Day 2: Off to a rough start. Edited.
Deep in a dark, mossy, cold, damp forest I slept on a stone altar. Each breath was a small struggle between the nose and mouth, both competing to draw in the most air in loud guttural snores. It was in this dreamless sleep that I heard the voice of what sounded like a old man speak in my head, (wake up.) Ignoring the voice it refused to let up, (I said, WAKE UP!) The noise more than anything else was enough to startle me, rolling off the altar and landing on my back. "Ow!" I sat up rubbing my head, "where am I?" Reaching up to the edge of the altar for support, I took the few seconds to look around. The first thing I noticed was my grip on the altar, four firm talons dug into the hard stone of the altar. Neurons fired, dragging me to the realization that I have talons. That’s impossible though, why should this make me feel surprised? I’ve had talons my whole life! They…
What did I use these for again? I must’ve done some sort of talons-on project when I was younger… My brain suddenly tried conjuring images of a childhood, they all seemed out of focus, the color was off, and nothing seemed familiar, leading me to believe that this is not my childhood. Nothing more than confused attempts of what I think a childhood looks like, but not the real thing.
Some sad part of me made itself known at my self-awareness, how could I not remember having talons, or growing up, or the feathers, or the wings...and the body of a pony…
Clenching my eyes shut, the only option I felt absolutely sure that needed to be made at that particular moment was to accept what I was. Like a sleeve that cut off at the wrist, brown and white feathers coated everything from the claw up, and after patting my chin and head I discovered they covered that too. From the collar bone down, my fur coat was a difficult color to make out in the dark, but it looked closer to a dark purple rather than straight black. The tail was part pony, easily made out to be a teal color. I liked how large the wings were as I stretched them to their limits, billowing out five and a half feet for a nice wingspan that would be the envy of most pegasus.
I shook my head; I knew about colors, I knew what to call my limbs, ponies and pegasus, envy, and the rest of the world- and I’m almost positive of what to call myself, but I need a mirror first to make sure.
After the self-examination, my gaze finally bolted around the large clearing in hopes of finding something reflective. For the most part it was absent of trees and small shrubbery. I nearly missed the markings burnt into the ground in the weak light, and I would have too if it weren’t for the bone bowls filled with ash placed around the altar in a set pattern.
My quest for a mirror was quickly set to the side as I moved to tap one of the bowls out of curiosity. Accidentally knocking it over, was enough enflame my embarrassment, followed by shock when sparks flew from the ash. It wasn’t enough to sate my desire to know what caused the sparks as I looked closer at the ash. The soot and scattered ashes exploded in my face, however, was. Smearing the ash out of my eyes was a step towards seeing again, and now I just needed something to wash it off. A small stagnant pond looked natural was the closest thing I could see, so I walked over to it and splashed some water on my face, removing the ash from my eyes. I splashed my face with water again, cleaning the rest of my face.
After blinking away the water in my eyes I looked into the pond, reflecting on my… reflection. Griffon… was the first thing that came to my mind. But now that I think about it, I look like--what's it called?--a hippogriff I think is what we’re called.
I stared at the thing for a few minutes, why was my reflection so strange to me? I mean, it is my body, so why would it weird me out? I've had it since I was born, right?
I sat there trying to think back to my childhood again, hoping for some kind of tether to clue me into what kind of creature I was, who I was raised by, if they were nice or not, if I was nice or not, but, I only remembered white. Morality, emotion, self-consciousness, anatomy, colors, ponies and griffons, I remember learning about those, but not the time or place for when I was actually there.
No matter how hard I tried I couldn't remember a single detail about my life before waking up.
Who am I? Where am I? How did I get here? What is my name? Is it nearly sunrise? What year is it? Once I asked one, dozens more ringed rang through out my head. (Focus.)
I looked around, taking in the area. The big clearing offered a nice view of the night sky, and the pure white moon. Everywhere else outside of the clearing was blacken by shadows of the trees, and other pieces of nature. (I could have sworn I saw a few sets of eyes.)
I went back to the altar, forcing the unanswerable questions aside while trying to form some sort of convoluted logic as to why I was here and the reason for my absent memories. Pictures made the markings, they seemed to depict Depicting a group of ponies witnessing the creation of a mismatched mess of animal parts. After the Everything after that particular panel everything was to smudged to make out anything.
Was anything else out of place in this ritual sight? A wandering glance finally locked onto a black robe caught in a thorny bush, which I tripped over my fingers a few times while recovering it.
Thorns that stuck to the robe were easily brushed off as I checked the front pocket. There were two pieces of folded up paper in the pocket, with a tiny jar of orange dust labeled 'spice'. I unfolded the first paper, revealing a letter. written by a figure who put special detail into his signature of a K within a circle, with a line running horizontally through the middle.
"We found two more pieces of the TETAK. Come to Zebrica as soon as possible. We also have the first harvest of the spice." the rest of the letter had a map on it giving directions to a place called the "Kenabra tribe". The other piece of paper was a response to the first, "I'll be there in one week, lock up the pieces, I'll bring mine. Start selling the spice as soon as you can." Again no signature, just the K.
"I wonder what a 'TETAK' is?" I asked the tree next to me, "and where is 'Zebrica'?" I looked at the map for other directions or some sort of scribble that said “Answers, this way!”,but there was nothing.
The tiny jar full of 'spice' was next as I opened it. "Doesn’t smell spicy..." I said, sniffing the contents. Sprinkling a bit on the tip of my tallon the taste reminded me of chilly peppers. Then it hit me, my tongue was on fire.
"hot, hot, hot! hot! HOT! HOT! HOT! HOT!" I yelled running around looking for that pond, I tripped over my tallons ten times before I jumped in.
I drank up as much water as I could, swallowing a fish or two in the process. "Note to self, don't eat random spices." I warned myself, sputtering coughing as I crawled from the pond. Shaking myself as dry as possible,
I walked back over to the letters, spice bottle, and stuffed them back into the robes pockets. The small clink of the vial against something hard made me searched the pockets again, only to find a bright purple, circular, glowing gem nearly the size of my claw.
"It's like looking into pure beauty itself." I couldn't look away from the gem, its luster dominated my thoughts. How could something so defining of one’s hour be here of all places? Who would leave it? Were they drawn to it like I am right now? How did they pull away? Horrible visions and revulsion finally made me drop the gem as I saw chaos. Utter, pure chaos. Ponies being horribly injured, entire countries burning, the sky falling. And the cause of it all, was a disfigured monster laughing.
I didn’t even hear the gem hit the ground while trying to catch my breath. "Another note to self; don't stare into glowy gems." That gem, it didn’t nag on me as much when I wasn’t touching the cursed thing. Pulling the robe’s pocket inside out, I picked up the gem and folded it back inside the robe.
"So... where to now?" I rubbed my chin, pondering the general direction I wanted to go. (West.)
I looked up, trying to find the moon. It must be past midnight so, it should be directly up. I found the moon and walked in the direction it was setting
***later***
God it was darker in here than I predicted! Sure, I had super owl night vision, but with hardly any light I could barely see my own talons in front of my face. It certainly didn't help that it felt like I was walking in circles.
"How big IS this forest anyway?" I asked the firefly a few feet ahead of me, the bug winked twice before zipping off through the trees and out of sight.. Fatigue forced me to sit down and rest. "And if I ever get out of this forest where do I go?" the thought was nagging with the same amount of foresight it took for me to think about which way to turn.
My eyes slowly dropped to the ground in front of my talons which I was pawing at for the past several minutes and the rocks I mindlessly dug up in the process. Finally I felt the tip of my talons press against a small smooth stone. Pinching two talons together, I brought the pebble up and let it drop into my palm.
With no other intention than to flick it, I heard it bounce against a tree, followed by growling. A deep throaty growl that coursed with anger made me turn from tree to tree as I tried to identify the source of the noise. I nearly had my heart back under control when I saw two green eyes appear in front of me.
I froze. My brain kept telling my body to run, while I was in the height of being paralyzed with fear. The creature revealing itself appeared to be a wolf, although something was off about it. I didn’t spend time trying to remember where I heard about them, but they fit the description-they looked like wolves, growled like wolves, and were made out of wood-timber wolves. The first timber wolf circled me, growling, and eager for me to give him a reason to pounce. With every lap, the cheeky devil closed the distance just a little bit more, as if I wouldn’t notice. It did draw my attention away from three more jumping out of the bushes and to join the first as they all lapped around me with their ever-shrinking circle dance. This was bad! I need to think of something, fast!
(Don't move.) The timber wolves snarled and barked at me, but they never came close enough to bite. What could I do? Nothing at all seemed to be the best working option, and after standing there for what felt like an eternity, the wolves lost interest in me. It was like someone whistled for them to come back home. They walked away slowly, constantly looking back at me as if I was about to try to run away.
I let out a sigh, relaxing my tense body. Slowly backing away from the direction the timber wolves left. I felt the pressure of something organic push against my descending claw. Trying to stop myself, I didn’t even know what it was until a loud CRACK snapped the branch I stepped on in two.
Every muscle in my body contracted. I turned around fearing the worst, to my surprise the wolves were still gone. I turned around and saw the timber wolves a few feet in front of me. "Oh my."
The timber wolves ran straight for me as I readied myself to dodge their outstretched paws and teeth. I jumped over the first wolf, flapping my wings for extra lift, before I was back on the ground, sprinting away fast as I could force myself. (though that might not be that fast considering this is the only time I could remember running away from something at all.) The wolves kept up a few feet behind me, barking, and snapping at my tail.
I ducked, jumped, and weaved through the forest constantly tripping over vines, roots, bushes, and some low hanging branches. I was about to ram head first into a tree, but I jumped and grabbed on the tree and climbed up it.
I sat on a branch watching the timber wolves try to jump up and bite me. One of them managed to bite my tail, and pulled it, causing the branch to brake off.
I landed on one of the wolves, and it fell apart. Another one of the timber wolves jumped at me, I side stepped out of the way, it hit a tree and broke apart. I got up and flared my wings. The other two wolves stood in front of me snarling. One of them ran at me and bit my right wing. It attempted to rip my wing off, causing me to fall and scream . The second wolf tried to bite my neck,but I managed block it with my left arm, (front leg? I don't know.) it bit my arm, and tried to rip it off.
It was the worst pain imaginable, it felt like my arm, and wing were on fire, being soaked in acid, and was getting stab by a thousand tiny pieces of wood. I used my right arm to search for something, anything I could use as a weapon.
I grab a big stick, and hit the timber wolf biting my leg on the head, causing the wolf to smash into pieces. The stick broke of at its end. I then flailed the stick in the general area of the other wolf, hitting its torso.
It didn't fall apart like the other ones, and was knocked back a few feet. We both got back up and circled each other. This is worse than when I started, my arm is messed up, so I can't run away, my wing is mauled, so even if I could remember how to fly, I can't. So the only option left is to fight... How did I get myself into this situation again?
The wolf jumped at me with its jaws aimed at my neck. rolled left and grabbed my arm as it spasmed in pain, forcing me to drop my only defense against the timber wolves. The timber wolf turned back to me and slowly walked to me. I backed up into a tree. I felt around for anything I could use as a weapon again, and found nothing. There was no were left to run, I'm dead!
The timber wolf pounced on me, I covered my eyes, and screamed. Awaiting my demise...
It never came. I opened my eyes and saw no timber wolf, only a pile of ashes in front of me. "where did it go?" I asked the ash pile. "Did it leave? No why would it leave wounded prey when it's cornered?" I sat there stroking my chin with my right claw pondering.
As I sat there pondering, my mouth felt something familiar. It was on fire again. "AAAH MY MOUTH!" I shoveled as much dirt I could grab into my mouth.
I then realized the mistake I made by putting dirt in my mouth, I spat it out wiping my tongue off with both my hands. The flames in my mouth were, luckily, doused. "Ow ow ow my mouth! Why did it burst into flames?! Hmm maybe..."
I pulled out the small bottle of spice out of my pocket. "No. The spice hasn't been touched." I put the bottle back in my pocket. "So why did my mouth get set a blazed?"
A sharp pain in my wing reminded me of my encounter from earlier "Ugh. I need to get moving." I got up and limped in the direction I thought was west.
***later***
After what felt like an hour, I reached the exit of the forest. I saw a huge field with nothing in it, other than a dirt road. I shuffled out onto the dirt road, and limped on, hoping to find a town or something before I bleed out.
I pressed on and on hoping to find something, anything before I died. But all I saw was grass and more grass. The only other things I could see were the forest I came out of, and a giant mountain in the distance.
"This is it? I got away from those timber wolves for nothing. I'm just gonna die here. What kind of a ending is that?!" I yelled to the clouds in the sky. I had to keep going, I needed to find an answer to my questions.
"I have-- have to-- keep... going..." Collapsing on the ground, The world slowly faded away from me as I fell into the coldness of death. As dark shadows creeped from the edges of my vision to slowly blot out all light, one single thought flickered like a candle in the wind...
...Who?