The Lost Shy

Chapter Two: The Skinner

The Manticore started turning towards the Fluttershy. She immediately slammed her eyes shut and played dead, before the beast could see that she was awake. After a few seconds she heard a small rustling in the trees behind her, it must have been a squirrel or bird because it sounded high up and small. After a few seconds she heard the creature return to what it was doing.

Slowly she opened her eye to see the world around her, with each movement jolts of pain coursed through her damaged body. She looked at the left side first because only her left eye was left uncovered. Her chest was wrapped tightly and the joint between her wing and chest was swollen badly, because of the recent dislocation of her wing.

Fluttershy slowly and painfully turned to look at her right which only reinforced her horror. Her entire wing was swollen and tightly held in place by two sticks and a length of rope. Bloody bandages were wrapped around her body, from the connection of her tail all the way to the right side of her face. It was all she could do not to scream and beg for her life, towards her still preoccupied capture.

Taking another look at beast she noted something was strange about it, his scorpion tail was curled up and appeared to be stuck that way. His wings lay limp off of his back, looking as though they had been in disuse for a long period of time. Taking in this information she noticed something, blood, the smell of blood was all around her. Not the blood on her side and face, which was log dried, no it was the smell of fresh blood. Another quick glace around brought it to her attention, something that could fuel nightmares for weeks.

The skinned bloody remains of the Manticore that had attacked her were hanging from a tree, his stomach and internal organs were missing leaving a gaping hole in his body. His claws were missing and his teeth were gone from his open mouth. The tree next to the body had the stretched skin dripping down, letting it dry out. A pool of blood was forming below the two horrors, in the center of the pool was another grizzly sight. A large Manticore skull was upside down in the pool being used as a bowl to collect some blood.

She felt the remains of her oatmeal rushing up her through her esophagus forcing her to quickly and very painfully vomit to her side away from the fire, she new her cover was blown and there was nothing she could do to stop her impending doom. She slowly turned to see that the creature was looking right at her. What she saw was not the face of a crazed Manticore, but a concerned look from a creature she had never seen before, who was only wearing the skin of a Manticore.

With the funeral over the ponies of Ponyville started to make the way back to their jobs and lives leaving only the five best friends of the diseased, the four guards two of which were the ones who went into the forest to find Fluttershy, and the Princesses. All but the guards had tears forming in their eyes looking to the fresh grave. One by one the friends left to go mourn by themselves leaving only Twilight, Pinkie and the princesses, the guards had moved out to give them some privacy. Pinkie was full out crying, and blaming herself because she couldn’t save her dear friend. Twilight was looking with pleading eyes at her teacher hoping that she would think up a way to bring her friend back. The princess look back with sadness in her eyes.

“There is no way to bring the dead back Twilight even with my powers.” Celestia said

“But there has to be some way to bring her back, she is an element of harmony, isn’t there anything you could do?” Twilight pleaded while looking into her teachers eyes.

“I’m sorry, I know a zombie spell that reanimates a corpse, but leaves the creature in the immense pain of their death until the spell is canceled. We have no body and could you live with yourself knowing that you will be causing your friend immense pain with no way to escape.” said the sun goddess with sadness and guilt in her voice.

A look of horror flashed across both Pinkie and Twilights face as they thought about what would happen.

“Noooo” pinkie yelled while collapsing, “Why didn’t I see it earlier, stupid pinkie sense you should work faster.” no sobbing into her hooves.

“Thank you princess, she would not… not wants us to worry about her.” Twilight joining Pinkie in sobbing.

The princess stayed with them until their crying slowed until it was just a sniffle. Pinkie stood up slowly bidding farewell to the others and slowly making her way home. Twilight cried herself to sleep, and was carried home be the princess. Spike was still up waiting for her return, and looked like he had been crying as well. He thanked the princess and put Twilight to bed then followed suit in his little basket.

Fluttershy heard several pops and the smell of fresh blood filled her nostrils again, this time it was her own blood. The bandages around her neck started to turn pink then dark red as pain soared through her body. The creatures face contorted for a moment then grabbed a small bag from the ground, and started to move towards her.

Fear overpowered pain, Fluttershy started crawling away from the tall approaching creature. As he moved closer she saw what it had been doing. The skinned remains of a wolf with several chunks of its flesh removed from it was laying on a mat on the ground, and the skin was being dried near the fire.

“POP POP POP POP POP POP” agonizing pain flushed through her body, her side bandages started to bleed profusely. But all she could think about was not being the next piece of filleted skin for this creatures sadistic collection.

The beast was gaining ground on her as she started to lose focus on the world due to blood loss. The pain was subsiding as her connection with the waking world faded, she took one last look at the creatures face it was full of pity and guilt. She passed out believing she would never wake.

To her surprise she did wake up again, with less pain then before, but more rope around her, restricting her movements. Her front legs  tied together, and a rope loosely tied around her neck, not enough to choke her but tight enough as to not be removed.

It was day now and the fire had died down, the Manticore body was gone and the skin was laid out like a rug. The pool of blood was dry and covered with dirt, the skull bowl was empty and laying on the grown near her. On top of the skin the creature wearing another Manticore's skin like before but was now asleep. She saw two mounds no far in the distance with two things poking out of the ground, they each were two sticks tied together perpendicular to each other. She could only assume these were the graves for the poor dead animals. She saw the wolf pelt on the ground near her, to her it looked like it was supposed to be worn like a set of clothing.

The creature started to stir, it looked directly at her and smiled. She was still afraid for her life, but at the same time curios, this thing had saved her life not just once but twice, one of which was by her own hooves.

The creature got up towering over her then reached to a bag at his left and pulled out two carrots, one of which he pushed near her. She did not know what to do, did she refuse and try to give him the stare or accept and maybe get a way out of the forest. Her stomach made the decision for her, letting out a loud growl that could rival a large dog. Her face turned red at this occurrence, and the creature laughed, not a mocking laugh but a kind and whole hardy laugh.

She devoured the fist carrot with more gusto then she had ever eaten with in her life, but this was not enough, she looked back at the creature who smiled and brought out several carrots and other vegetables for her to eat. After her meal the creature brought a small crude wooden bowl in front of her filled with a strange red and blue mixture, she eyed it carefully, before pushing it away.

The creature got up and looked at her for a second before turning away to move towards the low fire. Fluttershy thought she had made him angry and cowered a little before he returned with her book. He opened it to a certain page before showing her what was on it. There was a recipe for a healing elixir, he pointed at it then at the bowl in front of her.

Fluttershy finally understood, the bowl was full of medicine, to help her heal. He pushed towards her again with a smile. She started to drink, it tasted horrible, but she was able to get about half of it down before stopping. The creature still smiling, pulled the bowl back before pulling out a large piece of paper from a bag, it was her crudely drawn map of the town and forest. He untied her front legs and then laid the map in front of her.

She eyed him suspiciously as he pointed towards her then flapped his arms a little, followed by him pointing at town. He did this twice before she understood. She wanted her to lead him into town.

“You want me to lead you into town” she scratched out of her dry throat.

He took notice of the dry sound and produced another wooden bowl of full water for her before speaking.

“saln desj igro dehnhaji jefsy” the creature said before shaking his head and shrugging.

Fluttershy was shocked the creature spoke, although I another language, but still he spoke. She had no idea what to think.

Fluttershy spent the next several day being taken care of by this strange thing. He would leave in the morning and return after noon with fresh food and medical plants, he would then check her stitches and bandages. Then he would show her why he did the things he did. The first two day she was still afraid of him but as she learned why he did those horrid things her fears subsided.

She learned that the Manticore skins were to keep him warm because he had very little fur. The blood filled skull had had been used to pant the trees to keep predators away. The wolf had attacked him and he killed it to save his life, the flesh that was removed was in turn eaten by him to sustain his dangerous life in the woods. The claws were used to make a necklace, which could be used as a weapon if need be, and the teeth were used as fishing hooks so that he would not need too hunt.

As the days went by her pain subsided and the majority of her stitches were removed leaving only a few in her face, the bandages that once covered her whole body now just remained on her wing which might take months to heal on its own without magic. And until she could fly they were both lost in the forest, with only each other for company.

Fluttershy had three large scars running across the majority of her right side, they slashed straight through her cutie mark, which was still discernable but it was easy to tell it had seen better days. The scars on her face were the worst of the bunch, two scars running up her snout and a third slashing to the right of her eye and ending at what was left of her eyebrow.

The days passed slowly in Ponyville as thing started to return to normal. Pinkie had returned to a party pony but it was easy to tell that she blamed herself for her friends death. Twilight had been studying nonstop for a way to go back and save her friends life, but to no avail all the spells she found could endanger the world if she used them. The other three were still depressed but trying to move on with there lives.

Most of Fluttershy’s pets had returned to the forest, a few had been adopted, leaving only Angel bunny at the house. He was alone most of the time trying to keep the place livable for he still believed that his mistress would return and they would live together, again. Rainbow Dash would bring him food every few days, out of pity and loyalty to her friend.

About a month after Fluttershy funeral the CMC decided to visit Zacora in the wood to see if she could help then get their cutie marks. Along the way they got lost and started to wonder aimlessly when Apple bloom slipped and fell ten feet into a small creek bed. When she hit the ground a sickening crack could be heard, as she screamed out in pain as she felt her legs snap under the weight of gravity and her body. The other two were freaking out, one of their friends was writhing in pain and they could not help her until they found a way down into the ravine.

All of there hope drained when they saw something that should not be there, a large Manticore was striding down the river bank fairly quickly. Next to it was a medium sized wolf keeping stride with it, then they noticed Applebloom and increased their pace. She saw them and yelled up to her friend to run, but they were frozen in fear, the wolf got there first and received a hoof to the face.

The hit had knocked her hood off reveling a scarred and angry Fluttershy, who looked back and waited for the Manticore to arrive, then looking back at the two up at the top of the hill with a questioning look. Then a smile broke on her face, but not one they had ever seen her wear before, it was more beaming and less like she was hiding behind it to make others feel better. She then called out to the Manticore in some strange language they had never heard before.

The two fillies ran as fast as they could, they hated the thought of leaving their friend behind, but they had to get help for both Applebloom and Fluttershy. She was not dead, her friends needed to know.