The Elements of Liberty: The Second Perspective

I was sitting in class, staring at the clock as though it was the one speaking instead I the teacher . It was the last day of school, and it was the final period of the day. As I continued to have a staring contest with the clock I heard a voice grab my attention. Tearing my attention way from the object hanging on the wall, I turned to my right facing my best friend Gage, who had been trying to snap me out of my stupor. "Huh?" I asked, blinking at my friend in confusion. "Were you even listening at all?" He asked, staring at me Like I was an idiot. "Yeah.....maybe....not really" I admitted, turning back to the clock. "I said what are you doing after school? I was going to ask if maybe you wanted to play Halo 4 later, after I got home today after rifle practice" he said as he scratched some more notes down that the teacher has written on the board. "Sure, sure...." I replied, once again wandering back to the world of what I would do when school ended. "Cool, so when will you be online?" He asked me. "Huh? Oh, sometime around... 4 o'clock I think" I said as the clock once again became my main focus. Gage was just about to say something else when the bell finally rang, signaling my freedom from school for the rest of the summer. Tossing the paper that I was pretending to write on into the air, I stand and, grabbing my bag, speed walk to the door. But the second I open it, I hear the scream that causes my blood to run cold.

The scream threw me from the safety of sleep, and into the world of the awake. Bolting awake with a start, looking left and right, searching the dark for the source of the noise. Then I hear the scream again. Hopping off my makeshift bed, which was the bench at the back of Trixie's cart, with my jacket as a pillow. Throwing on my jacket as I got off the bench, I suddenly felt the ground begin to rumble. The I hear a very loud roar. Whatever it was, it sounded close, and it sounded PISSED. I was only just able to look to my left before the mysterious creature tackled me to the ground like an NFL linebacker. With the wind temporarily knocked out of me, I looked up at my assailant, and nearly shat myself. Looming above me, was what looked to be a giant lion with red spikes for a mane, and it looked hungry. And then it roared at me, sending spittle all over my face. And I responded like any true man would. I screamed like a bitch and punched it right in the snout.

The lion, obviously surprised by the sudden fist in its face, recoiled back, giving me enough room to place my right foot on it's chest, and push it off me. But what I didn't know, was that the lion had placed it's right hind leg on my left leg, in an attempt to pin me, and as I pushed it off of me, the beast's claws tore into my leg, causing me to cry out in pain. By now my autopilot mode had been engaged, an my fight-or-flight response was telling me that now was a good time to hightail it out of there. As I stumbled to my feet, a smashing sound was heard behind me, and turning around revealed that I had just barely missed being impaled by a... Scorpion tail? Looking down the length of the tail showed what I had previously thought was a lion trying to pull its tail out of the wall of Trixie's cart.  wait, where is trix--, I couldn't complete the thought as I was once again knocked to the ground with all the finesse of a large rag-doll being hit by a freight train. after regaining my senses, I peeked at my new assailant, revealing another of the weird lion-scorpion hybrids.

The abomination of nature grabbed its brethren's tail with it's teeth, and pulled the tail out of the basketball-sized hole in the cart. Now I had two freaky lion-scorpion creatures looking at me like a starving man looks at a five course meal. This was going to hell really fast, and I was just about to turn tail and test my track skills against the freaks of nature, when I was stopped by a voice that called out in fear, "BOWEN! HELP!" Turning towards the cry for help, where I saw Trixie on top of the cart, carrying what looked like saddlebags, using her magic to fight off three other arachni-cats that were fighting to get on top of the cart. Now I was faced with a decision: leave Trixie to her fate and book it to the nearest town, or risk my life to save her, and probably get eaten in the process. By now, my bleeding leg was really beginning to hurt but, thankfully, my adrenalin allowed me to push the pain down to somewhere that I could ignore it, and most of the arachni-cat group, save the two that were snarling at me and inching ever closer, seemed to be focused on Trixie and the cart. Deciding that I had a better change to walk out of this alive, I was preparing to leave Trixie and race the freak hybrids to the closest town, when I heard another scream.

Sparing a glance in Trixie's direction, what I saw made me reconsider abandoning Trixie. One if the Arachni-cats had slammed into the cart, misbalancing Trixie, causing her to slip off of the cart and onto the ground. Shakily standing up, she stared in horror as the devil-cats strode around the cart and approached her, obviously relishing an easy kill. It was then that my mind was made up, and I did one if the bravest (and dumbest) things that I had ever done in my short life. I sprinted towards my attackers, throwing them off as they sidestepped to get out of my path. I then raced over to Trixie as she was backing away from the demonic felines and, scooping her up in my arms (she was strangely light for a unicorn that came to about mid-chest level, she must've weighed like, 70 pounds), sprinted away for all I was worth towards the dim glow over the horizon. the Demon-cats, finally getting over the shock of the strange creature out-smarting them, gave chase.

And so it began.I would run as fast as my athletic legs could carry me and Trixie, and the demonic felines would chase me, occasionally taking flight in an attempt to catch me off-guard. However, my reflexes were thankfully on point, and i would dodge or sidestep these attacks. Finally, after what seemed like hours, the spawns of Satan eventually gave up the chase, falling back into the woods for protection from the growing sunlight on the horizon. at this point. the road that I was running on had gained a considerable incline, making it all the more difficult for me to carry Trixie, who had started to fidget while I was running, and she constantly checked over my shoulder, making sure that the evil beasts weren't still following us. by now my lungs felt like they were on fire, my throat and mouth felt like someone had zealously rubbed sandpaper all over my throat and mouth. finally, after making sure that the arachni-cats weren't coming back for round 2, I put Trixie down and promptly fell on my ass.

"Are they gone?" Trixie asked, looking back to where we ran from. "hopefully not..... because..... if they do, i seriously..... doubt that.... I'll be able to .....outrun them again... heh heh... heh...." I manage to pant. "Are you alright, Bowen?" Trixie asked, looking at me with worry. Truth be told, I felt further from fine than i even thought physically possible. I could barely stand, my injured leg is now extremely pissed at me and is most likely infected, I felt extremely light-headed from both exhaustion and blood loss, I desperately needed a drink and something to eat, and to top it all off, I lost my bag when we escaped the Arachni-cats. "just....peachy...." i wheeze. "you don't look fine to Trixie, you're hurt!" she replied, trotting over to me and examining my leg. "stay still, Trixie will try to heal you. It looks bad, but give Trixie a moment and she will have you up and running again." "If i have anything to say about it, that's the last time I'll be running for a while." I replied as her horn begins to glow a light blue. Then something pops into my head. Gage, being the brony that he is, forced me to sit with him and watch the first two episodes of my little pony when I had come over to his house once as an attempt to "Convert me to the herd". of course, i never watched past the first two episodes before declaring that I will never watch the show, but I've watched enough of it, (as well as studied enough basic mythology) to guess what we were nearly eaten by. "were those... Manticores?" I ask in a slightly pained voice, as the unicorn attempts to bath my leg in the same blue glow as her horn. "why yes, they are an indigenous species in the forest here. have you never seen one before?" she asked, looking at me in confusion. "no, never before in my life." I replied, my breath hitching in pain as I feel the wound try to close.

"Celestia curse it! Trixie must've used more magic than she needed to on those manticores...." Trixie exclaimed as the glow on her horn and my leg both disappear. "what?" I said. "what's wrong?" "Trixie can't seem to close your leg wound all the way, as she wasted too much energy fending off those flea-ridden beasts" she explained in frustration. "If Trixie only had a little more magic, she would be able to heal you all the way" "hey, don't sweat it, I'm sure it isn't as bad as it looks, just give me a sec to rest, and we'll keep going." I said. I was lying through my teeth, and from look she gave me, she didn't believe me either. But I wasn't about to risk spending another second longer out here than I had to. After taking a few seconds to regain my breath fully, I eventually struggled to my feet, muttering obscenities under my breath as my entire body heavily protested against me moving. "See? Nothing to worry about" I said, smiling. "Now let's hurry, I think I see a town over that rise" "wait just a moment, Bowen" Trixie said quickly, "Trixie doesn't want your leg to become infected, so at least let her bandage it" she stated, pulling out a roll of bandages out of her saddlebags. "Where did you get those?" I asked. "What are you talking about? Trixie always carries first aid in her saddlebags in case she gets hurts performing" she replied, wrapping my claw wound in the bandages. "Okay, I guess" I said, and when she finished, she hefted her saddlebags back on, and she began to walk towards the top of the rise, with me limping slightly behind, wondering what was going to happen next in this weird adventure.