fours and proceeded to gaze around the area swiftly, taking in every surrounding, every angle, and every other bit of the landscape in. The tallest figure walked out of the portal but soon stopped and looked around briefly, before turning its attention to its cloaked companion. The third figure stepped forth slowly with each of its eight legs, and then stood rigid; it’s full attention on display to the seeming leader of the group.

The shorter figure slipped a scaly claw into its cloak’s pocket, pulled out a photo, and presented said photograph of six colourful and happy ponies to the group. The tallest member of the three pointed with a black finger to the pony in the middle, on the bottom row, but received a shake of the head as a response. The leader of the trio pointed instead to the pony on the far right of the photo, top row, and shook its head. Putting away the photo, the trio then began to move out, heading towards a small cottage on the outskirts of the Everfree Forest.

“Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there was a kingdom ruled by cute little bunn-Eek!” The reading pony yelped as a bunny rabbit landed upon her open book, startled her and caused her to jump back.

Jumping back onto her hooves however was not entirely successful for the clumsy pegasus and the motion of her backwards jump propelled her to fall and roll backwards. Laying instead on her back, she had to roll back onto her hooves, and blow a wisp of her pink mane that had fallen over her eyes in the tumble. This pony, Fluttershy, looked ahead to her ‘cute little bunny’, who stood upon her book with a frown upon his face.

“O-oh, I’m sorry Angel, I was just reading my book and… do you need something, Angel Bunny?” Fluttershy apologised as she moved closer to her pet and began to rub her face against his.

Angel pushed his fussing owner away from him, pulled out a pocket watch from behind him, and pointed to it. Fluttershy was going to ask whether Angel wanted to be a clock, but an irritable scowl from Angel reminded her that she had already asked this question of Angel from this particular charade once before.

“Um, was I going to meet up with any of my friends today?” Fluttershy asked, pondering on what she could have had planned for the day. Something was on the tip of her tongue, something she did often but had arranged differently, yet the memory eluded her.

Angel wasted no time in performing another flurry of motions to convey his message. Throwing his arms up into the air, he pretended to wail at the air with large teary eyes, and acting as over-dramatic as possible.

“Oh, um… Rarity? Rarity! The Spa!” Fluttershy proclaimed, finally remembering what she had arranged for the day. “Oh I remember now. I had asked Rarity if we could have our spa day earlier, and I asked Pinkie if she could come too.”

Fluttershy was now fluttering about the room, checking if everything was in place and shifting through her head for if there was anything else she had forgotten. Mostly her thoughts turned to her regular animal caretaking duties, ensuring she had tended to all the critters she needed to for that morning. There were many disputes she needed to settle and many sick critters she needed to ensure had taken their medicine; so many things that when distractions came up it was like the world was pulled up from under her hooves.

“Thank you for reminding me Angel. What would I do without you?” Fluttershy complimented her pet, fussing him once more.

Angel looked around first, and seeing none of the other animals about, decided to let his owner run her hoof across his head, an action he expressed his joy from by stomping the ground with a foot. He always did love receiving attention, but never expressing it, at least when the eyes of others were about; he had a tough bunny image to maintain after all.

“Now I think I’ve got everything sorted but if you get chance to could you please do a double check on the others for me?” Fluttershy asked as she turned around to head for the door, “Goodbye, Angel.”

A loud thud sound caused Fluttershy to be startled once again and she quickly spun around back to Angel. The little rabbit of surprising strength had picked up her book and smacked it back down onto the floor and pointed repeatedly to it.

“Oh, I don’t need to take my book with me Angel.” Fluttershy's statement was met by a shake of the head from her pet, who continued to point towards the book with a scrunched brow and a scratch of his head. “Are you interested in this book?”

Angel was a rabbit, and like most rabbits had no interest in reading pony stories written in pony language. He was however interested in why his owner was reading the book, so he nodded all the same.

“Well then, this book is a very special book… to me at least.” Fluttershy walked over to said book and gently glided a hoof over its open pages, “For this is a book I wrote myself.”

Angel looked to his owner with a small measure of surprise. Hearing his owner had written a book was not a shocking thing, it was a peaceful hobby that suited his owner well, but his owner had never told him before that she had written a book.

“I was still in school when I wrote this, and it’s just a short children’s book, but it was fun. And just earlier I was sorting through my things when I happened to find it and… well, I couldn’t help but read it.” Fluttershy finally explained, patting Angel on the head one last time before getting up and walking to the door, “You can read it if you like Angel, have fun.”

The rabbit waved goodbye to his owner before turning back to the book. He looked at its old yet colourful pages, vibrant crayon colours having made the various pictures of bunnies within, and thick clear black ink making out the words to be read. Then he was bored of it, choosing to flip the book to a close, and inspect its cover instead. Looking to the title, while not in his own language per say, he could tell it read out as ‘The Rainbow Knight and the Shy Princess’. A scowl formed upon reading those words, which only deepened when he inspected the cover image. On the cover were two rabbits, one dressed up as a princess, with a tuff of hair shielding her face, clearly a rabbit version of his owner. The other rabbit was clad in armour, but from the rainbow hair and snarky grin upon the rabbits face, Angel could tell this was a rabbit version of one particular pony.

Hopping away from the book and up to the window sill facing the front of his house, Angel watched as his owner left for the spa. Angel was worried now, his owner had been reading a book from a time he was not a part of her life, a time instead when that rainbow jerk was dominant. Now she was leaving to the spa to talk with two ponies that consistently conspired to throw Fluttershy into the Rainbow jerks rough hooves. Nothing about this bode well to the bunny, and he dread to think of why his owner had arranged to meet up with the two.

“Please stop trying to help me with Rainbow Dash!”

Fluttershy’s outburst would have been heard by all those within the bathing room, through the hallways of the spa, and have been unintentionally heard by many patrons of the spa, but this was Fluttershy’s outburst, quiet in comparison to a normal pony’s, and so was heard by nopony outside the room. It was however barely loud enough to be heard by Rarity and Pinkie, whom stopped their idle chatter, and turned towards their friend surprised.

“Why, whatever do you mean?” Rarity inquired with a fake smile cropping upon her white coated face.

“Yeah, what makes you think we were helping you get all lovey-dovey with Rainbow Dash?” Pinkie asked as she splashed about in the spa’s hot tub.

Fluttershy gave her two friends a deadpan glare. First turning towards Pinkie Pie, Fluttershy began to lay down her accusation, “Pinkie Pie, only you would help Rainbow Dash jump out of a cake to surprise me.”

“It was all so perfect, Rainbow Dash would jump out of the cake and into your hooves, she’d have some frosting on her lips and you’d lick it off and then oh mumma… but no! You had to faint. How could you Fluttershy?” The prankster dramatized, all to a still very unamused Fluttershy.

Turning then towards Rarity, the unicorn already trying to hide her smile, Fluttershy continued, “And Rarity, how could you? You know that I have a weakness for… bunnies, and I don’t even know how you managed to convince Rainbow Dash to wear… that.”

By this point the yellow accusing pony had managed to turn a delightful shade of red, her face blushing brightly, all to which Rarity took note of as she replied, “It did take a lot of convincing, and a favour or two but it was worth it. After all, you seemed to enjoy it.”

“I-I-I did not,” Fluttershy whispered as her face became warmer and warmer.

“Oh, really dear, don’t you remember just how cute Rainbow Dash looked with her little bunny ears and small cotton tail?” Rarity said with a sly, almost seductive tone.

“Well… yeah,” Fluttershy could not help but admit as she thought of that time when Rarity had invited her to the boutique and her first sight was of Rainbow Dash dressed up in a bunny mare outfit.

“The royal-satin pressing tightly against her flank,” Rarity added, and from the flapping of outstretched wings she could tell that Fluttershy was indeed remembering.

Seconds passed and Fluttershy, who had been lost in her memories, realised her body’s embarrassing reactions. She reached for her energetically flapping wings with her hooves as best as she could, and clamped them back down to her body. Afterwards she turned towards the two giggling shippers, and tried to bring the conversation back to her point.

“A-As I was saying, I would like for you two to stop helping me… please.”

Rarity shook her head as she asked, “Now darling, why in Equestria would you want us to stop helping you?”

“Yeah, don’t you want to be lovey-dovey with Rainbow Dash?”

“I-I do but it’s just… too soon,” Fluttershy explained, though from the looks on her friend’s faces she could tell they wouldn’t accept that alone as the answer, “I mean, Rainbow Dash and I only became as close we are a short while ago and um… I don’t want to rush things.”

“Fluttershy, in a couple of months it will have been a year since you ‘re-fell’ in love with Rainbow Dash.” Deadpan was Rarity’s response as she looked to Fluttershy.

“Any longer and you’ll both be old mares with walkers complaining about how things aren’t like they used to be back in your day. You need to get in 1st gear and confess already!” Pinkie added with various engine noises.

“Oh, I don’t know… it still feels too soon, what if she doesn’t like me that way, what if it hurts our friendship and… and, what would other ponies think?”

The unicorn and earth pony across from her could not help but look at one another in amusement before turning back towards Fluttershy, “Please dear, if it’s what other ponies will think then you need not worry… everypony in Ponyville already thinks you’re a couple.”

“What!” Fluttershy yelled out, and her shocked brain made words stumble from her mouth “How? Who? Wha-Where-She-You-How? Eep!”

A giggle from Pinkie Pie and the mare added, “An before you even thinky-dinky it, Rarity and I had nothing to do with it… well, maybe just a teensy bit to begin with.”

“Yes, at first we were encouraging the notion, pointing out to ponies how close you were now, how you let Rainbow Dash race your pets through the Ghastly Gorge, and how she came for you and you alone at sunrise simply to get some cider.” Rarity boasted her accomplishments to Fluttershy, whose jaw remained wide open in dismay. “But after that hurricane incident, why, we didn’t have to do a thing.”

“Yeah, just watch this, actually, just listen to this.” Pinkie said as she leaped out of the hot tub, zoomed out of the room, and into the hallway.

“Hey there, I have a question for you,” Pinkie said loud enough to be heard even from the hallway as well as loud enough to call out to a pony within the hallway, “Do you think Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash make a cute couple?”

Fluttershy eeped at Pinkie’s question and eeped even more as the unidentified stallion replied, “Those two pegasus who helped get the water to Cloudsdale? Of course I do, doesn’t everypony? I mean, you must have read at least some of the news about it, they’re adorable together. I was really worried when it appeared they were going through some relationship troubles, but then after the hurricane they must have sorted things out as they were hugging and making out on the clouds. Why’d you ask?”

“No reason.” Pinkie giggled as she re-entered the hot tub room and leaped back into tub, a large splash soaking the other two ponies.

“Pinkie!”

“Sorry Rare.” Pinkie Pie turned towards Fluttershy and asked, “So now you know.”

Fluttershy did not reply. Aside from her quivering open jaw she barely moved, her eyes having a distant gaze at this revelation. Just as Pinkie and Rarity began to worry for their friend she burst back to life, yelping out, “Oh dear, oh dear, I wish it were true but it’s not. I’ve got to clear up this misunderstanding right away.”

As Fluttershy began to pull herself out of the tub, Pinkie quickly swam over to her and pulled her back in, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold it right there missy.”

“But I can’t have everypony spreading these rumours, believing them when they’re not true!”

“Ah, but Fluttershy dear, those rumours will soon be true,” Rarity said as she swam on over and placed a reassuring hoof on Fluttershy, “If you confess and get together with Rainbow Dash, then you won’t need to correct anypony.”

Fluttershy tried to stammer out a response, but Rarity was quicker. “Now Fluttershy, I understand why you’re having cold hooves about confessing to Rainbow Dash.”

“Y-you do?” Fluttershy murmured, no longer struggling from Pinkie’s grip.

“Yes, you lost your friendship with Rainbow Dash once and it took a long time for you to get as friendly as you are now. Anypony would be afraid of risking that sort of friendship,” Rarity began, waving her hoof in the air as if to emphasise her point, “But you shouldn’t worry about that. Pinkie and I think you’d be a great couple, just about everypony else already thinks you are a great couple, and I’m sure if you confess to her the two of you will be a great couple.”

Fluttershy looked to her friend with appreciation, slowly asking, “You really think so?”

“I know so darling,” Rarity gave her friend a hug, with the nearby Pinkie joining in because hugs are fun, “So what do you say?”

“…I’ll do it, I’ll confess to Rainbow Dash!” Fluttershy’s hesitant response erupted cheers from her two friends, and a smile spread on her own face at their happy reaction, “After all, what could possib—” A pink hoof rushed up against Fluttershy’s mouth, halting any further words.

Pinkie Pie looked to Fluttershy with utmost serious and whispered, “Whatever you do, don’t say that phrase.”

Rainbow Dash—future Wonderbolt, element of loyalty, performer of the legendary Sonic Rainboom, and all-round incarnation of awesomeness—stared bleakly at her unexpected foe. She could not have fathomed how one of her most difficult of all tasks could come in such a form. This would be because she chose to think of herself first as ‘future Wonderbolt, element of loyalty, performer of the legendary Sonic Rainboom, and all-round incarnation of awesomeness’ before she thought of herself as weathermare of Ponyville.

“Aww, do I really have to stick to this?” Rainbow Dash moaned at the piece of paper, a schedule on how long she should sleep, train, and hang with her friends on days when important weather meetings were being held, “There doesn’t even appear to time for napping on this thing.”

“No time for naps! I’ve given a 20 minute leeway on just about every appointment because of your constant naps!” Twilight snapped, having endured the pains of writing a list as relaxed and undefined for too long, “The reason you got in trouble and were late for your meeting was because you overslept, you need to cut back on it.”

Rainbow huffed, throwing out her wings and saying, “I can’t just cut back on sleep. You know how much energy flying takes up, I need that sleep.”

“Well in that case,” Twilight trailed off as she levitated a book from one of her library shelves over to her, ready to look up information if she needed to further her point, “You should just start eating more. I’ve read that’s the other way pegasus retain energy for flight.”

Rainbow Dash shook her head, throwing a hoof up into the air as if she were making a proclamation, “No can do Twilight. As a future Wonderbolt I stick to a strict, nutrition balanced diet… which is really hard when you live in the same town as a constant party throwing and sweet treats baking pony like Pinkie Pie.”

Applejack hummed at this remark and mused aloud, “Mah apple pie sales to these Wonderbolt do say otherwise.”

“Soarin’ is an exception.”

Rainbow Dash then continued to look at the list but eventually conceited, sighing at the schedule that she’d have to follow if she wanted to keep her job… or at least not get demoted into poverty. Snatching up the list, Rainbow Dash bid adieu to her friends, “Thanks for the list Twilight, I guess…”

As Rainbow Dash stepped out of the library she could hear Twilight call out to her, “And make sure you follow it!”

Rainbow grumbled at the reminder but was far enough to not be heard. Ironically, while she had just obtained a schedule, it said nothing about what to do on the days where she had no meetings to attend to, and at that current point she had no other obligations to attend to.

“Huh, guess I could take a nap,” Rainbow thought aloud, the talk of her schedule being a constant reminder that on some days this would be harder to do, “or I could hang with Fluttershy. I didn’t see her yesterday and tomorrow is her spa day so now would be a good time.”

Unaware of Fluttershy’s own change of plans, Rainbow Dash set off for Fluttershy’s cottage. With a flap of her cyan wings the flight loving pegasus took to the skies and flew forth at great speeds. In less than a minute she was already slowing down to prepare for landing at Fluttershy’s cottage. Luckily for her, one of Fluttershy’s windows was open and so she flew straight on into the cottage and into Fluttershy’s bedroom.

“Hey Fluttershy, wanna hang out?” Dash called out into the room and by extension the rest of the house, but no reply was heard. “Huh, maybe she’s out back with her animals.”

Rainbow Dash started heading towards the stairs, ready to look for Fluttershy, but this was delayed by her stepping and slipping on something. Lightly falling to the floor, Rainbow was barely dazed, having suffered far worse crashes in her flights and within Fluttershy’s household. Still, the first thing she did upon getting to her hooves was complain, “Ugh, what in the hay did I just-a book?”

Noticing a book upon the floor, the very thing she had tripped on, Rainbow naturally walked towards it, looking to and reading it’s cover, “’The Rainbow Knight and the Shy Princess by Flutter- Fluttershy!”

Dash held the book with her hooves, gazing at it as if it were some foreign alien object she had never laid eyes on before, “I never knew Fluttershy wrote a book.”

Curiosity, and nowadays a love of reading adventure stories, led Rainbow Dash to sit down and open the book up. It was bright, it was colourful, and it was filled with bunny rabbits; totally not her thing. This wasn’t too surprising, it was written by Fluttershy after all, and it was this fact alone that led Rainbow to continue reading the book. With the experience of reading every single book within the Daring Doo series, Rainbow Dash had learnt to read remarkably well in her head, though she was however still slow. So even with the children’s book before her, Rainbow Dash took her time with the story, devoting her complete attention to it.

“R-Rainbow Dash!”

Only a couple of pages from the end of the book, Rainbow Dash’s attention was pulled away from the story and towards the stunned pony in the doorway; Fluttershy. Speaking of said stunned pony, Fluttershy was unsure what to think. She had come home to see Angel hard at work on some sort of plan outside—she always liked how hard of a worker her beloved pet was—and had walked up to her silent room to unexpectedly stumble upon her best friend and crush awaiting her. Then she noticed that her best friend and crush was reading her book.

“R-Rainbow Dash is reading my book! Rainbow Dash is reading my book about bunnies, and us as bunnies, and us as bunnies falling in love,” Any confidence Rarity and Pinkie had managed to spur up in her to confess flew away as her mind became a mess of jumbled thoughts, “She read my book, she knows, she must know, what do I do, what do I do!”

“Fluttershy,” Rainbow Dash said, looking worryingly to the visibly shaken Fluttershy, “I’m sorry for reading your book without permission. Are… are you okay?”

Fluttershy screamed in panic and ran away. To this, Rainbow Dash could only stand frozen to the spot, dumbfounded. Once her brain took in all the events that made little sense however, she did the only thing that did make sense; chase after her friend. Flying down the stairs she went, speeding out the front door and landing on the cottage porch. Not too far off in the distance she spotted the fleeing yellow pegasus, her bobbing pink tail an easy thing to notice.

“Fluttershy, come back!” Rainbow Dash called out after her friend, spreading out her wings and preparing for take-off.

But she didn’t.

Instead Rainbow Dash was assaulted by a rabbit slapping her across the face and pulling on her ears. For you see, just a few seconds earlier, when Fluttershy ran out of house screaming like a mad-mare, a very concerned Angel Bunny watched her do so. He had no clue as to what could have caused his owner to act like this. Then he saw the rainbow hothead come out the door. Leaping to his obviously true conclusion that his owner’s distress must have been caused by the rainbow jerk he sprang into action, and began to attack.

“Gah! Get off me you little brat!” Rainbow wrestled the scratching and gnawing rabbit off of her, throwing Angel to the side, and then looking up for Fluttershy. Considering how un-athletic and slow her pegasus pal was, Rainbow was quite astonished at how far Fluttershy had gotten. Clearly out of earshot, Rainbow would have to fly forth and catch her as planned, and so she began to do so.

Then Rainbow Dash was blasted by water.

The water pushed her to the ground, rolling against the grass, but she made a quick recovery and scrambled to her hooves, pushing her soggy mane out of her eyes.

“What in the hay was that?”

Rainbow Dash turned in the direction of the blast of water, expecting to find that accursed rabbit yet again, but instead she saw a complete stranger. At least she judged the figure to be a complete stranger; taller than any pony, draped top to bottom in a dark cloak, and standing within the stream was somebody unknown.

Then the ground began to shake.

“E-earthquake!” Dash said in shock, leaping up into the air immediately as the ground tore open where she stood.

Rainbow Dash could not believe her eyes as another shrouded stranger came out of the chasm, eight clawed limbs pulling the figure out into the daylight. Rainbow Dash knew not who these two were, but from the initial attack she could tell they were bad news.

“I don’t know who you flightless bozo’s are but I’m not sticking around to find out.” Rainbow Dash teased her would be attackers and began to fly off.

Then she was punched. Worse, she was invisibly punched. Rainbow Dash’s fall ended quickly thanks to a speedy recovery, a flap of her wings allowing her to regain altitude. Still she was in shock, and looked around wearingly for the unknown, 3rd assailant.

“Wha-What?!” Rainbow yelped out in fright, shaking off her shock from the blow to lift her hooves up and try to block another invisible punch.

She succeeded in blocking it, but the strength of it disrupted her flying, and when struck by another punch she was knocked with such force she fell back down to the ground. Rainbow Dash had no intention of staying down, but when water somehow wrapped itself around her hooves and tied them together she didn’t have much choice.

“W-what is this?” Rainbow Dash yelped at what she could only reason was magic.

A shadow then overcast her as the second, digging figure loomed over her. It lifted up one it’s arms, a clawed fist clenched.

“W-wai”-Dash did not get to finish her sentence as the blow to the head knocked her unconscious.

The multi-limbed figure continued to look down at Rainbow Dash as it waited for its companions to gather. The apparently magical figure waded in from the water, and with the sound of something landing on the ground by them, the previously invisible, flying figure materialised.

“A shame, I was hoping for more of a challenge.” The flying figure scoffed.

“With the three of us attacking at once you couldn’t have expected this pony to pose much of a chal—”

The magical figure suddenly winced in pain, and looked down to its tail, finding a white rabbit attached.

Angel bit repeatedly, and when the figure tried to grab him he hopped out of the way, hopped onto the magical figure’s head, and then kicked off its head to lunge at the multi-limbed figure. Angel began stamping on its head, though the multi-limbed figure merely looked up at the rabbit curiously. Angel turned to the flying figure and leaped then towards him; teeth bared to attack, but was grabbed mid-lunge.

“It’s the bunny rabbit our boss told us about.” The multi-limbed figure said each word slowly, and only after saying this turned his direction to the bunny now within the flying figures talons.

“Dumb animal,” The attacked one moaned as it stroked its bitten tail.

“Shut it, it’s just a rabbit bite. You’ll live,” The flying figure snapped as it forced the struggling Angel to look him in the eye, “I would eat you, but I need you to do something for us.”

Throwing Angel to the ground while its cohorts stuffed Rainbow Dash into a sack, it ordered, “You go find your owner and her little pony friends and tell them that if they ever want to see Miss Skittles over here that they’ll come back to this cottage. A letter will be waiting for them, follow its orders.”

Angel glared at the trio with his utmost hatred. He absolutely despised being bossed around and yet, even though it was the life of the rainbow mop head at stake and not anyone he actually cared about himself, he knew his owner did, and so with no other choice, he looked to the ground, and nodded.

Angel ran as fast as his four little paws could go, turning his head constantly. He imagined his owner must have calmed down after whatever the rainbow jerk must have done to spook her as he could no longer hear her panicked voice. Whilst looking to the side though Angel had the misfortune of bumping into someone, his world going topsy-turvy as he fell onto his back.

“Uh, hello there Angel Bunny, whatever’s got you in such a hurry?” Angel looked up, ready to shake his paw in frustration at whoever had gotten in his way, only to see the apple bucker, one of his owner’s friends.

“What do you want, rabbit?” Angel heard grunted, and saw that the one he had bumped into was Spike, the dragon he hated for some reason he couldn’t quite explain.

“Are you looking for Fluttershy?” Angel felt a chill run up his spine as he saw and heard that the mad mare was also there, naturally accompanying her dragon.

Pushing aside his fear of dissection from the unicorn, Angel nodded his head, and then began to perform charades. Running on the spot and flapping his arms like wings, he tried to inform them of Rainbow Dash. Then he put on a sinister face, tried to make himself look big and menacing, and started throwing out punches. Then he leaped onto his back, placing his arms and legs together as if they were tied up, and pretended to cry out for help.

“Running, body building, and a backstroke?” The mad mare asked, and for the supposedly smart one of the group Angel showed nothing but a frown to.

“You tryin’ out for the Equestria Games?” The apple bucker suggested, and Angel shook his head, amazed that both were going with this train of thought.

“Peagasus, tough pony, punching, and being tied up?” Spike murmured aloud, scratching his scaly cheek, when Angel’s charades added up in his head and he yelled out, “Fluttershy’s been beaten up and foalnapped!”

“What?!” The two mares cried before turning to the bunny rabbit, “Is this true?!”

Angel shook his head and the two mares gave a sigh of relief. He then however began flapping his arms like before, and then combed back the hair on his head, crossed his arms, and tried to look stereotypically cool.

“Rainbow Dash? What has Rainbow… Rainbow Dash has been beaten up and foalnapped!” Spike yelled out in alarm, and this time Angel nodded his head.

“What?!” The mad mare and apple bucker said in union once again, with Twilight then asking, “How did this happen?”

Angel did not bother to answer, feeling he had wasted enough time conveying his message to them as it was. He needed to find his owner, inform her and so he sprang off to resume his search. The other three, not wanting to be left in the dark on this supposed incident, followed him with the utmost haste.

“Now Fluttershy dear, are you sure you’ve calmed down now?” Rarity inquired as she kept her reassuring hoof on Fluttershy’s shoulder.

“Y-yes, I’m… I am alright now,” Fluttershy said with a couple of deep breaths in-between, “Um, a little embarrassed though.”

“Now, now, I’m sure anypony would go completely 'cray-cray' if they accidentally told their crush that they loved them,” Pinkie said as she ruffled Fluttershy’s mane, and then proceeded to bounce up and down in excitement, “Oh but you should have stayed put. Dashie’s sure to have said yes and then the two of you would hug and kiss and be married by the end of the week.”

“Oh yes, Fluttershy, now that you’ve calmed down please do tell us how Rainbow Dash reacted when you let slip your undying passion for her?” Rarity asked, her voice dripping with an insatiable curiosity.

It was within the park that Rarity and Pinkie both reassured Fluttershy and pestered her about Rainbow Dash, not normally the place they’d chose to talk of such things but it was not normal for the two of them to bump into a rampaging panicked Fluttershy. This was what happened though, and it happened within the park, so the two concerned friend’s took their distraught friend to a more secluded area of the public park, sat her down on a bench, and began to calm her down. With their friend calm though, it was time for them to inquire about Fluttershy’s romantic situation, something they were perfectly delighted to do.

“W-Well, I didn’t confess or… or accidentally say I loved her.” Fluttershy began to mumble, immediately drawing uncertain expressions from her two friends.

Pinkie stopped mid-bounce and asked, “So let me guess this straight, you didn’t say you love her by mistake?”

Fluttershy fidgeted about where she sat and replied, “N-no, you see, Rainbow Dash was reading my book and—”

“Rainbow Dash was reading your diary!” Rarity shouted out, aghast though not totally surprised that Rainbow Dash would invade somepony’s privacy in such a manner.

“Oh no, no, no. It wasn’t my diary she was reading, it was a foal’s book I had written.” Pinkie and Rarity looked to Fluttershy with utmost confusion as they waited for her to explain, “When we were young I wrote this book about us, as bunny rabbits and it’s um, got romance in it…”

Fluttershy’s voice became quiet as she grew more and more embarrassed about discussing her foalhood creation, so it was unknown whether Pinkie Pie was aware she was cutting off her friend when she asked, “So you didn’t, upfront and without any possibility of her misunderstanding, say you love Rainbow Dash… to Rainbow Dash.”

“Ummmm, no,” Fluttershy answered, unsure where her friends were going with the conversation.

The unicorn and earth pony shippers looked to one another with quivering expression, uneasiness to their smiles, and lowered brows forming frowns upon their faces.

Rarity placed both her hooves on Fluttershy’s shoulder’s, looked her in the eye, and asked, “Fluttershy, are you telling us, having once been effectively handcuffed to Rainbow Dash for almost two weeks straight, that she is aware of romance to the point she can deduce you love her from reading a book?”

Fluttershy did not reply at first, seemingly lost in thought; however after a minute of silence she murmured, “Oh.”

“That was what I thought dear.”

“Then that means everything is okay,” Fluttershy cheered, a smile rising up on her face, “Rainbow Dash did not find out I love her.”

“Yep, and now it’s the perfect time to tell her you do.”

“W-what?”

Rarity nodded to Pinkie’s suggestion and added, “She’s right, dear. Rainbow Dash is probably worried about how you reacted, and she will demand answers.”

“Meaning all you have to do is tell her the truth about why you went cray-cray and tell her you love her,” Pinkie said with a sing-song voice, “Easy-peasy-lemon-squeezy, make sure you don’t get it in your eye, cause squeezy lemon stings, stings, stings.”

“I know I said I would tell her my feelings, but today? Today-Today?”

“Fluttershy, I know it’s a little sudden but this I can say is the perfect opportunity to confess.”

Just then Angel burst out of the bushes, frantically waving his little arms about and leaping for Fluttershy’s attention. Before Fluttershy could even ask what the matter was, Spike came out of the bushes, followed shortly by both Twilight Sparkle and Applejack.

“Wh-what’s the mat-“Rainbow Dash has been foalnapped!” Spike, Twilight and Applejack all yelled.

Fluttershy looked towards Rarity in silence, the latter merely replying, “Or maybe not.”

Eyes alert, and with a unicorn scanning the very area with a life detecting spell, the ponies, dragon, and rabbit approached the cottage. They moved cautiously around the large hole in the ground, taking note of it and, after Fluttershy told them she had no gophers, moles, or badgers of such a large size, wondering what kind of creature could have made such a hole. Continuing on, none of the party could spot a single sign of Rainbow Dash or her foalnappers still being within the area. They could however tell that said foalnappers were an aggressive bunch, spotting Fluttershy’s cottage door laying in the river, and her doorway exposing the insides to her house.

Once inside the cottage, Pinkie decided the time for silence had passed. “Hello, mean foalnappers, can we have Dashie back please?”

No response.

“Ah don’t think there here anymore,” Applejack said, but remained on guard.

Spike meanwhile was listening, or rather watching Angel Bunny. “Angel says they left a letter.”

“Oh, those ruffians! Foalnapping ponies, vandalising properties, and they don’t even have the manners to hoof us the letter in pony,” Rarity scoffed as she looked around for this supposed letter.

“Well I don’t see any letter,” Twilight said before walking out the front door, “I’ll check the letter box.”

“Hey, maybe one of us is standing on it,” Pinkie suggested as she looked to the ground, “Well what do ya know? I am standing on it! And so are you Applejack! And Rarity! And…”

Pinkie trailed off as she and all her friends took several steps back from the envelope they had been standing on. Twilight Sparkle had come back to the cottage upon hearing Pinkie’s discovery, but did not enter for fear of stepping on the envelope that lay on the floor. The seven of them looked to the envelope bigger than each and every one of them.

“That is one big letter.” Pinkie commented as Rarity carefully used her magic to open the envelope while Twilight carefully used her own magic to remove the letter from it. Twilight then laid the letter onto the floor so all of them could read it.

Dear Flutturshi,

I hav com back fore my revenge and capturd ur colorful luvur. If u onet im back, ull hav 2 get 2 my cassel and fight me fore im. All u hav 2 doo iz follow de fairee and shell take u 2 me. R u a bad enuff dude 2 resque ur luvur?

Sincerely, ur Arch-Nemesis.

P.EZ. Pleeze dont tell ur princessis, dey scare me.

“Oh no, it’s a letter from my arch-nemesis!” Fluttershy yelled out in horror to the sound of dramatic thunder.

Silence ensnared the room at that point. As Angel left the room, heading outside, the rest of the group looked at Fluttershy, at the letter, at each other, all in disbelief over the events that had occurred. Fluttershy nervously fidgeted on the spot, waiting for somepony, or anyone, to say something.

“This pony’s spelling is atrocious!”

“Yay, adventure time!”

“Oh I can see it now; clearly a bitter rival of love has taken to drastic measures to take Rainbow Dash all for herself.”

“Now how in tarnation did you get yourself an arch-nemesis?”

“Um, well, he’s not a pony an-and—”

“Well he forgot to add an ‘e’ to the ends of the words ‘have’ and ‘come’.”

“Hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to adventure we go!”

“Perhaps an enemy from your fashion model days? Some of them can get so jealous.”

“No, Ah need to know how somepony as kind as you ‘ave yourself an arch-nemesis.”

“It’s a long story, I’m sure you don’t want to have to listen to it all right now.”

“Colourful has a ‘u’ in it, Rainbow Dash is a ‘she, and how do you misspell castle as ‘cassel’?”

“Rarity, grab your diamond sword, you’ll need it for the giant crabs.”

“P-pardon?”

“Actually ah think ah’d like to hear tha’ there story, it’s unusual.”

“I-It is? Oh my, I’m sorry; I thought everypony had an arch-nemesis.”

“Hey look, a fairy.” Spike stated, and immediately every conversing pony stopped their conversation.

Looking in the direction of Spike, and then to where the little dragon pointed, they saw a small glowing ball floating by the door-less doorway. Then the group looked back down to the letter, reading the line ‘All u hav 2 doo iz follow de fairee’. The fairy giggled, flittered about in the doorway, and then began to fly away.

“After that fairy!” Twilight ordered as she and her friends chased after it.

Outside the house, by his own little bunny house, Angel was assembling various tools and blueprints. He was in the midst of wondering how he would fit the chainsaw in his small rabbit sized bag when he heard the sound of a small stampede. Spinning around Angel saw his owner and her friends chasing after a flying ball of light, all of them heading towards the Everfree Forest. Shaking off his confusion, Angel put on his bag, grabbed hold of the chainsaw and… failed to move at all. Sighing in disappointment, Angel grabbed a smaller saw of the non-chain variety and ran off to join his owner in the chase.

Fluttershy would have greeted her bunny as he hopped onto her back with a saw in his paws but her breath was currently being taken up by running. Twists and turns around trees and over hedges, the fairy took delight in not making things easy for the group, giggling louder and louder with each stumble, fall, and bump they took.

“Hold it!” Twilight yelled out, her horn glowing with magic as she attempted to telekinetically grab the fairy, yet nothing happened, “My magic doesn’t work on it!”

Giggling continuously, the fairy’s pace increased as it stopped flying around in circles and instead charged straight towards a tree with a dull multi-coloured swirling vortex in it. The fairy went straight for the vortex and disappeared.

“Stop! Stop!” Twilight yelled out as the group tried to break, tried to not head straight into the vortex.

It was too late. They all made contact with the vortex, disappearing into it, and leaving the forest calm, quiet, and serene.

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away, there was a kingdom ruled by cute little bunny rabbits. The rabbits worked hard but played plenty and they all lived peacefully under the rule of their Bunny King. Now this beloved Bunny King had a daughter, and she was called the Shy Princess.

The Rainbow Knight and the Shy Princess, by Fluttershy: Page 1.

Author's Note

Special thanks to Ugugg93 for proof-reading and many thanks also go out to my various Fimfiction blog followers and friends who have helped me out with advice for this story.

It has been a long while since I wrote Magnetism but I finally present you with the 1st chapter of the story I gave you a preview of at the very end of Magnetism. I hope you'll all stick around and enjoy the 14 chapters I will be writing for this story, to which I aim to upload the majority all within two weeks of one another. That said you can hopefully expect the next chapter to be uploaded on either the 16th or 17th of November.

I'm open to any and all criticism so feel free to comment and I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Cheerio!

Chapter 2: Campfire Chat.

Born from simple sparks, the crimson flame feasted upon a fuel source of leaves with an insatiable hunger. In doing so it rose with strength, its fires growing more and more intense. Its heat spread warmth to the chilled ponies huddled around it, the blaze’s presence bringing calm to their worried state of minds. The body of flame that sprung forth at first as but a small ember even fought off against the surrounding darkness, and with an ever present victory bestowed light to the ponies. Within the dead of night, within the unknown woods, within enemy territory, the campfire was the greatest gift of all. It was also perfect for roasting marshmallows with.

At this exact moment, Pinkie Pie was awaiting for her marshmallow to roast as she stared eagerly at the stick. She was also attentive enough to keep an eye on her friends’ marshmallows, their attentions cast elsewhere. Fluttershy and Rarity were comforting one another, troubled by entirely different reasons. Fluttershy worried for Rainbow Dash. Rarity worried about keeping up her appearance without even a comb.

Spike and Angel were arguing over who could collect the most sticks and leaves for shelter. This argument felt like a repeat of an argument the two had previously, though back then their arguing had been over who could collect the most sticks and leaves for the fire.

Finally, Twilight and Applejack were interrogating a fairy.

Well, ‘fairy’ had been the only thing they knew the creature by when they had first chased it. Upon chasing it down and trapping it within a wooden cage, paw-crafted by Angel himself, they realised that the creature wasn’t exactly a fairy.

“Now then, we are going to go over everything one last time,” Twilight stated, her eyes focused on the ‘fairy’ they had caught, “Just reply yes or no, got it?”

From within the cage a small pony, the ‘fairy’, not even the size of Angel, raised her head, looking to Twilight with her bulging eyes as she gently flapped her Parasprite-like wings. She smiled, and in a voice high pitched and sickeningly sweet she replied, “Yep, yep, yep.”

“Okay then, let us begin.” Twilight cleared her throat, then stared eye–to-eye with their captive, “Your name is Parapony, correct?”

“That’s what I told you it was.”

Twilight and Applejack scowled at Parapony’s reply. Unthreatened by their stares, Parapony merely sighed, before dully informing, “Yes.”

“An’ you’re a pony an’ a Parasprite combined, right?”

“Yep.”

Applejack was circling around the caged Parapony, making sure there was no way for the hybrid to escape. Twilight was supposed to ask the next question but was instead pondering on the existence of the pony and Parasprite hybrid before her.

“An’ you mean to tell us that you were ‘created’?” Applejack asked slowly, her eyes narrowed.

Yet again though Parapony nodded her head and confirmed with a “Yep.”

“How is that even possible?” Twilight muttered under her breath, but pushing aside her curiosity she got back to demanding answers. “Furthermore, you mean to tell us that this whole place, this… land, was created by the same guy?”

“Yep! My father’s amazing isn’t he?” Parapony squealed, flapping her wings with glee.

“Your father?” Twilight and Applejack both asked in union.

“Yep! He made me, thus he’s my father, right?”

Parapony stared up at the two with large puppy eyes… at least as puppy like as insect-equine hybrid’s eyes could get, and soon Applejack uncertainly replied, “Ah guess.”

Parapony began to giggle once more, a seemingly consistent habit of hers, but was interrupted by the sounds of a rumbling belly, “Oh oh! Food food! Can I have some food?”

“Here you go!” Pinkie Pie said as she instantly appeared beside Twilight and Applejack, and passed through the cage a marshmallow.

“Yay!” Parapony squealed before devouring the marshmallow in typical parasprite speeds.

Twilight and Applejack turned their prior scowls to Pinkie, whom simply answered back, “What? We can’t let her go hungry can we? She’s just a little filly.”

“More pwease?”

The two interrogator’s expressions softened, while a still smiling Pinkie added, “Oh, and you two should probably eat your marshmallows before they burn.”

Following Pinkie’s suggestion, Twilight and Applejack turned to the fire where there marshmallows awaited them. While Applejack picked up her stick-stuck marshmallow, Twilight telekinetically moved the caged Parapony into view, ensuring that the group would be able to see her.

“Oh lookie here, I can’t escape from this cage but nope, nope, nope! Need me in sight,” Parapony remarked with a sing-song voice.

“I’m just making sure,” Twilight said, and then proceeded to eat her roasted marshmallow. Giving herself a few seconds to swallow the roasted treat, she returned to asking questions, “Now then, just to confirm, you were sent here to guide us to Rainbow Dash?”

Fluttershy perked up at this point, and with Twilight, Applejack and the fairy now closer to the rest of the group, the others also started to pay more attention to the on-going interrogation.

“Guide you where colourful pony is? Yep yep yep!” Parony giggled further but before added on the side, “Though I was actually asked to bring just Butterfly Butt to the boss. You’re all extra’s father wanted to have come along.”

Pinkie Pie snorted with barely supressed laughter at Parony’s nickname for Fluttershy, Fluttershy gulped at the mention of being brought to ‘the boss’, and alarm bells began to ring in Twilight’s head. “Wait, your father isn’t Fluttershy’s… arch-nemesis?”

Parony shook her head, with Fluttershy adding, “I-I know it’s been a while since I last saw my arch-nemesis, but I really can’t see him creating a fairy… not that I don’t think he couldn’t if he tried really hard.”

“Well, if the spelling of your arch-nemesis is anything to go by dear, I don’t think I could imagine it either.”

“So just to be clear, what exactly were your orders again?” Twilight asked.

“Um… To wait until Butterfly Butt has read the letter, then take her to the boss so he can have his revenge. Oh, and if anypony else is there, if they are not princesses then take them along too, we have surprises for them along the way.”

“Ooh, I love surprises.” Pinkie jumped into the conversation whilst jumping over to Parony.

“Yeah, about these ‘surprises:’ how about you tell us about them,” Applejack asked only to see two shaking heads.

“Then it wouldn’t be a surprise, silly,” Parony and Pinkie Pie said in union, including the ‘tut-tut’ they added afterwards.

Veins practically bulged from Twilight and Applejack’s heads as the synchronised speaking duo of Pinkie Pie and Parony chatted away, already dubbing one another as ‘Frenemies’. Applejack gritted her teeth and asked, “Okay then, next question—”

Parony then yawned loudly, interrupting her interrogation.

Rubbing her eyes and looking to the interrogating duo, Parony announced, “I’m sweepy. Good night.”

“You’re in the middle of an interrogation! You can’t just go to sleep!” Twilight shouted out in frustration but any further yells were put to a stop by pink hoof placing over her mouth.

“Twilight! She’s just a little filly, she needs her sleepy time.” Pinkie whispered in a manner that was somehow both friendly yet stern. “Besides she’s not going anywhere, we have her in a cage.”

Twilight looked to the ‘serious faced’ Pinkie Pie, then to the already snoozing pony-parasprite hybrid captive of theirs, and then back to Pinkie. With a sigh, Twilight closed her eyes and shook her head. “Okay, okay, we can ask her more questions when we begin travelling tomorrow.”

With their job of interrogation put on hold, Twilight and Applejack attempted to relax by the fire. The campsite was not loud nor was it silent; Pinkie Pie munched away at her marshmallows, Fluttershy and Rarity chatted away to one another, and Spike and Angel were still running about collecting sticks and leaves. Little sounds were a constant. With nothing to put her mind to, Twilight just stared absently into the fire, its bright blaze reassuring in their current, unplanned situation. Twilight eyes followed the waving flames, and gradually her eyes grew weary, shut them, and tried to sleep.

“Fluttershy, Ah really think you need to explain somethin’ to us all first.” Twilight eyes snapped open at Applejack’s statement, and her eyes shifted towards Fluttershy, much like everypony else’s did.

“W-what do you mean Applejack?” Fluttershy stuttered, her ears flattening as she spoke.

“Well for starters, how in the hay did you get yourself an arch-nemesis, sugarcube?” Applejack’s tone was harsh at first—though not intentionally—and she softened her tone as she continued. “Ah mean, this nemesis of yours busted up your house, foalnapped Dash, and built a world in a tree! How did a pony like you get into such trouble?”

“I must admit darling, I couldn’t have imagined you’d get on someone’s bad side to the point they’d foalnap a pony.” Rarity added in, though keeping a hoof slung across Fluttershy’s shoulder.

As if sensing his owner’s nervousness, Angel had arrived back at the groups camping ground. Spike soon followed, whilst the little rabbit laid down his collected sticks, walked on towards his owner, and snuggled in her forelegs. Fluttershy looked her animal friend with a smile, proceeding to fuss his head as she replied, “It’s a bit of a long story.”

“That’s okay! Stories are fun and there’s nothing else to do!” Pinkie Pie said as she pulled out another bag of marshmallows. “Except eat marshmallows, of course.”

“We’re all ears Fluttershy,” Twilight said before turning to Pinkie and whispering “Why do you have so many marshmallows with you?”

“Pinkie sense: it told me to bring marshmallows; lots and lots of marshmallows.”

Fluttershy waited until Twilight and Pinkie finished their conversation, as well as until Spike had sat down. With a now silent and attentive audience before her Fluttershy readied her words. She thought back to the time, the time she met her arch-nemesis, the time she met her Angel Bunny, the time she came to Ponyville. Fluttershy looked back to these memories and all the feelings she had experience and once ready, then began to tell her tale.

The events that led me to meet my arch-nemesis happened only a few years ago, before I had met all of you and when I had arrived in Ponyville for the very first time. In a way, it feels like a really long time ago.

I had just left school and had already brought my first house. I was amazed at how cheap it was; I never would have imagined I’d have been able to buy a house so quickly.

“Wow,” I remember uttering, looking with awe at my tree cottage, though back then there was a tad bit more foliage.

“I can’t believe this cottage is only twenty bits,” I said as I turned around to the property salespony, “It-It’s not haunted, is it?”

“Nope, not haunted ma’am,” I remember the pony replying, though thinking back, I’m sure he whispered something under his breath about the house being next to the Everfree forest.

“Ah remember the town talkin’ ‘bout that, we all thought some courageous, fearless knight had come to live in Ponyville.” Applejack chuckled.

“That, or some crazy pony that thought living by the Everfree Forest was a good idea,” Rarity said with a snicker, as she too remembered the gossip about Ponyville that day.

Y-yes, I found that out, in one of my first trips into town. Upon getting my house, I was quite content to just greet all the animals that had taken shelter within it and let them know I would be living there from now on. We became friends quite quickly and they were fine with me setting my stuff up. I even bought some bird houses, cut out the holes a bit more for the mice, and made sure I knew where each animal was staying.

Eventually though, I needed to go down town, I needed food, supplies, and a job. Thankfully the tax was low on the house thanks again to it being by the Everfree Forest, so I didn’t have to worry about needing one for a while. That said, simply the thought of meeting the townsfolk for the first time was terrifying! I had chosen to live in Ponyville because it was the only place with a house I could afford and I had no idea what the ponies were like there back then.

After about four days of having been set up in my house, I ventured down town and, well, realised my worries were for nought … and that I was very lucky.

“Come to think of it, what actually is your job?” Twilight asked, having waited for the moment Fluttershy would pause, “I mean, you care for all those animals but it’s not like you run a pet store or are a vet.”

“My job is… a little different. I’m actually just about to get to that,” Fluttershy said before continuing.

When I got into town, it was a lot busier than I expected. Ponies were out and about in either groups or pairs, all talking loudly with one another. A lot of them sounded angry and this just made me even more worried: I didn’t like talking with ponies when they were calm, let alone when they were angry.

But while searching for a job something unexpected happened.

“Hello little blue bird,” I called out to a bird that flew fast past my head, “How are you—”

It was then that a pony ran into me.

I was really dazed at first, but I could sort of see and hear what the other pony was saying. “No! Don’t go back into the house! Don’t go back into the house!”

I could just make out the sight of the blue bird flying into a house, and the pony that had bumped into me began to stomp the ground. I must admit, with the bird being involved I was curious as to what was going on, but I knew it was none of my business and so tried to walk away.

“Sorry about bumping into you.” I heard the pony say, and I flinched when she addressed me.

“Um, uh… T-that’s okay, I-I… eep!”

“Wow, you’re practically a social butterfly compared to how you were back then.” Pinkie said with a giggle as Fluttershy humbly smiled.

“Ooh, while you’re here, I don’t suppose you could lend a hoof?”

“Um, I—”

I tried to protest but it was no good. The other pony grinned with a “Thanks,” and pulled me over to her house.

“Now, I need your help getting these birds out of my house,” The pony said as she pointed to her house. Through it’s open door, I could see a small family of blue birds perched on a table, “When I rush these birds out of the house I need you to close the door. Then, I need you to distract them while I get back into my house.”

“Um, h-have you tried to… tried asking them to leave?” I suggested, only to be given an incredulous look from the pony.

“The birds? I’ve tried to shoo them out but they just keep flying back in.”

“No, that’s not what I meant, let me just trying asking them,” I said as I walked on into the house.

I was sure to walk up to the birds slowly and quietly. Even from a distance I could tell they were nervous and agitated, ready to fly around the room and out of reach if I made any sudden movements. I called out to them as I approached, “Hello there. How are you all doing?”

The birds fidgeted, clearly taking notice of what I was saying. Still, the group of four birds looked at me wearily and I noticed that their feathers were tattered. Whatever had happened, the birds had been having a rough time.

“Oh you poor things, why, whatever happened?” The birds didn’t reply, but I continued to talk to them. “I think I see what’s going on. You came here for shelter, but I’m sorry to say the pony here doesn’t want you living here with her. It is really inconvenient for her.”

The birds squawked at this, so I added, “But I would love to have you back at my place, you can stay with me if you want. I promise to care for you and help you get food if you need me to. All I need you to do is leave this pony’s house, okay?”

The birds were not moving, but they had stopped fidgeting and I could tell that they were considering my proposal. I decided to raise and reach out my hoof towards them. After a short while, the biggest of them hopped over to me. Tepidly, it touched my hoof with its wing, pulling it back at first, afraid I was going to do something, but seeing as I wasn’t it allowed its wing to touch my hoof once again.

I walked on outside with the birds in tow, and as soon as I came into view, the homeowner gasped, “H-how? How did you… oh thank you!”

“O-oh, it was nothing, I’m happy to help out whenever animals are involved,” I remember replying.

The pony then chuckled and remarked, “Best you not be telling other ponies that. They’ll all be having you help out with their pest problems.”

“Pest problems?” I asked, looking about the town on the lookout for any other animals.

“Yeah. Recently this whole town’s been overrun by animals. They keep coming into ponies’ houses and stealing food. Why, they made a real mess of the local boutique the other day.”

Rarity shuddered and muttered, “Rats, so many filthy rats.”

“Huh. I didn’t know Ponyville suffered a pest problem before,” Twilight stated, looking to the others with a scrunched brow.

“Ponyville’s always had a problem or two with the critters on account of bein’ right by the Everfree Forest ’n all,” Applejack explained.

“Though this time it was far worse. The animals were coming out of the forest in droves and wrecking everything,” Rarity continued on from Applejack’s explanation and then remarked, “Well, everywhere but Sugarcube Corner.”

“I wonder why. I threw them a party with balloons and cake and everything, but none of them came,” Pinkie added, looking back to the lack of animal guests with a set of downcast eyes.

Leaning over to Twilight, Applejack whispered to her friend, “Ah reckon the pet alligator and the loud canon had somethin’ to do with that.”

The fire crackled loudly at this point, drawing the ponies’ attention to the dying flame. Upon noticing the weakened campfire, they became aware of the lack of warmth they had previously and so with haste they gently tossed some wood for the fire to feast on.

“May I continue?” Fluttershy asked, and upon seeing a series of nods, did as such.

After that little incident and kind of getting involved with many more throughout my time in town, I was soon approached by Mayor Mare. She and the council had been trying to sort out the animal problem for a while now, but they hadn’t had any luck. Apparently seeing how I was able to communicate with the animals, they then decided to ask if I could solve the problem. I told the Mayor that I would love to let all the animals stay at my place, but I hadn’t found a job yet and without that I had no means to care and feed all of them. I was surprised when Mayor Mare gave me a job there and then.

“Wait, so you’re employed by the town council?” Twilight asked.

“Yes. I am employed as Ponyville’s official Animal Manager and Everfree Forest Border Control Officer,” Fluttershy stated with a smile, then adding. “Originally, they had me down as their Pest Control Officer, but I didn’t like my title referring to the animals as pests.”

“So you’re paid by the town council to take care of animals.”

“It’s the best job in the world,” Fluttershy announced with joy. “Although, there is a bit more to it than that.”

“And so that’s the story of how Fluttershy got a job.,” Pinkie Pie said as she bounced in place, a smile on her face the entire time.

The atmosphere of merriment turned to silence, then to awkward silence, which led to Applejack asking, “So what does this have to do with your arch-nemesis?”

Further silence ensued before Twilight mentioned, “That’s right, what does any of this have to do with your arch-nemesis?”

“It does have something to do with him, it just takes a while to get to that point,” Fluttershy reassured her friend. Clearing her throat out once again, she continued. “Now let’s see, I had just taken up my job as Ponyville’s Animal Manager.”

It did not take me long to gather all the animals from Ponyville and find them somewhere else to stay. Many of the animals had decided to stay with me, and thanks to the funding from the town council, I was able to buy them all the things they would need. Thanks to having so many animal friends, I was never lonely, despite being new to Ponyville, and I worked hard to ensure they were all happy.

As weeks passed though, more and more animals started to come from the forest. More worrying was how many of them kept coming to me with injuries. All sorts of animals, from the small ones to the big ones, were visiting me with bruises and scratches and even broken bones. I could tell that a lot of these injuries weren’t accidental; something was hurting these poor animals.

“Oh dear, oh dear. How did you hurt your paw again, Mr. Fox?” I asked my patient, but he turned his head away and refused to answer.

This was the case with all the animals I would tend to. I’d ask them who were hurting them, but they would all refuse to reply. Eventually I saw more hurt animals than I could bear to stand and so decided to investigate.

I told my animals about what I was going to do, I swore that I would find out who was hurting them, and readied myself to venture into the Everfree Forest. It, um, took a few days to build up the confidence though.

“Okay Fluttershy, you can do this.” I would say to myself, bags packed and standing in front of the forest entrance.

Looking into the ever-expanding darkness of the Everfree Forest—the area seemingly swallowing up any light and making it seem as foreboding as possible—I would freeze. Eventually I’d make up an excuse and return home, continue to tend to the animals. Eventually—partly because of a few more injured friends—I finally urged myself into the forest. In fact, only a few short steps in, and I already witnessed my culprit in action.

“Ah, I get it now; this pony bullying the animals must be your arch nemesis,” Twilight concluded, with a smile and a nod.

“My, I never knew there was somepony responsible for causing that pest problem back then,” Rarity commented, turned to Fluttershy, “Go on dear, reveal to us your great and bitter enemy.”

Before my eyes I saw a squirrel struck down, by a simple slap to the face, by…

“Ooh, ooh!”

A bunny rabbit.

No response came from the listening ponies and dragon. Stunned silence followed, appropriate for this stunning revelation. Then it was followed by equally appropriate laughter.

“Are you saying Rainbow Dash was foalnapped by a bunny rabbit?” Spike asked amidst chuckles, falling on his back.

“Oh no! Not the bunnies! Anything but the bunnies!” Pinkie added with mock horror as she too feel on the ground, roaring with laughter.

Fluttershy meanwhile couldn’t fathom the reaction she was getting, “Um, I think you may have made a mistake, my arch-nemesis isn’t a bunny rabbit.”

Laughter died down quickly from Twilight, Applejack, and Rarity, but lasted much longer with Pinkie and Spike. Even as they heard the correction, the sheer thought of Rainbow Dash being held captive by a bunny rabbit amused them to no end.

“So why bring up the bunny then, we really, really want to know about your archy nemesissy.” Pinkie complained, waving her hooves in the air like they were made of rubber.

“Because this bunny is very, very important,” Fluttershy explained, Angel not being able to help but smile.

“Stop that!” I immediately yelled out as I dashed over to the two animals.

The rabbit thankfully stopped, but then jumped past me and started to flee. I first checked on the squirrel, a quick inspection telling me that little harm had been done, but I still wanted to apprehend the bullying bunny. I flew on after the rabbit and out of the Everfree Forest. I was able to follow him for a while but he was far too fast and I… wasn’t very good at going fast, or flying, or flying fast. In the end I had to stop, exhausted, and the rabbit had gotten away.

I asked my fellow animals if the bunny rabbit has been the one who had been bullying them. They shook their heads and told me no. Maybe I had just stumbled upon a fight between two of the animals, likely over food, and so I decided to leave it at that.

Having once been into the forest, I was a little braver next time and was able to venture forward the day after. I had only managed to venture a little further than I had before when I encountered the same bunny. He was hiding in the bushes near a badger and looking straight at me. It was as if he wanted me to see him and when he had my attention he ran on over to the badger and began stomping the poor animal on the head.

“Stop that this instance!” I yelled out just like last time, and just like last time the rabbit ran past me.

Everything we did was just as before, I checked on the badger, saw he was okay, tried to chase the rabbit, who ran of the forest, then failed to catch him.

“Sounds like you needed to get in a work out. Ooh, do we get a training montage?” Pinkie added in enthusiastically.

Um, no, next time I went into the forest with a plan. I had my doubts that it was the bullying bunny who was causing the injuries to all the animals—he was just one adorable little bunny rabbit—but I knew I had to catch him and tell him off regardless. I next saw the rabbit tripping up and attacking a bear.

“Um, Mr bull-I mean Mr rabbit sir, over here,” I called out to the rabbit and he turned around to face me.

I then put my cunning plan into action; I threw a carrot to the ground and readied a net to catch him. He looked to the carrot, just as planned, he moved to the carrot, just as planned… then he threw the carrot at me, that wasn’t planned. The rabbit got away that time but that did not stop my resolve to catch the culprit.

Each time I entered the forest I would see the rabbit. He’d begin picking on an animal, and I would chase after him out of the forest. I once tried to trick him into slipping on some honey; he ended up jumping over and pushing me into it. I set up a net between the trees; he undid and used to trap me instead. I tried so many things but each time he’d escape and I’d end up chasing him out of the forest.

“Hmm, it seems to be that there is a pattern with this story of yours.” Rarity mused, the others nodding their heads in agreement.

“You mean how the rabbit kept leading me out of the forest?” Fluttershy asked, a group of nods answering her. “Well, I happened to notice this after a while as well.”

A couple of weeks later, after another failed attempt to stop the rabbit, I chose not to chase after him. He ran off out of the forest while I decided to venture further in. I really don’t know how the Everfree Forest can be so spooky, even in the day time, but it made me skittish and jumpy. Every crack of a twig, every rustle of the bushes, every sound that I could not recognise, they all startled me.

I then heard a tremendous crashing sound, and with it a great yell of pain. “W-w-what was that?”

Birds flew from the trees in panic, the ground trembled, and I shook with fright. Even after everything had settled down I was frozen to the spot, worried about what could have possibly made such a noise, but when I heard faint groans of pain, I could not help but rush over to the scene.

“H-hello,” I called out as I waded through the trees, and for the first time, met my arch-nemesis.

Rainbow Dash groaned in pain, attempting to stand up. The world around her swayed about due to her disoriented state. It also literally swayed about as a result of the swaying floor she was on. These two factors combined made the task of standing a futile one, and her shaky legs gave way for her to fall. On the plus side she at least wasn’t the type to get motion sickness, something that no doubt would have made situation even less enjoyable.

“Okay Rainbow, charging into steel bars wasn’t the best plan you’ve ever had.” The fallen pegasus groaned as she looked to the bars of the cage that entrapped her.

With time the cage stopped swinging and her head stopped rattling, allowing Rainbow Dash to leap back up onto her hooves. She eyed the cage with both hatred and intent, having been trying to find a way to get out its accursed confines since awakening inside it. So far bucking hadn’t worked, biting hadn’t worked, and head-butting definitely had not worked. To note, Dash now had sore hooves, jaw, and head.

“Who even keeps a giant bird cage anyway?” Rainbow Dash asked aloud in irritation, looking around at the hanging cage, “And where the hay is anypony? Don’t I at least deserve to have a guard to yell at?”

It seemed Dash’s demands were somewhat answered as she could then somepony approaching… that and she could feel somepony approaching as her cage and the very room shook and trembled.

“W-what in the…?” Rainbow Dash asked aloud, her voice itself unable to withhold the slight worry she had as the massive red doors of the room burst open.

Coincidentally, as Rainbow Dash began to see the one who ordered her capture, Fluttershy was describing to her friends the very same guy, the arch-nemesis of hers she had met so long ago.

He appeared to have fallen down a hole, a pitfall trap, but his belly was quite, um… I mean, he was quite big so he couldn’t quite fit down the hole.

Rainbow’s mouth hung agape as the towering green skinned creature, at least as tall and wide as an Ursa Minor, waded pass the doors.

He was trying hard to get out, using his four fingered hands to claw at the ground around him in an attempt to free himself.

Rainbow Dash eyes bulged as within the creature’s huge hair covered hands, being dragged along into the room was a large steel club equal in proportion to its thick muscular arms.

Eventually he began to make a little leeway, pushing off against the ground with his broad arms was enough to begin lifting his body out of the hole.

Rainbow Dash gulped as with each step the creature before her took, the room trembled more and more.

Out of the hole I could see him in full view, his dark green skin, his head riddled with protruding bumps…

Before her Rainbow saw the creature’s large jutting teeth, and his dark, violet eyes...

“Now Fluttershy, dear, are you sure that this is what you saw?”

“Yeah, it doesn’t sound like any pony, or zebra, or even griffon.”

“It sounds more like a big ol’ monster.”

“Y-yes, and it kind of sounds like you’re describing a… well a—”

Now girls, I’ve said before, my arch-nemesis isn’t a pony. Unless he’s turned into one now, who I saw that day was without a doubt…

Rainbow Dash had the hulking figure before her in full view. Despite being inside a huge hanging cage, the creature still looked down to her. She could see his large grin, displaying his yellowed rotting teeth and letting out his ghastly breath.

“Oh snap...” Was all the usually unintimidated pegasus could say, for towering before her was…

…An Ogre.

The princess of the bunny kingdom was very kind, very polite, but most of all, very shy.

“H-Hello,” the Shy Princess would whisper, but no bunny would hear her. She couldn’t make any bunny friends because she was so shy and her father was always busy running the kingdom. As such, the Shy Princess was very lonely.

The Rainbow Knight and the Shy Princess, by Fluttershy: Page 2.

Author's Note

Thanks goes to Ugugg93 for proof-reading this chapter as per usual.

Sorry about this chapter being a little late, organising my time has been a little tricky recently. In fact, even with this chapter being late as it is I was quite pressed for time. I fear I may have rushed my own edits and additions of this chapter, so if you spot any mistakes, my hastiness to upload this chapter might be the cause and I'll be thankful if you point them out along with any other critique you have.

As for a little bit of extra fun, I dare you try and name the Pokémon whom I have based the design of Fluttershy's arch-nemesis off of. Yes, I based an ogre's design, or at least the inspiration for how this ogre looks, off of a Pokémon. Cheerio!

Chapter 3: Campfire Chat Continued.

Chapter 3: Campfire Chat Continued!

“An ogre! I can’t believe we’re going to be facing an ogre; this is insane!” Twilight moaned and hollered, cradling her head in her frightened panic, “We’re doomed, doomed I tell you.”

“Now Twilight, there is no need to be so over dramatic about this.” Rarity advised.

“Talk about the pot callin’ the kettle black,” Applejack muttered under her breath, but clearly not quietly enough as she received a stern look from Rarity, “Ah mean, come now sugarcube, it can’t be that bad.”

“Have you even seen an ogre before?” Twilight snapped back with a strained smile, her worries beginning her usual decent into madness, strands of her mane already springing up.

Fluttershy raised a hoof, quietly inputting the answer ‘yes’ into the conversation as Applejack asked in retaliation, “’Ave you?”

“No,” The worrying mare said calmly, relaxing, and then panicking once more, “but I’ve heard about them, Princess Celestia has told me all about them. She would tell me about how they’re strong, brutish and big. They could reach the size of even the largest of whales and their simple minds and tough skins make them resistant to all kinds of magic.”

“Oh, I know what will cheer you up then; Big told me he’s not as big or strong as other ogres.” Fluttershy added, helping to soothe Twilight a little.

“He’s not as big as other ogre’s and he’s called ‘Big’?” Pinkie asked with a grin, already feeling a funny moment coming.

“His parents thought calling him that would help him grow bigger.” Pinkie Pie laughed and fell onto her back at Fluttershy’s explanation.

The shy mare then continued going on to help soothe Twilight some more, “There’s nothing to worry about, he’s nowhere near as big as say… the dragon we saw, at least half its size.”

“Only about half its size huh.” Twilight Sparkle then grabbed a stick telekinetically and began scrawling in the dirt.

“What ya’ writing?”

“The inscription for my headstone.”

“Come now Twilight, I’m sure we’ll figure something out, perhaps Fluttershy knows something about this ogre we can use to our advantage,” Rarity calmly added, waving a hoof toward the current storyteller.

Twilight sighed, rubbed a hoof against her head and conceded, “Maybe you’re right, please continue telling us about your arch-enemy, we need to know all you know about him.”

Fluttershy nodded, ready to continue from where she left off, but stopped upon seeing Pinkie raise a hoof, “Um, Fluttershy, just wondering, is Dashie going to be safe?”

Applejack grimaced and added, “Yeah, Rainbow Dash bein’ captured by an ogre of all thin’s is cause for concern.”

Worry passed through the group’s minds, fears of Rainbow Dash being thrown about by the beastly creature, at its mercy, and in some thoughts, at its hunger.

Fluttershy thought on this for a second, think back to her arch-nemesis, “Well…”

Rainbow Dash looked up at the still, menacing ogre before her with shock, awe and horror. The Ogre’s pure violet eyes stared down at Rainbow Dash, focusing intently on the pegasus. The Ogre gnashed his teeth together, grinding them for a brief moment, as if it were a habit done when thinking. The Ogre ground its teeth, then continued to grind its teeth, then did so louder and louder until…

“Will you stop doing that already!” Rainbow Dash yelled out in aggravation.

“I’m tryin’ to think how ta introduce myself! Wait a bit!” The Ogre yelled back, the sheer force of the yell sending Dash flying into the back of her cage, and losing her footing.

Sitting up, Rainbow rubbed the back of her head, and looked back to the now mumbling Ogre. Due to how loud said Ogre was it was not hard to hear that he was mumbling about his introduction, mentioning things such as making sure he was as scary as possible.

“You could start with your name,” Rainbow Dash suggested, still with aggravation in her voice.

The Ogre looked to Rainbow Dash perplexedly, put a grimy finger to his lips, licked said finger, and then decided that Dash’s suggestion was a good idea, “I am Big Boss!” Big Boss roared, Dash’s cage trembling from the volume and the pegasus had to take flight to avoid being shook about.

“And you,” Big Boss announced, pointing towards Rainbow Dash, “are my prisoner.”

This statement of fact did not sit well with Rainbow Dash, who glared back at Big Boss, and snapped, “Yeah, and why is that?”

“Well you see,” Big Boss began as he dropped down onto his hind, causing the room to once more shake, “I needed you to get to lure my arch-nemesis here.”

Rainbow Dash touched down on the floor of her cage, briefly grimacing at how cold it felt, and then looked to Big with confusion, “Your arch-nemesis?”

“That’s right.”

“What in the hay do I have to do with your arch-nemesis?”

Big Boss’s eyes widened, he leaned in closer to the cage and asked somewhat quieter than before, “You don’t know? Hasn’t she ever told you about me?”

“I don’t even know who you’re talking about and I’ve never heard of you before.” Rainbow Dash retorted.

Big Boss frowned and breathed out heavily. Then he grasped both sides of the cage and began shaking it furiously, all while yelling, “Why didn’t she tell anyone! How could she not tell anybody about my scariness? Why!”

Rainbow Dash ping ponged about the cage; grunts and swears slipping out of her mouth each time she banged against one side of the cage to the next. After a few seconds of this, Big Boss stopped rattling the cage, huffing and puffing, leaving Rainbow Dash to fall down onto the cage floor with her world spinning.

“Wait!” Big Boss blurted out as a thought struck him, “What if she was so terrified of me that she never mentioned it to anyone, for fear they’d be unable to sleep. Yes, that’s it, that’s it.”

“Y-yeah, sure buddy,” Rainbow Dash groaned as she continued to lay on the floor, not even attempting to stand at this point, “Now who are we talking about?”

Big Boss turned towards Dash, and with much dramatic flair answered, “Why, my arch-nemesis is only the most strong, the most scary… Fluttershy!”

“Wha…?” Dash mumbled, looking to Big Boss with disbelief… and then bursting out with laughter. “F-Fluttershy is your, is your arch-nemesis!”

“It’s true, it’s true, that magical eyed pony is my arch-nemesis!” Big Boss refuted, believing Rainbow Dash’s laughter to be a sign of disbelief.

Rainbow Dash reigned in her laughter, chuckles still escaping from her lips as she inquired, “So you foalnapped me in order to lure Fluttershy here to…”

“Have my revenge!” Big Boss answered with enthusiasm, stroking his club and laughing heartily, “Foalnapping her coltfriend was the easiest way to get her to come here.”

As Big Boss continued his laughter, Dash sat up and snapped, “Coltfriend! I’m a mare!”

Stopping his laughter, Big Boss stated questionably, “But Fluttershy is also a mare… mares can love mares?”

Rainbow Dash went to blurt out her answer but then paused and instead slowly replied, “Yeah, they can, but what does that have to do with me and Fluttershy?”

“Cause you’re lovers.”

Rainbow Dash blinked. Big Boss’s statement drifted into her ears, floated about her head, and then was processed. Rainbow Dash blushed.

“W-Wha-What?” Rainbow Dash stammered out, her jaw dropping and hanging agape.

“I have a real smart guy working with me and he came up with the idea. The villain captures the damsel and the hero follows to rescue her.” Big Boss said aloud with a grin, ignoring Dash’s stupefied expression. “I’ll be able to have my revenge on Fluttershy and none of those scary princesses or her friends will get in the way.”

“H-Hey, me and Fluttershy aren’t-”

“That reminds me,” Big Boss continued, undisturbed by Rainbow Dash’s attempts to correct him, “I need to talk to Zeb about those friends.”

Big Boss took a few of his heavy ogre steps to the open doorway, started to exit the room and close the giant double doors before him, but then turned around and called back to Dash, “Don’t you go anywhere now.”

The doors were closed, and Rainbow Dash was left trapped in the room once more, “Yeah, no worries about that.”

I stood still, frozen on the spot, and unsure what to do. Before me was the scariest creature I had ever seen. He had big teeth and big hands and big everything. That and he was frowning, his eyes were all menacing, like he was really mad at something.

“Gyahh!” He yelled and began stomping all of a sudden.

I yelped out in fright, hanging onto a nearby tree to stop myself from losing my balance; his stomps seemed to make the whole world shake.

“None of this seems all that encouraging Fluttershy,” Twilight announced, her hooves shaking at the thought of this ogre.

“That wabbit tricked me again!” He bellowed, throwing up his arms into the air, which um, let’s just say he could of done with a bath.

Covering my nostril and mouth as best I could I blurted out, “The rabbits been tricking you too?”

“Well Ah’ll be that was awfully brave of you Fluttershy.” Applejack complimented.

I realised immediately that I had stupidly blurted out my question. The ogre turned towards me, saw me and… screamed. Then I screamed. Then he continued to scream. Then I leaped into a nearby bush and tried to hide. Then he toppled over… and got stuck into the hole again.

I peered out of the bush, terrified of him approaching me, only to see and hear him calling out for help, “Aw, I’m stuck again!”

I stayed in the bush, my fear of him preventing me from coming out, but seeing him flailing his legs and arms, calling out for help, I couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. I reasoned to myself that he wasn’t that scary. He wasn’t a dragon.

The group looked back to Fluttershy with bulging eyes and slightly gaping mouths. The idea that a pony was scared of dragons: perfectly understandable. The idea that a pony wasn’t scared of an ogre: not quite so understandable.

So I crawled out of the bush and called out to him, “H-hello, d-do you need some help?”

Straining his neck to look past his uh, moderate sized belly, he looked at me with bemused eyes, “A talkin’ animal.”

“Actually, I’m a pony,” I replied as I fidgeted on the spot. “All ponies talk.”

“They do?! Wow!” Big drawled out and whistled before going quiet for several seconds, “Can you get me outta hole pony?”

I nodded, flew up to his outstretched hand, grabbed a hold of it and pulled.

“An you pulled him out of the hole!” Pinkie blurted out, then leaped on over to Twilight and slung a foreleg around her shoulder, “Worry not Twilight, Fluttershy can pick up an ogre. She’ll beat down this guy with her mountain lifting abs of steel.”

“Actually pulling on his hand didn’t help at all.”

Try as I might I couldn’t lift him out of the hole. So I had another idea instead, I’d try and push his feet down to the ground wherein he could push off against it and get out.

“Hold a second here.” Pinkie interrupted as she raised her hoof politely, “If his feet aren’t stuck in the hole… and you said earlier he was flailing his legs and arms… then that would mean…”

Pinkie Pie burst into laughter, “His heiny got stuck in the hole this time!”

“I… um, didn’t really consider that important enough to point out but yes.”

Anyway, I flew on over and began pushing down on his foot. It took a lot effort but I managed to get to touch the ground. He immediately dug into the earth with his toes, the floor cracking as soon as he started to put force into it. I flew out the way as he suddenly lurched up, free from the hole, and fell forth onto his knees.

“Ooh, ma toes hurt,” He said as he turned towards me, “Thank ya pony.”

“Oh, t-that’s okay.”

The ogre then stuck his hand out at me, showed me a large grin and said, “I’m Big.”

I backed away from his hand, looked him up and down through my mane and replied, “Y-yes, you are very, very big.”

The big fellow before me let his jaw hung, his jutting teeth quivered, as he looked around at his body, “No I’m not, I’m small.”

As I only measured up only to the size of his foot and had to look up to see he was as tall as most the trees in the Everfree forest, this confused me. “N-no, I assure you. You’re big.”

“I am Big but I’m small.”

I tried to work this all out in my head but it wasn’t until I look to his still stretched out hand that I realised what he meant. I put my hoof forth tentatively, “I-I’m Fluttershy.”

“An I’m Big! Hello Fluttershy.” Big the ‘small’ ogre said as he touched my hoof with a finger.

Big pulled back his hand and looked around the forest with fast shaking head. He stopped only to grumble, shake his clenched fist and moan, “Oh, that wabbit got away again.”

“Oh my, are you talking about a mean little rabbit?” I asked.

He turned to me with wide eyes and bellowed out his following question with such force it blew me over, “You know of the mean wittle wabbit?!”

“Um, yes.” I squeaked out, scrambling to my now unsteady feet. “He’s been bullying the animals so I’ve been trying to stop him.”

“He’s been picking on me too.” Big informed me, showing off some small but recent cuts and scratches. “I was just playing with the animals and he started pickin’ one me.”

“Oh you poor thing,” I noted as I saw his injuries, “I’ve got some band-aids back at my house. Would you like me to get you some?”

Big stared blankly at me, slowly opening his mouth. He raised his brow, his open mouth slipping to the side, and he leaned forth like an eager puppy. “You’d… you’d do that for me.”

I nodded. He grinned. Then he leaped up, dancing on the spot giddily.

“Yes please. I’d like that.”

That was how I made my first non-animal friend since Rainbow Dash.

“That is ever so sweet Fluttershy,” Rarity cooed but her happy expression quickly grimaced, “though in hindsight with him becoming your arch-nemesis, maybe not.”

“Yeah, how did ya’ll end up as enemies?” Applejack inquired with bleak eyes and a downcast smile.

Fluttershy mirrored Applejack’s expression, “I’ll… I’ll get to that point in a bit.”

From then on Big and I would often meet, working together to track down the mischievous rabbit. I’d spot the rabbit as usual, picking on a poor defenceless animal and then trying to lure me out of the forest.

Of course I would instead go into the forest and visit Big. I’d often find him in the very spot I first saw him, or around the area. It was a nasty place to be really, filled with all kinds of traps. Yet when the rabbit would pick on Big, this is the place he’d run back to. Surely it was there that the rabbit had his hideout. After discussing where the rabbit had been, as well having to help Big out of any trap he’d fallen into that day, we’d split up and look for clues.

“You went traversing about the Everfree Forest on your own?” Rarity questioned.

“Oh, it was only during the day. The Everfree Forest is slightly less terrifying during the day.”

Sometimes we’d never spot him. He was just one little rabbit, a crafty one who knew all the best places to hide, so spotting him was never easy. An then when one of us did spot him it never went to well.

I noticed him hopping from one bush to the next, poking his head out from time to time and looking about the place with a paw above his eyes. As I slowly and quietly snuck around, he kept on the lookout, even as he snacked on a small carrot. I thought I was doing my best to keep quiet, I thought he hadn’t noticed me, but a carrot hitting me kind of told me otherwise.

He began to run away so I asked, “Please stop, rabbit.”

He didn’t stop. I didn’t think he would have but it would have been nice if he did.

I ended up chasing after him, which was even harder to do far into the Everfree Forest. In comparison to chasing him closer to the edge everything more untamed, darker, and dangerous. I slipped through and around trees, constantly outmanoeuvred by him. I took one wrong turn and ended up walking into many low hanging vines.

“Oh no! Oh dear.” I gasped, trying to pull myself away from the bundle of vines but only getting more and more tangled up in them.

I tried to move out of the vines carefully at first but as they wrapped around my hooves I got more desperate. I began to flail my legs, resulting in the vines binding my legs, hugging against my body tightly… and tighter and-

“Fluttershy!” The shouted at mare snapped her eyes open to audience of ranging emotions.

Pinkie and Rarity smirked, hooves to their lips, whereas Applejack shifted on the spot with her hat over her eyes. Twilight looked back sternly, her eyes narrowed and her hooves remained pressed against Spike’s ears.

As Spike called out for Twilight to stop covering his ears and how he wanted to hear what Fluttershy was saying, the canary yellow pegasus of the group turned a tomato red colour, whispering, “Sorry.”

When I realised there was no way I was getting out on my own I called out to Big for help. I kept calling until, well, until I spotted all the spooky creatures about the place. I thought it would be best to wait in silence for Big to find me, to which thankfully did not take long.

“Bunny Wabbit?”

I sighed, “Bunny rabbit.”

Big reached along and snapped all the vines off the trees they were hanging from. He then lifted me down safely to the ground, where it was easier to start trying to untangle myself.

“Fluttershy?” Big asked as he sat down, nudging any loose vines away from me.

“Yes Big?”

“Why’d you want ta catch da wabbit?” I stopped trying to push the vines away and instead looked up to my wide eyed ogre friend, “Da wabbit is picking on me. That’s why I want ta catch him but he ain’t picking on you.”

I thought on how to explain things to him, I wondered if I even should, but seconds passed and I mumbled, “I… I don’t like bullies, that’s all.”

Big didn’t say much at first. He wedged his finger under one of the vines and tugged, giving me room to squirm out of its bindings.

“I was bullied,” Big mumbled. “It’s not nice.”

I couldn’t imagine anyone as big or as terrifying as Big being picked on, other than the daring bullying rabbit, so I stammered out “You mean… by the rabbit?”

Big shook his head solemnly, “By the ogres back home. They’d always tease me because I’m small.”

I looked my gargantuan friend up and down in disbelief. He seemed to notice this added, “For an ogre.”

I didn’t say anything else as I removed the vines from me. He didn’t either, just sat there in silence, dragging away any vines I got off. Once all the vines were off I looked at him, then looked to my wings, flapping them a couple of times to ease them out of being bound for so long.

“Fluttershy, Fluttershy, Fluttershy can barely fly.” I muttered, receiving a naturally bewildered look from my friend, “T-that was what, what the bullies would taunt. I-I’m bad at flying… for a pegasus.”

Big smiled, and quickly mentioned with an almost light hearted tone, “Big can’t lift, Big can’t lift.”

I reflected Big’s small smile with a small one of my own and replied, “They’d also call me Klutzershy.”

“Tiny Mouse.”

“Dirt lover.”

“Big can’t lift.”

“Um, you’ve already said that one Big.”

“Ogre’s aren’t good at coming up with words, even insults.”

It was strange. We regaling of our experience of being bullied, telling one another of all the mean words thrown our way, the nasty glares and the cruel pranks. Yet we smiled. We laughed. Letting it all out, telling it all to someone who understood, made the unpleasantness… soothing.

“A pony became friends with an ogre over being bullied. That certainly isn’t something you hear often… or at all.” Twilight remarked.

“It wasn’t just because we had been bullied that we became friends, Big also liked animals.” Fluttershy explained.

“See Twilight, this ogre isn’t so scary. He seems silly, is teeny tiny and likes animals.” Pinkie assured with several hard pats to her friend’s back.

“Yes, yes. The ogre isn’t as scary as I thought.” Twilight admitted, comparing what little she had heard about ogres to what Fluttershy had just been telling them.

“At the time I had never seen him with any animals. He said he kept them safe at his place in the Everfree Forest but had been unable to play with them much since the bunny started picking on him.”

The time of night having been long since set, the youngest awake member of the group felt its passing and a yawn emanated from the dragon. Spike brushed his eyes as drowsiness tried to take him to a land of slumber, shifting in place in order to keep awake.

“I’m assuming it’s pretty late. Perhaps you should get some rest Spike.” Twilight said, casting one eye of concern to Spike and an eye of wonder to the fake night sky above.

“Yes, perhaps we should all think about getting some beauty sleep.” Rarity suggested as she gently brushed her mane with her hoof, pondering how she’d style it in the morning with no comb nor brush in possession.

“Oh come on, can’t I at least listen to the end of the story.”

Spike’s pleas were answered by Fluttershy’s reassuring response, “Well, it shouldn’t take much longer to finish telling it.”

Twilight looked to her grinning assistant, rolled her eyes and relented, “Fine, it it’s almost finished.”

As the owls hooted in the night and howls of wolves could be heard in the distance, Fluttershy continued her tale.

Over the course of a couple months Big and I would continue to meet. From that day onwards it was not just to try and track down the rabbit bully but to also chat as friends. It had been an awful long time since I had a non-animal friend and I was still too scared to talk long with any of the ponies back in Ponyville.

“Yet not to be speaking to an Ogre in the Everfree Forest?” Applejack said with a tinge of amusement, raising light chuckles from everyone in the group.

During that time the injured animal situation was beginning to trouble me more and more. More of the animals were coming to me with their cuts, bruises and even broken bones. They’d literally beg to stay and oh, I couldn’t resist letting them.

I was really beginning to wonder how the bunny was managing to hurt so many creatures. I wouldn’t see the bunny bullying the animals all the time, though I heard from Big that the bunny would lure him into traps more frequently, and I doubt he could have hurt so many of these bigger and more ferocious animals. I came to the conclusion that it must have been the traps he were using, it was how we managing to hurt Big so surely it was how we was managing to hurt the bears, boars and Manticores.

Thankfully though, mine and Big’s efforts of trying to catch the bunny were eventually met with success. I was chasing after him as per usual, though in recent days I had acquired a small cage to trap him in. So far I had been unable to catch him in but that day…

“Stop, Mr. Rabbit!” I cried out, running after the rabbit that dipped and dove around the trees, heading in the direction of my cottage and out of the forest.

It was then that I tripped, the cage I had been carrying flying out of my hooves. He must have heard my fall, as he stopped and turned around to check. Miraculously, the cage that had been flying through the sky landed right on top of the little bully, open door first. The cage rolled about, stunning the animal. So I seized my chance and leaped to the cage, locking its door before the rabbit could get out.

“Ah-hah!” I shouted out as loud as I could with triumph, holding the caged bunny in my hooves. “Look here you mean rabbit, I’ve finally caught you.”

I held the cage down to my face to see the rabbit up close. He didn’t look any different from most rabbits. His fur was a beautiful snow white and he had long perky ears and a cute button like nose. They real difference was the scowl on his face, as he crossed his little paws and ‘huffed’.

“Now then, are you going to behave yourself from now on and stop picking on all the animals around here?” I tried to demand of him but he didn’t respond.

I asked once more and got a response, a small sigh and a slow, nod. He didn’t look at me as he nodded and I could tell he wasn’t putting his heart into it. Luckily I knew just what to do to make him understand how much he’d been hurting everyone.

“Just to be sure I’m going to have you apologise to everyone you’ve been picking on, understand.” Again he didn’t bother to look at me as he nodded.

I strapped the cage to the side of my saddle and set forth deeper into the forest. Shortly after beginning though I heard the cage rattle incessantly. I looked down to my captured rabbit, who raised an eye and pointed back to the direction of my cottage.

“Oh, don’t you worry, I’ll be taking you back to apologise to all the animals you injured soon.” I explained to him as I continued along my current direction, “But I’m also aware that you’ve been bullying a friend of mine in the Everfree Forest and I’m going to have you apologise to him first.”

The confused expression of the rabbit continued, even as I looked away from him. He kicked against the cage some more, grabbing my attention, with his set expression still on his face.

“Oh you know the one, that poor, um, little for his kind, ogre that lives in the forest. We’re going to see him and you’re going to apologise for all the picking on him you’ve done.”

I felt the cage lurch at the moment. The previously irritated but calm rabbit had turned rabid, shaking the cage about as much as possible. I looked back to him to see him looking as alarmed as he was acting, constantly bashing about inside the cage.

“Oh, I see now, you thought you could just pick on him without worries; always sure you could run away from him and not pay the consequences. Well now you’ll have to face Big and pay for what you’ve done.”

This probably wasn’t the best thing to say as the rabbit still didn’t calm, continuing to hit and scratch and bite at the bars of his cage. I was certain the cage would hold and that the rabbit would soon tire out so I continued onwards undeterred.

I eventually made my way to mine and Big’s usual meeting spot, only to find him not there, “Big. Big, where are you?”

The rabbit stopped rattling his cage to snicker and ensure I heard his relief.

“Now look here mister, I’m not letting you out of this cage until you apologise to Big as well, understand?” I said back to the trapped rabbit.

Continuing to look around and call out for him, I saw no sight of Big. It’s not like I could miss him, ogres tend to be pretty easy to spot. After waiting at the spot for a few more minutes, looking about the area, something caught my eye.

I walked on up a row of tree’s that lead away from the spot and deeper into the Everfree. They were bent and leaning outwards, like a large creature forced its way through them day after day… like an ogre.

“If Big isn’t here then,” I looked around me at the foreboding creepiness of the Everfree Forest and then back to the rugged worn path, “I’ll just have to find him myself.”

It wasn’t difficult to track Big. I just had the follow the most trampled on routes, the tree’s that had regularly been pushed aside and his… distinct smell. I was actually a little worried I was going into some large Everfree monster instead but the smell, thankfully, told me I was going the right way.

All throughout I was happy to hear that the rabbit was no long causing so much noise. He was teething a little as I could hear his little nibbles against the metal bars, but it was nothing to worry about.

Throughout the Everfree Forest I had seen many spooky things. Things that made me want to run back home immediately. I needed to see Big though so I went on, hiding whenever necessary. I was really quiet so nothing seemed to notice me and nothing seemed to approach me, but I had seen many horrifying things. The worst though was when the trail was coming to an end.

I gasped the moment I saw the poor injured lovely little fox. It was limping about, it’s leg clearly injured. I immediately tried to approach but it shied away, frightened. Still it was injured and as such unable to get away. I placed my hooves, sung soft words, all to calm the shaking fox as I did my best to bandage its leg, try to straighten it as best I could.

The moment I finished the fox unsteadily scampered off. I figured it wasn’t anything to be too concerned about, the poor dear may have just gotten into a fight with another animal, but it unnerved me all the same.

I walked onwards a little to find myself in a rather open area. The tree’s had been uprooted and pushed to the side, leaving a lot of space for whatever creature lived in the cave just up ahead of the clearing. Well, rather who, I was sure that this would be where Big lived.

I felt the cage rattle some more, the rabbit getting more frantic, “Now, now. Big may look scary but he really is a sweet thing. I’m sure he won’t be mad once you apologise.”

I started to slowly make my way into the cave. Knowing my friend was sure to be in there kind of relieved me, I wasn’t scared of going in. It also helped that the moss inside the cave was glistening; it was so bright that I could see everything. I could see all the cracks in the walls, the rocks on the ground… and the animals in cages.

“Wait, back up one second. Did ya say animals in cages?” Applejack blurted.

Fluttershy nodded but didn’t speak. Her hooves twiddled around one another and her mouth opened several times but no words followed.

“Yes,” Fluttershy eventually said, having found the choice of words she was looking for. “I found inside the cave numerous animals in cages.”

“Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!” I mumbled, running up to the large cage filled with animals.

The size of the cage, many times bigger than myself, was the only relief to be found. Squirrels and bears, mice and snakes, bats and blue jays, all sorts were within the single cage looking down and miserable. The poor creatures were all scrawny, their coats bleak and lifeless, all signs of their lack of food and time spent within the dark.

“Don’t worry animals, I’ll get you out.” I cried out to them as I pulled my hardest on one of the cages large log bars.

It came out. It came out so easily in fact that it almost fell on top of me, unable to hold up its weight all on my own. Regardless of how easy it was, it didn’t matter to me. What did matter was that the animals could now get out of the cage.

“C’mon little ones, you can get out now.” I ushered to the animals, who one by one, slowly came towards me.

Then from further back in the cave came a large thud. Then more thuds, each one louder and louder. Each thud getting closer and closer.

The animals that had been moving to exit the cage did so, grabbed a hold of the log bar, got back into the cage and put the log back into place.

“Wh-what are you doing? You need to get”- I stopped talking as I heard the thudding noise right up by me. Felt it too as it lifted me off the ground.

“Animals! You aren’t trying to run away again.” I heard a familiar voice yell and looked up to see Big, who looked down to see me. “Fluttershy? You came to visit me?”

I did not know what to say. Of course I had gone to this cave believing Big to be there. I shouldn’t have been surprised to see him. Yet seeing the caged and injured animals, knowing that whoever lived in this cage was most likely responsible… I had just immediately put thought of my friend being in the cave out of my mind at that point. I didn’t want to make the connection.

“Fluttershy, what’s that you got there?” Big’s question snapped me out of my thoughts and brought my attention back to him, “Is that a cage?”

“Um, yes.” I said, remembering the very reason I had come to see him, presenting it before him, “I caught the bullying bunny.”

“Ya caught the wabbit!” Big yelled with joy as he leaped up and down and terrifying the entrapped animals.

Big lowered his hand, one of his four fingers pointing up to the caged animal I held. I could tell what he wanted from the gesture and so reluctantly placed the contained and fuming rabbit into Big’s hand.

“Speaking of catching animals…” I began to say as I looked towards the caged creatures within Big’s cave, “What are all these animals doing in that cage?”

“Oh, those?” Big asked as he held up the rabbit and inspected him closely. “Those are my pets. They keep running away from me so I put them in that cage.”

I looked to the miserable and hurt animals, whose eyes begged for freedom, were begging me for it, “Um, an where did all those injuries come from.”

“Ah said, they kept running away.” Big explained as he placed the rabbit down onto the floor, to whom was still gnawing at his cage. “So I catch them, sometimes ah have wrestle with them. They bite back so I have ta scold as da ogres would back home.”

I kept looking at the animals, conspiring how Big’s methods, even if were a mere slap, would be terrifying for any of these animals, “Big, I really don’t think you should-What are you doing!”

I couldn’t help but scream as I saw Big raise his giant foot high above the bunnies cage. I never had sprung forth so fast in my life, flapping my wings for acceleration, grasping the cage and sliding out of the way of Big’s heavy stomp. I held the bunnies cage close to my chest, panting for the suddenness of the action.

“Fluttershy! You have to be careful, ah almost squashed you.”

I pulled myself off the ground, flew up to talk to Big face to face and snapped, “Big, what were you trying to do?”

“Squish the bunny.” Big said in such way as you’d say you were having breakfast or going for a walk.

This just… that just made me mad. I… I couldn’t help myself but the way he said it and he tried to do just made me so very mad.

“Why would you squish him?” I asked him.

I’m sure Big could tell I was upset, his voice seemed to soften but his expression was of confusion, “Cause he’s been picking on me. I squash him and he won’t pick on me no more.”

“You-you can’t do that! It’s not right.” I yelled back, my throat already feeling hoarse from how much I had been yelling.

“Not right? It is right!” Big shouted out loud, stomping his foot down this time in frustration, “I was happy just playin with my animals when they just kept on disappearing. I tried lookin for them but when I did the wabbit started attacking me. He stopped me finding ma animals!”

Something Big has said struck me, something that sounded familiar and to which I thought upon as he continued to say, “Now that I’ve got the wabbit I’m gonna squish him. Then I can go find where he hid ma animals and put them back where they belong.”

I looked to the caged animals. The bruised animals, the beaten animals, the animals that now feared to run away… the animals with injuries that couldn’t have been caused by something as small as a rabbit, only by something as big as an ogre.

“Big, did you… did you scold these animals?” I asked quieter than normally, even for me, and it was only thanks to Big’s big ogre ears that he heard me.

“Ya, I have to do that with a lot of the animals. They don’t listen to you at first until you give em a whack, just like an ogre.” Big answered and then of all the things he could he laughed.

It may be he was laughing at something back home, something to do with the ogres who have a disciplinary method I don’t at all agree with, but at the time I could not help but link that laughter to the hurt of animals. Each bellow of laughter seemed to come with the thought of an animal being slapped about by a large, green, ogre hand.

“Sometimes they’re really quick and, and small. This morning I had a fox in the cage but he escaped. I hit him but he still got to the trees and through the plants and I just couldn’t find him after that. With that wabbit no longer able to hide em I’m sure I’ll… are, are you crying Fluttershy?” Big stopped his regaling once I had started to tear up.

“N-no,” I managed to say as my eyes watered, “No I’m not all right.”

“H-how come? Are you hurt? Hungry? I suppose I could let you eat one of the mice if you need to-

“No!” I remember screaming out, “I’m not all right because I’ve found out that my friend is a big, mean, bully!”

Big gasped, reeling back at my words, “I-I am not a bully.”

“Yes you are.” I cried out, pointing a hoof towards ‘his pets’, “You’ve been taking these poor animals from their homes, locking them up in cages and beating them!”

“I already told ya why I do that!” Big shouted back. “The real bully here is that wabbit. He’s been hidin ma animals.”

“No he hasn’t. I have!”

Big didn’t respond to that. I couldn’t tell what expression he had on his face. I was looking down to the ground, trying to wipe the tears out of my eyes. As I did so I heard no sound from him, not until I looked back to him at least.

“Wha-Why would ya”-

“The animals, they came to me.” I rudely interrupted him to say, “They came to me injured. I help them out, helped nurse their wounds and since then they’ve refused to leave my cottage.”

Big’s jaw trembled, his two jutting fangs bobbing up and down as he smoothly suggested, “Th-then, you can give em’ back right?”

I looked him in the eyes and said “No Big. I… I won’t give them back to you if you’re going to treat them like this.”

“B-but…” Big started to babble before flailing his arms in the air, jumping up and down in a tantrum. “But they’re mine. Ah caught them, I beat them so they’re mine.”

“Which is exactly why I can’t let you have them. You’re bigger and stronger than them and so hurt them very easily. You can’t just boss them around like that.” I tried to tell him but it was hard to even hear myself over his jumping.

“I’m the biggest and strongest around here. That means I’m the boss. It was the same back home and it is the same here!” Big hollered as slowly stopped jumping, huffing and puffing. “Now I’m telling you, give me back my animals.”

“No!”

I was filled with confidence at that point. Then Big roared. That dampened my confidence. Then he raised his large arms high up. That unnerved me. Then he swung them down. That blew me away, as in literally blew me away.

I was blown backwards to the ground around the same time as his fists hit the ground, the earth flying up from the heavy impact. I was dazed by the sudden fall and with the small quake making everything in the cave shaky, unable to get up onto my hooves. I could see though Big approaching me, the before friendly ogre making me as scared of him as when I first saw him.

“Give me the animals back Fluttershy!” He demanded, his hot breath slipping through his teeth.

I shook my head. Then Big roared again, sending shivers down my spine.

All of a sudden though Big stopped roaring. The noise of the angry ogre ceased and instead I heard a single clanging sound, that of something metallic hitting the ground.

Big turned around, his foot kicking aside the small cage I had been carrying and what I assumed had just been thrown towards Big. Looking past Big though I spotted the previous captive of the cage, the rabbit bully, by the entrance of the cave. He smirked, blew a raspberry and ran off.

“Wabbit!” Big hollered out, falling down to all fours and charging at the escaping bunny rabbit like a bull seeing red.

The sound of Big’s rampage grew fainter and fainter as he chased the rabbit further and further away. The absent of the sound and the anger within the air made everything feel a little better, more soothing. The atmosphere helped me to stand up in a way, made me feel that I wouldn’t be falling down again anytime soon.

I made my way to the log cage and removed one of its bars once again. The animals, although nervous, smiled to me. I didn’t need to usher them out of the cage. I simply smile backed and they came out, one by one exiting the cage and one by one exiting the cave.

I let out a sigh. I had no idea what to do. Earlier I had just done things in the heat of the moment, argued back because that was what came to me. Then though, in a sudden calm moment where I had time to think of what to do, I had no idea. I looked down to the small cage, the cage to which I had used to trap the bully rabbit. It got me thinking, if the rabbit was not responsible for all the injured animals then why had I seen him picking on them? I thought back to the events involving the rabbit. How he’d wait for me to see him, how he’d lure me away from the forest, how he’d been picking on Big and then it all clicked. I understood now what had been going on.

I heard a crash. That of tree’s being flung aside and knew that in the distance Big was still chasing the rabbit. Of course I had no idea what to do still. There was no way I could help after all. But in thinking on all that the rabbit had done for me; how he’d been stopping Big from finding out where all the animals had been going, how he tried to stop me from entering the forest and encountering Big, I knew I had to do something.

I flew out of the cave and headed straight for the sky. Then I looked down below, witnessing the carnage that had been wrought and following where said carnage was continuing to go. A little ways ahead I saw a patch of the Everfree Forest where the rocks rose up higher than most of the trees. It was towards this area that more and more trees began to tumble down and bellows of anger could be heard.

“Okay Fluttershy, you can do this.” I reassured myself as I flapped my wings as hard as I could and sped off in the direction of the rabbit and ogre.

By the time I could see Big, cornering the rabbit up against the rocks, I was exhausted. My lungs hurt, my wings hurt, yet I only flew faster. Faster as Big laughed and faster then as Big raised his arm.

“Wabbit goes squish now!” Big bellowed, while I flew under his legs and landed in front of the rabbit.

Big’s descending fist stopped and he moaned, “Fluttershy! Stop getting in ma way!”

“No, Big.” I replied back as I felt myself growing more and more determined, once more flying up to meet him face to face, eye to eye, “You stop.”

“Wha?” I heard Big mutter as I opened my eyes… and then I heard him yelp with fright.

“You listen to me right now!” I guess this was when I first learnt how to use the Stare. It must have been as the large and terrifying ogre before me stumbled backwards and fell over, his whole body shaking. “You have been a bad ogre.”

“But”-

“No but’s mister. You have been picking on animals, using your size and strength to bully them around, to hurt them. An worse of all you don’t think there is anything wrong with that.” I scolded him as his eyes diluted, unable to pull away from my stare, “To top it all off you made me think you loved animals. You made me think that a bunny rabbit was picking on an innocent ogre. You made me think we were friends.”

Big started to sit up, his jaw opening ever so slightly as he tried to say, “We are fr”-

“No Big! You hurt all these poor animals. Now either say you’re sorry and promise to never hurt or order these animals around again…” I started to demand of him, my stare unflinching, “or leave and never come back!”

I couldn’t hear much of anything after that. The forest was silent. There was no wind, no animal noises, no monstrous sounds that had no explanation. I only heard my thudding heart and deep breaths.

I could only see Big before me. His soft terrified expression trying to frown. I saw his try to bare his teeth, to push his head forward and scowl. But fear would take over. No matter how much he tried he couldn't bring himself to roar back, to retaliate fear with fear... he was terrified.

I then watched as Big scrambled to his feet, kicking up huge heaps of dirt. He turned his back to me and then ran. Without a word, nor a roar nor a yelp he ran away. It seemed like he ran on forever, or rather I watched him run on forever. I flew on the spot and watched as my 2nd non-animal friend left.

I dropped down to the ground, disheartened by it all. I had just lost a friend, even if I found out he was a meanie, it hurt all the same.

I didn’t want to dwell on it any longer. I turned my attention instead to someone who needed my help there and then, “Um, bunny rabbit.”

I was startled to see the rabbit lying down on the ground, unmoving. Rushing up over to him I was relieved to see his chest rising ever so slightly.

“Poor guy, he must be exhausted.” I said to myself as I picked up the rabbit and headed on home.

I thought to myself about all he had done. Tricking me to think he was the bully so I wouldn’t track down the real culprit, leading me away from the Everfree Forest, protecting me. I couldn’t help but the pure white rabbit was like a guardian angel. It was at that moment I thought up the perfect name for him. A name fitting for a beautiful rabbit that worked hard to protect me and the animals.

I named him Angel Bunny.

While nightlife began to make some noise throughout the rest of the forest, it was quiet where the ponies sat. Fluttershy finished her tale but no one decided to speak, instead allowing themselves the time to take all of the information and think it over.

The fire flared up once or twice, a small spark and crackle sound coming forth. Light mumbles within her sleep came from Parapony and Fluttershy looked left and right to each of her contemplating friends. While her friends continued thinking Fluttershy decided to remove the now asleep Angel Bunny from her head, placing him carefully on the ground. Fluttershy then unfurled her wing and rolled her pet closer to her side, who even whilst asleep, instinctively rested his head against her.

Turning back to her friends Fluttershy was unnerved that they had still not spoken, “Oh, I don’t like this silence at all. Please could somepony say something.”

“Ta think that an ogre was why all them pests invaded Ponyville.” Applejack mused, her interjection of conversation into the uncomfortable atmosphere allowing Fluttershy a sigh of relief.

“Truly surprising, I wouldn’t have even dreamed that was the cause.” Rarity added with a huff, “The damage those rats caused to my Boutique. I’ll be sure to have a word with this arch-nemesis of yours when this whole trouble is sorted out.”

Fluttershy looked to and fro with worried eyes and proceed to say hesitantly, “S-so you’re… you’re not mad at me?”

All the ponies present looked to one another in confusion before Pinkie asked, “Now why would we be mad at you?”

Fluttershy fiddled her hooves and hung her head as she mumbled out, “Well I… I kind of made Big my arch-nemesis when I made him leave the Everfree Forest and now… now he’s foalnapped Rainbow Dash and I’ve gotten you all involved…”

“Fluttershy, there’s no way we’d be mad at you for that.” Twilight said with a small smile growing on her face. “You did the right thing back then and none of us here blame you for anything happening now.”

“Yeah, you can’t help it if you found out some ogre was a meanie, told him off, and then he decided to be a big jerk about it, become your arch-nemesis and foalnap Dashie.” Pinkie explained with several hoof motions and facial expressions, just to emphasise her point.

Fluttershy smiled and nodded and this smile of gratitude spread to the rest of her friends. Soon a silent feeling of merriment spread to the circle of ponies, whom all enjoyed the happy moment.

Then Spike yawned. The young dragon fell down onto to his belly as he tried hard to keep his eyes open.

“Spike, I’m really sure it’s time you get some rest.” Twilight instructed her non-objecting assistant and then turned towards the others to say, “In fact, I think we could all do with some sleep. We have a big day ahead of us.”

“That seems like the sensible thing ta do. Nighty-night ya’ll.” Applejack announced as she hoofed up some dirt.

The other ponies scrambled to get themselves and their already sleeping companions underneath their small Diy shelter comprised of gathered sticks, stones and draped foliage. Wrapping themselves up in blankets fashioned from the least prickly foliage they could find, the others bid Applejack goodnight. That being her signal, Applejack threw the dirt over the fire. The flames and its accompanying light were snuffed out, leaving the ponies in the dark.

An leaving Applejack to try to find her way back into the shelter. Whilst trying to avoid stepping on the ponies already within the shelter.

“Ow! Not my face, not my face!”

She wasn’t successful at this part.

One day, when the Shy Princess was playing on her own in the gardens, two mean bunnies came along and began to pick on her.

“Neh-neh, neh-neh, cry-baby princess! The two bullies, Bell and Hops, would sneer as they pushed and shoved the Shy Princess.

“P-please, please stop!” The Shy Princess would say but Bell and Hops continued.

It was then, out of nowhere, that a bunny with rainbow hair appeared.

The Rainbow Knight and the Shy Princess, by Fluttershy: Page 3.

Author's Note

Thanks for proof-reading this time goes to NintendoGal55. I'm starting to think this will be a recurring thing with my ongoing fanfics. Ugugg proof-reads the majority of the chapters but then fails one week so I have to ask NintendoGal for help. Anyway, yeah, NintendoGal proof-read this chapter so applause for her and all that.

Now you may notice that this chapter is late. It is late by a whole week and a day. The writing style of this and the 2nd chapter, the whole flashback from a 1st person perspective and switching back to present day 3rd person narration scenes when one of the present characters talks, is annoying as heck to write. It was unique though and I wanted to incorporate it in one of my stories... never again! This was a pain to write and took forever.

Still this chapter is here now and I hope you all enjoy. I haven't had a great track record for uploading chapters this story so rather than say "Look forward to chapter 4 in two weeks time around the 21st/22nd", I'm just going to say "Sometime in December."

Chapter 4: Woodland Wade.

Chapter 4: Woodland Wade!

There were exactly thirty-seven cracks on the stone floor. Very few of them were big and perhaps some were unable to be seen in the dark, but by now the caged mare’s pink eyes had grown accustom to her darkness. She was confident there were thirty-seven cracks on the stone floor.

As to why Rainbow Dash was spending her time counting cracks within a stone floor, the simple answer was that she wasn't able to sleep. Try as she might, the expert of napping could not fall into a slumber. She always enjoyed hitting the hay upon the clouds in the sky, with sweet dreams always coming swiftly to her. Light moments of nodding off also came to her on occasion if she found a somewhat comfortable spot to serve as a bed. Being trapped in a giant metal bird cage within a pitch black room was not one of those comfortable spots.

Once upon a time, sleeping even in a situation like this would have been possible for her. Then that incident occurred wherein she was effectively hoofcuffed to Fluttershy for well over a week, her sleep always accompanied her friend, and Rainbow Dash was now bothered by loneliness when she tried for sleep on anywhere but the most comfortable of clouds. Obtaining her pet turtle shortly afterwards allowed her to at least sleep within her own home and bed, although every so often she’d sneak back to Fluttershy's simply to sleep beside her.

Anyway, that was then and this is now. Now was a time in which Rainbow Dash had neither friend nor pet to count on to help her sleep and she was left to amuse herself in her exhaustion. When the tiny windows were drawn shut by their overly large shutters, Rainbow Dash was left in darkness. Her eyes grew used to it and soon she had made a note of every aspect of the room… which wasn’t much. It was all plain stone bricks for the most part. There were the shuttered windows to start, unfortunately too small to be unable to escape through them. The floor was made of the same grey stone as the walls and ceiling, although for some reason there was a red line painted across the floor; a single brush stroke from one side of the room to the other. Beyond that, standing tall and mocking her hopes for reason, were ogre-sized double doors.

Ogre-sized double doors that began to open.

“Morning, my damsel in distress!” Big Boss bellowed as he skipped into the room.

“I’m not a damsel!” Rainbow Dash snapped back immediately.

Big jutted out his lower teeth and grinned in such a way he came across as both smug and stupid. “Are you a mare?”

“Yes.”

“Are you trapped in a cage?”

Rainbow Dash gritted her teeth, seeing already where this was going. “Yes.”

Big hopped from one foot to the next as he went right up to Rainbow Dash’s cage and teased, “Then you’re a damsel in distress.”

As Big began to boisterously chuckle and Rainbow Dash began to fume with aggravation, someone else entered the room. He stepped hard, each step a call for attention, one that could not be heard over the noisier members of the room. So the newcomer was forced to wait for attention, his deep frown immovable.

As the chuckles simmered down, Rainbow took her chance to retort, “That still doesn’t make me a damsel in distress. What is there for me to be distressed about?”

Big Boss stopped chuckling completely as she looked back towards the smug Pegasus and scratched his head, “Uh, Ah don’t know what distressed means. Ain’t that part of bein’ a damsel?”

Before Rainbow Dash could add another sly remark the zebra took this opportunity to interrupt, tapping his hoof against the stone floor. Big Boss and Rainbow Dash turned their attention to the zebra in the room.

“Big, if my eyes do not deceive me, to which I highly doubt they do, our captive looks to be of inadequate health.”

Rainbow Dash was immediately taken aback by the Zebra’s voice. The zebra, clearly male judging from his stern eyes and thick muzzle, yet with legs as slender as any mare, spoke with a conflicting voice. It was not the lack of rhymes that took Rainbow by surprise, but how the zebra sounded like an idiot and yet spoke with vast sophistication. He possessed a deep voice, though nowhere as deep as Big’s, with clear Zebrafican decent and a slight drawl. It sounded like a Zebrafican attempting to speak like an Equestrian, and basing said voice off of famous singers and celebrities, yet doing a poor job of it. The voice betrayed its owner, who pronounced his words with an intellectual undertone, brief wispy pauses, and eyes that shone the individuals craftiness, however impure it was.

“Captive of ours, I suspect your sleep was troubled, this shall not do,” The zebra said sternly, his eyes calculating rather than concerned. “I assume the cold cage floor offers a rather unpleasant sleeping experience.”

The zebra then smiled, but otherwise remained silent. Rainbow Dash waited for him to say something else, his voice having thrown off the notion of retorting, at least for now. She did begin to ponder throwing out an insult regarding it, but timing was critical, she had to wait for him to speak again. Minutes passed and no one had spoken nor moved.

“That’s your cue, you buffoon! Bring the stuff in!” The zebra snapped, throwing out his hoof and pointing vigorously towards Big.

“Ohhhh, riiight,” Big drawled out, then making his way to the door, “Sure thing Zeb.”

“Zebadiah! You shall address me as Zebadiah!” Zeb snapped before closing his eyes and taking a few deep breaths.

Big exited the room to fetch the “stuff,” which must have been just around the corner as he returned almost immediately afterwards. Big Boss made his way to Rainbow’s cage, dropping down an assortment of things, though most apparent of all was a bed.

“Place the cage on the floor as well; I need our captive to be in a healthy condition, both physically and mentally.” Zeb added with his eyes still firmly shut.

Big did as he was asked, grabbing a hold of the giant bird cage and unlatching it from the ceiling. Rainbow Dash did not enjoy the swaying much, yet it was in the midst of the relocation of her cage that a plan came to mind.

Once the cage was down on the floor Dash decided to remark, “A bed eh? That will make sleeping easier. In fact, I could do with a nap right about now. Why don’t you open up this door and put that bad in here for me?”

“Okay,” Big said, grabbing the bed with one hand and opening the cage door with another.

“Yes, you do-wait, no!” Zeb cried out as the moment Rainbow Dash’s door was open she flew out.

“See you later, suckers!” Rainbow Dash yelled out as she dashed past her captors, past the red line, immediately falling to the floor paralysed. “H-Hey! What is… I can’t move!”

Even with all of her strength, Rainbow Dash could barely even squirm as her body refused her whims. It was like she was petrified, minus the turning to stone part.

Zeb breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank goodness that spell worked.”

“Hey, why’d she stop?” Big mumbled only to receive a vicious glare from Zeb.

“You buffoon! Are you telling me you let her out, unaware of the spell I have explained several times to you that was set in place to prevent her escaping?” Zeb snapped with a snarl, his earlier achieved calm already wasted.

Big instead looked up to the ceiling, staring seemly at nothing and pointing a finger towards that same nothing. “I thought that was why you had Griffleon stay up there.”

Rainbow Dash could not see what was going on—unable to readjust her position in her current state—but she did hear a strangely familiar voice, “Boss, I am once again amazed at your ability to detect me.”

She couldn’t pick up on where she had heard it before, it sounded like one she had heard from a distance, as if it had spoken as she fell asleep or lost consciousness. With that thought, Rainbow's eyes snapped open wider. “Hey, you’re one of those jerks who knocked me out. Come down here and let me give you a piece of my mind.”

The assailant huffed. “It would please me to do so, but I see no point in picking on you in your… disadvantaged state.”

Rainbow Dash grumbled, trying harder and harder to move herself, but to no avail.

“I requested Griffleon to position himself above in case the spell did not meet demands,” Zeb explained. Rainbow could hear him approaching her as he talked, “My Area Limitation Geomancy spell has never had to halt any subject of such speeds. Lucky for you then that I happen to be an absolute genius.”

The downed Dash could see from the corner of her eye that Zeb had reached her. The Zebra looked her up and down with cold, calculating eyes, muttering inaudible mumbles to himself. From this close up and no longer distracted by the Zeb’s mismatched voice and tone, Rainbow Dash could see that he carried a saddle bag, one that he had begun to look into.

“Aside from a lack of sleep, you appear to otherwise be in perfect health. Such a small matter should not affect the sample.”

“Sample?” Rainbow Dash inquired and would have raised her brow if that weren’t also frozen in place.

Seeing Zeb withdraw a large syringe from the saddlebag answered her question.

A light yawn came forth from the stirring Parapony, her large eyes flickering open. Sunlight streamed in through the gaps between the tree’s and the light poured upon her; soothing yet stinging.

“Good morning sun… you’re really bright today,” Parapony muttered, smacking her lips together, getting them used to opening after a whole night of them sealed shut.

Parapony blinked several times, her parasprite eyes trying hard to adjust to the light. Spinning around in her cage though, she could make out each of her captors, or as she considered them, the visitors to Zeb Land she was under orders to guide.

The ‘hat-pony’ was barely within the shelter, at least two legs sticking out from cover. Yet she looked like she had slept soundly, her face one of content, her hat hanging over her eyes.

The opposite could be said for the ‘squishy-pony’. Adequate space obtained, she was able to lie down with hooves spread and yet her face was troubled, often turning in her sleep.

The ‘fun pony’ and the ‘bossy pony’ lay side by side, their heads resting against one another and their tails tangled. The smile never left the ‘fun ponies’ face, even as she whistled tunes in her sleep. Likewise, the serious expression from the ‘bossy pony’ remained set, even as she nuzzled up into the mane of her sleeping companion.

Resting against his similarly purple pony master was that dragon thingy. Parapony had yet to think of a nickname for him and it was as she looked to the little dragon, his sleep a troubled one due to a rabbit sleep-kicking him in the head, that she pondered what to call him.

“I’ll him name him not fwuffy, cause he aren’t fwuffy like ‘fwuffy’.” Parapony decided with a nod of her little pink head.

Finally, on the other side of the shelter with ‘fwuffy’ resting against her was ‘butterfly butt’, sound asleep. Constant murmurs escaped her though, the name of a pony being spoken over and over again.

“Hmm, I’m hungry,” Parapony said aloud as her Parasprite based stomach grumbled.

Trapped in a cage though there was no way to get out and grab a couple hundred snacks. That is, unless she ate the cage, but such a thought was ridiculous.

“As if I’d be hungry enough to eat not-food. I can wait.” Parapony thought with utmost confidence.

Her stomach rumbled again.

Parapony licked her lips, eyeing the cage with pleasure, but then shook her head furiously. “Nope, not gonna eat it.”

Parapony, shuffled on the spot, easing herself into a comfortable spot and started waiting for the ponies to awaken. Parapont waited for minutes, watching the world go by and her tummy rumble at every passing sight.

The cage was delicious.

Free from the confides of her imprisonment, Parapony was free to go anywhere she wanted. So she stayed with the ponies; her job was to guide them after all. Yet she was also hungry. She wanted food but she needed to stay with the ponies.

“Ooh! Ooh! I’m guiding them; they can get me food in return,” Parapony exclaimed as she floated down to Fluttershy. She went right up to the pegasus’ ear, and shouted, “Good morning!”

Fluttershy leaped up in fright, crashing through the roof of the stick made shelter and breaking it apart. Sticks weren’t the only thing that flew up when Fluttershy leaped into the air; Angel was jolted into the air as well, landing splat against a nearby tree. No longer properly supported by the shelter walls, the sleeping Applejack fell back as the sticks gave way; the same sticks burying Rarity, Twilight, Pinkie Pie, and Spike.

There was much chaos and panic from the group. There was also much laughter from Parapony.

As Fluttershy hung onto a nearby tree in fright, Angel lay dazed on the floor and the others attempting to pull themselves out of the stick pile, it left only Applejack to glare up at the giggling hybrid.

“How’d you get out your cage?” Applejack asked with a huff.

Parapony burped. “Scusey me.”

“Ah, I see,” Applejack mused before looking back to Parapony with an even sterner expression. “An how come ya didn’t make your merry way out ah here when you ‘ad the chance?”

Parapony drifted down to be face level with Applejack, rolling her eyes, “I wouldn’t be a very good tour guide if I weft you, duh.”

Pinkie Pie darted out of the piles of sticks, unaware that a tail tangled Twilight came out with her, to pat Parapony on the head. “Aw, such a good tour guide. We need to get you a little outfit, or at least a hat.”

Twilight sighed. If her wake up was anything to go by then it was going to be a long day.

If the group of ponies had been on their own they would have probably been able to set off sooner. In all likelihood, both Applejack and Fluttershy were accustomed to early mornings and may have woken up in just a few minutes after Parapony, if not for said creature’s assistance. In waking up they’d have gathered food, ate a quick meal and set off to save Rainbow Dash. Unfortunately they were accompanied by a tour guide with literally the stomach of a Parasprite. The quantity of food gathered was far larger.

“Mind your step ponies.” Parapony called back to the group as she flittered on the spot, “Boss want’s his revenge quickwy.”

“An just how is that supposed to motivate us?” Applejack remarked, leaping over a particularly large root.

The group traversed through the woods, hastily and paranoid. The former was due only to their speedy little guide, the latter however was their awareness that they were in enemy territory.

The woods themselves were not foreboding in anyway. Light trickled in through the tall trees and rather than giving way to distorted illusions of monstrous faced trees, like they might have expected from the Everfree Forest, the trees were more normal. Several were cracked from charging beasts, others were covered in leaves, some were scarred by bites, and others had been untouched. This pose true for much of the woods though, from its occasional rocks to its tangled roots that propped up out of the dirt; there was much that had been damaged but much had been untouched.

The only fearful factor that it had in common with the Everfree Forest was the unknowingness of it all. They did not know what dangers could be lurking and what nefarious things their enemies had set up.

“Oh my!” Fluttershy yelped.

“What is it Fluttershy?” Rarity quickly asked as the group all turned around to check on their startled friend.

Fluttershy had her back to her friends, facing a bush, with her body shaking, “It’s… its…”

Fluttershy spun around, “Adorable!”

Slowly wrapping around Fluttershy’s neck, with the animal loving pegasus goading over it, was small young snake.

“Isn’t it just the sweetest thing?” Fluttershy cooed as she propped up the snake’s head for her friends to see. “And earlier I spotted some beautiful beetles and a flock of birds flying in each of the colours of the rainbow.”

Fluttershy carried on talking about all the woodland animals she had seen, as well as the not so woodland animals that were for some reason within the woods. Such things the others had noticed though the only thought that had been on their minds was one of caution.

“Fluttershy! What are you doing?” Twilight snapped from within a barrier.

“Oh, I’m just saying hello to all the friendly little animals.” Fluttershy said sweetly at first. However, upon noticing Twilight’s protective spell, her brows scrunched slightly. “Why are you in a magic shield?”

“That’s not important,” the shielded Twilight replied. “What is important is that you shouldn’t be playing with the animals. We’ve been lured here by your arch-nemesis. You in particular need to be careful. Who knows what traps he’s set!”

“Yeah, that snake you’re holding could be a bomb,” Pinkie lightly added while trying to throw a foreleg around Twilight’s shoulder, her efforts barred by the barrier.

“The fact that these animals have been around Big makes it important for me to check on them. He’s so reckless when handling them,” Fluttershy replied as she gently traced a hoof against the snake’s body. “All of the animals here seem okay and happy though.”

“That’s great, now put the snake down and let’s move it!”

“Okay,” Fluttershy said solemnly as she placed the snake down who began to slither towards Twilight.

Before the snake could even reach Twilight’s protective bubble the unicorn had teleported herself away. The snake looked around for a moment, confused as much as Twilight’s friends were, before slithering out of sight.

“Oh dear. Twilight, where are you?” Rarity called out.

Pinkie Pie glanced upwards, finding sight of Twilight’s purple shield within the tree branches, and giggled, “Up there.”

Fluttershy flew up to Twilight, who was slowly lowering her shield, “Um, Twilight, I hate to ask but are you afraid of snakes?”

“W-What? Don’t be ridiculous. I just thought…” Twilight began to stutter as her eyes drifted over to Pinkie Pie, “That it was a bomb. I-I mean, it could have been one.”

By this point, giggles were spewing forth from the group below, unable to prevent laughter slipping from their mouths. Spike on the other hand, made no attempt to hide his laughter.

“Yeah, Twilight’s terrified of snakes.” Spike guffawed, “I once placed gummy snakes all over her when she slept. She ran out of the house screaming across Canterlot.”

“That was you! I thought Shining did that!” Twilight snapped; teleporting to the ground just as her friends burst into uncontrollable laughter.

“What’s funny? What’s funny?” Parapony cried out as she flew back to the group; having briefly but unknowingly flown too far ahead whilst the group were occupied by the snake.

“Nothing’s funny. Just being cautious in case you’re leading us into a trap.” The Twilight muttered, wishing to brush this moment under the carpet.

“Now why would I lead you into a trap? I’d have to be a very poor tour guide to do that?”

Twilight huffed, but said no more, a mere glare given in Parapony’s direction. She merely smiled back, started to whistle a tune and began to lead the group once more.

“Well, um, I don’t know about traps b-but I don’t think the animals are going to bother us,” Fluttershy added with a reassuring smile.

“Yeah, this place doesn’t seem all that dangerous,” Applejack noted, looking around the place with ease of mind.

“Nor all that dirty. The foliage is practically styled compared to the Everfree Forest.” Rarity brushed a hoof against one of the bushes, a small trace of admiration for Mother Nature’s beauty.

“Yeah, compared to the Everfree Forest there is nothing to be scared here,” Spike said.

It should be noted at this point that the universe hates Spike, for it was at this moment that several loud howls were heard. The ponies, dragon, and rabbit of the group looked to one another in concern. Fluttershy looked over towards all the playful animals, who were now going into hiding up trees and under rocks.

Spike gulped, “What was that?”

Parapony calmly turned to the group and asked, “Soooo then, who here can fly?” Fluttershy raised her hoof “Congratulations! You won’t get eaten.”

“What?” was the collective reaction of the group, though further protests were stopped once the howls were heard again: louder and closer.

“It sounds like wolves but…” Fluttershy pondered as the source of the howling came closer and closer.

“They are wolves. Special wolves.”

“Hey, I don’t about ya’ll but can we have the explanation as we run,” Applejack perked up, eyeing the nearby bushes with suspicion.

“Yes, let’s get out of—” Twilight did not get to finish her sentence as red blur leaped out from the bushes.

Applejack was right to keep an eye on said bush, being prepared gave her the opportunity to strike back at the leaping beast, bucking it away from the group. The creature fell to the ground, an while it got to its paws quickly they were now able to see it clearly.

Wolf was an accurate thing to call it because it was just that: a wolf. Said wolf however had red hair, traces of yellow and orange upon it to give it the look of fire. Most of its body looked like that of a normal wolf but its front legs were slightly bigger, more muscular, clearly to cope with the strain of its larger and heavier head. Its head was not comically bigger than the average wolf but noticeably so. Despite its larger head, the wolf had smaller eyes and its nose was titled upwards; all to accommodate for its large teeth.

Its jaw was massive, it’s teeth even bigger. Sharp and deadly; the wolf looked like it could tear any of the ponies to ribbons.

The wolf tried to prove this, lunging forth with open fangs at Applejack. The earth pony avoided with ease and as the red, raging wolf turned to lunge at her again, it was struck by a blast of magic. Steam emanated from Twilight’s freshly fired horn as the unicorn poised herself for battle.

The wolf rose up quickly and howled once again. Closer to the sound, the group could tell how it differed from a usual wolf. It was higher pitched, painfully so, and sounded like several attempts to howl at once. All the sounds were gargled slightly by a mix of trying to get past the wolf’s thick teeth and the copious amount of saliva that had built up in the animal’s mouth, drooling out as it howled.

Rarity only had one word for this. “Ew.”

Twilight’s magic began to charge up on her horn and Applejack readied herself to buck the animal away, yet this intention was halted as Fluttershy walked towards it. Twilight and Applejack voiced no objection to Fluttershy getting in the way and instead watched as she slowly stepped towards it.

The wolf attempted to growl, the sound almost completely blocked out by its closed fangs. This flawed attempt made Fluttershy’s undeterred approach of the creature all the easier, getting closer and closer with a soft smile on her face.

“Um, the boss kind of wants his nemesis not-eaten, at weast by worves,” Parapony mentioned, weary of Fluttershy’s current actions.

“Now, now; no need to be afraid. I won’t hurt you,” Fluttershy said with a soothing voice as she looked to the still growling wolf. “Now then, what seems to be the matter?”

Pinkie Pie sprung forth, grabbed Fluttershy’s tail and pulled Fluttershy away from where she stood. A second red wolf had leaped out from the nearby bushes, pouncing on the spot where Fluttershy had stood.

“Oh, the rest of them are coming,” Parapony remarked as the two wolves wildly charged towards the group.

Twilight conjured a shield to which the first wolf bit into with little effect. Its fangs locked onto the shield, Applejack bucked the wolf’s jaw, knocking the creature away into a nearby tree. As the wolf slumped down, its teeth cracked, the second wolf lunged towards Applejack.

With little time to dodge, Applejack was thankful that Rarity quickly jump kicked the attacker. As the stunned wolf shook its head, another wolf leaped from the direction of the bushes.

“They’re just going to keep running, let’s run for it,” Twilight announced, already hearing the sound of more wolves approaching.

Twilight raised a larger, more temporary shield to block the approaching wolves and began to usher everypony away. One pony had yet to move though, and Twilight turned to see Fluttershy watching the injured wolf get onto its feet, its tongue seemingly tasting the air as it slipped past it’s now smaller teeth.

“Fluttershy!”

Fluttershy snapped to attention, took one last look at the injured wolf and began to follow the others in running away. As Twilight got further away from her shield and the wolves continued their assault on it, it faded out, allowing the wolves to pursue.

At first the group focused only on running. Angel was faster than the lot of them but either out of foresight that he’d tire quickly or laziness, he hopped atop Fluttershy’s back. Spike on the other hand had small little legs that weren’t expected to get him anywhere fast. As he started to trail behind, started to be out sped by the rest of the group, he was levitated onto Twilight's back.

Fluttershy meanwhile pushed herself to fly ahead of the group and alongside the particularly relaxed Parapony. “Um, Parapony, do you mind if ask you something?”

Parapony nodded. “Yes, butterfly butt?”

“What are those wolves? I’ve never seen any breed like them before.”

“Oh, those worves, daddy made them,” Parapony said, looking only to Fluttershy for a second before taking a sharp turn, “This way now, pwease!”

“What? What do you mean your father made them?” Twilight called from below, barely getting out her words as she struggled to make greater distance from her and the rapidly gaining pack of wolves.

“Duh, that daddy made them,” Parapony replied with a roll of her eyes. “Daddy decided to make some worves better. So he game them rearry good teeth, but then they got angry, got all red and ran off. Daddy said they were failed experiments, unlike me!”

“He tested on those wonderful animals!? How could he!?” Fluttershy said aghast, looking back to the raging wolves trying to hunt them down and savage them into bits with sorrow.

“Hey, Parapony, are you sure we’re heading the right way?” Pinkie Pie asked a hint of worry in her usually cheerful voice.

“Yeah, why’d you... oh.” Parapony looked ahead just in time for her and the rest of the group to reach a dead end in the form of a large, curved, and quite un-scalable rock, “Nope. We have a rock in the way.”

“Not to worry, we can just—” Applejack turned around to see the red fanged wolves had already circled the area, blocking out any gap for escape.

The wolves stepped in closer; the group of primarily ponies stepped back. As the wolves kept approaching and ponies kept wondering what to do, looking to and fro for any means to escape. Eventually their rumps touched the curved rock and the wolves stopped approaching, already knowing they were stuck.

In the midst of looking for an escape though it seemed one pony had the answer, “A tad thick but in this situation it will have to do.”

The rest of the group looked in wonderment as Rarity activated her horn, her magic’s blue glow surrounding something tangled within and against the trees. The wolves didn’t like the sight of Rarity’s glowing horn, leaning forward and readying their assault. They took too long though as the object Rarity had grasped with her magic uncoiled itself from around the trees and went straight towards the wolves. Loose vines spun about like nature’s ribbons, entangling the wolves up until they couldn’t move. A little bow tied on top later, and the wolves were completely ensnared.

A sigh of relief was had by the group, as well as many startled jumps when the wrapped wolves began barking ferociously.

“Say, how long ya’ll reckon that thing will hold?”

“Not long I guess, we best move on before they break out.” Twilight replied.

“We can’t leave them like this,” Fluttershy said, walking on over to the wolves.

“Look, Fluttershy, they will probably break out pretty soon so you shouldn’t worry about it.” Twilight added with a hint of exasperation, shaking her head from side to side.

“Oh no, I don’t mean that. We need to tend to their problem.”

“Problem?” The group asked bewildered.

Raised eyes abound, they watched as Fluttershy tried to give out soothing words to the wolves. The wolves either ignored her and continued to bark ferociously or couldn’t hear her over their own ferocious barking. As Fluttershy offered kind words, none of which could be heard by the group, she circled around the wolves and inspected each one. A nod from her seemed to indicate she had an answer and she soon made way over to the group.

“Um, Applejack, do you mind helping me for a teensy-tiny second.” Fluttershy asked before walking on over back to the trapped wolves.

Applejack followed her wordlessly and when closer to the wolves, Fluttershy began to explain. Muffled out once again by the wolves’ barks, the group could only judge the conversation by their friend’s accompanying actions. There was Fluttershy raising one back leg and waving it in the air, Applejack’s face twisting into an expression of shock followed by a furrowed brow but concerned eyes. Yep, the group had not a clue what they were talking about.

Applejack then bucked a wolf in the head.

“Are you trying to make them more mad at us!?” Twilight yelled out in panic, the rest of the wolves having stopped barking and opted to glare with utmost rage at Applejack.

“Um, no good, try it again please Applejack,” Fluttershy kindly ordered.

“You’re telling her to do it!?” Twilight yelled out once more, this time directed at Fluttershy.

Applejack bucked the wolf in the head once more, or more specifically, bucked its oversized teeth. The wolf’s teeth cracked, a couple having been sent loose from the blow, revealing a few smaller teeth. Applejack did not hesitate to strike again, smashing apart the remaining large teeth, leaving the wolf with only its smaller set of teeth. Immediately the wolf stuck out its tongue, relishing the feel of air coursing down its throat.

The glaring wolves looked to their small teethed comrade and began yapping with glee.

“There, that’s better.” Fluttershy cooed as she pat the small teeth wolf on the head.

“Wait, what?” Twilight inquired, her confused expression mimicked by all bar Fluttershy and Applejack.

“Well, it was something I noticed earlier with the first wolf that Applejack kicked.” Fluttershy began to explain as said wolf made its way towards the group, having been slowly following its pack for a while. “When Applejack kicked out its large teeth I noticed it had smaller ones underneath and that its breathing was better regulated.”

“So what you’re saying is that those wolves’ giant teeth… are bad for it?” Rarity asked with a slight moment of hesitance.

“Yes. The teeth are far bigger than they need to be,” Fluttershy said with a nod. “They put a lot strain on the wolves jaw and upper body, are hard to open and make it difficult for them to breathe.”

Fluttershy then went over to the first wolf, who was happy to comply with Fluttershy lifting his lips and showing the smaller teeth, “Furthermore, those large teeth didn’t replace the old ones. They had grown out and pushed their natural teeth backwards.”

“So Fluttershy here asked me to buck their teeth out.” Applejack stated and then turned around to look at the remaining wolves. “Which reminds me, Ah’ve got a few ‘ore teeth to knock out.”

The rest of the group sat down in relief as Applejack got to work. The wolves, seeing that they would be freed from their painful teeth, were accepting of the kicks. Fluttershy cringed with each inevitable yelp but it had to be done. Once all the wolves unneeded teeth had been knocked loose, the pack scampered off merrily.

“So, we almost got eaten by wolves,” Spike thought aloud to nopony in particular.

“Better than ‘we got eaten by wolves’” Pinkie Pie cheered with open hooves and then fell back onto the grass.

“Certainly not the best start of this expedition,” Rarity commented before facing Twilight and asking, “Are you sure we cannot contact the princesses? Their help would be most appreciated.”

Twilight sighed and shook her head, “Sorry, but with Princess Celestia away from Equestria on a meeting there is no way she’ll be able to come and help us. An even if we were able to contact Princess Luna instead, she cannot leave Equestria without a princess in charge.”

“Yeah, Ah get that part but Ah’ve never heard of Celestia leavin’ Equestria before. What is this meeting?”

Twilight’s mouth quivered and her eyes darted back and forth, as if she was fearful of an invisible eavesdropper. Her eyes briefly gazed over each member of the group but locked onto Parapony.

“Could you cover your ears for a second Parapony?”

“Hmmm, okie dokie!” Parapony agreed, placing her hooves over her ears.

Twilight returned to looking back to her friends and started to say in a hushed tone, “Now, this is a secret I’m not supposed to tell anypony but I know I can trust all of you. The meeting Celestia has left to attend is… the World Leader Meeting.”

The train eased into its stop, slowly coming to a halt with utmost grace. The smoke trailed finely and orderly from the now resting locomotive and calmed within a perfect amount of seconds. Perfect being the term used as the smoke drifted away just in time for the train’s doors to slide open, sounding a quaint bell that was at just the right pitch to alert passengers without harming their ears, and allow the passengers to disembark to fresh air.

From this perfect train stepped out a pony, a large pony with both wings and a horn, the princess of Equestria and the sun, Celestia. She walked onto the train platform but a few steps before turning around to look at her train.

“Perfect.” Celestia thought with a shaky smile.

Celestia did not like the word, term or ideal of perfection. She was the type of pony who admired even the flaws within others and in their work. A part of her felt it added character; perfection often meant falling in line with the works of others and often got boring as a constant. You can only have so many perfect meals and perfect walks that you long for a bite of a slightly singed carrot or a spot of unexpected rain.

She did not however mind perfection all the time. In fact, there was one matter that Celestia enjoyed the concept of perfection and all the things relating to it being perfect in turn. For it was this matter she required perfection, the most important duty of hers; waking up in the morning to raise the sun, and she was not a morning pony.

Each morning Celestia would have to get up and raise the sun, adjusting it ever so slightly depending on the time of year and assuring it had fulfilled its day’s course correctly. For this she needed the perfect night’s sleep which in turn required the perfect bed. For making her mind alert she required the perfect coffee; many a heat wave had been caused as a result of bad coffee.

So how did this all relate to having the perfect train? Simple, she had to sleep in it over-night. Its connection to her sleep meant it had to be perfect as a result.

Then out from the train, stepped yet another pony, yet another winged and horned princess. Princess Cadance squinted under the harsh sunlight, trying to make out the silhouette of her aunt.

“Auntie, I don’t suppose you could pull the sun away just a little bit,” Cadance said as she walked forward with uncertain steps.

“Now Cadance,” Celestia said as she looked up and admired the sight of her sun in a way she did not often see, “The sun is supposed to be like this in Saddle Arabia.”

The slight breeze of wind, the shift of sand, and the overbearing waves of sunlight and heat in particular; Celestia took it all. For too long had she stayed within Equestria, a constant guard against all who might endanger it, with no pony either trusting or strong enough to fill her absence. With her sister returned though, she could now take this opportunity to properly visit places within her royal duties, and with that, embrace the change of location with no worries as to how her home might fare.

Cadance just felt the place to be hot. Her newly appointed kingdom had previously been surrounded by snow and ice, and even in the midst of its springtime fields of grass, a chill breeze hung in the air. The transition from the Crystal Empire to Saddle Arabia was not a pleasurable one.

Celestia waited until Cadance walked up alongside her, proceeding then to turn and walk together to their destination. As the two princesses made their way out of the train station; a second bell chimed, followed by orderly metallic clangs. Guards of both Equestrian and Crystal Empire allegiance poured out of the train one by one, standing at attention.

Cadance cast an eye back to the soldiers. “Why did you order none of the guards to accompany us?”

Celestia giggled, a small smile perking up on her face, “Well, they’re mostly here for formalities sake.”

When the stone platform neared the sand, a slow ramp down towards the common terrain of Saddle Arabia, Celestia practically skipped to it. Cadance stepped forth normally, though upon her hoof touching the sand she immediately withdrew it. This was not her first time stepping onto sand; it was however the first time she had been to Saddle Arabia and the first time she had stepped forth on sand under a blazing hot sun. Surprised first by the heat, Cadance gingerly stepped onto the sand and continued to trot along until she was beside her aunt.

Cadance’s head turned to and fro as they journeyed across the sand. Her eyes absorbed the sights of stone structures standing firm, even upon its grain based surface. Her hooves felt said structure, the heat rising from it and the slightest of breezes moving the finest layer of grains. Her ears listened to said breeze and the mix of hooves on gentle sand and firm rock.

Cadance took heed of horses going by; well clad in light clothes of bright colours. Equestria had many races dwelling within its borders, but horses were a rarity. They stood taller than the average pony; striding far faster with their longer legs, the sand being easy traversing for those born within the country. All of this Cadance took in with wonder, though a question rose to mind with each new sight.

“Auntie, are you really sure about bringing me to such an important meeting?” Cadance asked, as she attempted to make eye contact.

“I’m sure,” Celestia said curtly as she looked over to Cadance. “Are you sure about this though?”

Her smile quivered and her line of sight trailed downwards as she replied, “Well; I believe it’s for the best to reconnect the Crystal Kingdom to the rest of the world as soon as possible, but feel this may be rushing things for myself.”

Celestia kept her attention on Cadance and raised an eye. She said nothing and asked her question through expression alone.

“I’ve only been ruling the Crystal Empire for a few weeks; I don’t think I’m truly ready to speak on both the Crystal Ponies behalf and their best interests,” Cadance voiced her concerns; concerns heeded by a fellow ruler who waited to hear more. “I’ve learnt and seen a lot of things and I’m certain I can settle the worries of my subjects, but to already be opening discussion with so many other kingdoms...”

Princess Cadance knew not what to say from there and so let the brief silence hang. A shift in her body language, a turned gaze and a shifting hoof cued Celestia to reply at this moment and to prevent the onset of a stifled mood; “I would not worry about so many things at this time and place.”

The princess duo stopped and allowed for a passing carriage to go by as Celestia continued to say, “It is true that there will be many world leaders attending this event; many whose land and cultures you are unfamiliar with, but that is also what makes this the perfect opportunity.”

“I’m not sure I see how.”

“Well, this is the fastest way to establish connections between the Crystal Empire and the rest of the world, which is in the best interests of the Crystal Ponies,” Celestia explained. “Also, meeting the rulers of the various kingdoms is a great way to learn about them.”

As the carriage had gone by and the princesses continued on their walk, Cadance brought up another quivering smile, though one that was more perky and uplifting. “I suppose.”

Celestia continued to smile as she turned from Cadance and looked ahead to their destination; a large dome like building, cream in colour and settled within the midst of town. Something up ahead however caused a sigh to escape Celestia’s lips, and if one were as close to her as Cadance was, a barely inaudible chuckle. “Besides, it’s not like you don’t know anyone here.”

“Looks like I beat you here again, oh Princess of the Sun.” A griffon of dark grey feathers called out as he strode towards Celestia.

Walking alongside him in a more subdued and calm manner was a smaller griffon of both dark brown and pure white feathers, who waited until he stood before the princesses to greet them, “Good day your highnesses.”

“Hmm, and it’s plain to see you rushed your way here, oh King of scruffy feathers.” Celestia snidely remarked, a grin blossoming onto her face as she witnessed the large grey griffon frown.

“Good day to you as well Sir Galahad.” Princess Cadance replied to the curtly bowing griffon before her, “But please, as always just Cadance will do.”

The King of Griffons brought up his large talons, strong enough to crush boulders and sharp enough to cut through diamond… and then started flattening his head of dishevelled feathers, “The fact remains that I got here first.”

“Hmm, yes, but at the cost of grace. A King such as yourself should better present himself, eh Galchobhar.” Celestia once again snidely remarked.

Galchobhar, the Griffon King, glared back at the smirking ruler of Equestria. His opening taunt had declared a battle of wits between them; a battle far more favourable to the prank-loving alicorn than to himself. He was though a stubborn one, grin and bare it he would, sending daggers with his eyes for the moment.

“Of course, Cadance. So how have you and Shining been?” Galahad, loyal head knight of the griffons, asked Cadance with a more relaxed and informal tone. “The last time we met you two had only just gotten married and now you’re already in charge of a kingdom.”

“Yes, an awful lot has happened as of late,” Cadance said, forcing out a chuckle to alleviate the stressful worries of recent incidents. “An as for Shining, well, he’s a little overwhelmed at having to take over the kingdom while I’m gone.”

Galahad’s beak formed a larger smile as he voiced out his humorous thought. “That would be quite a sight. How do you think he’s doing it, sneaking them sweets or having them rank and file?”

Cadance repressed a giggle, a hoof over her mouth as she snickered back. “Hopefully he won’t treat all the subjects like he does the children or his regiment of guards. We’ve already received one complaint about the foals coming home with saddle bags filled with chocolate.”

“If that’s the only sort of complaints you’re receiving then you’re doing a fine job managing your kingdom.” Galchobhar chuckled, before sneaking a look back to Celestia. “Now where we with this little discussion of ours?”

Celestia tapped her chin mockingly and then said with a sweet tone, “Why, I believe you were still bragging about getting here first. While I must commend you on your vehicle of transport I would like it if you’d move onto another subject.”

“Vehicle of transport? Please, we griffons flew our way here!”

Cadance could not help but let out a laugh at this, “Please King Galchobhar, you and your jokes. I know you’re a hard worker but I’m sure you wouldn—”

Cadance stopped speaking as she felt an uncomfortable emotion stirring in the atmosphere, turning to see Galahad staring blankly; anger and suffering seeping from his body.

“The desert… is cold at night.”

“That sounds exactly like something you’d do,” Celestia replied with a roll of her eyes, “I imagine such a journey has tuckered you out.”

“Ha!” Galchobhar scoffed, “Please, flying here was a warm up. I’ve got plenty of energy to spare.”

The griffin king leaned in towards Celestia, his ruby red eyes glistening, “I bet I’ve even got enough energy left to run circles round you.”

Celestia raised a brow, yet her magnenta eyes gleamed, “Really, this all sounds like you’re challenging me to a race.”

“Hmm, maybe I am.” Galchobhar chuckled, “An what would you say if I were to ask you for a race?”

Celestia smiled, “It would be rude of me to turn down an invitation from a fellow ruler, so I’d accept.”

Galchobhar flapped his grey wings as he spun around, pointing towards the domed building in the near distance, “One lap around Mundus Cuspis and up the stairs.”

Celestia made her way to beside the griffin king and stomped the sandy ground softly, “Deal.”

With their banter through, Celestia and Galchobhar stood still and silent, grins etched onto their faces. The two turned to look at one another once, then turned back to face Mundus Cuspis and waited for Celestia to reach his side. They then disappeared. In actuality they had not disappeared, they had merely started their race but it was with such great speeds that they ran that any onlooker would believe that the two had vanished.

Cadance and Galahad could not help but snicker as they spotted the two rulers of large and mighty countries in the distance; having already run a fair deal of their set course.

“My, my; it is always jarring to see how Celestia acts here in contrast to when one visits her in Equestria.” A young voice, conducted in a posh manner, was directed towards the griffon knight and pony princess.

Turning around, the two were quick to greet the cicada before them. The six legged insect before them was of equal height to the average pony, only having to look up to Cadance and Galahad with her small protruding eyes due to the significant height difference.

Cadance wasted no time in running up and embracing the cicada with glee, “Momohime, how are you?”

The cicada, Momohime, returned the hug and shared a mutual expression of glee, “Fantastic of course. How about you then Cadance, I hear you’re in charge of a kingdom now?”

Cadance pulled back smiling. “Yes, it’s all come about a bit fast but Shining and I have been managing it well. I didn’t expect Celestia to invite me along to the World Meeting so soon though.”

“Perhaps she did not mean to,” Momohime added, her eyes narrowing and her smile growing smaller. “This world meeting was called forth premature, though I can assure you it has not been by my kingdom.”

“Nor has it by the griffons, princess,” Galahad noted as he remained stiff, his talon latched onto the hilt of his sword.

Cadance eyed this with worry, unsure what to make of Galahad’s sternness. Princess Momohime however sighed, raised one of her thin cream legs and waved it twice. For those not looking towards the nearby building, nothing had changed, but those whose eyes were trained on it would have noticed three shadows departing from the area.

“I hate ninja’s.”

“They are bothersome and yet they are simply doing their job of watching and protecting me.” Momohime noted, casting one eye back to where her Cicada guards had last been, “And to be honest, you looked a little too keen to draw your blade.”

Galahad’s glare hardened, leading Cadance to chuckled. “It might help if you softened your expression from time to time.”

A small smile broke out on Galahad’s face, though as always it was upon a warrior’s face, a hardened brow and piercing eyes remained. Those same piercing eyes looked aside, over to the eventual destination of group. Spotting distant activity, Galahad noted, “It looks like the race is over.”

“I see,” Princess Momohime noted as her antennas perked up, a smile spreading wide on her green marked face. “Shall we make way to the meeting hall as well?”

A hum of agreement later and the odd trio of friends trekked forth to the Mundus Cuspis.

“Stupid needle… stupid zebra!” Rainbow snarled aloud in the lonely room as she rubbed her bandaged leg.

It had been some time since her captors had left the room, leaving her with her cage on the ground, a bed to sleep on and a sore leg from the blood sample. What they did not leave her with was anything to occupy her time; boredom sought to drive her mad. Ideas to escape had become no more fruitful than previously and with the area spell in place, things just got more complicated. It had become clear that Rainbow Dash would have to wait for an opportunity to arise when she could escape.

Oh, how she loathed the act of waiting.

The dull soundless world was thankfully shattered at that point, as now familiar footsteps bounded towards her room. Placing her hooves over her ears in anticipation for the inevitable, Rainbow tried to shield herself from the booming sounds.

The doors swung open and a loud voice greeted her. “Hallo, my damsel in distress!”

Rainbow Dash had decided earlier that she would ignore Big’s inevitable return but boredom had crushed her resolve and she longed to talk to anyone to entertain her. “Hello, Big.”

Big merrily skipped his way to Rainbow Dash’s cage, plopping himself down onto the floor and looking down towards the imprisoned pegasus.

“I’m on my break now so I decided to see you, make sure you’re still my prisoner,” Big Boss said with a toothy grin.

Instead of expressing irritation, Rainbow expressed only curiosity, “On your break?”

“From my training,” Big proudly stated as he flexed an arm, displaying his bulky muscles under his green skin. “I have to be prepared for when my arch-nemesis gets here for our ultimate showdown.”

Rainbow Dash could not help but let out a single laugh, a grin beaming on her face as she amused herself with this ogre considering Fluttershy somepony he’d even be able to have a showdown with. Scenes of Big roaring ferociously only for Fluttershy to begin staring him down and thoughts of Big throwing Fluttershy a weapon to wield against him and her instead choosing to talk and hugs things out conjured in her mind.

“That reminds me.” Big mumbled before suddenly opening the cage and tossing something inside of it.

Rainbow Dash had little time to react, her attention grabbed by the thrown object leading her to be a couple seconds too late to make her escape. Big had shut the cage door swiftly; much to her annoyance.

Muttering a curse, Rainbow Dash looked over to the tossed in object with suspicion. She could see it clearly from a distance but she second guessed what she saw as truly being what it was, having to move in closer just to verify it.

It was Fluttershy… if Fluttershy had button eyes, was made of cotton and had no tail.

Rainbow held up the pony sized doll to Big and asked, “What… the… hay?”

“I know, she ain’t got no tail, but it’s hard when you ‘ave big hands,” Big Boss wailed, a blush of embarrassment blooming upon his green face.

“Okay, ignoring the fact that you have made me a plush toy of my friend, why have you given me a plush toy of Fluttershy?”

Big pointed a finger towards Rainbow Dash and remarked, “Because Zeb wants you in proper health. You haven’t been sleeping and I figured out the reason why! You missed your lover.”

Rainbow Dash frowned, a tint of red coming upon her face. “Look, I’ve told you already, Fluttershy and I are not a couple.”

Big hummed and cooed, with Rainbow Dash unaware as to why. It was only upon noticing her tight grip on the Fluttershy toy that she realised why. Her blushing brightening, she dropped the toy.

“Well now you have a sleeping companion,” Big giggled as he then slyly decided to add, “It may even-may even get ya ready to share a bed with the real Fluttershy.”

Rainbow Dash stared back blankly and cocked her head to one side, “I already sleep with Fluttershy though.”

“Whaaa!” Big Boss screamed out as he toppled over backwards. The ogre sat back up and yelled out, “You two are lovers!”

“H-hey! That doesn’t prove anything. We’re best friends. It’s perfectly normal for best friends to sleep together sometimes.” Rainbow Dash shouted back, trying to dissuade this misassumption on Big’s part.

“I really don’t think best friends do.” Big mumbled, though not exactly certain of this for himself.

“W-well…” Rainbow Dash, was momentarily loss for words, her face dismayed even as she babbled out, “Well Fluttershy and I do so neh.”

Big looked to Rainbow Dash with an open mouth and open eyes, confused at the whole thing. Big Boss didn’t understand much so when something was said that didn’t make sense according to one of the few things he did understand, it was a lot for him to cope with. So he kept staring at Rainbow Dash with a bemused expression and continued to do so as the pegasus put her cuddly gift by her bed and looked to him.

“Why do you even have a toy of Fluttershy anyway?”

“Smashing practise.”

Big’s simple statement froze Rainbow Dash’s current line of thought. The atmosphere, one of energy, embarrassment and light humour, chilled and darkened.

“Say what?” Rainbow Dash inquired, a brief look cast back to the toy of her friend.

“I said I was training. I use those toys and hit them and squish them and crush them,” Big said before breaking out with a big grin and a quiet, sinister and confident chuckle, “When Fluttershy gets here I’m going to squash her.”

A quick retort was what Rainbow Dash wanted to give but a sudden lump within her throat stopped her. Her tongue refused to work as her mind focused too much on thinking of that possibility. The large ogre before her, as stupid as he was, meant his words; they shimmered with intent. Those earlier humorous thoughts were replaced with outcomes that Rainbow Dash wished never had popped into her head, outcomes that worried her mad.

“Y-you know,” Rainbow Dash started to stutter but her voice steadied as she smiled with a confidence that matched Big’s, “Even with me stuck in here, even if you could ‘squash’ Fluttershy, you won’t be able to. Our friends won’t ever let that happen.”

Words of bravado aimed to strike Big Boss’s confidence merely deflected off of it. “Oh, Zeb is already taking care of your friends.”

Dash’s eyes bulged as she screamed back, “What?!”

Big merely smiled back, tranquil as can be. “Zeb’s promised me that your friends won’t get in the way. The only pony who’ll be coming here is Fluttershy.”

Big Boss stood up, stuck out his belly and boasted, “Your friends won’t beat Zeb’s trials.”

The water gently flowed along its course. The fish swam along in formation; organised and functional. The odd disturbance came from falling fruits and nuts; ripples ringing out along the river. The water gushed against small rocks and large rocks, the two sides of the river bank and the wooden legs of the bridge.

Upon this bridge, listening to the sound of the river stream was a hooded figure. The figure was waiting: waiting for ponies.

“Finally, Ah cannot believe how long that there woods took us to cross.” A southern voice disrupted the figure’s listening to the river and the figure looked up to see its quarry.

“Oh, I’m so glad it was a pleasant peaceful woodland. I was so worried something frightening would happen,” Fluttershy remarked with a large smile on her face as she flittered out of the woods happily.

A shivering Twilight chuckled, “Sure, perfectly pleasant aside from the giant fanged wolves, the tree camouflaged bears, and the snakes falling down on us. Particularly the snakes!”

“I have to agree with Twilight, that was certainly not a pleasant woodland.” Rarity scoffed, keeping her head drooped to allow Spike to assist her in removing all manner of twigs from her mane.

“Really, I thought it was fun-erific. Want to go back in there again?” Pinkie Pie giggled.

Twilight groaned. “We’ll have to on our way back from saving Rainbow Dash. Hopefully we’ll find some shortcut out of this place by then.”

The group soon stopped walking though as they noticed the change in scenery. Out of the woods, the area opened up to a small area of grassland. A river coursed through the area, separating the woodland side from the vast field that lay ahead brimming with flowers.

The wonderful scenery was not the group’s focus though. In looking to the other side they had spotted the large red bridge. The bridge stood sturdy and strong, inviting them to walk across it, yet they held back from worry.

They could see, sitting at the far end of a bridge, a cloaked figure. The cloaked figure looked backed towards them, able to see them in turn. This was why they worried; not knowing who this figure was, why this figure was there and what this figure would do if they stepped forth on the bridge.

As the group pondered all these matters, Parapony flew ahead with a smile. She turned back to the rest of the group and beamed.

“Now, now, we should all cross the bridge,” Parapony giggled as she pointed towards the cloaked figure, “and say hello to my friend.”

Twilight looked from the Parapony’s hooded friend and then back to Parapony, suspicion stirring within her eyes, “And this friend of yours would be?”

Parapony kept her smile as she chirped, “Monktaur.”

“Leave her alone!” Were the unforgettable words the rainbow bunny first yelled.

She stood donned in armour, and with a bunny knight’s rarely used sword at her hip. She was a bunny knight of the bunny kingdom.

“Y-yeah, and what’re you gonna do about it.” Bell and Hops snickered as they ran forth and tried to shove the Rainbow Knight.

The Rainbow Knight was too quick for them. They would charge and lunge at her and all she would do is hop out their way and they’d crash or stumble. Eventually the two bullies got so tired they collapsed to the ground. The Rainbow Knight grinned at her victory, then went on over to the Shy Princess and asked, “Hey, are you okay?”

The Rainbow Knight and the Shy Princess, by Fluttershy: Page 4.

Author's Note

First off I would like to apologise for the long wait and thank you all for your patience. I’d also like to thank Ugugg for proof-reading as per usual.

There are many elements to this chapter that may bring up further questions; my introduction of cicada’s for instance. I intend to explain many things about this chapter in my upcoming blog and shall provide a link right here… once it has been uploaded.

Now then, I do regret to inform you of one other piece of news. It has been planned for a while and the troubles with getting this chapter written on time has confirmed to me that it is needed; I shall be taking a hopefully short break from this fanfic. Yes, the long wait for this chapter wasn’t my break; that was just me being painfully slow. This break will at least last a minimum of 4 weeks and is being done to access my current planning for this story in the hopes of, when I start uploading chapters once again, to be able to write and upload them at a better planned pace. It is also to allow me to settle a couple of other fanfiction matters, some in regards to my work in the Super Smash Bros fanfiction community and some for you to enjoy here in the My Little Pony community. I apologise for this break but hopefully it will benefit this story and you, my readers. I’d say to expect chapter 5 late March then, although giving my recent track record it’ll probably slip into April. Cheerio for now though.