Epona
By:TankFodder
Zecora crept through the dark underbrush of the Everfree Forest. In her saddlebags where groceries and other goods from the market in Ponyville, where she had stayed the past few days. Normally, she was not bothered by the oppressive atmosphere of the forest in which she made her home. Tonight, however something felt off.She stopped, and sniffed the air. A coppery scent wafted through the air sickeningly. As she rounded a tree, she came upon a tiny clearing. A dead manticore lay at the other edge of the clearing. It was too dark to see clearly, and Zecora crept closer, to examine the grisly sight. Warning bells went off in her head. The manticore lay on its stomach, when she came closer, she saw the pink its flesh and slivers of its bone underneath. She retched. Whatever had killed it had not stopped there. The manticore had been skinned and carved up, much of the meat was gone, and its body had been stripped of its skin and fur. Zecora scrambled back, and forced herself not to sprint off into the forest. But the blood on the ground was dry, or very nearly so. It had been lying there at least a day, yet nothing had disturbed the scene. As she explored further, she noticed several deep wounds on the manticore, and a metal spike with a broken end was sticking from its gut. A wooden shaft lay nearby, a metal tip extending from the shaft and also broken at the end. A large rectangular wooden panel with a strange design on the front hung stuck from the manticore's barbed tail. Splatters of crimson blood lay around the ground, and followed a trail of scuffed dirt which led back into the forest, in the same direction as her home. She quickly went back for her saddlebags and tripped over a strange object. A piece of armor, much like that which the Canterlot Royal Guard wore. It was made of interlocked metal strips, and what she assumed was the front was indented, with three jagged scratches across the breastplate. It couldn't have been a pony's though, the way it was shaped would put pressure on a pony's chest, and the leg holes were too far to the side. A chill feeling of dread spread throughout her body, and she took off for home. As unlikely as it was, the further she followed the trail, the closer she came to her hut, until she finally came upon the clearing which she called home.
The door was closed, but she could see that the lock had been smashed off at some point, and a strange creature stood just outside. It stood much like Twilight's Spike, on two legs, with two arms coming off of the sides of its torso ending in five stubby appendages that weren't quite claws. It wore a red shirt, which looked as if it had been repaired recently, and carried a long wooden stick with a metal shaft extending from the tip. Very noticeable was the wolf's head draped over its own which made it hard to tell how tall it was, but it had to be at least a foot taller than herself. Zecora looked at it and failed to suppress a gag. The creature suddenly looked up, very alert now, and drew a short blade from its hip. She pressed against the tree she was hiding behind, desperate not to be seen. She saw its face under the hood of the wolf fur, its eyes sweeping the forest, before coming to rest on her own. Zecora froze. Her heart leapt to her mouth as she prayed to the spirits, to Celestia, Luna, to anypony who could save her. The creature shouted, and began to run towards her, she heard crashing inside her hut and others like it began to pile out of the hut. Zecora snapped out of her shock, turned, and fled. Hopefully towards Ponyville, but anywhere away from the demons that chased her would do.
Titus chased the fleeing person. He hadn't gotten a good look at them, but they were short enough to be a child. He panted, a fast child at that. Fast or not, child or not, no one could know where they were. The germans were merciless foes, and would certainly kill the men hiding there if they were discovered. The figure fled tirelessly, but as he chased them, he couldn't shake a strange feeling. The person's cloak concealed their body, but their posture was all wrong, and they moved with an almost unnatural speed and endurance for one so small. He felt himself tiring and had sensed his fellows fall behind a while ago. As he ran, he fumbled in his belt pouch and pulled out a length of braided rope and a smooth, round stone. He came to a stop and fitted the stone in a pouch in the center of the rope, before lifting it up, and twirling it overhead.
Zecora dared for a moment to look back, and almost collapsed with relief when she saw the demon -bareheaded now, when had it discarded it's grisly hat?- come to a stop. She gave it no more mind and concentrated on getting out of the forest now. In fact, she thought she could see the forest's edge now. As she slowed to preserve her strength, she almost heard a slight whistling before a flash of pain exploded in the back of her head.
Titus couldn't help but smile in relief when the escaping barbarian collapsed to the ground. He replaced his sling in his pouch and drew a long dirk, having had discarded his sword during the run. He approached the fallen figure, and stopped. This wasn't a man at all. Underneath the cloak he could see four hooves extending from a long body. Tentatively, he pulled back its hood. And stared. A striped horse lay unconscious on the ground in front of him, too small for a man to ride, and strangely colored with black and white stipes running across its body, but undoubtedly a horse. His first instinct was to kill it and be done with, but a stray thought stayed his hand. This creature wore clothing, it had dropped supplies when he had seen it. No human was there to guide it, but it had run with purpose and direction. It could give him answers. It still breathed, so he half-carried, and half-dragged it back towards the hut they were staying in until he found his comrades once more. Though they were also surprised at its appearance,they helped him carry it back to the hut they had found in the forest without argument.
After some debate, they strapped it upside down to a table, to restrict its movement as much as possible. A gag was placed in its mouth, not so tight as to be painful, not yet anyway, but enough that the men would have some warning if it tried to scream. After some debate, as Marcus, Cassius, and Lucius refused to believe it could be anything more than a dumb animal. However, given that they had just slain a creature of myth just yesterday, and Marcus was wearing its head on his helmet, they were willing to let it go.
The strange Horse woke up some time later, Marcus watched as it struggled against its bonds for a few moments before lifting its head to lead around. Its movements were frantic and panicky, but he thought it seemed too observant to be just a dumb animal. It noticed him in the corner, and its surprisingly large eyes shot wide open, and it began to struggle once again. He waited for it to tire and then cleared his throat.
“I see you're awake.” the strange horse just looked at him. He continued, “can you understand me?” The creature still didn't move, so he shrugged, and turned to the door. “Hey, guys! Its awake!” The creature whimpered through its gag and looked on apprehensively as four other men walked into the side room it was held in. The one who had chased her was not there. One of them walked over and pulled the gag out of her mouth. Although they had at least partly expected it, all of the men were surprised when the horse began to speak in a strange language none of them could understand. She, for the creatures voice did seem feminine, also seemed to speak very rhythmically. They were probably asking the same things of each other, but it didn't help when neither of them could understand a word the other spoke.
Titus crept through the forest, back to where he had caught the striped creature, back to the edge of the forest. It thinned into a light woods, and in the distance he thought he could see a small town through the trees. A path went into the forest of to his right, and led off towards the town, reinforcing his thoughts. He paused, grinning at the new lion skin he wore over his armor, before heading along the side of the path, determined to find out where he and his fellows were. As he passed a fork in the path, he heard singing. Titus couldn't understand the words, but it was beautiful music nonetheless. He turned, and followed the turn and a bend in the path. When he rounded the bend, his draw dropped, and he mouthed a quick prayer to the gods for protection, answers, thanks, anything he could think of, as he tried to make sense of what he was looking at. A true Pegasus floated around in front of him, singing to herself as she tended to a garden beside a quaint cottage. Woodland creatures scurried about, showing no fear, and even helped the pegasus with its chores. The winged horse looked so peaceful, so kind, that he was more than a little bit tempted to simply walk up and introduce himself. A smaller, darker corner of his mind wanted to capture it, and take the honor of owning a creature from mythology. He shut that thought down as quickly as it had come though. For one, the thought just seemed repulsive, particularly compared to the scene he was watching. For two, Titus was on a mission. He turned back down the path, and then towards the town in the distance. As he came to the edge of the woods, he crouched in the bushes, and scanned the town before him, taking great care to remain unseen.
“RUN! EVERYPONY RUN FOR YOUR LIVES! THE HORROR! THE HORROR!” The ponies of Ponyville looked up, many of them nervously, although Lily would often overreact, she seemed genuinely scared as she galloped screaming through the streets. A rainbow blur streaked down from above and tackled the purple panicky pony to the ground.
“What is it this time Lily?” Rainbow Dash stood over Lily, looking frustrated. Rainbow forced herself not to say anything sarcastic, and in a great feat of restraint, held her tongue further until Lily could explain herself.
True to to form, the pony began gushing hysterically “It was awful, I was going for my walk around Ponyville, when I felt something watching me. I looked around, and there was a manticore, just hiding in the bushes, waiting for me to pass by!” an audible gasp came from the small crowd standing around the scene. The seeds of panick that had been planted began to take root, as the ponies began muttering to each other and looked at the roads out of town as if they were the Everfree forest itself.
Even Rainbow was taken aback at this. In that moment, though, Applejack pushed her way through the crowd. “Aw, horseapples. The Everfree got some nasty critters in it, and it ain't so far away, but they all stay in there. I bet you just saw one of Fluttershy's animals. In fact, just point the way and me an' Rainbow here'll go check it out, just to show you everything's okay.” Rainbow, who was nearly ready to grab Lily and drag her there, simply nodded, and accepted Applejack's idea. Lily lifted herself up from the dirt, and pointed a shaking hoof towards the woods neighboring the Everfree. Which was also where Fluttershy kept her cottage, many of the nearby ponies noted. “Come on Rainbow,” Applejack shouted as she trotted down the path. She was sure it was a waste of time, but she had pretty much promised to go check it out.
Rainbow, apparently determined to at least make something of the task, blew past her at full sprint “Race you there, farm pony!” she called over her shoulder. Applejack chuckled and took off after her. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all.
Author's Note: So I had an idea for a story, which I started on. But then I had another one, which is this. So... yeah. It's.. uh.. late. I'm gonna go to bed now. (read:deep and insightful comments/thoughts about the story and my experience thinking up/writing it)
Comments/Critiques are appreciated... etc. etc.
Epona Ch.2
By:TankFodder
“mehercule...” Titus watched the pony run screaming into town. How had she seen him? He pushed it out of his mind, for now. Priorities first, he may have been discovered, but he couldn't allow himself to be captured. Titus turned and began to run back towards the forest. They would come looking for him, but he would not be there when the creatures arrived.
Applejack and Rainbow Dash raced towards the treeline where Lily had claimed to have seen a manticore. Applejack was catching up slowly, but Rainbow Dash put in an extra burst of speed at the last moment and pulled up to the trees just ahead of her friend. As she reached the edge of the path, she flared her wings, and lifted into the air for a victory loop
“Oh yeah! And the pegasus takes the win!” she cheered.
“Aw, you just won because you got a head start.” grumbled Applejack. All in good spirit of course.
Rainbow grinned and looked, “oh, Applejack, you know I- hey, what's that?'
“What's what?”
“Rainbow squinted “There's something running through the woods. It's heading towards Fluttershy's house!” with that, she flapped her wings and shot into a shallow dive towards the running figure. Huh, she thought, it did look like a manticore.
Applejack hesitated, before running through the woods in the direction Rainbow had gone. What had Rainbow seen to make her take off like that?
Titus looked back, as he thought he heard branches snapping behind him. He didn't even have time to curse before a multi-hued blur slammed into him, and knocked him off his feet. The human and pony both went sprawling, spluttering dirt and curses. Rainbow stood up, sizing her opponent who also recovered quickly.
It was pretty small for a manticore. She smirked, “Manticore, huh? More like manti-kitty cat!” she leapt at the beast, and was shocked when it ducked under her jump, and grabbed one of her hooves with a hairless paw. She felt momentum take over, as she arced straight into the ground. She got up again, and backed off warily. She stopped, and stared. This was no manticore! She looked closer, noticing the outline of a creature underneath the.. she blanched as she realized why it looked like a manticore. What kind of monster would wear another creature's skin like that? And it was going to go by Flutterhy's house if she let it get away! Rainbow's expression of disgust turned to one of anger, and she leapt at the creature once more, beating her wings for extra speed. What happened next was almost too fast for even her to really see. It sidestepped, and grabbed her hoof again -a pox on opposable thumbs!- and directed her into a tree. Pain exploded in her head as she heard the rasp of metal on metal, and something slashed across her side. Rainbow gasped, and bucked her back hooves, feeling the monster's breath blast out. The both backed up, assessing their wounds. An orange form suddenly crashed through the brush, yelling a battle cry.
“Ah'm here Rainbow! Don't worry!” Applejack skidded to a halt next to Rainbow Dash, and turned to glare at the intruder.
Titus looked at the orange horse that had joined the blue one with the odd mane. Watched as its look turned into horror as it saw its companions slashed side, and the lion pelt he wore, before shifting to rage. He couldn't figure out why, but he really didn't want to hurt theses ponies. Not permanently, anyway. They were shouting at him now, the orange one had moved between him and the multicolored one, who seemed to have just noticed the blood seeping from its side.
Rainbow gawked at her side. Blood flowed from a long cut that ran from her flank to nearly her wing. The monster stood four or five pony-lengths away. In its... paw now was a short metal blade, like a dinner knife, but bigger. Blood dripped slowly from its edge. HER blood, she realized numbly. She shuddered as she realized that if the creature had cut any further, she might have been grounded for a very long time, at the least. She looked up, and saw Applejack advancing on the monster. She started to call out to Applejack, before Applejack charged the creature, which leapt out of the way. It rolled and stood up again, facing Applejack, who also turned toward her opponent. The creature shouted at her, “abi sis, belua!”
Applejack scraped the ground with her hoof, and shouted back, “git outta here, you monster!Ah won't let you get any further!”
Rainbow walked up next to Applejack, and planted her hooves in the dirt. “Just run, monster, you can't win!” Though she sagged slightly from the wounds she had taken earlier in the fight.
Maybe the creature understood what she said, or maybe it had been thinking the same thing, as it began to back up into trees, never taking its eyes off of the two ponies glaring at it.
The romans at Zecora's hut had given up rather quickly on finding out any information from their captive. They couldn't speak, as no one could understand her language, and they could hardly have a horse do pantomime with hooves.
Cassius sat on a stool across the room from Zecora. They had taken her off the table after a while. The room she was in was locked tight, and he wasn't worried about her attacking him. He held his crested helmet in his hands. She couldn't understand him, so he just talked. “luppiter te perdat, you cursed horse. If Titus hadn't found you, I'd still have some hope of getting back to Roma. But no, this isn't Germania. This is just some foul land where horses talk and manticores really do exist.” He got up and left. In the front room, he found the other legionnaires. Sitting around a rough cooking spit they had erected over the hut's fireplace. “Where's Titus?”
Marcus looked up from the fire pit. “Still on that scouting job you gave him. It's not that unusual for Explorators to be gone for days, Cassius.”
“I know that, but I told him to only be gone for a couple of hours. It's been all day.” he sat down on the log they had dragged inside. "If he's not back by morning, take Gaius and find him."
Marcus nodded, "Of course, Centurion."
Rainbow Dash limped up to Fluttershy's cottage with Applejack. They had tried to follow the creature, but it had used a strange rope to fling stones at them, and had disappeared when they tried to take cover. Applejack knocked on the door. Moments later they could hear rustling inside beofre the door opened to reveal Fluttershy.
“Oh, hello Applejack, Rainbow Da-” she gasped. “Oh my goodness, Rainbow what happened? No, it can wait, come in and lie down, I'll fix you right up.” Rainbow Dash walked in slowly, wincing slightly when she stepped on her back leg. Applejack stopped at the door.
“Listen, Fluttershy, we came to make sure you were okay, Rainbow can tell you all about it, but ah need to get home before it gets too late.”
Fluttershy looked at her, “are you sure? I mean.. um... I wouldn't want you out there by yourself if you're hurt or anything.”
Applejack smiled, “naw, Fluttershy, ahm fine, just look after Rainbow, y'hear?” then she turned and trotted back down the path towards Ponyville.
Rainbow lay down on the floor next to Fluttershy's couch. In an instant, Fluttershy was next to her, bandaging her side. Fluttershy looked at Rainbow.
“If you don't mind me asking, what happened? Unless, you don't want to talk about it, that is...”
Rainbow shifted, to give Fluttershy better access to her wound. Her thoughts drifted back to the fight in the forest, the creature hadn't moved nearly as fast as she had, yet it was a step ahead of her the whole time, with those strange paws, using her own moves against her. She clenched her teeth. Next time would be different.
“Hello...? are you okay, Rainbow?” Fluttershy looked worried. Rainbow shook her head to clear it. “yeah I'm fine, Fluttershy.”
“Are you sure? I mean, I don't want to be rude, but you're being really quiet, Rainbow. What happened tonight?”
“There's something out there, Fluttershy. I don't know what it is, but it gave me this cut.”
“What?!? Rainbow you-” Rainbow Dash cut her off.
“Fluttershy, listen, you need to go into Ponyville tomorrow. And stay there, until we can figure out what's out there. Only you, me, and Applejack know something's up, but we need to get the town together so nopony gets hurt.”
“I.. okay, but what about my animals? I can't just leave them by themselves. Who's going to take care of them?”
“Fluttershy, listen. to. me. The animals lived her fine before you came to live here. I'm sure they can survive for a little while without you.”
“But what Zecora? She lives even further out than I do?”
“What about...? Zecora! She lives all by herself!” she stood up quickly, only to find Fluttershy blocking the door.
“No! You're in no condition to go into the Everfree Forest. Especially not at night. Go lie down.”
Rainbow wanted to argue, but there were times that even Fluttershy was unshakeable. Such as right now, apparently.
Outside in the dark, Titus watched. His stomach growled, and he looked to the dark forest in which he could find his companions. It was too late outside, though. He doubted he could make his way back to the hut without bumping into some of the monsters that he was sure inhabited the forest. So he waited. He watched the orange one leave and the blue one enter the cottage, and waited. Stealthily, he crept over to the cottage and looked around. He grinned when he spotted the chicken coop. He felt a twinge of guilt as he took one of the chickens and wrung its neck, as this was the place that had seemed so at peace earlier that very day. Then his stomach growled again, so he put it out of his mind and grabbed the eggs from the chicken's nest before making off with his dinner.
A/N: I kinda wanted this to be longer, but ending it here felt about right. I've been fiddling with the tags, I'm not really sure what to put up there. I'll probably put 'dark' back up, but other than that, I dunno.
All comments/critiques are welcome. G'night/morning/day/afternoon/evening folks!
Oh yeah, the latin bits. Thanks be to google.
mehercule: "by hercules"
abi sis, belua: "be gone, monster"
luppiter te perdat: "jupiter destroy you"
I think that's all of them.
