My hooves were beginning to prune up due to the grass, wet with the morning dew. I could hear the thumping of their hooves growing closer. My knotted mane and tail were windblown, and my blood dripping. It was the blood! That was how they were following me. It was leading them right to me. Looking at my surroundings I was desperately looking for some way to trick them. There were too many trees to lead them astray but to malformed to climb and hide in.
Soon enough, the soft moist grass turned into a floor of muddy, dead leaves and the morning dew was frozen. Though what really drew my attention was the blessing of a change of scenery. The seemingly everlasting amount of twisted, irregular trees, wasn't there anymore. Instead, there were the typical, normal, everyday trees, they were more spread out, and I could actually see beyond the trees. Then, finally, I found my way out. There was a stream and, beyond that, there was a cave.
To a lot of ponies, the Everfree Forest may have been frightful but I would guarantee anypony that whatever was in this forest could do was sure to be better than what the ponies chasing me would do. I used the 'gift' they had given me to see what was in the cave. The cave had a glowing purple bear that would seem transparent but wasn’t quite, it instead had glowing balls of light coming from within their bodies. "An Ursa Major" I muttered under my breath involuntarily. "I thought they were extinct!" I shook my head trying to bring me back to the land and not in the clouds. Heck, I'm not even a pegasus.
I desperately tried to wash the blood off my coat and raced into the cave using all my abilities to keep myself quiet as to not wake up the sleeping death trap.
I was absolutely and utterly wrong. By no fathomable means was it safe. I was hoping that somehow the Ursa Major would attack the members of the Moon Institute, unfortunately, that’s not how things turned out. Instead, I wound up pinned between a very angry, and hungry, Ursa Major and the members of the Institute. Note to self, don’t underestimate creatures who've stood in the sky for just as many years as I’ve been alive. Honestly, thinking back on it I should have taken my chances with the Ursa. But nnooooo, I had to outsmart those birdbrained ponies. I just had to try and pretend to be smart, after all, they were holding off the Ursa for me even if they were the ones to wake it up.
That and I was already surrounded by a group of eight unicorns with different magic enhancing stones on themselves. I had been attempting to spot the red stone each of them should’ve had, but a few of them had somehow managed to hide it somewhere on their pony. All too soon, an Earth pony stallion with a white mane and an electric blue coat approached me and the unicorns made way for him. The moment his cutiemark came into view I instinct dropped into an aggressive stance ready to charge. The triangular beaker with lightning striking an orange liquid inside proved he was a scientist.
"Miss Kindling, we will find it rather decorous of you if you were to kindly come with us. That shouldn’t be too difficult, after all, it is where you belong."
I bit the inside of my cheek. They had me for now. If I wasn't able to find all the red stones I wouldn’t be able to cripple them like I had during my escape. I subserviently hung my head and in a very depressed manner, begun to walk towards him as though I was submitting to the so-called fate everypony went on and on about. Then, for the first time since leaving those tall concrete walls, my rather weak voice was heard. "Where will you take me?"
"The facility of course." A tan pony with the buzz-cut spoke. He looked around my age if not two or three years older, his voice was smooth and his cutiemark was a golden skull with a ruby in one eye and an emerald in the other. "Of course this time you won't be leaving." The pony approached me with a rope managing to get it around my neck and held the end of a leash. "You see, this particular rope has a rather magical touch, I’d suggest you remain civilized I wouldn’t want to use any hurt any beauty such as yourself."
I scoffed at that, there wasn’t any single particular reason for it, I just felt that his entire sentence was a forced cliche and really just too out of place. He didn’t seem to be the kind of guy to be involved with the institute. On the other hoof, he seemed right at home for some reason. I gave him a show of 'struggling' and he bought it. Unfortunately, that meant he pulled me closer with the ‘leash’ and held my lower jaw. He gave this cocky ‘I’m so much better than you’ grin that made him look like a pirate that had finally gotten his hooves on whatever bloodied treasure I’d have wanted and was flaunting it in my face.
I tried to glare at him, but the proximity between him and I was extremely discomforting and made it rather difficult for me to keep it up.
"I did tell you she'd struggle." The scientist from earlier said, directing it to somepony behind us.
“Well, I never said that she wouldn’t struggle, I merely said that she wouldn’t try and escape yet.” It was a mare’s voice and it was like a velvet covered punji trap.
“And what, prayer tell, is the difference?”
“More than you think, I suspect.”
“I see.” He looked at me as though I was a math equation before shouting out to the other ponies. “We’ve got the girl! Everyone fall back!”
Soon enough the ponies all began to retreat, the tan was still pulling me along with him by the leash. I didn’t blame them for running though. I’d only read about Ursas so at first, I wasn’t sure how dangerous they really were. But now? Let's just say I would never fight against a being of the stars ever again. The only reason we weren’t devoured was that the Ursa refused to leave the cave.
As soon as we were at a safe distance away from the cave, deemed by the scientist, a lot of attention was on me. Much to my happiness, the tan pony dropped the leash to catch a better breath. Unfortunately, as I thrust my hoof out to grab it, a beautiful pegasus mare grabbed the rope. Her mane was both topaz blue and midnight blue. Matched with a light gray coat, raspberry eyes and had a key underneath a magnifying glass for a cutiemark. I couldn't tell what position she had at the facility. Probably one of the more physical jobs given her wings, though the cutiemark seemed to suggest otherwise. She eyed me rather incredulously before grabbing the rope and all but dragged me to a tree, to which she tied me to. She tethered me to a tree as though I wasn’t a sentient being, but instead some pet.
Soon enough the scientist began barking out orders to everyone and delegated the work rather equally. Until it came to his own workload and the tan ones. The tan one was given an excessive amount of work, whereas, all he did was lounge around under the pretext of supervising the ‘inexperienced man-child’, Caballeron, who turned out to be the one that dragged me here.
“Ah, Dr. Beaker. You must be so proud of finishing all your work so quickly.” Caballeron said in a slightly mocking, yet gentlemanly way. “It’s almost as though you haven’t had anything to do.”
"Now, now, Caballeron there is no excuse that gives you any right to treat me with such attitude Caballeron."
“Oh, of course, Doctor.” He gave a mock bow, “After all, how in Equestria could I be a bad tracker when I’m merely being your own personal pack mule?”
He laughed. “You certainly seem to fancy yourself a comedian.”
There was a definite tension between them and rather murderous. If stares could kill, the scientist would have been murdered by one of his ponies within a millisecond.
Once again the gray mare from earlier approached the scientist. He seemed to shrink in size a bit when she came over even though he seemed to be the one in charge of everything. "Electro Beaker, we have an issue." The stallion opened his mouth to speak but wasn’t able to say anything before she explained. "There’s a storm coming. And mere ropes won't hold that filly, no matter the spell used on them."
"I am not a filly! I'm nearly eighteen!" I shouted at her as I 'struggled' again.
"Those ropes are magic, she isn't nearly strong enough to break them. She's been struggling this whole time." Caballeron said confidently. The mare just gave a snort in reply. "What was that?" He asked.
"Nothing important to me. Just set up camp. We do want to make it through the night." She met my gaze with a soft smile. She was the pony the scientist had talked to over my shoulder earlier. "Please, don't run off tonight night. I don’t want to waste any more patrols on a lost child like you.” She turned around as though she was about to leave but paused mid-step. “I know you more than you know yourself. Who do you think designed your containment cell?"
The smart thing? Ask what kind of position she had under the First Hoof Project. No. I just had to taunt her instead, "Then how did I escape?" Smaaaaarrrrrt, Ascending Kindling. Real smart. Granted it could’ve been comedic to see her angelic facade morph into the grotesque image of a murderer, but it was terrifying when you knew she was coming after you.
She swiftly pinned me to a tree with her wings on my gut, her left hoof to the right of my head and her right hoof somehow wedged in between of my throat and lower jaw. "That, my dearie, is something I’d like to know. I’d simply love to see the traitor in our midsts suffer by my hooves. Any ideas on who it may be girl?" Her voice was quickly forming into a sadistic one. I opened my mouth to say something that may have sedated her, but she was blocking my airwaves. "I said, do you have any ide-." Then she dropped me just like that, letting my knees buckle under me and drop to the forest floor. As if nothing had happened. As if she didn't care about it. "Scared? Good." She said giving me a good hard kick in the ribs, and with that, she pranced off to a group of ponies.
I used the tree to pick myself up and leaned against it. I was pretty sure I had a new gash down my back, oh, and maybe a broken rib. Another thing to add to my list of things I hate, Pegasi.
"Well," The scientist began, breaking the long silence. “Caballeron. Please help the security squad, I'd love to talk to Miss Kindling." Caballeron quickly gave a respectful nod and left me with the scientist. "Good evening Miss Kindling. I don’t suppose you’d like to tell me something?" he asked walking up to me.
"I despise you." I answered spitting at him.
"Okay, to business then." he met my eyes. "How did you escape and why"
"One, none of your beeswax. Two, First Hoof project."
"Oh, but it is my business and, if it’s any consolation, I'll let the boss know that you were just scared due to miscommunication if you tell me about the spy." With a little snort, I flipped right, 180 degrees and leaned on the tree. Or at least I would've if somepony in particular hadn't grabbed the rope and yank it. Instead, I fell landed on my more injured side, my left to be specific. "Why does your boss want to see me?"
“Ascending, you are the most successful experiment, and yet you’ve run away. To him, you're not an experiment but his child. He’s made you what you are."
"No."
"I beg your pardon.
"He has not made me who I am. He's the one who's taken away my identity, my individuality." I motioned to my bare flank. "The only thing he cares for is the experiment. Did you hear the pegasus? She said containment cell."
He sat down in a disappointed huff and just sat there, waiting. He had waited for a good ten minutes till Caballeron came back. "Sir, we're ready." I gave an exasperated sigh. "I'll take her." he said. His stare was part determined, part uptight, and another part on edge.
When the scientist hoofed over the rope. The scientist had come over to help me up and whisper the following into my ear. "Sorry'' However, as I sat there with my back feeling moist, I blacked out.
Author's Note
This has been edited and I'm hoping to be able to jump back into this story soon.
