I am not a dog

Fluttershy was scared. Not that being so was a significant change of pace for her, its just that this time she felt it was entirely justified, and therefore worthy of note. Waking up in a dumpster can make any amount of fear totally justified in her opinion. Especially when said dumpster is not where she went to sleep the night before.

Tempting as it was to just stay there and whimper forlornly to herself even she could see that doing so wouldn't really help other than to sate her own fear and so she endeavored to escape her current confines. The 3ft of foul smelling garbage made that harder than it really needed to be but eventually she managed to hook her front hooves over the lip of the dumpster and gingerly poked her head out.
The alley she looked out into was not the comfort she hoped it would be, less so because it was also full of foul smelling rubbish but mostly because it wasn't anywhere she recognized.

"Oh where am I?" she said with an adorable frown. Taking a moment to gather together what stray nerves she had left she made to leave the dumpster by flying out. Normally in her experience this would have worked perfectly well as a means of dumpster evacuation but as it was all her flapping did was cause her to gracelessly flop over the edge and do a rather spectacular yet painful faceplant on the garbage strewn tarmac 5ft below.

"Ow" she said softly after having rolled onto her back. She lay there for a short while wondering why her wings hadn't worked, and also wondering what kind of pony would make a dumpster so tall. She also put a few moments towards thinking about why she was there, but couldn't come up with anything that didn't basically boil down into 'because magic', which isn't very useful. Realistically she realized she should put thought into getting up and moving on but the world was spinning an awful lot and thinking was a good method of passing the time until the world righted itself around her. Still lying on her back she gently spread her wings and did her best to look at them. They appeared unharmed but were incredibly filthy as was the rest of her.

"I guess they're just too dirty to fly with" she said to herself, unconvinced that was the actual reason but seeing as how she had no other theories coming to her she stuck with the most obvious reason since 'because magic' wasn't very useful here either, no matter how close to the truth it may actually have been. Rolling onto her front and standing up slowly since her legs still seemed to think inaction was the best course of action and displayed this by being ridiculously wobbly; she moved to the entrance of the alleyway step by timid step until finally she could see out beyond.

Fluttershy immediately regretted this course of action. Instead of seeing the comforting surroundings of Ponyville and the ponies that lived there she was confronted by somewhere completely unknown that was inhabited by creatures she had never seen before.

Emitting a barely audible 'eep' she quickly withdrew back into the alley and let panic have its way with her for a while.
"What were those things? They don't look like anything I've seen before?" Taking a moment to garner a bit more courage she found a shady spot and took a moment to observe these creatures. The zoologist in her also got to work.

"They walk upright like minotaur or dragons but lack full body hair or scales, or at least I think so since I can't see their bodies. They have no horns or spines, hooves, claws or anything else that relates them to minotaur or dragons." She sighed, "I have no idea what I’m looking at, but since they're wearing clothing and appearing to be communicating verbally they must be at least vaguely intelligent." Spying two of the creatures walking towards her she had a closer look in the hopes of learning more. Thankfully the warm weather had caused the creatures to not over dress which was helpful in allowing Fluttershy to at least make a guess as to which might be male or female. Judging by the curves and lumps and longer hair on the smaller of the two creatures she figured she had found a male and female couple. Taking a deep breath she trotted out in front of them.

"Um...hello." she said just loud enough for them to hopefully hear her. In the future she would forever regard the exact moment she approached these two as the single worst decision she had ever made.

For a moment the two creatures stood there staring at her until the possible female crouched down and said
"Hey there lil guy, are you lost?" Suddenly Fluttershy was immensely relieved, she could understand them! That means they could understand her!

"Oh thank Celestia you speak equestrian! And um...I'm a mare but, um...anyway yes I am lost so if you could show me the way to go to Ponyville or even Canterlot I'd be very grateful." Fluttershy looked at them smiling hopefully. That hope was somewhat dashed when the female reached over and attempted to tickle Fluttershy behind her right ear.

"Um...what are you doing?"

"Well aren't you just adorable." the female suddenly exclaimed still tickling Fluttershy.

"Could you, possibly, please stop that?" Fluttershy said feeling decidedly uncomfortable as anyone would at being publicly tickled by a stranger.

"Aww but look at how filthy you are you poor little thing, we should take you home and give you a nice bath, right Paul?" The last question had been directed at the male who so far had stood there with his arms folded wearing a look that said 'this is going to cost me money isn't it'. Looking at Fluttershy he rolled his eyes and sighed.

"Yes dear." Fluttershy quirked an eyebrow at that. Was this a matriarchal society where the males served the females?

"A bath does sound like a lovely idea but, I um...don't really want to go with you, I want to go to my home if you could just point the direction I should go please". Fluttershy looked between them; her optimism waning as her annoyance at still being forcefully tickled grew. She also looked around at the other creatures that walked by. Why did none of them seem concerned that these two were loudly and publicly planning her abduction.

"Look at the poor thing shaking, pick her up and carry her back to the car."

"But she's filthy!" the male, Paul, protested.

"Then take your shirt off and wrap it around her."

Paul sighed. "Fine" he grumbled before muttering something about how women would never get naked in public. Looking up, Fluttershy watched frozen as he took off his shirt, wrapped it around her then squeaked as he picked her up bodily. Just to make it worse the woman then reached out and tickled the bridge of Fluttershys' nose causing her to produce a cute little sneeze.

"Aww aren't you the cutest little doggy ever!" Fluttershy froze in the middle of rubbing her nose with her hoof.

"Doggy?"

"Come on lets go get you all washed and clean."

"Oh dear."