Bare Bones, Thick Soul

Over a course of several days the 'zebra' taught me many things, she told me who I encountered on the edge of the forest, what I was and where I came from, yet talked to me very blatantly as if I had no brain. Even though I..... technically REALLY had no brain, I was strangely able to remember everything that was said. Anyways, she taught me things (or really told me things and expected me to forget them) and explained things, but had nothing for those strange feely things I got when the 'ponies' ran away from me. Well, even without that discovery, she put something called a 'collar' around my bony neck and started to guide me through the dark forest.

I walked with this newfound zebra friend nearly to the entrance of the forest before we were stopped by a bunch of ponies who had.... less than desirable looks on their faces. I began to chatter, getting that queasy feel again, not able to control my chattering, I examined the group, recognizing the yellow one with funny feathered appendages and the purple one with the strange nub on it's head. The rest were a white one, with a similar nub to the purple one's, a blue one, with the same.... feathered limbs, and then two more, a pink and orange one, neither had any extra limbs.

"T-that's the thing!" The yellow one, whom from Zecora I heard was 'Fluttershy,' exclaimed.

"That's no thing" began Zecora. "This is a skeleton, they breed in the zebra lands, far to the west.... however, this one behaves differently from the rest, while his brethren feed from flesh and hate, he seems free of the want to feed, or at least on us.... he has no need."

The blue one quickly hovered forward into my face. "That doesn't mean it's not evil and doesn't WANT to scare the crap out of us!!" She shouted, this made my queasy feeling get worse, and my body began to chatter uncontrollably, causing her to back off back to her friends.

"Do not scare such a brainless creature.... and haven't you learned your lesson about judging someone by their features?" Asked Zecora, pointing toward herself, and the ponied just sort of stood there, dumbfounded on what to say.

Wait a second..... did that zebra just call me brainless? I turned to the zebra, a new feeling boiling in my head, I felt by bones go from cold to hot as I stares at her. Apparently my facial expression DID change because she stared back and backed off a little. Thoughts began to run through me head. How DARE she say I was brainless! I've understood EVERYTHING she said to me and she still treats me like i'm stupid! My bones began to chatter fiercely, and I hissed lowly at here, she took the collar of of me and looked up at me.

"Excuse me, did I offend you? I do not understand, what did I do?" She asked, before she realized that i've understood everything she's told me. She nodded and apologized. "Now, you six" she began, turning to the ponies again. "This creature is very tempermental, a few wrong words and it could go.... She spun her hoof around her head and moved it around like she was crazy. I guess that made a little sense.... I man... I did just get extremely angry at being called brainless..... but I had a fair point there... but what happened next is what really made me angry.

"Ah don't care what that thing does! It can't just go around scarin' ponies fer no good reason! Thers nothin' else it could do as an occupation? Or is it required to brainlessly roam?" Asked the orange one. There it was..... 'brainless...' I stepped forward quickly, my bones chattering in frustration as I glared down at the little orange pony. I hissed and she backed away, then guess who worked up the guts to step up? The white one, who tapped my shin and caused me to turn to her.

"Darling, do you really think hissing at a lady is the proper thing to do? I mean, you may be brainless, but could you at least be p-" I interrupted her by covering her mouth, and picking her up by her front hooves, I stares with my black eye sockets into hers, and when I removed my hand, she screamed horridly. I dropped her and looked to her friends, each of which, would not step forward. I stepped quickly at them, hissing with my hands up, and they all scrambled off. That's right... they ran.... 'brainless' if I could spit I would.

I turned back to the zebra, still feeling very boiled, and threw a stick at her. This was at least enough to make her leave me alone. Good....... wait.... was it so good? Didn't I just screw up my chances of ever getting a friend? As I began to feel normal again, I questioned everything I had done. With questions along the lines of things like why did I do that? Was this all over a word? I spoiled my only chance to make friends! Even if they thought I was stupid! I felt that same boiling feeling rising up again, and decided to calm myself before I went berserk on the bushes...

I abandoned my stationary position and started walking to the forest entrance. If I had any shot at making friends the least I could do was apologize. By the time I made it to the entrance the six were discussing what I assumed was me, so I hid and listened.

"Ah just don't know how it blew up like that, all we were sayin' is that it shouldn't scare the ponies!"

"Well, maybe it had to do with the word it uhh.... interrupted me on." Stated the white unicorn.

"What, yah mean 'brainless?' It's just a harmless word!" Replied the orange one.

"Applejack" interrupted the purple unicorn. "Don't you get pretty mad when ponies call you a stupid hillbilly?" She popped the question at her friend, which caused her to clam up, she stopped speaking. "Exactly, everyone gets mad when they're insulted, especially a creature that doesn't know what emotions are."

Huh.... so that feeling was called "Mad," made sense. It fit the description. I listened onward.

"Well, that doesn't mean it had permission to be such a big meanie!" Exclaimed the pink one in..... i'm not sure if it was a good emotion or the mad one... it was hard to tell. She continued speaking. "He hissed t us and scared Rarity! Is that any way to treat someone you just met?"

"Well, Pinkie, you've got a good point." Replied that unicorn. "But if I had just strolled into town and called you an annoying party pony would you like me very much for that first impression??"

"Well...... no.... it would make even ME upset..."

I decided this is where I would intervene. I stepped out of the bushes, my chattering becoming louder and louder as the queasy feeling built up. They all knew I was here, and they all turned to face my loudly clattering bare boned body. I knew I couldn't speak so I waved in the stupidest way possible.

No response from the group, save for the light blue pegasus. Thanks to the zebra knowledge, I could at least tell what RACE they are. "What was your big idea trying to eat Rarity?" She shoved a hoof into my rib cage, my chattering got much worse. I wasn't trying to eat her.... the thought of that made my non-exsistant stomach queasy.

"Rainbow Dash, please!" Said the orange regular pony. "Look at him! He's shakin' like ah leaf! You wanna make it's anxiety any worse, I'll bet it's tryna apologize, and you're gonna shoo it away."

I watched as a small argument took place between the two, before the purple unicorn stepped between them. "YOU TWO! STOOOOOP!!!" She screamed, and they shut up, their faces blushing. "The least we need after having encountered something like this!" She pointed to me. "Is you two arguing like bafoons!"

"So..." began the white unicorn, Rarity. "What do we do with it?"

"We take it back to the library and study it." Came the response of the purple unicorn. She grabbed my skeletal hand with a hoof and led me to the direction of a large tree.

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Shortly after my arrival at the tree house there followed several hours of magic, introductions, and stranger feelings. The weirdest was the feeling of the purple magic the unicorn did. It made me feel like I was going to explode. Not like in emotion, but physically just KABLOOIE! When she stopped with the magic, she looked around at the quintet of friends. "He's made of a dark magic, I can't replace it or he collapses into bone dust."

I pictured that in my head. It wasn't very pleasant.

"Well then we wont replace it." Spoke the light blue pegasus who was named Rainbow Dash. "But what do we do with it?"

"We keep him and help him along, Rainbow. He's clearly lonely, we need to help him make some friends."

That felt good, the pony folk were going to help me make friends? Oh I could jump for JOY! That is...... if I could do it without scaring the crap out of the six occupants of the room.