Fluttershy slowly flew through her new cottage, tucking in her animal friends into their special beds for a good nights sleep. She had just gotten the cottage a few months ago, and a dozen animals since then had come to her for warmth, protection, and healing, including a troubled fluffy white bunny named Angel. She had found him hiding in a bush outside her cottage a few days prior.
She flew to the front door and opened it, a quiet creak escaped it as she did so, and looked out into the cool night air, making sure none of her animals were left outside in the cold before she closed the door again and landed on the floor. She took out a key and walked over to the green food cabinet and locked it for the night.
A soft smile graced her lips as she walked across the cottage to her couch, since the rooms upstairs weren’t furnished or ready to live in yet, climbed up onto the couch cushions and laid down. She put her head against a soft pillow and closed her eyes, falling asleep to the woodland animals’ quiet breathing.
Angel hopped silently between the dozen pet-beds littered on the floor, looking for anything he could munch on. He still wasn't well accustomed to the yellow pegasus’s house yet, but he knew the place where she stored the food for the animals. He hopped over to the green cabinet and put his paws on the handle and pulled as hard as he could to get it open with no success; it wouldn't budge, no matter how many times or how hard he pulled.
He sighed defeatedly and turned around to go back to his bed before a loud rumbling noise resonated from his stomach, paining him enough to decide to look for another way to sate his hunger.
He scratched his head in thought as his eyes wandered over to the front door beside the cabinet. He smiled, an idea having formed immediately. He hopped over to it and pushed the bottom half of the oak wood door as hard as he could and wondered if the pegasus had also locked this door as well, because it wouldn't move either. He decided to switch tactics and tried something else.
He leaned back and put his front paws on the floor behind him, before he shifted all his weight onto them and lifted his back legs into the air. He kicked forward with his powerful back legs. The door swung open quickly, barely giving him enough time to react to the momentum as he fell backwards. The door hit against the outside of the house with a loud bang and creaked slowly back.
Angel stood up and put his ears against his head as he looked behind him to make sure no one else heard it or had woken up. A few of the animals stirred, but they only shifted in their blankets and were silent again. He sighed in relief and ran out of the cottage into the dimly moonlit night, in the direction of the Everfree Forest.
Angel chewed feverishly, like his life depended on it. He was hidden in the middle of a blueberry bush just inside the forest. The blueberry juice slid down his throat as he chewed and stuffed himself, staining his paws and mouth blue as his cheeks extended to their fullest.
He knew what he was doing was wrong and he shouldn't be out at night or in the forest stuffing himself sick in general, but it was the only way he could stay awake to keep the nightmares away.
It helped that the berries in the center of the bush were always the sweetest and juiciest.
He swallowed the last of the berries in his mouth and cleaned himself off, as his ears twitched at the sound of a slow, irregular hoof-beat coming from further in the forest. He licked the last bits of the blueberries off his lips and cautiously hopped out, looking into the moonless forest’s darkness.
He watched fearfully as a shadowed figure walked closer and collapsed unconscious a few inches in front of the bush.
Angel approached the shadowed pony slowly and jumped onto its chest, before he looked at the head, which was right outside of the forest and illuminated by the moon.
The chestnut earth pony stallion’s muzzle was shaped like a square with an even jawline, a shock of dark brown mane atop his head. The rise and fall of the stallion’s chest told Angel that he was still alive, but he had no idea what was wrong with the stallion, or why he would suddenly collapse in the first place, but he knew either way that the forest was very dangerous at night and this pony needed help.
Angel thought about the best course of action and jumped off the stallion, and ran back to the cottage to get the pegasus.
Fluttershy was deep in the middle of a relaxing dream in the middle of a bright meadow having a quiet picnic by herself as a stream flowed behind her. It was quickly interrupted when she felt something on her head. She looked as confusion painted itself clearly on her face at seeing nothing there but couldn't focus on the picnic anymore because something was continually putting pressure on her head, like it was jumping.
The landscape started to disappear and the dream dissipated as she opened her eyes, to find Angel looking at her upside-down from on top of her head. He had to wake her up by climbing up onto the couch and onto her head.
She sat up and smiled at him, “Are you alright Angel? Did you have another nightmare or night terror again?” she asked, concern dripping from her voice for the bunny.
Angel frowned and shook his head before he hopped off her onto the couch pillow she previously had her head against and pointed to the open front door with importance.
Fluttershy looked at the door with her hoof against her chin. “What's out there this late at night that is so important to you?” she wondered, before a realization hit her, “Angel! Did you go out into the Everfree again? And at night too! You know it isn't safe and it is no place for a bunny!” she chastised him.
Angel sighed and slapped himself in the face, before he jumped off the couch and waved his paw back to Fluttershy, to get her to follow him before he ran back out into the night.
“Angel, wait!” Fluttershy exclaimed, before she flew out of the house after him. She followed him to the edge of the Everfree and noticed a pony lying in the darkness of the trees there. She landed beside the stallion and gasped as she noticed a big gash on the side of his head, trickling out bright red blood into the grass, and big bite marks on his right foreleg that were seeping blood out as well.
Fluttershy looked down at Angel. “Oh Angel, you were trying to help this poor pony, not go into the forest to get in trouble. He is lucky you were here to get help for him, or he might not have made it. Lets get him to the cottage,” she said. She slowly lifted him up off the ground with a little difficulty, and laid him across her back comfortably as she began to walk back to the cottage with Angel.
Fluttershy entered her cottage and was able to transport all of her sleeping animal friends in their beds into a spare room, without awakening them and took a towel out.
She walked over to her couch and put the towel down onto it to keep blood from staining it before she gently took the stallion off her back and onto the couch. She looked him over and noted that his short mane and tail were disheveled and bloody. His coat was caked with dirt, and he had bruises along his back and barrel. The fur around his hourglass cutie mark had been pulled out in small patches by sharp teeth, and the skin underneath was an angry bright red color.
She inspected his foreleg closer and saw that the bite marks were unfortunately deep, but they had not pierced the bone. Though, they would require bandages, including his head wound, to heal properly. She figured that he was probably out in the forest, wound up lost, and had gotten attacked by a lone timberwolf, as rare as those are, and had managed to get away before it could do any worse damage to him.
Fluttershy nodded, knowing what she needed to make the stallion feel better and turned to Angel, whose ears were turned back as he heard a weird sound outside, confusion written plainly on his face. She listened for a minute as well, but heard nothing and decided to ignore it for now, the pony in her care’s health was what mattered then. “Angel, can you go and get some bandages from the pantry in the other room please?” she asked. Angel nodded and looked behind him once more, just for a second, before he hopped away to get the bandages.
Fluttershy closed her eyes and listened as the pantry door squeaked open and Angel rooted around looking for the bandages. She walked over to the food cabinet that she had already unlocked while she had moved everyone just in case they woke up and were hungry. She opened the door, grabbed a plump, green fruit that curved to a point at its top and a small brown bowl from inside before she locked it up again.
By the time Angel came back into the room, he had apparently had a struggle. He looked like a mummy, with bandages trailing behind him, and he was unable to take off the bandages from around his body. Fluttershy had already crushed the strangely shaped fruit into a liquid with her hooves into the bowl and held the stallion’s head up gently with a hoof as she tilted the bowl’s contents into his mouth and down his throat.
She smiled at the bunny once she set the bowl onto the ground and gently put the pony’s head back onto the pillow. “Let me help you out of that,” she said. Angel hopped over and she gently unwrapped the bandages off of him, until he was his usual fluffy white self again. Fluttershy put the bandages down and gave Angel a quick hug before she looked him in the eye.
“You can go to bed if you want to now, I can take care of him by myself, go get some sleep,” she suggested as she picked up some of the unused gauze in her hoof.
Angel frowned and shook his head before he picked up some of the bandages as well and jumped onto the couch between the stallions legs. Fluttershy smiled, honestly happy and pleased that Angel decided to stay and be her helper, instead of hiding away from everything like he had been doing since she had found him.
Fluttershy went to her task and wrapped the stallion’s head snugly to stop the bleeding. She then helped Angel wrap the bandages around his foreleg, making sure to wrap every wound, to stave off infection. She finished with the bandages and put away the extras that were left over and cleaned the dirt and blood out of the stallion’s coat with a warm washcloth she had taken while putting away everything else before she put healing lotion into the hairless patches around his hourglass cutie mark to ease the redness and the possible stinging when he woke up.
Fluttershy sat down and looked at what she had done with a sad smile before she grabbed a spare bright blue blanket out from under the couch, and covered the stallion with it to keep him warm. She sighed and looked up the staircase, which led up to the half finished bedroom that she had started to fix up the day she’d bought the cottage, before she was too busy tending to the animals that started to visit her, unsure where she would sleep herself.
Angel hopped over to Fluttershy and pushed on her leg. She looked down and saw that he was holding a soft yellow blanket and a big white pillow in his paws and he put them down beside the couch.
Fluttershy smiled warmly. “You're such a good bunny Angel, thank you for helping me take care of him,” she whispered as she laid down and put the blanket over herself. Angel hopped under with her. The last thought she had before she fell asleep was that she was happy Angel had thought of the solution that if the stallion were to wake up, she would be there to help him.
Angel smiled as he closed his eyes and fell asleep, there would be no nightmares this night for him.
During the night, while Angel and Fluttershy slept peacefully next to the couch, the stallion’s foreleg twitched involuntarily, which shot needles of pain through his whole body as he grimaced.
An eyelid slowly lifted up and a tired brown orb looked around the room confusedly. His eyes travelled down to the floor and gazed upon the yellow blanket. His eyes shrunk in terror at the sight of the yellow pony and white bunny sleeping on the floor next to him. He tried to move his leg to sit up, but intense pain traveled through his leg and that caused him to fall back against the couch, his head seared in pain as a quiet hiss escaped his lips.
He stared ahead at the front door as the pain continued to course through his head, his eyes went fuzzy and golden dust escaped his lips as he fell unconscious again, a quiet whirring sound from outside the last thing he heard.
As night changed to dawn, the sun came up into the sky and shone through the windows into the cottage. The stray rays of sunlight found their way through Fluttershy’s eyelids and awakened her gently. She slowly opened her eyes and looked around, unsure why she was sleeping on the floor, before the memories of last night came back to her.
She slowly stood up and looked around, Angel was nowhere to be seen in the room. She frowned a bit worried but thought that he might be in the kitchen as she stood in front of the couch. She looked at the brown stallions bandages, they had a bit of blood on them and the blood had managed to seep through them, but they had otherwise done their job well and kept his blood mostly inside him.
She leaned over and grabbed the bandages on the stallions head with her teeth and pulled them off. She looked at the gash, it had gotten better over the night and looked to have begun to seal itself up over night. The same could go for the bite wounds on his legs, but Fluttershy knew they weren't fully healed and it would take a while before they stopped hurting.
She put fresh bandages on them and left him be to sleep for awhile longer as she went into the other room to feed her animals their food and make a special salad with a cherry on top for Angel.
The stallions eyes squinted open and he watched Fluttershy walk into another room before he sat up and jumped to the floor. The sudden weight put onto his leg made immense pain shoot throughout his body and his legs buckled and forced him to kneel on the floor.
He frowned, his eyes slightly misted over, determined to make an exit. He stood back up, favouring his leg and looked around the room, confused. The sudden pain had clouded his brain making him unsure which door would be the exit, as well as made his vision blurred.
He shook his head to try and, unsuccessfully, clear his vision. He limped to the door closest to him on the left wall and pushed it open with his head.
Fluttershy finished feeding her animals and was making sure that Angel wasn't eating his salad too fast or in danger of choking, when the stallion she had left on the couch walked through the door in a sort of blind daze.
He squinted as he looked around the room, trying to see clearly of what he was seeing. When his vision finally did clear out, Fluttershy was standing in front of him, her face full of concern.
“Are you ok sir?” she asked, worried why he suddenly looked frightened by the sight of her.
The stallion needed quickly and winced from pain as he stopped, “Oh yes my dear, I’m completely fine. I couldn't be better!” he exclaimed in a slight Trottingham accent before he looked around the room a bit paranoid, like everything would fall apart.
Fluttershy smiled sympathetically, “There isnt a need to be afraid of anything here sir, your safe and I was taking care of you while you slept. What were you doing out in the forest at night?” she asked.
The stallion avoided her gaze, “I was looking for something and got a bit lost, not really by choice though, and it found me first.” he said cryptically. Fluttershy wasn't sure if he was lying or not, but she could see that she was managing to calm him down a little bit. She just needed to talk to him some more and she was sure he would relax.
“If I may ask, what’s your name sir?” she asked, slightly disappointed when he went back into his shell and started to shuffle his hooves nervously.
He coughed as he looked everywhere around the room except Fluttershy, “You could call me by many names really. Clockwise Clockwork, Hour Glass, Time Turner, Timer, it doesn't really matter what you call me.” he said.
Fluttershy nodded slowly “Alright...Time Turner, I made you some soup I made by crushing a few fruits and was going to give it to you before you woke up like I had last night so you wouldn't be hungry, but now that you're awake it will be easier and you can drink it yourself.” she said as she pointed to a brown bowl on the table behind her, full to the brim with suspicious green liquid.
Time Turner studied it with distrust, “What's in it?” he asked, not keen on staying around very long.
Fluttershy smiled, “Well, I read somewhere in a book once that pears are very healthy for a pony and can help give nutrients and important elements to somepony hurt...” she said, before she saw turner’s face contort into great disgust.
“You gave me pears?!” he exclaimed indignantly, suddenly able to taste it quite vividly.
Fluttershy hesitated slightly, “Um...yes I gave you pears...is that bad? Are you allergic to them?” she asked worried.
Time Turner frowned, “Yes its bad! Pears are absolute rubbish and probably the worst food in existence! There is nothing good about them!” he yelled as he stomped his injured hoof on the ground and winced as a fresh spasm of pain jumped through his leg and up all through his body as he arched his head forward.
“Oh please calm down, you're going to make it worse. Let me see your hoof and I promise to bring you to the hospital later today and never give you pears.” Fluttershy pleaded as she walked closer to him.
Time Turner backed away as he shook his head, “No, I have interfered too much here at this time already, you haven't even met them yet or realized...this is probably messing with it as we speak...” he muttered as he shook his head again, “I can care for myself well enough, thank you!” he yelled, before he turned tail and ran out the door, ignoring the pain he left as he put pressure on his leg and his head.
Fluttershy blinked, surprised, before she ran after Time Turner. Angel stood on top of the table beside his salad bowl, a cherry hanging out of his mouth as he stood stock still, trying to process what had happened. He put his cherry down and jumped off the table. He bolted after the pony who made him feel safe and who felt like a mother to him.
Fluttershy stood outside her cottage, looking at an odd blue box. She wasn't sure how a full grown pony would be able to fit comfortable inside of a small box, much less an injured one who she knew needed space to heal better.
She was about to pull the door open, before the door swung itself open like it had a mind of its own into a perfectly circular room where she stood at the top of a metal staircase. The rooms floor was made of perfectly clear glass, easily seen wires jumbled underneath. A large green tube above a ring of metal was littered with all sorts of levers and buttons, with letters Fluttershy didn't recognize wherever a lever or button wasn't. Metal staircases went upwards all around the room leading into hallways and the room had intricate holes put in that made the room glow a bright orange color.
Fear washed over her at the sheer size that was held inside of a seemingly small box before her common sense told her that this was probably a unicorns magic that made it possible to be that large. She trotted up the steps, unaware that Angel was following behind her as her hooves made a soft clipping noise on each step. She walked over to the center of the room and looked at the metal ring where she tried to decipher the symbols.
Fluttershy was just tracing her hoof on one of the strange circular symbols when Time Turner walked through a doorway on the opposite side of the glass tube. The bandages were nowhere to be seen and his injuries were clearly visible as he muttered something quietly to himself
He put a hoof against the gash on his head and felt it as he studied the bite marks embedded into his foreleg. “This will be terribly annoying and very problematic for me. Going to have to cheat a little bit just to fix it.” he said as he closed his eyes.
Fluttershy started to walk over to him to scold him for running away in his condition while she was only trying to help him get better and scaring her half to death when a furry paw pushed on her foreleg. She looked down and frowned when she saw that Angel had followed her after Time Turner instead of staying inside of the cottage where it was safer.
He smiled at her and waved happily before he noticed that his normally white fur was reflecting a golden colored shine on it and he looked forward to where the source was coming from, fascinated.
Fluttershy shook her head, “Angel, what...” she began, having made up her mind to tell him off, but the light reflected off his fur and his attention focused elsewhere behind her made her take a look over her shoulder to see what was happening.
Time Turner sat down onto the stainless glass floor as he let a golden light appear around him and surround his head and foreleg. The light moved and swirled around his cutie mark, but he dispelled it away without having it fix a thing, instead he focused on using it on the more painful and important injuries that would slow him down.
The light glowed a bright yellow like a star before it melted into the wounds. The bite marks filled with new flesh and fur, while the gash across the side of his head shrunk and closed up, covered by new fur, completely rebuilding the muscle and tissue structure as it seeped into them before disappearing entirely, leaving the skin to look as if it was never touched at all.
Time Turner lifted his foreleg up to his head, relief washed through his whole body at the shear bliss of having no pain follow the movement anymore and being able to think clearly without getting his vision blurred. He stood up and smiled as he looked around the empty room, “I feel I may just pay for doing that later, but I couldn't very well continue on in that sort of state, now could I?” he asked aloud, before he frowned slightly,
“Probably shouldn't have run off like that though, even if she will be important later on and I was meddling with something I wasn't supposed to. I had done enough damage just by having the bunny find me.” he walked over to the console in the center of the room and tapped his hooves against it, “Where shall we be going now, perhaps Romane?” he wondered happily.
Fluttershy had hid under the metal contraption with Angel to keep from being seen by the magically healing earth pony when he had walked over to the other side of it. She didnt understand what he meant by her being important or how an earth pony could use magic to fix himself, but she didn't like it and wasn't comfortable staying around anymore. She wanted to leave the impossible box as quickly as she could, but the door was too far away to get to without a confrontation with Time Turner.
Angel stared up at Fluttershy, confused why she would make them hide and was looking around like she was a trapped animal before he realized that she was afraid of the magical glowing earth pony.
He frowned angrily and hopped out from under the metal disk, determined to help Fluttershy not be afraid of the weird stallion.
“Angel no!” Fluttershy whispered as she watched him crawl out from under metal disk just as he jumped up in front of Time Turner.
Time Turner stared at Angel in surprise, “How did you get in here? I thought the TARDIS was locked...and that bunnies didn't have the capability to open doors...” he said, rubbing his chin with a hoof in curious thought.
Fluttershy crawled out from under the disk and stood up, “Sorry...” she whispered as she stared down at the floor. Time Turner whipped his head towards her, surprised, “The door opened and he followed me in.” she said apologetically as she took a few steps closer to him.
Turner backed up while Angel hopped onto Fluttershys back, This is very bad, I’m disrupting the history of Equestria further by her being here... he thought, before her words sunk in and registered in his brain, “Wait...did you say that the door opened for you?” he asked incredulously as he stopped in his tracks.
Fluttershy nodded, “Yes it did. It was a bit odd, but I’m starting to question ‘normal’ at this point after everything that has happened today.” she said as she looked around.
Time Turner laughed as he looked up at the roof, “You must think you're very clever don't you TARDIS? Allowing this pony into here. You know very bloody well that history will all unravel if we were to take this pony, this important piece of the future!” he yelled.
Fluttershy stared at him and shook her head, “I’m sorry, but I think you might be mistaking me for somepony else, I’m not really very important.” she said apologetically.
Time Turner looked down at her and smiled warmly, “My dear mare, everypony is important in the world. I have never once met a pony who wasn't important in the world and it seems that the TARDIS has forgotten the fact that you just happen to be a bit more important then most others and letting you into here was a mistake!” he exclaimed as he walked over to the control panel.
Fluttershy watched him, “What do you mean, what's a TARDIS?” she asked.
Time Turner hummed happily, “Nothing that you truly need to know about now, you really must be going.” he said as he began to lead her towards the open door. Just as he had gotten her to the top of the steps, the door slammed itself closed and a loud wheezing noise resounded throughout the room as the blue cylinder in the middle of the control panel moved up and down in its place.
Time Turner frowned and released his hold on Fluttershy and quickly ran back to the center console. He pushed buttons and pulled levers hurriedly as he tried to make everything stop moving, “No no no, I told you already we can’t take any one of them at any time whatsoever! Especially at a time like this before they have even met, not after what happened last time! We must return so that I can fix the damage and bring everything back to normal.” he growled as he stared at the cylinder. nothing responded except for a few violent shakes inside the whole room that forced him to hold onto the console as the blue cylinder continued moving regardless, while Fluttershy sat confused by the door as she held Angel in her hooves.
Author's Note
Where do you think the TARDIS is taking them? Where would you like to see them be? The past? Future? This is unedited!!
Also, I need a small favour from some of you artistically talented readers, because my drawing skills are in the toilet. I need someone to draw me a picture for a cover art to this story. I cant find any pictures with Fluttershy and the doctor except for where she is with her friends. Also, if interested, I need a picture of a pony in a cage, I will give specifics later.
