Live a Little

by Astrocity

Rating: teen
Tags: Original Character, My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic, Other, Fluttershy, Random, Slice of Life
Length: 48402

A zombie walks into Ponyville. Can Fluttershy help it out when no one is willing to give it a chance?

Strange things happen within the Everfree Forest. All ponies know that. What they don't know is what lives in it. Everyone is in for a surprise when a zombie comes crawling out of the wicked forest. Call it a curse, an awoken evil, or a cruel joke. It could be many things. No one expects that it wants to talk of all things. But under all that decaying flesh, there's still a heart, though not necessarily still working.

Maybe it takes a shy pegasus and a little bit of kindness to get that heart pumping again.

Set before Twilight's Kingdom.

Published 2014-09-12 03:40:06 UTC
Last updated 2020-07-13 17:19:57 UTC

Words

It’s quiet.

I stand at the center of the town. There’s no one around, no one to talk to. Not a single living thing was awake. It’s too early in the morning, I suppose. I've grown unaccustomed to their natural sleep cycle, forever trapped in my state of wakefulness.

I sigh, disappointed.

Oh well. I can wait.

I wander aimlessly. I take a glimpse through every window, looking at all the knick-knacks and doodads that fill every house and shop. I peek into a bakery of sorts. There are many pastries and cake and goodies on display, all made of an assortment of colors, much like the building itself. There’s a large tree that acts as the town’s library with its many collection of books and novels. I see a boutique housing pony mannequins clothed in pretty fabric. A flower shop, a shoe store, a furniture emporium--it’s all mundane, but that’s what I love about it.

They were once part of my life, but not anymore. I have no need for them.

A clock tower stands near the center of town. It measures the time of day, ticking away the seconds of every pony’s life. It tells ponies when they need to be somewhere, dictating their lives according to a fixed schedule. But because I’m dead, it’s no longer relevant to me. I have no where to go and no one to meet. I live in a world unlike anyone else’s.

The sun is a little higher now, and there are more ponies on the street than there were before. Ponies have begun to leave their homes. Shops begin to open. Everyone is starting their day.

What I find more fascinating than the day-to-day objects are the ponies themselves. They are not at all like the clock tower, which serves only one purpose. From a glance at their cutie mark, I can take a guess as what each pony’s talent was.

A pocket watch for someone who’s punctual or perhaps fond of watches. A bright, red rose for someone who loves to grow roses. A quill for someone who writes novels, maybe filled with romance. And so on.

But, ponies are so much more than what their cutie mark reveals about them. They are very complex.

Aside from their cutie mark, they are unique in a way that is not visible to the eye. Their mannerisms, their personalities, their history--all of these things differentiates one pony from another, and I have none of them. From the moment I died, have I stopped being a pony?

My shoulder bumps against someone while I was lost in my sea of thoughts. A mare glances at me, looking quite irritable.

“Hey, watch where you’re going!”

I try to apologize, but the only thing that comes out of my mouth is a dreadful moan.

Her lip tightens into a scowl, and she begins to walk away. “Sheesh, you’re not the only one who’s not a morning pony.”

I’m left standing alone in the street.

It’s so hard to talk to ponies. I’ve wanted to talk to someone for the longest time, but now that I’ve met someone, I can’t say anything. The words turn to dust in my mouth, and all anyone hears is a breath of dead air escaping my defective lungs.

I hobble away with my head down.

I pass by a farm filled with apple trees. There’s a wooden fence trailing between me and the fields. Only a few ponies are working out in the distance. A stallion is hauling apples, and a mare is bucking the trees.

I crane my neck past the fence and stare at them.

They don’t notice me; they’re too busy with their work. Ponies work to eat, and they eat to live. They go through this routine, this process of living, until they retire and shrivel away before they die. Is there any point to all this? Why work so hard when death becomes a certainty from the moment you're born? If it's about survival, one can only prolong their death for so long. So why?

“What are you doing?” a voice asks.

I turn to the pony speaking--a little filly with a big, red bow on her head. She’s looking at me curiously.

The memory of my first meeting with a pony pops into my head. I don’t want to mess this up again. My mouth opens and closes as I try to remember how to talk. I've practiced it many times in front of my reflection.

“Hi…” I groan in my pitiful attempt at a greeting.

She looks at me strangely. “Hi… Are you lost?”

I shake my head. I don’t know what to say at this point.

She follows my gaze from earlier and looks back at me. “That’s my big sister and big brother. Do you need to talk to them?” she asks.

I shake my head.

She looks at me up and down. “You’re not from around here, are you?”

Another shake from my head.

She kicks a hoof at the ground, unsure what to say. “I need to go to school now,” she says. Before she leaves, she digs into her saddlebag and hands me an apple. “Here. Granny always says to be kind to other ponies. This one’s on the house.”

I take the stem of the apple between my teeth.

“Well… Bye,” she says awkwardly, before running down the dirt road.

I watch her leave. If she knew what I truly was, I’m sure she would have treated me differently, and I don’t want that. I don’t want to scare or upset a little filly like her. In the end though, I’m glad to have met her, even though she did most of the talking. I now know that she has two older siblings, who grow apples. I go over this information in my head multiple times like a mantra. It’s so that I remember it. I don’t have much when it comes to my memory, so I hang on to whatever I can. I’m afraid that one day it’ll slip away unnoticed.

The apple is still between my teeth. I set it down on the ground. It’s a shiny, red fruit. It looks very sweet. I think I ate one of these in my old life, though I’m not quite sure. I wonder what it smells like. I wonder what it tastes like.

I take an experimental bite and chew thoughtfully. It’s nothing like how I imagined. There’s no taste. Juice is dribbling down my chin as I chew. It’s all mush in my mouth. It’s like I’m chewing cardboard into a tasteless mesh. I don’t like it, so I spit it out. It’s a disgusting pile of apples chunks on the ground. There’s no point in eating it anyway. These vestigial organs inside me are nothing but dead weight.

I leave the apple where it is and head down the road.

There are noticeably more ponies now. I walk through town without any incident. Though, they do notice me. I probably stand out quite a lot. I never noticed how colorful or animate these ponies are. They always seem to avoid me, though that’s no surprise. I must look horrid to them, especially with my unnatural gait. I have to look less dead. I fix my posture and straighten my back.

I need to fix my limp. I need to walk like a normal pony.

I try to walk normally. I make sure to not drag my hooves. My steps are slow and tentative, as if the illusion of being normal would shatter if I take one wrong step. It is painstakingly slow, even slower than how I walked before. I keep practicing my walk.

What am I doing here? How could I ever think I would pass off as a normal pony? Did I think I could go back to a normal life? I can’t eat. I can’t sleep. I can barely form a sentence. This is a mistake. Someone is bound to find out about me. There is nothing for me here.

I bump into someone again. I have to pay attention more to where I’m going. There’s a little dragon sitting in front of me. I had never seen a dragon up close before. There’s a comic book covering his face.

I freeze at the sight of it.

The cover shows a cartoon picture of a pony with its grotesque skeletal features showing--a zombie. It looks nothing like me. It’s crawling out of the muddy ground with its maw gaping open. Most of its teeth are missing, like a pony after a terrible hoofball accident. Only the whites of its eyes are showing, just a vast emptiness. It looks so menacing and unintelligent.

Looking at the dragon, he seems very young, probably still a child. I wonder if he’s even old enough to be reading these kind of materials. A book like this would probably give him nightmares. But then I remember: I'm a zombie too.

“Sorry about that,” he says. “I couldn’t see where I was…going.”

His eyes meet mine. He’s staring at me. I can see the cogs slowly turning in his head as he clutches the comic book in his claws. I quickly brush past him. It doesn’t take long before I get a reaction out of him.

“T-Twilight!” he shouts, like a foal crying for his mother.

I look over my shoulder, and I see him running towards the library for some odd reason. Poor little guy. I hope he feels better soon. I would hate to give him nightmares. I still remember the look he gave me. He was scared and terrified, as if I was a monster from a nightmare.

I want to die right then and there, all over again. I want to leave this place, leave my body so that I don’t scare anyone anymore. Nothing is turning out right. Trying to live again was a mistake.

I hobble away, my confidence shattered. I ought to have stayed dead because there is nothing left for me here.

I find a creek some distance away from the busy life of the town. I lie in front of it with my hoof dipped in the water. Why is it so hard to talk to others? My hoof idly traces patterns in the running water. How do ponies do it? What’s the secret? I’m sure I was able to do it back in my old life--talk, socialize, mingle.

I moan, not because I’m trying to say something, but because it seems like the appropriate thing to do for how I’m feeling right now.

But then I hear it--a song. A wonderful tune reaches my ear. It wraps around my brain. It’s enchanting. It’s a kind of sound I haven’t heard in so long. It’s music. But who is singing? I have to find out.

I walk along the creek at a brisk face until I see a bridge. Beyond it, I see a house with little birdhouses in every tree surrounding it. There’s the chirping of birds, the croaking of frogs, and so much more in that small place. The whole place is teeming with life. The music lures me to the place.

I take a step past the bridge, and all the animal noises stop. The singing, too, stops shortly after. The sudden silence puts me off, but I tread on. I look around for the source of the music. I peek in the window. There’s no one inside, so I look outside the house. For a place that was teeming with life, there’s not a single creature around as far as I can see. It’s disturbingly quiet. At last, I hear someone.

“Hello? Where did everyone go?”

Beyond some bushes, with her back turned towards me, I see a pegasus. She looks so pretty, and her voice is like a bell. She could be an actress or a singer with a voice like hers. I take a step through the bushes. Her ear twitches, and she turns to me.

She shrieks, though it comes out very quiet.

My ears drop. That wasn't exactly what I wanted to hear. My eyes drop to the ground, and I start making my way back. Maybe I can find a hole to lie in back in the forest.

"Wait, I'm sorry. Don't go. Please, don't leave."

Curiously, I turn to the pegasus. She has a guilty look on her face. Her form shrinks when my eyes meet hers. She fidgets in her spot, like she wants to hide, but she doesn't.

"That was very rude of me to scream like that. You just surprised me," she says.

I don't say anything, but I'm delighted to know that she doesn't want to hurt my feelings.

"Um, is there something you need from me?"

I concentrate really hard for what I'm about to say next.

"Hi..." I groan.

She looks at me curiously.

"Hi..." she says back. Her voice is soft and quiet, as if she's afraid she might scare me away.

My jaw shifts, and my tongue is fighting to make the right sounds. My raspy voice comes out, forgotten words trying to escape my lips.

"S-song," I say.

"Oh, you heard that?" she asks.

I nod.

"Song... Good."

I've managed to say two words in the same sentence. I'm finally talking to someone, using my words and everything. I'm setting a whole new record here. My sentence is broken, but at least I can talk. I’m finally connecting with someone.

Meanwhile, the pegasus is blushing behind a strand of her mane, all bashful and embarrassed. She averts her eyes from me.

"Oh, um, thank you," she says quietly, and I wonder if I've offended her somehow.

"Name?" I ask.

Her eyes drift back to mine, and she speaks in almost a whisper. "It's Fluttershy."

I repeat that name in my head--Fluttershy. It's a pretty name. It suits her.

“Pretty,” I say.

She smiles. “Thank you.”

There are many things I want to ask her, so many important questions. What's your favorite color? How old are you? What are your hobbies? Do you like flowers? These are the important kind of things to ask.

But instead of any of these questions, I moan.

I'm embarrassed of what she might think of me, though she seems to be more confused than anything.

"What's your name?" she asks me.

I think about it. My eyes shut as I try to grasp for a name in the haze of my memory. But there's nothing. I look at my cutie mark to see if it would give me any hint to who am I, but all I see is another one of those wild blue flowers I love so much. Something feels off about it, like it shouldn’t be there. How could something on my body feel so alien to me? Why can’t I remember?

“Oh dear! Are you alright?” the pegasus asks.

My eyes blink. The grass is touching my face. I’m on the floor with a worrying mare looking over me. I must have fallen from thinking too hard.

“Let me help you up.”

I don’t refuse her offer as she helps me stand up. She presses against my side and keeps me steady with an outstretched wing.

“Oh my, you don’t look well, and you feel very cold too,” she says. “My home is close by. I’ll take you there, that is if you don’t mind.”

I shake my head, and we walk towards her cottage. Her home is filled with more birdhouses and tiny stairs that wind up and spiral towards high places. It’s a paradise for birds and rodents and small creatures alike. But there are no animals.

“Well, that’s strange. I wonder where everyone went.” Fluttershy helps me onto the sofa and begins peering inside every mousehole and birdhouse. “Hello? Little friends, where are you?”

I stare at the pegasus fluttering to and fro around the room until something strikes me on the nose. It’s a small carrot. A white rabbit is sitting on the floor in front of me, brandishing another carrot like a sword. My eyes lock onto him, and he flinches.

“Angel, there you are!” Fluttershy swoops down next to him. “Where did everyone go?” she asks him.

By now, he’s wildly hopping for her attention.

“Is there something wrong?”

He points at me.

“Her? She’s just someone I met today.”

He flails his arms wildly, yanking on her tail and looking at her with pleading eyes. He’s terrified. He smells the foul stench of death coming from me. It’s not just him. Every animal went into hiding because of me. He’s just one of the braver ones to stick around.

“Dangerous? She’s not dangerous at all. She is a sick pony in need of some help.”

He throws the carrot he’s holding at me. It lands in one of my nostrils. I scrunch my nose and snort. I must look really silly right now. A puff of air escapes my nostrils, dislodging the orange obstruction.

“Angel! That wasn’t very nice. Say you’re sorry to her,” she says but then adds, “for me, please?”

He shakes his head and jumps onto her back. He’s tugging at her mane now, madly pointing and screeching at me.

“What are you trying to say?” she asks.

I wrap my hooves around her, the rabbit letting out an alarming cry as he loses his balance and falls to the floor. I pull her close and press her head against my chest, earning a squeak from her. She tenses in my hold. She’s trying to hide her rosy face.

“Oh my! I-I’m not sure how I should feel about this…”

I wish I can roll my eyes. I turn her head slightly so that her ear was over my chest and press her head gently. She actually listens this time. The room is silent, much like the pitiful organ in my chest. The rhythm is gone and forgotten. Her eyes widen, and she stares at me, speechless.

I let go. She has this look on her face, shocked and disbelieving. I understand, though. I will do her this kindness for the kindness she has shown me: I’ll leave.

I take a step, but a pair of hooves stop me.

“I’m sorry.” She sniffles. “I’m sorry that you...you know.”

I turn around, bewildered. This is...new. She’s crying for me. a pony she barely knew. Why does she cry, she who has no reason to cry? I never thought anyone would really care about me. She’s too kind for her own good.

“What happened to you?” she asks.

I shrug.

Tears mat the fur on her face and gather at the corners of her eyes. It’s pity. It’s an unexplainable sadness that comes from no one knows where, perhaps where my heart has gone to. It is such a secret place.

I press my head against the crook of her neck to soothe her cries. “No...crying.” My hoof touches her chest where I know lies a beating heart, even without seeing it. “Living. Talking. S-singing,” I stutter.

She wipes her tears. “You’re right, I know. But it’s sad, isn’t it? I just met you, but it’s like I gained and lost a friend in the same day.”

“Friend…?” I ask.

She nods and smiles. “Of course, you’re my friend.”

The corners of my lips curve upward for the first time, and I feel something I haven’t felt in a long time. I feel less dead. Somewhere within this cobwebbed shell of a body, I’d like to think there’s a part of me that hasn’t decayed, a part that can still feel things. It’s a very farfetched thing to think of, but so is the dead making friends with the living.

My mouth twitches to say something, and I close my eyes. “Flutter...shy.” It rolls off my tongue. She beams when I say her name again as I tap on her chest. “Fluttershy.”

I hold my hooves to my chest.

“Fluttershy,” I say. “Name?”

“Your name?” she asks. “You want me to give you a name?”

I nod.

Her eyes trail over my body before stopping on my mane. “Oh, your mane! It’s a lovely shade of gold. Why, with a little bit of cleaning and brushing, I’m sure you’d look beautiful. How do you like the sound of ‘Golden Locks?’”

I try to sound out the name. “G-Gold…” My voice fails me.

“How about I call you something shorter, like ‘Goldie?’”

“Gol...die,” I groan. It sounds like the name of someone’s pet goldfish, but I don’t mind.

“Hi, Goldie,” she says.

“Hi...Fluttershy,” I say.

On this planet, filled with hundreds and hundreds of ponies, there is a pegasus who has a voice like a bell and tears that are meant for others. She’s shy and quiet, but that’s fine with me. It means I have to listen closely to the meaningful words she has to say. Her name is Fluttershy, and to me, she has become the most interesting pony in the world.

Author's Note

There are people who are good at coming up with names. I'm not one of those people...

Voices

I’m standing in front of a white porcelain tub, watching the water rise. Ripples distort my reflection as I stare at it. I don’t know when was the last time I had a real bath. A quick dip in a pool of murky water was the closest thing I had to one. Fluttershy dips a hoof in the water before shutting off the running water.

“There! It should be warm enough by now,” she says.

My front hooves latch onto the side of the bathtub in an effort to pull myself in. I fall forward with a large splash, soaking the floor around the tub. The water turns brown, clumps of dirt, twigs, leaves, and who knows what floating in the once-clear water. Apparently, it’s been a really long time since I properly washed myself. Off to the side, Fluttershy has a small net in her mouth and is pulling out the debris. Meanwhile, the rabbit from earlier is standing on the sink, giving me the stink eye.

“So, um, Goldie, where are you from?” Fluttershy asks, smiling. She pulls the drain and begins refilling the tub with water.

I shrug.

“Well, what did you do before you...died?”

I shrug.

The smile on her face falters briefly. I can tell Fluttershy is running out of things to say. Clearly, this small talk is not going well.

“Goldie, what do you remember?”

There are many answers to that question. The sky. The sun. Hot summers and cold winters. Ponies talking to each other about the weather, their day, their work, and all things metaphysical and metaphorical. There's so many things that I remember about the world, yet nothing about myself. I am but a pebble in a massive ocean. I'm afraid I'm going to drown and lose myself in it.

"Goldie!"

I'm back in the present. My face is half-submerged in the water. I pull my muzzle out and begin clearing my waterlogged nostrils. Fluttershy is staring at me, looking quite aghast. I have an incredible urge to blush right now.

"Sor...ry," I say.

"No, it's my fault. I shouldn't have asked."

I rest my head on the side of the tub, while Fluttershy scrubs the shampoo into my mane.

"Not...sure," I say at last. "Many...things."

"Anything about yourself?" she asks.

I shake my head, getting shampoo all over Fluttershy, but she doesn't seem to mind. A blue flower falls into the water. It's the one I keep behind my ear. My eyes level to it as it floats on the surface. It floats away from me with each puff of air from my nose. It's very hypnotic.

"Oh, that's a very pretty flower you have there," she says, getting a closer look. "It kind of reminds me of poison...joke." Her voice trails off.

For a moment, something flickers in her eyes. She can’t see it, but I can. She has a faraway look, like she’s watching a film, memories flashing behind those big eyes. She jerks her head away from the flower as if she's been bit. I watch with mild curiosity. Is she allergic to flowers? It would be sad if she was.

After she looks over herself, she gives me a worrying look. "Goldie..." She flinches as if expecting something to happen, but nothing does. "Goldie," she continues, "do you feel any different than usual?”

I shake my head and go back to watching my flower.

She gives a long stare at me before they soften. “I see…”

She knows something that I don’t, but she doesn’t want to say what’s on her mind. I don’t want to upset her, so I don’t ask. I’m content with things being the way they are.

Fluttershy starts lathering my coat with soap, mindful of the open cuts that mar my body. “Oh my, how did you get hurt so much?”

I shrug. It might have to do something with walking through thornbushes and prickly branches in the forest. I hardly notice these things anymore. It’s not so bad. They’re just shallow and minor cuts.

“You really should take better care of yourself, even if you aren’t alive,” she says.

I nod dumbly, still not taking my eyes off the floating blue flower, now surrounded by bubbly suds.

She rinses me off one last time before draining the filthy water and drying me off with a towel. The flower goes down the drain, much like most of the important things in my life. Oh, well. I can always get another one. I’m taken to a bedroom. It’s ordinary, as expected, but it’s filled with treasures of the mundane. The rabbit makes himself comfortable on a pillow, still keeping a wary eye on me.

“Okay, Goldie. Just sit down and I’ll get you all patched up,” she says. “Um, Goldie?”

I’m too busy nosing through her stuff. My nose is flipping through pages of a book, and a vase full of flowers was knocked over in my clumsiness. I make a poor houseguest, I know, but I can’t help it. Curiosity pulls at me like a dog on a leash. My eyes are staring at words on a page, but they aren’t words. They’re lines on paper, their meaning lost to me. I wordlessly flip through each page, hungry for lost knowledge. It’s all in front of me, but I can’t understand any of it. Those words that once spoke to me of stories and messages are silent, as if there’s nothing left to say to me.

Fluttershy drapes a wing over me and leads me to her bed. “Let’s fix you up over here, okay?” she asks sweetly.

I nod.

The mattress sinks below me as I sit on top of it. Fluttershy has a box with a red cross in her mouth. It’s a first aid kit, but I highly doubt it would be of any use to me. You can’t treat death like you do with a scraped leg.

A tender hoof brushes the fur away from my cuts as she inspects each one closely. There is no bleeding or pain, just gross open wounds. She doesn’t flinch at the sight of them, surprisingly. She goes to work, cleaning the each area with a moist cotton swab and bandaging it. The gesture is entirely pointless, but at the same time, it’s very gratifying.

My eyes wander around the room before stopping at a full-length mirror. I see myself sitting next to Fluttershy and the three butterflies that make up her cutie mark. But what I find most surprising is the smile on my face. Had I been smiling the whole time? I hadn’t noticed. I actually look nice for a change. The sheen has returned to my coat, tail, and mane. My creamy coat is back to its original color. I don't look like some feral pony. No twigs or leaves in my mane. No mud on my hooves. No depressing frown stuck on my face. I look...normal. My eyes still have that faraway, daydreaming look. But if this is a dream, then I don’t want to wake up from this moment.

“There! All done.” Fluttershy closes the first aid kit and looks at me. “How do you feel?”

I lick my lips and work my mouth. “Better.”

“Oh, that’s good to hear.” There is silence between the two of us until she asks, “What will you do now?”

I begin to shrug, but I stop and use my words instead. “Don’t...know.”

"Well, you're alive again, sort of. There must be something that you want to do."

I am silent. Nothing comes to mind concerning the things I want to do. I have never really thought about it. I never thought I would get this far. I have someone to talk to now, a friend even, but is that enough? I still feel empty. The hole inside me is big enough to fit the whole world and more.

“You don’t have to think about it now. I’m sure you’ll find something to do.” A clock chimes somewhere. “Oh, it’s time to feed my animal friends,” she says as she makes her way to the door. She stops and looks back. “Would...you like to help?”

I nod eagerly and follow her.

It's bright outside. It's never this bright in the forest. There isn't a thick canopy above to shade me. Was it always this bright?

A soft grunt comes from beside me. Fluttershy is dragging bags of animal feed that is much too big for her to carry alone.

"Can you help me carry this while I fill the bowls, please?" she asks, nodding towards a line of food bowls beside her cottage.

I grunt and heft each bag onto my back. Fluttershy grins and begins filling the animals' bowls with a small shovel. I do my job of dragging the bags around without complaint. It's not too heavy for me, but I move much slower while carrying them. We stop at each bowl, filling it with a different bag each time.

We get the work done in no time. Fluttershy puts the shovel back in the bag and wipes her forehead. "Goodness, we finished a lot quicker than I thought. Thank you, Goldie."

I groan and nod. I'm still not quite there to being an eloquent speaker just yet.

"Lunch time!" she calls. None of the animals show up. "Anyone? Where did everyone run off to?" She then says to herself, "I guess they're not hungry..."

I listen for the animals, but it's dead silent.

"Well, maybe my bird friends are hungry. Goldie, can you stay here while I go feed them?"

I nod.

She runs back into her home before coming out with balls of bird seed attached to laces of ribbons. She flies to every surrounding tree, hanging the bird seeds and offering words of encouragement. No one leaves the nests.

She returns, crestfallen. "I just don't understand. Why is no one coming out?"

She searches around her home for the slightest sign of wildlife. When she brushes through some tall grass, she finds one. It's a small field mouse.

"Oh, hello there. Do you know why everyone isn't showing up?"

It sees me and scurries deeper into the tall grass. Fluttershy notices it but goes to her house and comes back later with a small slice of cheese.

"Please, come out. She won't scare you. Right, Goldie?"

I nod and grunt in response. My lack of words isn't making me any less intimidating.

Though surprisingly, I see a small, whiskered face peek through. It sniffs a piece of cheese Fluttershy is holding out. It stares at me for a while before tentatively taking it and eating it.

"See? She's not so bad."

Other animals have started showing up now. A few more mice show up in front of Fluttershy, which she was more than glad to feed. A few more small animals show up to eat from their bowls, though cautious at the sight of me. The birds finally come out from their hiding spots and fly through the trees. Life slowly crawls back to Fluttershy's home.

As Fluttershy starts singing to the animals, I move away from the commotion. I’m sure the animals would feel more comfortable without me around. I find a nice shady spot under a tree and lie down on the grass. I watch from afar. It’s like watching an old memory. I try to imagine myself in Fluttershy’s place, talking and singing to the animals. Vocal chords shake the air. The words that flow out of her mouth are expressive and beautiful, while mine stumble in the dark. All anyone hears are the echos of my thoughts. I want to be more like her.

Something obstructs my view.

A finch is perched on the tip of my nose. It gives a chirp and then cocks its head at me. I don’t notice it at first, but I hear the flapping of wings and a chorus of chirping and whistling coming from the top of my head and my back.

“I hope you don’t mind, Goldie,” Fluttershy says. “You looked kind of lonely, so I asked my friends to meet you. You don’t mind, right?”

My head leaves the comfort of the ground, causing a flock of birds, all of different colors and sizes, to fly up to the branches. They look down at me curiously. Below, there are little critters hiding shyly under bushes, though still within my sight.

I look up at the pegasus standing in front of me. “No… Not...at all.” There’s a tingling sensation in my chest, but I wave it off as a phantom of a heartbeat.

She smiles. “My friend, Pinkie Pie, says everyone should smile. Maybe you should smile more.”

My lips quiver and twitch as I try to put on a winning smile.

She suddenly looks unnerved. “Um… I think you’re trying too hard.”

I try smiling again. I think about the way Fluttershy smiles--warm and friendly.

“See? You do have a nice smile,” she says.

I let my ego soak in the compliments. It’s not easy getting compliments when you’re dead. I’ll take them wherever I can.

“With a smile like that, I’m sure you’ll make more friends in Ponyville.” Her face brightens up. “I should take you to see my friends. They’re the nicest ponies you’ll ever meet.”

My smile vanishes, and my eyes shy away from hers. I don’t know if that’s such a good idea. Fluttershy may be an exception, but I just don’t think I can talk to ponies as I do with her. She’s...special. I’m terrified of other ponies, I realize that now. My previous, awkward encounters are a testament to that. It’s scary, like so much of the world, but there’s an unexplainable fascination that I find appealing.

“Oh, um, we don’t have to meet them today. Sorry if I’ve upset you,” she apologizes. “We can take things slowly if you want.”

I shake my head. “It’s...fine. Want to...meet.”

“Oh, that’s wonderful! I just know they’ll like you.”

She wraps her hooves around me and holds me. If she held me tighter, would I feel her heart beating? Can her heart remind mine of life’s rhythm?

I let out an involuntary groan, but she smiles anyway. I smile back. Smiling is the universal language where unspoken words are said. Perhaps behind those moans and groans, she can hear me and the things that I want to say. There are words that I want to say to her. The words that have been trying to leave my mouth carry the weight of the entire world: “Thank you.”

Author's Note

Another short chapter.

Painting

“Have you ever seen a Breezy, Goldie? Oh, they’re just so small and adorable,” Fluttershy gushes, going into detail about the little creatures. “Maybe I can introduce you to them when they come around next time.”

I grunt and nod.

I love our one-sided conversation. I love the way she talks, the way she paints a picture for me out of nouns and verbs and adjectives. I love the pauses and syllables that accompany her acrylic words. When I close my eyes, it’s as if I was with her when she faced a dragon or traveled to the Crystal Empire. I can smell the smoke and feel the biting cold of the frozen North. When she mentions a delightful cup of tea she had yesterday, I guzzle down her words and let it fill me with warmth. The way she talks isn’t that different from another pony’s, but it tickles the right side of my brain. It’s like taking a breath of fresh air whenever she speaks. With all these thoughts in my head, I’d like to think I was maybe a poet once, or perhaps a writer. Maybe I was neither and was really someone who always had her head in the clouds.

I'd like to meet the pony I was before.

We arrive in town. It is like my first arrival in Ponyville, only this time I'm not alone. There are a few ponies who notice Fluttershy and say hello to her. However, their greetings stop short at the sight of me, unsure of what to say to someone they have never met. It’s all awkward smiles from them. I can’t relieve the tension either because I, too, am unsure of what to say to them. I avert my eyes in the hopes of saving myself from further embarrassment.

Noticing my discomfort, Fluttershy says, “You don’t have to be afraid. These are really nice ponies, Goldie.”

A dejected groan slips out from me.

She frowns as we walk in the silence brought upon by my dour mood. But then, she smiles. “You know… I once took a class on being more assertive.”

I turn to her and raise my eyebrows. I’m a bit dubious of her claim, but she has certainly piqued by interest.

“There was a minotaur who taught the class. His name was Iron Will, and one of the things he taught me was: ‘Don’t be shy. Look them in the eye.’”

I nod and think. It’s good advice, but Fluttershy still doesn’t seem to be the all that assertive even after taking such a class.

“How’d...it go?” I ask.

She looks away and blushes. “Um, it didn’t turn out so well for me,” she says, “or for anyone else for that matter.”

I don’t pry any further. “Okay. I’ll...try,” I say, and she smiles.

We stop in front of bakery. The building reminds me of a gingerbread house with its frosting-like decorations. It’s dark inside the windows.

“Well that can’t be right,” Fluttershy says. “Sugarcube Corner should be open right now.”

She walks through the front door with me in tow. Something isn’t right. Fluttershy yelps as the door closes behind us, swallowing us in the darkness. The lights turn on, and I am confronted by many, many ponies.

“Surprise!”

There are streamers hanging from the ceiling, and bright, colorful balloons cover every corner of the room. The floor is littered with confetti. A pink mare bounces towards us with a party horn in her mouth. “Surprise! Do you like it? Pretty nice, huh?”

I can’t get a word in as the words flood out of her mouth in torrents.

“When I heard there was a new pony in town, I just had to throw you a welcome party! So, I invited everyone in town, but there are some that couldn’t come or were running late. Oh, my name’s Pinkie Pie! What’s yours?”

My mouth moves, but nothing comes out. My name is on the tip of my tongue, but it hides in the safety of my mouth, where no one can see it. Fluttershy comes up beside me.

“This is Goldie, Pinkie,” she says for me.

Pinkie shoves a party horn into my mouth and a party hat on my head. “It’s nice to meet you, Goldie! Do you like the party? Well, do you? Do you?”

Fluttershy comes to my aid again. “Goldie, doesn’t talk much,” she says, glancing at me. “She’s shy.”

Pinkie seems to nod in understanding. “Oh, okay! You’re going to like Fluttershy a lot, Goldie. Why, I’m sure you two have lots in common to talk about!” Her eyes light up. “Oh, oh, oh! I should introduce you to everyone in town. That way, you’ll have more friends!”

Everything around me becomes a blur as a pink hoof hooks around my shoulders and pulls me through a sea of ponies. I can hear Fluttershy shout something in her little, quiet voice, but it is lost in the cacophony of noises.

I’m brought to a mare with three smiling flowers for a cutie mark.

“Miss Cheerilee, this is Goldie. She’s new in town!” Pinkie says.

The mare smiles at me. “Hi, nice to meet you.”

I’m not sure what to do. I look around for Fluttershy, but I don’t see her. I turn back to the mare, who is still smiling at me. I gather up whatever’s left of my courage and look into her eyes, doing my best to give a friendly smile. Don’t be shy. Look her in the eye.

Her smile breaks, and there is a look of terror on her face, though I hardly notice since my eyes are fixated on hers. It never occurred to me that I should blink every once in awhile. I have a strong urge to find Fluttershy .

“Oh, um, this has been great, but I need to go get some...punch! That’s it. Punch.” She nervously chuckles and trots away.

I don’t even get a chance to brood as Pinkie pulls me away again. “Come on! There are plenty of other ponies I want you to meet.”

I groan.

With each successive pony, I feel worse than before. Eye contact is, as I’ve found out, not the answer to my dilemma. In fact, it has only made it worse. At one point during the party, a mare ran away screaming, which Pinkie described as her being "excited" to meet me.

In the crowd of ponies, I see a pegasus with light pink mane. Fluttershy spots me and finally puts a stop to my torture. “Goldie, there you are!”

I let out a sigh at the sight of her.

“Are you alright?”

“She’s great!” Pinkie answers for me, bouncing in place. “I had her meet so many ponies, and I think they all like her!”

“Well, that sounds nice,” she says and notices my pleading look. “But I think Goldie could use a rest.”

Her bounce slows down. “Aw, I didn’t get to introduce her to our friends.”

“Well…” She pauses. “I guess we can do that.”

“Great! Let me go find them!” Pinkie says and leaves off in a pink blur.

I sit on the floor. My shoulders slump, and my form deflates, a sudden tiredness weighing on me. It’s hard to keep up with the living. Dying is easy. Living, however, is much harder.

Fluttershy places a wing over my wither. “Are you okay, Goldie? You look tired.”

I groan. The words don’t bother coming out this time.

“Well, we can go back home if you’re tired. But I’d like you to meet my friends first. Please?”

My eyes meet hers, and I nod reluctantly, hoping that the rest of her friends weren’t like Pinkie. I don’t think I’ll be able to keep up the living act much longer, but for Fluttershy’s sake, I’ll try.

“Girls, I want you to meet Goldie,” Pinkie says, bringing with her a group of ponies. There’s three of them: a unicorn, an earth pony, and a pegasus.

I want to say, “Hi,” but a guttural sound comes out instead. I think my greeting got stuck halfway up my throat, creating an unpleasant choking noise, like a hydra choking on a manticore bone. I try to hide my embarrassing mistake with a friendly wave, as if the whole thing never happened. My hoof only comes up for a second before it drops to the ground like a lead weight.

The looks I get from them vary from one to another. The white one looks very unsettled, no doubt from my disturbing introduction. The orange one is trying to feign ignorance with a smile on her face, though she does a poor job at it. The blue one has an eyebrow quirked and is staring at me strangely.

I expected these reactions from these mares, but the giggling from Pinkie Pie felt out of place.

“Isn’t she great?” Pinkie asks.

"Yeah... Great," the orange pony says. "Howdy, I'm Applejack."

She holds out a hoof. I stare at it. I forgot what I was supposed to do in this situation. She's smiling, but even I can tell she's starting to feel uncomfortable waiting for me to do whatever it is I'm supposed to do. I wish I knew what to do. I hesitate holding out my hoof, mimicking Applejack. Her hoof immediately latches onto mine and gives the limp limb a hard shake.

"Landsakes! You've gotta work on that grip o' yours," she says. She eyes the bandages that cover my body and the rest of me. "Anyways, what happened to you? You look like you just got hit by a runaway cart."

I shrug. Though, it seems my response isn't the kind of answer Applejack is satisfied with.

Before she can cut a word in, a blue blur rushes in front of me. "I'm Rainbow Dash, fastest flyer in all of Equestria,” the pegasus says, earning an eye roll from Applejack. “I’m sure you’ve heard of me.”

I shrug again. I wouldn’t know for sure.

“Sonic Rainboom? Rainbow Dash? Ring any bells?”

I shrug. I feel most comfortable with this response. Her tail glows blue and is yanked down, earning a surprised yelp from her.

“Honestly, Rainbow Dash. Not every pony in Equestria would know who you are,” the unicorn says. She smiles at me as if she’s putting on a show, the kind showing only the best side of her. "Hello, dear. My name is Rarity. My, you have a lovely mane! Perhaps it would look even better with a nice chapeau."

I look up at my mane. If she says a hat will look good on me, then I'll be inclined to believe that. What do I know about good appearances? I just had my first bath in who knows how long just yesterday.

Everything she does is precise and calculating from her manners to the way she speaks, giving her an air of elegance found only in Canterlot. And I wonder, have I been to Canterlot before? Or did I meet someone from there, whose impression has somehow stuck to me?

Fluttershy glances behind the trio as if expecting someone else. "Where's Twilight?"

Pinkie finishes off a cupcake that she had somehow procured during our talk. "Oh, she's just running late. She had to take care of something with Spike. She should be here any minute now."

As if on cue, a pony walks through the door. A unicorn--no, not a unicorn. She has wings too. If what I was seeing was true, then she had to be an alicorn, a princess of some sort. I didn't know there was another princess, or maybe I did and I've just forgotten about her. But none of that matters to me at the moment. My eyes aren't on her. They're fixated on the little dragon clinging worriedly on top of her.

Uh oh.

She spots us and trots towards us, all the while talking to the dragon who seemed quite frantic about something. She glances back at him and says some things to him. The dragon nods sullenly and hops off, marching his way towards the table full of snacks.

The pony comes up to us. "Hey, sorry I'm late," she says. Everyone returns the greeting, except me. She notices me. "Hi there. Who are you?"

The question barely registers in my head as I'm too engrossed looking at her horn and wings.

She follows my gaze, and her wings open up just a little. "Oh, so you noticed. You don't have to bow or call me 'Princess' or anything like that. Just call me, Twilight."

I forcibly tear my eyes away from her wings to look at her face, full of curiosity. My tongue brushes against my lips. It feels heavy, like a dead piece of meat in mouth, which isn’t that far from the truth.

Come on. Say something. At least, say your name, and for the love of Equestria, please, don’t mess this up.

My lips part, and the careful manipulation of my tongue lets the syllables flow out my mouth.

“Goldie.”

She beams. “Nice to meet you, Goldie.”

Fluttershy taps Twilight’s shoulder to get her attention. “Um, Twilight, what’s wrong with Spike?” she asks, glancing in the direction he went off to.

“Yeah, the little fella looks like he got bucked in the chest and lost a rodeo,” Applejack says.

Twilight purses her lips, unsure of what to say. “He’s just...been having a bad dream. He'll get over it soon."

"Oh, poor Spike," Rarity says. "I wish there was something we can do to help the dear out."

Twilight lets out a sigh. "It’s those comic books. He just needs time to realize that there's no such thing as zombies."

"Zombies? That's what got him so scared?" Rainbow asks. "Pfft. What's so scary about a dead pony walking around?"

Applejack gives her a deadpan look. "Maybe the fact that they're dead in the first place?"

"Oh, I know! It's because they go around eating other ponies' brains!" Pinkie shouted, adding her two bits to the conversation.

"So?” Rainbow retorts. “Haven't you seen the way they move? I'm pretty sure I can outfly them. And if not, what's stopping me from bucking their brains out?"

By now, Rarity is looking a little green in the face as they continued to talk about their plans in an encounter with the undead. All this talk about zombies has left me silent and feeling quite unsettled to the point of unconsciously backing away from them. I want to hide in a hole.

Noticing my discomfort, Fluttershy clears her throat. "Girls. Can we change the subject?"

"Oh, sorry about that, Fluttershy. Didn't mean to scare ya or anythin'."

They all apologize to her. Fluttershy puts a comforting wing on me.

"Goldie is feeling a little tired, so I think I should take her back."

I can't nod any faster. I seriously can't. My head moves with stiff, jerky motions.

We all say our goodbyes. It was just in the nick of time, too. At that moment, the little dragon comes waddling towards the group of mares with a plate stacked high with sweets. Just as Fluttershy and I are about to leave the door, his eyes drift across the room before gravitating towards mine. I watch as recognition slowly creeps into his eyes, a look of horror taking over his face. The cupcake he had been holding in one of his claws drops to the floor.

Hello again. I'm sorry we couldn't have met under better circumstances.

I can hear his frantic cries as we leave. I want to hide again. It's hard being around ponies, to walk among the living as if I am no different from one of them.

Fluttershy notices when I stop walking. "Goldie, is something wrong?"

I try to hide myself, but the only hiding spot I can find is a knothole in an oak tree that reaches up to my neck. It hardly conceals my head, and I'm pretty sure the squirrel whose home I barged into is none too happy with my intrusion.

"Don't mind what my friends said. They were just joking. I'm sure they didn't mean it," she said.

I flick my tail. Whether they meant what they said it or not didn't matter. Being reminded of what I was has left me feeling both ashamed and indignant. Why should being undead be treated any different from being alive? My body no longer functions properly, but in essence, I am still very much a pony. But why would anyone care? I'm an unnatural oddity that came crawling out of the woods.

The next thing I know, Fluttershy is next to me with her head near mine. "Come out. Please?"

I sneak a glance at her. A look of worry adorns her face. I sigh and slide my head out of the hole, giving the angry squirrel an opening. It climbs my head and up the tree, making sure to scratch my face on the way up.

Fluttershy holds my head and examines my face to see the extent of the damage. Her hooves press against my cheeks as gravity pulls my head down.

She turns my head towards her face. "Goldie, look at me."

I do. I can count every eyelash that hangs over her eyes like pairs of dark butterfly wings.

"You're not a monster. Would a monster care about my animal friends? Or help a pegasus like me?"

I think about it.

She gives me a hard look, one that I didn't know she was capable of making. "You're as much a pony as me, with real feelings and everything. Just because you're not quite alive anymore doesn't mean you're not a pony."

I find myself smiling once again. Her words resonate inside me and awakens a newfound desire to carve out the rot of my old self. It's not enough that I emulate the living. Wanting to change is only the first step. I need to find a purpose, a direction to my aimless wandering. My thoughts bring me to a question Fluttershy had asked me about what I was going to do.

"Want to..." I say, trying to get out the words.

"Yes, Goldie? What do you want?" she asks.

My nose scrunches as I try to force the sentences, while Fluttershy watches patiently. "Want friends. Live again. Start over." I can't help but feel proud as the words leave my mouth. It's probably the most I've ever uttered at once.

"That sounds nice. If that's what you want," she says. "But you're going to have to try if you want to make this work."

“Try,” I say, nodding. “Try harder.”

“That’s great, Goldie.” She smiles.

I smile.

We smile, as friends are often known to do, sometimes together.

“I think you did well tonight,” Fluttershy says. “My friends seem to like you. They can be your friends, too, once you get to know them.”

We make it back to the cottage.

“It’s time to feed my nocturnal friends.” She pauses. “Would you like to help, too?”

I nod.

We stop by a large tree. Even though it’s dark, I can make out the small shadows hanging from the branches.

She places bowls of chopped fruits beneath them. The shadows all swoop down and crowd around the food. As I watch, something lands on my head. Something small, furry, and with wings. A little head wiggles into my view and stares at me with its fox-like face. It’s a bat, and it’s a baby from the looks of it. I can feel its wings latched onto my head between my ears.

“Aw, I think she likes you,” Fluttershy says.

She picks up the little bat and cradles it. She grabs a chopped banana from a bowl and feeds it gently. More of the little bats come to rest on top of me as they wait their turn. Soon, I am nothing more than a pony-shaped tree for bats to hang on.

Fluttershy giggles, while I attempt a grin.

When we are done, we walk back inside. “What do you feel like eating for dinner, Goldie? I just bought groceries yesterday, so I have some hay, alfalfa, lettuce…” she lists on.

I think back to the apple I had earlier and the poor impression it left on me. As much as I would love to try her cooking, I’m afraid I won't be able to fully enjoy it without working tastebuds. So I shrug.

“That's okay, Goldie. I'll make us some nice pumpkin soup.”

When she leaves for the kitchen, I make myself comfortable on a couch in the living room. I stare at the ceiling and think back to the party. The images from the party of unnerved ponies burn in my head. But most of all, the words of Fluttershy’s friends echo loudly—zombie, dead, brains. And that one final look of terror from the little dragon wraps up these depressing thoughts.

I shake my head.

No. Stop. Enough of that. Fluttershy wouldn't want to see you like this, all sad and depressed. I'm tired of being like this. At what point in my undead life did I become like this? That doesn't matter. Become someone who’s more happy and less depressed. Someone who is more confident in herself and better with other ponies. Be more like Fluttershy.

I pause in my thoughts.

But how do I do that?

Being alone with my thoughts, I didn't realize there was someone else in the room, that person being a small, white rabbit who is slapping my face right now. My eyes drift towards him, earning a flinch from him. Yet, he didn't scurry or hide, as most animals do. He is very brave for a little critter.

While I wonder what he wanted from me, he takes a hold of my mane and yanks it, pointing a paw towards the kitchen. I stare at him before getting up to go to the kitchen. Fluttershy is just finishing up with setting the table.

“Oh, you're just in time, Goldie,” she says, setting down a bowl of piping hot soup.

I glance at the rabbit, but he’s tapping his foot impatiently next to his food bowl.

“I'll be right there, Angel,” she says to the rabbit.

I take a seat at the table and look unsurely at the food in front of me. After Fluttershy takes care of Angel and seats herself, she notices the look on my face.

“Oh, is something wrong? Is it the soup?”

I shake my head and flash a small smile, taking the bowl in both my hooves and giving an exaggerated whiff of the stuff.

A rather hammy moan leaves my mouth. “Mmmm.”

She beams at this and digs into her own food with a spoon. With the sound of quiet slurping filling the room, I stare at my own soup, unsure. Fluttershy looks up from her meal, and again, I smile back, only this time I put the bowl to my lips and tilt it.

“You might want to be careful with that, Goldie. It’s kind of…hot.”

She watches with a surprised look as I down the steaming liquid without a pause. When I set the bowl down, it is entirely empty. About a quarter of the soup is on my face, but at least I managed to eat most of it, even though I can't taste a thing.

“You’ve got something…” she begins to say, pointing at the left corner of her mouth.

I wipe my mouth with a hoof, covering it with a generous helping of what was on my face, and look to her again.

She frowns. “Not…quite. Here, let me help.”

She reaches over with a napkin and begins wiping the soup off my face. I'm a little embarrassed for having her clean up after me like a foal.

When her meal is finished, she takes my bowl and hers, washes them, and then leads me to the living room. She takes a look at a clock hanging on the wall, which shows that it was getting late.

“Is it that time already? Goodness, time has passed.” She lets of a yawn before turning to me.

“I only have one bed, but I don't mind if you…”

My attention kind of stops after that. My legs give out under me and I fall to the ground like a sack of potatoes, lying on my side on the hard wooden floor. These limbs of mine just don’t cut it when it comes to keeping up with the living. Especially Pinkie.

“Oh,” she says. She looks worryingly at me and then to the couch. “Wouldn't you rather sleep on something softer, like the couch? I don't even mind if you take my bed.”

My eyes drift up to meet hers, and I let out a sigh. I've grown used to lying on the hard ground, but I'd rather not let her worry about me. Besides, there is no way I'm ever going to take her bed for everything she's done for me.

I crawl onto the couch and curl up. Fluttershy leaves the room for a minute and comes back with a quilt with butterflies sewn onto it and a pillow. She slips the pillow underneath my head and wraps the quilt around me.

As she is tucking me in, my eyes are drawn to hers. When her eyes meet mine, she smiles.

“There. Comfortable?” she asks.

I nod wordlessly.

She begins up the stairs. “If you need me, I'll be right upstairs,” she says. “Goodnight, Goldie.”

After she leaves, my voice slips out, albeit a little late. “Goodnight… Fluttershy.”

It is quiet, but not entirely so. The crickets’ chirping in the night is the only sound I hear. I toss and turn a few times before finally settling for staring at the ceiling. I sigh.

When was the last time I ever slept under a roof? Or sleep at all for that matter? Sleep has eluded me for quite some time.

I kick off the quilt and get up. I abandon my “normal” walk and fall into my usual limping gait. I travel upstairs on creaky stairs, though it could also be my creaky joints. I head towards where Fluttershy’s room would be. When I reach her door, I hesitate for a moment before opening. Moonlight spills into the room and onto the sleeping mare in the bed.

I trot closer to look. If she were to wake up and catch me staring, I would surely burn with embarrassment.

She lies still on her bed, like a corpse under the pale moonlight. The steady rise and fall of her chest betrays that morbid analogy. But unlike a corpse, that which I am, she is beautiful. The way her body curves shows the contours of muscles under her skin, skin that is not at all grotesque or marred or rotting. My eyes travel up towards her bare chest, past her exposed neck, before stopping on her serene face, sleeping without a care in the world. Her mane spills out and frames her face like a portrait. Stray hairs fall across her features perfectly.

This may seem like an obsession with the living, but when one has forgotten what it's like to be alive, it is only natural to be curious. I am an artist making note of every detail and committing it to memory, while Fluttershy has become the living subject in my otherwise dead career. It would be wrong of me to say I am not a little jealous. I place a hoof over my heart, perhaps fooling myself into thinking that I would feel something like a heartbeat. What greets me is silence and stillness.

I freeze when Fluttershy mumbles something in her sleep. It is about time I leave her to her dreams. But before I do, I take the edge of the blanket in my teeth and pull it over her chest to cover her. When our faces are close, I can feel her breath on my nose. There is a tingling feeling on my nose that my mind barely registers. I exit the room, closing the door quietly behind me and trot downstairs towards the front door.

Outside, the moon shines brightly and the stars glimmer, watching over the sleepy little town. I cross over the bridge that leads off of Fluttershy’s property. No longer do I wander aimlessly. My body moves with a purpose. In the night, I slip into the darkness of the Everfree Forest, unnoticed.

Author's Note

Out of touch with writing. This had been sitting in a vault 80% complete for a year now. If you've followed this far, then I must be doing something right.

Book

At night, when the Everfree is at its most beautiful and most terrifying, I find myself relaxed. With the moon to light my way, I walk along a well worn path leading into the Everfree. Fireflies glow in the darkness and crickets chirp, singing their songs in the silent night.

I have some idea of where I’m going, though it’s more of a general direction really. Well, no plan is perfect. A wooden hut lies ahead of me, though it seems to be part of a living tree. If it weren't for the potions and bottles hanging from the branches, I never would have noticed it.

Curiosity gets the better of me again and leads me to one of the windows where light spills out. Sticking to the shadows, I peek inside. What I see is someone much like a pony but with stripes, as if someone had taken dark paint and ran it all over her. She hums a tune to herself as she fills a cauldron with various herbs and pours liquid from strange flasks. All the while, her hips sway to her own rhythm, bangles jangling to her tune. If I hadn’t known any better, I would have said she was a dancer from some exotic lands.

I move away from the window and continue my trek. If I am going to make it back by sunrise, I have to move quicker. My pace changes to a quick trot.

Past some brambles and bushes, the path disappears and everything grows wildly in front of me. Moonlight comes in trickles as the canopy grows dense. It’s harder to see now as I trip over roots and rocks and other small shrubbery. As if I haven't had enough problems walking as it is.

There is something up ahead. Through the shrubbery, I can see a dark hulking form. It's at least twice as big as a full-grown pony. A pair of wings and a scorpion-like tail stick out of a lion’s body. Its back is turned towards me, unaware of my presence.

Dead or not, you would hardly find a pony warmed to the idea of being a manticore’s next meal, and I do not plan on waltzing into a predator. So, I back away slowly. Stiff limbs struggle to move, like rusty cogs grinding against each other as I kick into reverse. I hear a sickening crunch come from whatever the manticore is eating.

Another step back.

So far, so good. Once I’m out of sight with a good amount of Everfree Forest between us, then I can rest at ease.

One more step.

Crack.

I freeze. The manticore whips its head towards the sound and stares in my direction. It's practically looking at me as I stare back through the leaves. We don't break eye contact. If my heart was working, this would be the part where it would be pounding in my ears as I wait for the dark, sickening surprise that is bound to happen any minute now.

The manticore stands up and falls into a position to attack, low to the ground and ready to jump at the first sign of movement. Those sharp teeth and those sharp claws on that manticore look very suitable for tearing into flesh, and soon they will be on me. I try to imagine myself what I will look like when the time comes. Will I let out a deathly scream? Or will I go quietly back into a lifeless form?

As I brace myself for the next event to unfold, the bush, a little ways down from me, rustles as a cockatrice comes bursting out, squawking and cawing up a storm.

Despite being smaller than me and much smaller than the manticore, it didn't seem to care about the size difference as it challenged the manticore with flared wings and a snapping beak full of sharp teeth. But to be honest, I'm more worried about the manticore than the chicken. One can't do much when they're petrified statue. With one against one and me at the sidelines, I can already tell that this was a place I shouldn't be at.

Thanking small miracles, I turn tail and run, stumbling over unseen roots. The trees around me blur as I gallop. My head begins to throb as an overwhelming sense of déjà vu threatens to split my head open. My legs run automatically, steering along a vaguely familiar path. Ahead is an opening in the forest, highlighted by the moonlight.

I charge ahead into the opening. My hooves lose purchase on the ground as the end of treeline leads to a steep hill. The surprise catches me off guard as I find myself tripping over my own hooves and tumbling haphazardly by my own momentum. Along the way down, I hear something snap out of place in my shoulder. My roll comes to a stop at the bottom of the hill. When the world has stopped spinning in my eyes, I listen for any of the Everfree inhabitants.

Silence.

Not a single sound can be heard. I sigh and try to stand up, though I seem to be having trouble with that. Something is wrong with my right shoulder. It probably got dislocated in the fall. No matter. A little bit of fiddling with my leg and joint pops it right back in, good as new. Sort of.

When I take a look around, I find myself in a ditch. But what lies beyond has me smiling again as I see before me a large patch of wild blue flowers. I trot up to it and lie down to admire them. It’s amazing how something so beautiful can grow in a place like this. I don't know how long I've been staring. I could probably spend days watching it grow. Shaking my head to get back on track, I pick one of them and fix it into my mane.

I gather enough flowers for a bouquet and hold them in my mouth. I've gotten what I've come here for. Now I just have to get back to Fluttershy’s place. However, it would help if I knew which direction to go. North? South? Left? Right? I've been lost for so long that I'm afraid that I've gotten quite good at it.

As I circle around the patch of flowers, trying decide which way was Ponyville, my hoof kicks something solid. A curious glance reveals a book. Too small to be a novel. Perhaps a journal or a notebook for one’s most private thoughts. But why is it out here, all alone, without anybody to accompany it?

I nose the book open to a random page, watching the pages flutter as they fall. A flower falls out, the same one I have. It’s all flattened and pressed, having been stuck between somebody’s words for some time, but not so long as to wither because it still clings onto life with its vibrant blue hue. Neat, curly writing adorns the pages in ink, its meaning still lost to me.

Each page turns with crinkles from days of weathering against the Everfree’s wild elements,and with each new page, I am pleasantly surprised by a new flower, pressed into the pages. Suddenly, I remember that I had to be somewhere else right now.

I take two steps, stop, and look back at the book. It would be a shame to leave something so nice here. I take two steps towards the book and stop. But what if someone comes back to look for it? I turn around and take a step, before looking back again. Then again, ponies are known for being forgetful.

After a few more times of going back and forth, I take the book, putting my bouquet between the pages so that the flower petals are not crushed within. I try to leave back the way I came. The way up is steep but not impossible. My teeth grip tightly to the book as I make the arduous climb up the hill. Every so often my hoof slips under me. My chin would hit the rocky ground when it happens. By the time I reach the top, I'm a mess. Nonetheless, I move on. Though, I hope I don't bump into that cockatrice.

~~~~~~~

The forest ends and I step out into the open. Scratches cover my body like battle scars, mostly self-inflicted. In my mouth, I carry the spoils of war: a bouquet of bright blue flowers and a book. I march towards Fluttershy’s cottage just as the sun is rising. The early morning birds are chirping. They stop momentarily at the sight of me but continue.

I quietly trot up to Fluttershy’s room next to her bed. She is still sleeping soundly. Her mouth hangs open as little snores escape, matching the volume of her voice. I set the flowers on the bed next to her. Surely, she will love them.

Once I've settled back on the couch with my book, I open it to a random page. Illegible scribbles meet my eyes once again. I want to understand. With all my heart, I want to understand these words written by this unknown author, who may or may not be dead. Why? Because someone cared enough to put thoughts down onto paper, knowing they may never be read. And that, I find, is beautiful in itself. In a way, it's like having a chance to listen to someone who’s not around anymore and get a glimpse of who they were.

My eyes stare at the first word until, I don’t know how long, it begins to change. Letters take form and fit into place where nonsense once was, and in its place a single word starts forming. I try to draw the word out slowly with my mouth.

A scream shatters the calm of the early morning. Except, the scream doesn't sound like it's coming from Fluttershy. It sounds more like a stallion. I nearly jump at the sound, tearing my eyes away from the book. Last I checked, there weren’t any stallions in her house.

Faster than I’ve ever moved before, I run up the stairs towards Fluttershy’s bedroom. When I reach her, she is still in bed, awake. She is holding her blanket up to cover herself. Her eyes are wide and they lock with mine the moment I enter, though perhaps it may have to do with my barging into her room like a charging bull and making as loud of a ruckus as I can in the early morning. Her panicked expression soon softens at the sight of me.

“Oh, it’s just you,” she says in a deep, masculine voice.

I stand there, unmoving. Her lips are moving and words are coming out. But it doesn’t sound like her. I close the distance between us. She subtly tries to cover herself for whatever reason. When I’m at the edge of her bed, she herself blushes. A glance under her bed reveals nothing. There’s no stallion under there as I had thought. That brings my gaze back to the pegasus in bed, scrutinizing every detail of her face and comparing it to the sleeping face I saw last night.

“Goldie, it’s me,” the pegasus says. “Fluttershy.”

I fall on my rump and tilt my head. One of my ears twitch at the low bass of her new voice.

“Fluttershy… Not mare?” I ask.

She shakes her head frantically. “No, I am! Believe me. I’m just...” she trails off, her eyes flick to the bouquet for a moment. “Sick.”

My eyes lock onto the bouquet that had gotten slightly crushed. Perhaps putting it there had been a mistake. “Sick…” I repeat. “Flower… Make sick?”

A wave of guilt hits me. Were the flowers poisonous? Was she allergic? The thought of doing harm to someone who has done nothing but kindness to me twists my insides. I back away from Fluttershy and sulk in the corner.

A feathered wing brushes against my back. “It’s okay, Goldie. You didn't do anything wrong. I think it’s a wonderful gift,” she says in that deep voice of hers.

I sigh, drawing circles with my hoof on the floor.

“Don't worry about me. I'll be just fine. It's really easy to fix,” she says.

I look at her questioningly. “Hmm?”

“All it takes is a quick trip into Ponyville and I'll be back to normal.” Her eyes trace over my figure. “Oh dear. You're hurt. We better fix you up and change your bandages first.”

I follow her as she pulls out her first aid kit and begins wrapping a new roll of gauze over my body. Of course, she would put my needs before hers. Because that's the kind of pony she is.

~~~~~~~

We are crossing through Ponyville’s market. Wearing a large sunhat and a pair of saddlebags, Fluttershy looks just as conspicuous as I do. She insisted that I also wear a hat as well as sunglasses and that I leave the blue flower behind. She might be thinking of my own shyness around other ponies, and I smile inside at the thought of that. How thoughtful of her! Despite the choice in apparel, most ponies either don’t notice Fluttershy or they choose not to notice her out of respect for her seemingly inconspicuous disguise. Regardless, Fluttershy is still trying to be subtle in hiding herself, unaware that doing so only makes her stand out much more.

Every so often, I find myself distracted by a vendor’s wares or school children playing on the street. And every so often, I find Fluttershy bumping flanks with me or steering me closer with a wing as I wander off. I can't help it. What’s that mare selling? What are those kids playing? Can I play too? I'm as easily fascinated as a foal.

We enter a place that appears to be a spa. There is a waiting room with magazines on fashion and beauty. At the moment, there aren’t a lot of ponies probably because it's too early in the day. While Fluttershy talks to a pink pony with blue mane, I busy myself with trying to read one of the magazines. Again, trying. Mostly, I like to look at the pictures of all the mares with their makeup and pretty dresses. There’s even one that looks like Fluttershy, coincidentally.

My ears catch the end of Fluttershy’s conversation. “Right this way, please,” the spa pony says, leading Fluttershy inside.

“Stay here for a bit, Goldie. I’ll be out quick,” she says in that deep voice of hers. I'll never get used to that.

I slowly nod. She smiles and trots away. Sitting in one of the seats in the waiting room, I peek inside the hallway Fluttershy went through. There are large bathtubs further in, about three times larger than the one in her home.

“Hello there! How may I help you?” someone says.

I turn around to see the same pony from before. No, wait. Not the same pony. At least I don't think it is. The color of her mane and coat are swapped.

I point to where Fluttershy had gone. “F-F-Flu…” I stutter. I wish Fluttershy was here to do the talking for me. I'm no good with words.

“Are you here for the full body treatment? Newcomers get a half off discount.”

I shake my head and force myself to talk . “No… Thanks…”

The pony frowns after giving me a onceover but then smiles. “At least come in for a massage. No charge.”

I ponder this for a bit. A massage shouldn’t take too long. “Okay…”

“Great! My name is Lotus, and I will be taking care of you today,” she says as she leads me down the hall and into a room at the side.

There is a table for a pony to lie on comfortably and a shelf filled with towels and oils.

“Please, lie down. Oh, and if you could please take off your hat.”

I do as she says.

“Now, I’ll start around the withers and work my way down. If you feel discomfort, let me know, okay?”

I nod. I never noticed before, but she has an accent. I can't put my hoof on where it's from.

She grabs a bottle of oil for her hooves and starts working around my shoulders and withers. There is a satisfying crack from my shoulder, the one I had fallen on in the Everfree, as she puts pressure there.

“Oh my, you have a lot of tension! You’re completely stiff around here.” A hoof digs into my back as she kneads the piece of meat.

I try to shrug, but her hooves are keeping from doing so. Then, she moves further down, eventually massaging my flank where my cutie mark is. “It’s no good to keep all this stress and worry in you. Are you cold? You feel cold. Well, no matter. You'll be warmed up after this. After this massage, I guarantee you will feel much better.”

She bends one of my hooves experimentally, slowly twisting it in wider motions. More cracks and pops come from my back and joints. Limp limbs fold and bend at awkward angles with ease. If I had started a career as a professional contortionist, I can see myself doing quite well. Just when I find myself beginning to get comfortable, it's over.

“There! You should be feeling much better now.”

When I roll onto my hooves, I notice that it’s somewhat easier to move.

“How did you like it? It was good, yes?” she asks.

I nod and pick up my hat, but I don't think my face left the impression that I enjoyed it because she smiles uncertainly, not quite sure if she did good or bad. These sunglasses make it difficult to read my expression.

I hold up a hoof. “It’s… fine," I say, following her back to the lobby.

Lotus manages to relax, though she tries to hide it behind the professional smile. “Good. Would you like to schedule an appointment for next time?”

I fumble for words to say. How do you tell someone you're flat out broke? Not only that, but living off of someone’s kindness at their home?

When we reach the lobby, Fluttershy runs up to me. “There you are, Goldie! Where did you go?” she says, now with her sweet normal voice.

I paw at the ground. My bad habit of running off must have worried her.

“She was with me getting a massage,” Lotus says, standing next to her twin. “You have quite the friend, Fluttershy. You should bring her with you next time.”

“At a discount, of course,” says the other spa pony.

“Would you like that?” Fluttershy asks me.

I nod, standing a little behind Fluttershy as the spa ponies look at me.

“Quite a shy one,” the twin says, giggling.

“Come now, Aloe. Don’t tease the dear.” Lotus turns to me. “Perhaps next time, you can try one of the baths.”

Fluttershy is suddenly pushing me out the door. “Maybe. If we have time,” she says. “Bye Aloe. Bye Lotus.”

We are walking side by side in total silence. When I look at Fluttershy, she’s thinking about something. Something deep by the thoughtful look on her face. What's gotten her so bothered?

“Fluttershy…” I say.

She jolts out of her thoughts. “Yes, Goldie?”

“Feeling better?”

“Oh! Yes, I'm fine now.”

Another bout of silence. There’s an air of uncertainty between us.

“Say, Goldie,” she says. “If we happen to find a cure for your… situation, would you take it?”

To be honest, I hadn't thought about that. The fact that there could be a cure never crossed my mind. If I was cured of my deathly condition, would I be able to remember who I was before? If I could remember myself, I bet it’d be like being reacquainted with an old friend. I nod slowly.

“Even if it means things might be different? Or if things don't go the way you planned?”

I stop in my tracks. Fluttershy stops, too, at my sudden lack of movement. All this complex thinking and these deep questions have left me unprepared for what to say next. Things like what-if’s and plans for the unexpected are things I can't entirely answer as of now. Because they're unexpected, of course. The could be a million answers and I still wouldn't be able to give an outright answer. But I am certain of one thing and that is the present, here and now, regardless of how I got here.

I trot ahead of her. “Yes.”

She sits there deep in thought until she notices me walking off. “Goldie, wait! It’s this way!”

I hurriedly turn around and start walking.

From the corner of my eyes, I can see Fluttershy giving me a smile, though it’s a small one. She’s still thinking about something. I wonder what's going on in that head of hers.

When we come to a stop in front of the library, Fluttershy knocks at the door.

“You can come in! The library’s open,” a voice calls from inside.

We walk in, and I am surprised to see the purple mare from before. She had just closed her book as we came in.

“Fluttershy, Goldie, what brings you two here?”

“I'm just here to look for a book,” Fluttershy says.

“Oh? About what?”

“The Everfree’s flora, if you could. I need to find a special plant for one of my animal friends.”

“Sure, just let me find it,” she says as she skims the titles on the shelves.

While Fluttershy and Twilight are busy chatting about the new things in their lives, I can't help but wander around the library and put my nose into things I shouldn't. Books are neatly arranged on the shelves, and I start taking them out haphazardly. With little control on my grip, I fling them over my shoulder into a pile. For some reason, the eagerness to relearn how to read is gnawing inside me.

“Hey hey hey! Stop! I just reshelved those!”

I turn around to see the little dragon from before.

“You gotta be more careful with these. Twilight’s gonna have a fit if she sees someone throwing books around.” He organizes the pile into a neat stack. “There, see?”

He stares at me.

“Do I know you? You look kind of familiar.”

I shake my head. One thing was certain now and that was he lived here apparently. What bad luck, more for him than for me. Thankfully, my disguise worked like a charm.

“Well, whatever.” He twiddles his claws, unsure of what to say next. An air of awkwardness lingers between us. “So, do you like reading comic books?” he asks.

I begin to shrug, but the more I thought about it, I realize this could be my chance for him to teach me to read. I nod my head.

His eyes light. “You should see my comic collection! Oh, my name’s Spike by the way.”

“Goldie,” I say, trying my hardest to keep my voice steady.

He leads me upstairs into a bedroom containing a bed and a basket beside it. The dragon walks up to the basket and pulls out different issues of various comic books.

“You should read this one if you haven't already. It's the latest issue of The Power Ponies. Or this one! The Mysterious Mare Do Well!”

I glance at the selection. Illustrated covers, some slightly bent, make it all look appealing, and the amount of pictures inside make it easy for any child to read. But my curiosity is drawn to one particular comic and that is the one with the zombie on the cover.

Spike notices where I'm looking and picks it up. “Night of the Living Dead? It’s alright, I guess.”

“Not scared?” I asked.

“Me? Pssh, no! Why would I be afraid of a dumb old zombie?” he says with a nervous laugh.

I nod slowly.

I hold up one of the comic books. “Spike, teach me… read?” I ask.

“You don't know how to read? But I thought you liked comic books?”

I look at the cover in my hooves. “Pretty… pictures.”

He gives me a weird look. “Hasn’t anyone taught you how to read?”

I stare at him and shrug.

He scratches his head. “Huh… Well, I guess I can teach you.” He picks the book out of my hooves, turns to the first page, and points at a word in a speech bubble. “Can you sound out the letters? You know what letters are, right?”

I squint at the word. Bits and pieces of the Equestrian written language fade in and out of my memory. The muscles in my mouth twitch.

“Fr… Fre...md. Fremd?” I ask.

“Fremd?” Spike looks at the word. “Close. It’s ‘friend’. Those sunglasses might make it hard for you to read. How about we take those off?”

Before I can voice my objection, he lifts the shades off my face.

“There, isn’t that… better?” he trails off. I can practically see the neurons firing in his brain as recognition crosses his face.

I try to tell him not to be scared. Yes, I am a zombie, but that doesn't mean I'm any less of a pony. But instead, what comes out of my mouth are some strangled syllables and a horrible groan as my mouth fails to cooperate with me. I accidentally bite my tongue at some point and pretty hard too because when I stick my tongue out I can see the gross open wound on the tip of my tongue. In hindsight, I should not be sticking my bloody tongue out in front of Spike. Looking back at him, he seems to be stuck in a state of shock.

Then, without warning, he faints. I look left, then right, then back to Spike. I am alone in a room with an unconscious dragon on the floor, and any minute now, two mares can come walking in.

A heavy sigh leaves my mouth. “Sorry...” I say to him.

I gingerly lift him into his basket. I start humming one of Fluttershy’s songs to calm myself as I throw a blanket over the young dragon. It also seems to have an effect at calming him as a content look takes over his face.

Picking up my sunglasses, I leave the room to join Fluttershy and Twilight. When Fluttershy notices me, she wraps things up with Twilight.

“It’s been so nice talking to you, Twilight. But Goldie and I need to get going.”

I nod quickly. The faster we were out, the better.

“Alright, Fluttershy. It was nice seeing you too, Goldie,” Twilight says to me.

I smile politely. “Same…”

When Fluttershy and I are outside with some distance between us and the library, I let out a sigh that is heavy from all the things that happened today. It has topped one of biggest sighs in the past few days, a new sighing record. Fluttershy’s eyes glance at me. Noticing my depressed mood, she puts a comforting wing on my shoulder. “I had fun today being with you. How about you?”

I can see she's trying to cheer me up. I think about the things I saw and the spa and the comic books Spike showed me. Looking past all the bad stuff, this day didn't turn out so bad.

“I had fun too,” I say.

Then, she smiles. “That's good. Though, I'm starting to think the hats were a bit too much,” she says as she adjusts her large hat.

I can't help smiling. It's contagious. “Maybe,” I say.

She lets out a laugh, like little bells ringing, and I hope one day my voice will ring alongside hers. Just once more, I give a small sigh, the kind that is reserved for moments like these, knowing that there will be more of them in the future.

When her laughter has subsided, she gives a small sigh of her own, and I wonder if it means the same thing to her as it does to me.

Author's Note

Would have had this out a week ago but there was a problem with importing from Google Docs (and still a problem).

It's amazing how much the show's canon changes since this started. Anyways, sorry it took very long to publish this chapter.

Wings

I stare at my book as Fluttershy flutters in and out of the corners of my vision. A feather duster in her mouth sweeps over dusty shelves and items. Just an hour ago, she was sweeping the floor. An hour before that, she was taking out the trash, all while humming a song with lyrics that I don't know the words to.

At some point in my past life, I must have done the same things Fluttershy is doing now. It's so normal. Throughout all of this, I had asked if she needed help, but she had declined. So now I sit, trying to make heads or tail of the word I'm reading. I've must have read the same word about a hundred times now. It's like trying to solve a jigsaw puzzle without seeing the whole picture.

After the incident yesterday, we had come back to the problem of those flowers I got her. Knowing what it does to Fluttershy, I wanted to throw it out and forget the whole embarrassment I've caused. But surprisingly, Fluttershy stopped me from doing so. When I asked why, she said that a gift as thoughtful as mine is worth keeping. She said they were beautiful. So now the salvaged bouquet sits in a vase on the living room table.

I hear some heavy shuffling by the door. “Goldie,” Fluttershy calls from the front door, “can you watch over the place while I'm gone? I need to go out and feed Harry.”

I look up from my book and raise a brow at all the things she's carrying, specifically the fishing gear.

“He's a bear,” she says.

I nod in understanding.

She leaves the door, carrying a fishing pole and a net. “Bye Goldie. I'll be back soon,” she says before shutting the door.

I am alone now in her home. My eyes focus on the feather duster she left on the table. I want to do more for her. Even if it's just simple cleaning, I want to do everything I can for her.

I trot towards the feather duster and take it in my mouth, giving it an experimental shake. Dust falls from the feathers and gets in my nose, and there's a tickling sensation before my body launches into a sneezing fit. When my sniffling has stopped, I finally get to work dusting the furniture and anything in my line of sight, like an overzealous child. Who knows if Fluttershy missed a spot?

In my eager and reckless dusting, a framed photo falls and shatters. There’s the sound of a crack as my hoof steps over it.

I freeze.

There’s pieces of broken glass on the ground. Underneath it all, a photograph of two young fillies sits under a spiderweb of cracks. My hooves brush the glass aside, and I gingerly pull it out by the corner with my teeth. There is a filly in the middle of laughing, as if being told the world’s funniest joke, while the other smiles politely behind a curtain of her mane. It's obvious which one is Fluttershy. Though, the blue filly looks extremely familiar. It’s not very common to have a rainbow mane. They must be somewhere near Cloudsdale by all the clouds they're standing on.

As much as I want to speculate Fluttershy’s childhood, there's still the current problem. I've only made things messier, and I can't help but drag a hoof across my face with a heavy sigh.

I stash the photo safely between the pages of my book and get to work on the mess. All the broken glass is pushed into a pile and the broken frame is tossed into the garbage bin. I find a broom and a dustpan to sweep up the last bits of glass. The result looks as if nothing happened in the past few minutes, with the exception of a missing photo.

There's a knock at the door. I trudge towards it and open. It’s the blue pegasus from the party, the same one from the photo.

Of course, she wasn’t expecting me to answer the door to Fluttershy’s home. “Oh, uh, hey. Goldie, right?” Rainbow Dash asks.

I nod. I wasn't expecting Fluttershy to have visitors.

“So, is Fluttershy around? She said she was going to watch me practice my tricks for the Wonderbolts.”

I shake my head.

She gives a questioning look. “What are you doing at Fluttershy’s place then?”

I stare at my hooves, averting her curious gaze. “House… Watching.”

After a pause, she asks, “Well, do you want to watch me instead? It's not like you're doing anything, right?”

I think about this, and she does have a point, so I nod.

“Great! Let's go! I know the perfect spot nearby,” she says.

As she starts pushing me out the door, I can’t help but think that she just wants someone around to give her attention.

~~~~~~~

I watch as the wind whips past my mane. I am at an open meadow behind Fluttershy’s cottage, and Rainbow Dash is in the air doing her stunts for the Wonderbolts. As loud and boastful of herself as she is, she is actually quite good at what she does. Her moves are swift and smooth as she pulls off a loop and banks into a corkscrew. All the while, a rainbow trail follows her as she paints the world’s largest blue canvas above.

Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash are lucky to be born as pegasi. What if I had wings? What if they were mine instead? I would take flight into the airy blue endlessness, not weighed down by these heavy thoughts. Like a homing bird, I'll fly as a bird on wings. I would go anywhere as far as my wings can take me and bask in the weightless freedom, where the walls and fences of undead indifference can no longer keep me.

“Hey, are you paying attention?”

I jolt as Rainbow hovers in front of me, and I nod dishonestly.

“Did you see the way I did that wingover? Wonderbolt material, right?”

I nod slowly.

“Thanks for being here, Goldie. Normally, Fluttershy watches my stunts. All my other friends are too busy. It's nice to see a new face in the audience for once.”

I nod again.

She frowns. “You don't talk much, do you?”

I shrug.

“Well, let's see how you react when you see this next stunt!”

She escalates upward, beating her wings and carrying herself higher until she is but a speck in the sky. I have to strain my eyes just to see her. Then, she swerves around and takes a steep dive as she tucks in her wings. I stare in self-contained awe as she shoots through the air like an arrow, piercing through clouds like paper. As entertaining as it is to watch, I can't help but frown.

She is going fast. Really fast. I may not know much about aerodynamics or the complexity of physics, but I'm sure that ponies don't fare well when colliding into the ground at high speeds.

If she doesn't slow down now, she won't be able to pull up. I have to do something, but what can I do? If only I were a pegasus instead of an earth pony.

I gallop towards the direction she's heading. My legs are working double time to keep up. When I'm finally in her path I hold my hooves out. I must be out of my mind thinking I can catch a pegasus like a fly ball. But if I don't do something, someone is going to get hurt.

The distance closes between us as gravity pulls us closer in what could possibly be a fatal attraction between two ponies. I can now see the look plastered on her face while mine remains stoic as ever. Pupils dilated and sweat dripping—this is a look of panic. I only hope that Rainbow Dash walks out of this in one piece.

Light starts bending and pulling around her, oscillating across the color spectrum. A colorful ring bursts from her trail, followed by what sounds like the world's loudest cannon. My ears are ringing, and everywhere around me, colorful hues wash over me like the inside of a kaleidoscope.

I'm so distracted by the amazing phenomenon that I momentarily forget about the pegasus in front of me. Rainbow Dash collides into me, knocking me off my hooves. The fence that enclosed Fluttershy’s yard, once far behind me, suddenly explodes into pieces of wooden shrapnel against my back. We come to a stop with a long groove in the dirt, as if a large hoof dragged a line across the earth. At the end of it, we sit under a mound of dirt in the wreckage of our destruction.

The pile of dirt on top of me moves. “Ow…” Rainbow mutters.

A weight lifts off my chest as she wearily stands up and shakes her head, sending dirt everywhere. There is a thin red gash on her shoulder where my mouth had latched onto during the crash. I run my tongue along my teeth, and I can actually taste a slight tang to it.

“Oh my gosh! Goldie!” Rainbow shouts, looking at me. “What were you thinking?!”

She helps me up to my hooves, though I feel off balance. I think I may have broken a few ribs as well. “Keep you… safe,” I say, popping my joints back into place.

Rainbow lets out a snort. “I totally had that! If you weren't standing in the way, I would have…” Her rant stops short. I trail her gaze to my leg where a wooden post sticks out below my cutie mark like an oversized splinter.

“I'm so sorry! Does it hurt?” she asks, but then says, “Of course it does. We need to get you to a hospital!”

My body starts moving in the direction of Fluttershy’s home, ignoring Rainbow’s shouts until she flies in front of me to block my path.

“Wait, where are you going? The hospital is in the other direction!”

I look at her for a long time before answering before pointing at Fluttershy’s home. “House…”

“What? Why?!”

I grunt much to Rainbow Dash’s annoyance. “Watch… House…”

“You’ve gotta be…” she mutters as I continue limping away. “Hey wait!”

Once inside Fluttershy’s cottage, I pull the wooden post out of my leg. The wound in my flesh stares back at me like an unsightly pimple in a reflection. A new dressing of bandages should hide it, but Rainbow Dash seems to take it much more seriously. It's as if she’s dealing with a life or death situation. But then I remember that living ponies aren't so used to being impaled. I’ve almost forgotten how fragile ponies are. One misplaced step could be a sprain, a broken bone, or even death, if conditions are unforgiving.

She puts a hoof on my shoulder. “I really think you should get that checked out.”

I shrug off her touch and make my way to Fluttershy’s room. There was a first aid kit there last I checked.

“Hey! Are you even listening? This is serious! You're hurt! I know we haven't known each other long, but I can't just leave you like this.”

The kit is still where Fluttershy last put it. I dump the contents of the first aid kit in front of me. My eyes focus on the scratches all over Rainbow’s body, mostly on her knees, thigh, and shoulder. She’s much better off than I am, but one can never be too sure.

“Hold still,” I say.

She looks at me strangely. “What?”

I start applying antiseptic to her wounds like I've seen Fluttershy done many times before. A stifled gasp comes from her on contact. I pull out a fresh roll of bandages from the pile of medical supplies and start ravelling it around her.

When I'm finished, she looks at her bandages and frowns. “Wow, you did a terrible job with the bandages.”

It's true. I did a sloppy job with it. Some areas are loose and dangle around her limbs, like a poorly made Nightmare Night costume. I've even used up an entire roll, and to be honest, I don't think she needed that much anyway. If only I was as good as Fluttershy...

Rainbow Dash awkwardly smiles. “But thanks anyway.” She starts pushing me out of Fluttershy’s room. “Now it's your turn. Time to go to the hospital.”

“No,” I say. I dig in my hooves, doing my best to keep her from pushing me. “Watch… House…”

“Yes, you are! You're coming with me whether you like it or not.”

I shake my head and drop my rump to keep her from pushing me. She grunts as she shoves me from behind. My hooves slide across the floor, scrambling for purchase as soon as we hit the stairs. Rainbow Dash lets out a yelp as we take a tumble down each step, landing in a heap of limbs at the bottom.

The front door opens, and Fluttershy stares at us. Neither of us move. “What are you two doing?” she asks.

Rainbow Dash runs up to her first. “Fluttershy! Help me out here! Goldie’s being too stubborn to go to the hospital.”

Her eyes drift from Rainbow Dash then towards my flank as I try to cover the bloody hole. “Oh, dear,” she says, and I cower embarrassingly under her gaze. Her lips form a thin line. “Rainbow, we need to talk.”

“But Goldie—”

“She's going to be fine, but I need you to listen to me.” She looks to me. “And I need you to sit down so I can help you.”

I nod wordlessly and sit on the couch.

She hurries out of the room and comes back with an especially large medical kit. Her hoof pulls out a needle and thread, the kind used for sutures. She's probably had an injured animal on her hoof before. In the thickness of silence, Fluttershy gets to work on me. Behind her shoulder, Rainbow Dash grows a little pale as she watches Fluttershy work on me like a practiced surgeon, or perhaps a mortician.

When she finishes, she leaves to wash her hooves, while I'm left with a mirror to admire her stitching.

When Fluttershy finally comes back, Rainbow crosses her hooves, sitting on the other end of the couch from me. “Well? Spit it out. You know I hate secrets.”

Fluttershy seats herself in a chair beside us and takes a moment to collect her thoughts. “Promise me you won't freak out until I'm done explaining.”

Rainbow waves a hoof. “Sure, whatever.”

“No, Rainbow Dash. I need you to really promise,” she says.

“Come on, do I really have to?” Rainbow asks, but then notices Fluttershy’s stern glare. She gives a sigh. “Fine, I promise. Now what is up with you and her? You've been acting strange all day.”

I assume it isn't easy for Fluttershy to explain. Where to begin? She starts telling the story of how we met. When she gets to the part where I'm a zombie, Rainbow Dash laughs. But then her laughter dies when she notices Fluttershy doesn't join her.

The look on Fluttershy’s face is deathly serious. There is a long silence between them as Rainbow Dash looks on as if expecting the punchline to come.

“So you mean…”

“Yes.”

Rainbow gives a weak chuckle. “Oh, come on. You can't be seriously thinking…” Fluttershy’s stare silences her.

The truth weighs heavily in the room. The cat’s out of the bag, and Fluttershy and I are left to gauge her reaction. Rainbow Dash stares at me, as if finally acknowledging my presence on the other side of the couch, and I squirm under her scrutiny. In her mind, she's probably trying to associate my current appearance with that of a buried, rotting corpse. It must be hard for her to imagine me as anything else. After all, I'm practically funeral fresh if not for my recent wound.

At last, she lets out a breath. “Why are you keeping it here?” she asks with a surprising amount of calmness. I don't know if she's actually taking the news in stride or if the shock just hasn't hit her yet.

“Why wouldn't I? She has nowhere to go.”

“But it’s… you know, dead,” she says. “Isn't it weird to keep it in your house? She’s all dead and gross! Couldn't you have buried the corpse or something? What would ponies think?”

Her words hurt a little, but there is reason behind that thought. After all, why are ponies buried when they die? Because ponies don't want to make the connection between the thing they're burying and themselves. A depressing reminder like that can't be healthy.

Fluttershy is silent for a long while. There is the steady rise of indignation on her face, like a tea kettle ready to boil. She gives a hard look. “You think that death is just gross and disgusting? How could you say that?”

“Well, she’s… Do I have to spell it out for you, Fluttershy? She’s a zombie! You know, like the ‘eat your brains’ kind of zombies?” she shouts, pointing at me. When her eyes meet Fluttershy’s again, she shrivels.

“Goldie, does NOT eat brains, Rainbow Dash!”

We are both left speechless at the volume she spoke. Who is this mare and where did this newfound boldness come from? Then I realize that she's doing this all for me.

“How do you know that?” Rainbow Dash asks. “What if she’s waiting for you to let your guard down?” Her gaze meets mine, burning holes into my eye sockets. “Then when you're sleeping, she takes a bite out of you!”

Fluttershy matches Rainbow’s stare with her own, except hers hold a whole new level of intensity like that of an exploding star. “Goldie is still a pony as much as you and me!” She glances back at me. “And… And she’s my friend!”

Rainbow Dash breaks the stare and awkwardly rubs a hoof on her shoulder, like a scolded child before a mother’s fury. A lightbulb seems to switch on inside Rainbow Dash’s head, eliciting some kind of panic reaction.

“Oh my gosh! I just realized something!” She tries to get a look at the bandaged wound on her shoulder, pawing at it to get a better look. “What if I turn into a zombie? She's already bitten me!” She’s already pulling herself as far away from me as possible like some kind of disease.

“Calm down. That won't happen,” Fluttershy reassures.

Rainbow Dash flinches at her touch. “How do you know?! My life is over! I'm dead!” She starts bawling.

Fluttershy walks over to her and brushes a wing over her withers. “You won't turn into a zombie. I promise that's not going to happen.”

“You sure?”

Fluttershy glances in my direction, and I shrug. She turns back to Rainbow Dash. “I have a feeling you won't.”

It takes a long time for Rainbow Dash to calm down from her hysteria, even with the gentle reassurances from Fluttershy. After one last sniffle, Rainbow glances in my direction. “I’m worried about leaving you alone with her.”

Giving Rainbow another brush of her wings against her withers, she says, “I've been with her the whole time she was in Ponyville. She just has trouble being around other ponies. That's all.”

Rainbow Dash gives her a look of disbelief. “Fluttershy, she just crawled out of crater and shrugged it off like it was nothing. How are you so calm about this?”

She ponders about this, and I'm also wondering why as well. “No one gets to choose how or when they die, Rainbow. It just happens, and there’s nothing wrong with that at all.” There is a pause. “I wouldn't think any less of you if you were a zombie. Would you think any less of me if I were one?”

I watch Rainbow Dash as she winces at the question, struck by Fluttershy’s words like a buck to her chest. “No, I wouldn't. I’m sorry, Fluttershy.” She turns to me. “Sorry, Goldie.”

I give a small smile. “It… Alright...”

“So what now?” she asks Fluttershy. “Do we tell the others?”

Fluttershy’s eyes meet mine. “We'll tell them eventually. Just… not now.”

“So we're just going to wait until one of them finds out like I did?” She grabs Fluttershy by the shoulders. “Twilight is going to freak out if she hears about this!”

“Why?” I ask. Twilight seemed like a level-headed pony last I met her.

“Trust me when I say that when it comes to finding an explanation to things, she gets a little too excited.”

Not exactly a comforting thought.

“Oh, you're just exaggerating, Rainbow,” Fluttershy says.

Rainbow Dash raises a brow. “Am I?”

“Well…”

“Remember the Smarty Pants incident? Or the Pinkie Sense fiasco?”

Fluttershy’s eyes seem to drift towards a distant memory. “Okay, so she may take things a little too far.”

Rainbow Dash has Fluttershy’s face squished between her hooves. “We have to tell someone about this, Fluttershy. This is big! Not as big as every Equestria-saving adventure we've gone through… But how often do you meet a zombie?”

Fluttershy pulls off the hooves gripping her face and holds them in her own. “Please, Rainbow Dash. You're my closest and oldest friend. You have to keep this a secret.” She gives a pleading look. “Please…”

Rainbow bites her lower lip before letting out a sigh. “Alright, I got it. But only because you're my friend.”

She smiles and nods. “Thank you. After what you've gone through, how about I go make tea now?” She leaves for the kitchen.

It is just us two. Without the sole mediator in the room, we are left in an awkward silence. We sit at opposite ends of the couch.

“Nice weather,” she says.

A grunt is my non-committal reply. I wish Fluttershy would hurry up with the tea. I need her as my groan-to-Equestrian translator. Because right now, we are trapped in a perpetual state of awkwardness.

I want to say something, but I don't know how to continue from that.

What were the first words ever said? What secret meaning did they hold that it was enough to penetrate the wordless silence between ponies?

Rainbow looks in the direction of the kitchen where we can hear Fluttershy humming to herself and the sound of teacups clinking.

Every so often, her eyes focus on me, but when we make eye contact, they find something else to look at. “So Goldie... Even though you're dead, are you still all up here?” she asks, pointing to her head.

I nod. “Most… of the time.”

This answer seems to spark a genuine interest.“Oh? What's it like being a zombie?”

“Not…sure,” I say. How can I explain being stuck on the edge between life and death to someone who has no experience in the latter? If she were to die right now, then maybe I could explain it to her, but I don’t think that’s an option on the table. I struggle to find the words. “Like… dream. Only… not.” It almost feels surreal.

She seems to visibly deflate. “Huh… Was expecting something, I don't know, more.”

I don’t know what she was expecting from me. “What like being…alive?” I retort back.

“You don't remember?”

I circle a hoof in the air. “Sort of. Not clear.” Hazy memories of things come to me as I try to fish it out of the murky depths of subconsciousness. None of it is about me specifically.

She sits down and crosses her hooves. Her face twists into a look of deep thought that I didn’t know she was capable of making. “Well, if being dead to you is like being in a dream, then I guess being alive is like being awake. Because when you're awake, you’re living in the moment. This moment. This place. Us talking. The only way we could’ve gotten here is because we’re alive in some way.” She pauses and then looks at me. “Same with you, if you think about it.”

Funny. Just a while ago, she thought I was dead. But now, she’s saying I’m alive. I find it amusing how easy it is to be categorized as living or dead. But do I fall into the gray intermingling between life and death or am I actually one of the two categories?

“Alive? Me?” I say out loud.

“Sure, why not? Be whatever you want to be. I’m not stopping you.”

My mouth opens slightly as more words start trickling out. “Be…your friend…too?”

“Sure, Goldie,” she says. “We can hang out or watch a Wonderbolts show or something.”

“Friend…” I say, still savoring that word.

Rainbow Dash kicks back against the armrest. “Yep! Any friend of Fluttershy’s is my friend too. If anyone says otherwise, then they’re going to have to answer to me.” She stares at the ceiling.

“That’s nice.” I look towards the kitchen where Fluttershy had gone. “Both of you are.”

Rainbow Dash chuckles. “Yeah… It’s just like her to help someone out.” I can feel her eyes take a glance at me. “You know, when we were little, Fluttershy used to get teased a lot.”

My full attention is on her now.

“These colts from flight camp… They were always bringing her down. They always made fun of her because she wasn't a strong flier.”

I frown. Even while young, foals are still capable of small acts of cruelty. I don’t know why it happens or what it accomplishes. Why would anyone want to make fun of Fluttershy? And why is Rainbow Dash telling me all of this?

She continues. “Want to know why she’s helping you?” Without waiting for a reply, she goes on. “It’s because she knows what it feels like to be helpless. And I get all that because I was like that back then too. The only difference between me and her was that I fought back.”

I watch as she furrows her brows, lost in an old memory. “But she’s too nice to fight back bullies. It’s why everypony seems to walk all over her. One time, I caught the tail end of a conversation between Fluttershy and the jerks from flight camp who were making fun of her. I was going to kick their flanks and make them apologize, but then Fluttershy stopped me. She just smiled and told me to drop it. Can you believe that? It made me so mad when she said that. I mean, who wouldn't?”

Rainbow Dash slowly shakes her head and lets out a slow breath. “Looking back, I guess I kinda owe her for that. Otherwise, I’d have been kicked out of camp on the first day. She’s always like that, looking after me when I should be the one looking out for her.”

I find it difficult to swallow that Fluttershy had to deal with something like this at such a tender age. “That’s… sad.” I start speaking louder with more clarity. “That’s so sad.”

Rainbow Dash shrugs. “It was, but that’s all in the past. You don’t need to worry about that. We’ve both moved on.”

If I met Fluttershy at camp, I’d tell her that she was nice and beautiful and that she had a voice like a bell. I’d tell her how much I cared about her everyday, and then we’d go to the spa and get massages because that’s what friends do.

“Hey, you alright there? You’re starting to freak me out.”

My mind is pulled back to the present. “Fine,” I say. “Just… thinking.”

“Thinking about how you’re going to eat me?” she asks. My eyes widen and my jaw drops as I try to find words to deny that. She laughs at the shock on my face. “Kidding! I’m kidding. If Fluttershy says you don’t eat ponies, then you don’t. So lighten up, will ya?”

I grin awkwardly.

Her laughter subsides, and she grows uncharacteristically quiet. “So anyway,” she mumbles, “I've known Fluttershy for a long time, and I don't think she has once blamed anyone for anything. So don't ever think you're a burden to her, Goldie.”

I give a solemn nod.

She smiles at that, and we come to an understanding as mutual friends. At the bottom of everything, past her brash personality and reckless actions, she is a caring and thoughtful pony.

Rainbow Dash then leans in to whisper something. “Uh, don’t tell Fluttershy I said all this, okay? It's kind of embarrassing saying all this stuff with a reputation like mine.”

I'm already good at staying quiet, but I nod anyway.

“Good. Now what’s taking Fluttershy so long?” she asks.

Rainbow Dash nearly jumps as Fluttershy comes walking into room with a tray holding teacups and cucumber sandwiches on her back. “Tea is ready. Were you two talking about anything interesting?” she asks.

“Nah, nothing much,“ Rainbow nonchalantly replies.

For a second, a grin flashes onto Fluttershy’s face as she hands a teacup to Rainbow Dash. I swear I can almost see a blush on Rainbow Dash’s face as she desperately tries to hide it while sipping her teacup.

“Nothing much,” I say and copy Rainbow Dash.

Fluttershy giggles. “You two look like you're getting along well.”

“Yeah, she's cool,” Rainbow says, but then adds, “but not as cool as me.”

As Fluttershy takes a seat between us and picks up her teacup for a sip, Rainbow Dash pipes up again to keep the conversation going.

“So what do we do about Goldie now? Is it time to find a cure?” she asks, and I watch as a liquid arc sprays out of Fluttershy’s mouth. “You okay there, Fluttershy?”

She coughs behind a hoof. “I'm fine. I'm fine.”

Rainbow Dash’s plan is simple. Step one: find a cure. Step two: cure me. If only curing death was as easy as it sounds. It almost sounds like a joke. But Rainbow Dash says it all without sarcasm. It almost sounds hopeful.

“Do you really think we can help her, Rainbow? What makes you so sure?” Fluttershy asks.

“I don't know. It sounds something like Daring Do would do,” she says, standing up. “I bet there's some ancient artifact that raises the dead or some kind of mummy’s curse keeping her here.”

To be honest, I don't think anything short of a miracle can help me.

“I don't know, Rainbow. Some of those things seem hard to believe. Even if we do find a cure, what's keeping her from just…” Fluttershy falls into a barely audible whisper. “Dying?”

“Nah, that's not going to happen,” she says with unexpected confidence, “not while we’re around.”

For statement meant to inspire confidence, it didn't do much to reassure her. “But where do we start?”

“How about we start with her first?” Rainbow says pointing to me. “Come on, Goldie. Don't you remember anything?”

I close my eyes, going backwards in my memory like a recorded tape. Up until my arrival in Ponyville, I haven't done much. If I hadn't met Fluttershy, I'd probably still be standing in the Everfree or rolling in a patch of flowers like a dumb animal. But now, there are new memories constantly being engraved into my brain and in such vivid detail too. From the moment I stepped into Ponyville to the present, I can trace a solid line of everything that's happened to me.

“Think about the times when you were happy. Your friends. Your family. Your old life.” She moves close beside me. “Imagine you’re back at your home. Remember waking up in your bed and starting your day before going to work. Every morning you’d say hi to your friends and then you’d talk with them and laugh about a funny joke and then you’d make plans for the weekend. But then you’d say you can't because you've got a date with your coltfriend that weekend at some fancy restaurant that had just opened.”

“Oh my…” Fluttershy says.

I'm trying to picture myself in that situation. It feels nice, but none of that feels right. I open my eyes.

Rainbow’s eyes are practically shimmering with hope. “Well?”

I shrug. “Sorry.”

She groans but then her face lights up. “I know! We just need to jog your memory.”

“And just how will you do that?” Fluttershy asks.

Rainbow Dash grins. “By doing things she used to do a long time ago.” She pats me on the back. “Don't worry, Goldie. You'll be remembering tons of stuff by the time I'm done with you.”

I know she's trying to be helpful, but why do her words sound so ominous?

~~~~~~~

“Heads up!”

A ball hits me between the eyes. An almost quiet whimpering comes from the catcher behind me.

“Come on, Goldie!” Rainbow Dash shouts, wearing a baseball cap bearing the logo of some baseball team I don’t remember. “When I said to keep your eye on the ball, I also meant that you should hit it.”

“Maybe we should do something else,” Fluttershy meekly offers.

“I don't know,” Rainbow Dash says. “Anything yet, Goldie?”

I shake my head. The bat in my mouth makes it hard to say anything. We are standing in front of Fluttershy’s yard since Rainbow and I destroyed the fence behind her home. Fluttershy was pretty disappointed about that.

“Wish we hired the Crusaders for this. They’d probably get a dozen things done in an hour.”

“What were you expecting?“ Fluttershy asks.

“I don't know. A reaction? I thought if we did all these things there’d be a small spark, and then all your memories would come flooding back to you.” She takes off her cap and tosses it away into the pile of junk accumulating of the things we’ve done. “C’mon, Goldie! Anything at all?”

“Oh, I don't know, Rainbow. Do you really think baseball would help Goldie remember herself?”

“No, not really. But it’s something, right? Instead of sitting around waiting for something to happen, at least we’re doing something. Maybe we’ve been going at it all wrong.“

My mind begins to wander, and their voices are nothing but a mesmerizing hum in the background, going high to low, low to high, like a crooning old record player.

As they start discussing our next plan of action, something suddenly taps me on the flank and falls to the ground. A glance down reveals only a small rock. Wondering where the rock came from, I’m struck by another small stone square in the face.

Harsh whisperings can be heard by a bush.

As I walk closer, I can hear some young fillies arguing about something.

“Are you sure that's our monster?”

“That's what he said!”

“Would you two be quiet? We don't want to let it hear us.”

Behind the bush are three little fillies, too busy arguing amongst each other to notice me.

I try to greet them, but it comes out in a gravelly voice, caught between speech and a groan. “Hello…”

They turn to me, eyes wide open as if caught with a hoof in a cookie jar. The one with a familiar large ribbon in her mane looks at me with some recognition. I remember her from my memories. She lives on a farm with her brother and sister. They grow apples. She has a very kind granny. I would have eaten a hundred of those tasteless apples if it meant having another chance to talk with her again. It’s one of the first few pleasant moments I've had in Ponyville. Now here she stands before me—young and alive and more than just a part of my memory.

“Hey, I know you!” she says. “You're that pony from before. How’ve you been?”

“Who is she, Apple Bloom?” the pegasus asks.

“Why do you know her?” the unicorn adds.

The filly from before addresses the other two. “Well, I gave her an apple once.” She pauses, trying to think of something interesting to add. “I guess that's about it. What'd you think of it by the way? Pretty good, huh?”

I smile uneasily. It probably looks out of my place on my face. “Yes… It was… Good,” I lie.

“Sorry for botherin’ ya. Y’see, we’re looking for our cutie marks, and we heard there might be a monster on the loose that’s needin’ to be caught. These two are my friends, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle.”

The little pegasus, Scootaloo, is in my face all of a sudden, abandoning any sort of trepidation. “What happened to you anyway? You look like a mummy!”

A glow around Scootaloo’s tail yanks her back, and a unicorn takes her place. “Are you getting ready for Nightmare Night? My sister makes costumes too.”

I hardly get a statement in as they keep on coming with the questions.

“What's your name?”

“What’s your cutie mark?”

“What does it mean?”

The amount of questions, fueled by childlike curiosity, are too much for me to answer. “Please… Slow down…”

Surprisingly, my soft spoken words manage to reach them as they tone it down to a reasonable conversational pace. “Sorry about that,” Apple Bloom says. The other two apologize as well.

“Sorry about throwing the rock too,” Scootaloo adds sheepishly.

“So anyway,” Apple Bloom continues. “If ya ain't a monster, I guess that means we brought all this monster catchin’ stuff for nothing.”

I peer over their shoulders at the seemingly random objects strewn about.

Apple Bloom picks up a net from the pile. “We found this net to snare the varmint with and some bait for the monster—”

“It’s just an apple on a stick,” Sweetie Belle adds.

“—but now I guess we don't need it anymore.”

Scootaloo gives a heavy sigh. “I guess there's no monster hunting cutie marks in it for us.”

For a couple of young fillies, they seem awfully ambitious about catching a monster with the tools they have. It would have been adorable, if not for the fact that I can probably fit their description of a “monster” in their book.

Fluttershy’s voice calls from way behind me. “Goldie? Who are you talking to?”

Apple Bloom holds a hoof to her lips with a soft shush. “Please don't tell. If our sisters catch wind of this, we’d get in so much trouble.”

Pulling my head away from the bushes, I look back to Fluttershy. “Myself…” I say uncomfortably.

I look towards the bush, and the fillies are gone, having hightailed it out of there.

“Come on, Goldie!” Rainbow Dash calls. “There's still one more thing we haven't tried yet.”

A strange sense of dread washes over me, despite my undead condition. I wonder what else Rainbow Dash has come up with to rattle the memories in my head. Hopefully, not another baseball...

~~~~~~~

There is an oak tree in a field, a bit away from the path to town.

It’s quiet. It’s calm. It’s not what I expected from Rainbow Dash.

Said pegasus is pushing some clouds around, making small adjustments to their positions.

Fluttershy leads me to the tree with a wing stretched over my withers. Under the shade of the great oak, where only a few rays of light trickle through the leaves, she makes herself comfortable. I copy her and lie with her.

By the time Rainbow Dash is finished, she glides over to where we are. “You girls ready?”

“Ready…for what?” I ask.

She wraps a hoof around me. “Just a little something I like to call ‘chillaxing.’” She falls onto the soft grass, wiggling into a comfortable place under the tree.

“This is nice,” Fluttershy says, letting out a sigh.

A moment of silence.

I look to Rainbow Dash for more instruction. “What do…I do?” I ask.

“Just chill and relax, Goldie,” Rainbow answers. “Nothing to it.”

My gaze hovers towards Fluttershy and the way she peacefully lies on the grass. Copying her, I close my eyes and allow myself to drop my feeble mind into the dark well of subconsciousness.

The next thing I know, I am surrounded by blue flowers, sitting at an ornate patio table with a tea set ready. Beyond the flowers is a picturesque meadow around me, something you would find in a painting or on a postcard.

The sound of someone clearing their throat catches my attention. The mare sitting across from me smiles, and I can't tear my eyes away because she looks exactly like Fluttershy, down to the way she looks at me with that small grin from when we first met.

“Hello Goldie,” she says.

“Fluttershy?” I ask.

She shakes her head. “Yes and no. I guess I'm kind of the way you see her. Maybe your imagination. Maybe your new conscience. Either way, feel free to keep calling me by that name.”

Am I dreaming? Is my mind making this up?

I wonder. Is there another version of me that walks into Fluttershy’s dream as she does into mine? If it is ever possible to see her in all my dreams, I'd go to sleep forever and never wake up.

“You have to stop this,” she says suddenly.

I stare at her. “Stop what?”

She gives me a hard look, almost looking directly into my soul. “You know what. You're putting her on a pedestal as if she's the goddess of your world. Like a lovesick child, you're making this mare your entire world. I thought you said you were going to try?”

“I am.”

“You're not,” she says with unwavering conviction. “You can't have her holding your hoof everywhere, while you lose yourself in your own thoughts. Right now, more than ever, you need to want this change in yourself. Can't you feel it? It's already happening.”

I'm speechless from all these words that I don't hear too often from Fluttershy, like seeing a side to her I hardly see during the day.

Her gaze softens. “Remember what you said to me? What you said to her? About trying? You have to see this through to the end, Goldie, even if it takes you years to do it.”

“Can you at least tell me who I was?” I ask. “What point is there in a future when I don't even know my past? I'm hardly getting by in the present as I am now.”

Her lips tighten.

“You're better off not knowing. The old you kind of went out darkly, long before all of this even happened. Well, maybe not as dark as it could've gone. After all, you're still here. Oh, I shouldn't be telling you this,” she says the last part embarrassingly. “Besides, you finally got a new start.”

“New start? You call being dead a new start? I'm tired of the constant moaning and the painless existence. I just want a cure.”

She takes a sip of her tea. “What point is there in a cure if it can't fix the gnarled roots of your existence?” she asks me. “How will you cure the affliction that runs so deep in your enigmatic past?”

“I don't know!” I shout and the meadow changes into the dark forest of the Everfree. I let out a slow shuddered breath. “All I can do is try. Trying is only the beginning, I know, but maybe my efforts will yield something meaningful and beautiful. Maybe in trying, I'll rediscover myself and make peace with my past, whatever it may be.”

“You're getting closer, Goldie,” she says, “but you need to think about where you want to go with this. After all, that's why I'm here: to help you see this through and become something altogether new.” She aims that smile of hers at me.

I try to look away. “But what if I fail? What happens to me then? What if…”

She is suddenly by my side and holding me like a mother over a crying child. “Enough of that talk,” she says. “You’ve made it this far. You'll make it to the end.”

Her hoof brushes against my withers. “Tell me,” I say, speaking barely above a whisper. “Is this what the old me would have wanted?”

She is silent for a moment. “Probably.”

I lean into her, melting into her embrace. “Thank you,” I whisper.

“Don't tell me. Tell her, the one who's sleeping outside, dreaming of cute kittens and adorable puppy dogs.”

The scenery begins to fade until there is nothing but us and a field of wild blue flowers.

“Fluttershy…?”

“Yes, Goldie?” she asks.

“I'm sorry I couldn't be there for you when you were young,” I say. “But now you don't have to face your problems alone. You have me and Rainbow Dash and all your other friends who care about you.”

She smiles. “Thanks. That means a lot to me.” She breaks away from me to look me in the eyes. “Remember what I said, Goldie. You still have to do your part in all this.” Then there’s a new look on her face that I haven’t seen before. That faint anticipation of things to come, unknown and unavoidable.

In an instant, the dream is over like a popped bubble and awareness rushes to me.

I am greeted by the sight of both Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy, the real one, staring worriedly at me. I stare back at them and at the sky that is growing darker.

“Um, did you have a nice nap, Goldie?” Fluttershy asks.

My eyes don't leave her, and I nod slowly, a little confused. I don't know when was the last time I ever slept or even had a dream. It’s left me disoriented.

“Did you know you mumble in your sleep?” Rainbow asks with a smirk.

“How long?” I ask.

“Honestly,” she says, “not that long. Not as long as my usual naps anyway. But what was that about? I think I heard you say the word ‘enigmatic’ at one point.”

I move to sit up. There’s grass and dried burrs stuck in my mane. My mouth closes shut, only for me to spit out the strands of my mane that got caught in my mouth.

“Off in your own little world again, Goldie?” Fluttershy asks.

I nod and stare. My eyes linger on her for a bit longer than I should have.

“What’s the matter?” she asks.

My eyes meet hers. “Than—” The rest of the syllables halt abruptly.

She tilts her head. “Hmm?”

I shake my head, averting my eyes. “Nothing.” When she turns around to talk to Rainbow Dash, I whisper to myself in a quiet voice, “Thank you.”

As we start making our way back to Fluttershy’s place, Rainbow Dash is flying beside me and Fluttershy, going off on one of her plans. “So I guess everything we did was a waste of time.” Rainbow sighs. “Maybe there’s something in Daring Do that’ll help us.”

“I wouldn’t say that today was a complete waste of time,” Fluttershy says. “With you, Goldie has one more friend now. Isn’t that great, Goldie?”

I shrug.

Rainbow is in my face. “Aw c’mon, Goldie. What was that? You should be excited to have an awesome pony like me as a friend.”

“Yay…” I groan.

“Was that sarcasm?”

I allow a smirk to creep to my face. “No… Me? Sarcasm?”

“Okay, that was definitely sarcasm! Don't you get smart with me now,” she says, prodding me in the chest. “I get enough of that from Rarity.”

Beside us, Fluttershy giggles. Walking down the trodden path back home, I can't help but sneak glances at Fluttershy and hear those words: “become something new.”

What did she mean by that? I don't know what I'll become, but I hope that when the time comes and it finally happens, nothing changes between me and these ponies.

Home

I've always wondered if I was ever an art critic in my past life.

My eyes are focused on the piece of paper in front of me, as I tilt my head left and right trying to make sense of what I'm looking at. It’s drawn in crayon. It is a picture of a pony with soulless eyes and crooked teeth covered in red stains. Its mane is a nest of messy blonde hair. Jagged scars line its body. It’s ugly. It’s terrifying. It’s unsightly.

It’s me—Goldie, the zombie.

This is a wanted poster.

I am standing in front of town hall in front of a bulletin board. Most ponies would put up flyers for job postings, services, or lost pets. But right in the middle of clusters of papers is a crayon-drawn wanted poster that must have been done by a child. There’s even a reward below it: five bits and a half eaten sapphire by the looks of it. I wonder why the reward was drawn too.

My tail flicks back and forth. I know I should be offended, but I can't bring myself to hate whoever put this up. I have a feeling I know who drew this. Am I mad? No, not really. I guess I'm just disappointed, not in the artist but in myself. It’s hard being normal.

Maybe I should just turn myself in.

“Goldie,” Fluttershy calls at a distance away. “Sweet Apple Acres is this way.”

My eyes linger on the unflattering portrait before I follow her.

We are out and about today to help Applejack, the pony with the apple cutie mark and the hat. Rainbow Dash is busy today, having to work with the weather ponies. Despite how fast she can move and kick clouds, she is constantly being called into work, though I figure it’s because of her tendency to sleep on the job. I've seen her napping on a cloud in the middle of the day. Colorful streaks of rainbow in the sky aren't exactly subtle.

But back to the matter at hoof. Applejack also happens to have a dog that needs to be checked on, which Fluttershy has volunteered to do. We make it as far as the entrance to the farm’s property before we stop. My hooves hesitate to go further. I've been to this place before, but never actually in it. It's where I first met the little filly. But this time, I'm going to be walking in as a guest, and unfortunately, I don't know a thing about being a good guest. What if they start asking me questions? Is it a faux pas not being able to answer?

Fluttershy nudges me on. “It’s okay,” she says. “You remember Applejack, right? She’s nice and so is the rest of her family.”

I stare at her, feeling like a shy child, and nod.

“Heya Fluttershy!” a loud voice calls from afar.

The orange mare trots up to us from the apple orchard. She’s covered in a fresh coat of sweat and dirt, no doubt from working hard in the fields. She gives off a sort of down-home vibe one would normally find in a cowpony.

“Hope ya don't mind with the way I look. Just got done with harvestin’.” Her eyes drifts towards me. A little surprised at first, she smiles. “Oh. And you brought Goldie, too. How’ve you been?”

I go with something simple—a shrug and a grin. Simple without the need for words or the complications of elaboration.

She gives me a hearty clap on the back, still as exuberant as the day we first met. “Well, it’s nice to see ya around!” She turns to Fluttershy. “Winona’s in the barn. Ever since that skunk sprayed her, she’s been stinkin’ worse than Big Mac after a night of beans.”

“Oh my, I'll see what I can do,” Fluttershy says.

Applejack takes us to the barn, and upon opening the door, a little brown dog leaps out and rushes towards us. The smell must have been terrible by the way both Applejack and Fluttershy are holding their noses, but it doesn’t affect me much. It stops every few paces to rub its body against the dirt to rid itself of the acrid stench.

Then it notices me, and I freeze. Can it smell the decomposition under the flowery soaps and shampoo? I hope not. Do you know how long it takes to change these bandages? I don't need another bath.

The dog runs up to me, sniffs my leg, and starts gnawing on it.

“Winona, no!” Applejack rushes to my side to pull Winona off. “Bad dog! No biting now, ya hear me?”

At hearing her master’s voice, the dog tucks her tail and whimpers, looking duly chastised.

“Sorry about that,” she apologizes. “She’s usually behaved around most ponies.”

Fluttershy is suddenly by my side to inspect my chewed leg. “Are you okay? You're not hurt, are you?” she asks.

I have had way worse injuries in the past, and it doesn't look like the dog broke the skin. “I'm…fine,” I tell her. “Honest.”

Fluttershy looks at me and then at Winona, who is now being put on a leash by Applejack. The cowpony is trying not to tear up from the smell as she hooks the leash on. “Maybe you should wait out here,” Fluttershy says.

It’s probably sound advice. I nod slowly as they take the dog back inside.

There isn't much for me to do on the farm. I guess I can amble aimlessly, but what would be the point? It wouldn't be any different from what I was doing back in the Everfree. Is there something I'm supposed to be doing? If there is, I just don’t know. It’s hard to become something new by some vague instructions coming from a pony in my head.

One of the first things I notice is an old mare sitting on the back porch in a rocking chair. She’s the kind, old mare Apple Bloom spoke of, the one I have to thank for giving me the apple on my first visit to Ponyville. Time has wrinkled her face and whitened her hair, but it hasn’t dulled her bright eyes as she gives me a friendly look.

“Howdy there, stranger! Are ya here fer Applejack? Or maybe fer Big Mac? Bout time that colt meets a cute mare.”

I shake my head, trying to force eye contact. “Just…Applejack.”

“Course you are! I'm only kidding. Name’s Granny Smith, but you can call me Granny!” the old mare says. I think it’s strange calling someone Granny when she isn't even my grandmother, but at the same time, it makes me feel a little less lonely. It's like I have a family again. For a mare of her age, she still acts with a spring in her step, undeterred by the passing of time. “Don’t suppose you can help me up? This rickety ol’ hip ain’t what it used to be.”

Well, mostly undeterred.

I pull her outstretched hoof and help her onto her hooves. Her legs wobble, but they manage to stand as she walks inside. I walk by her side for her to lean on me for support.

“Thank ya kindly. You're such a nice mare. What was your name again?’

“Goldie…” I say.

“Well, that’s a nice name,” she says. “You remind me a lot of my daughter. Don’t suppose you got any Apple family kin, do you?”

I give an uncertain shrug. While entirely in the realm of possibility, I doubt I’m related.

We make it to the kitchen, and she starts pulling out pie tins, bowls, and other various kitchen utensils. “Dearie, can you get me that jar up there?” She points at a glass jar on the highest shelf.

Even with my help, it seems out of my reach. Looking around, I spot a stepping stool and pull it below the shelf. Standing on two legs on the stool, a feat that would have been near impossible for me if not for the table’s leverage, I stretch a hoof towards the container, but it still comes up short. The jar seems ridiculously out of reach, especially for the old mare. In terms of motor control and flexibility, I'm not much better than she is.

“Just a little higher,” she says.

Hot air escapes my nostrils as I’m practically climbing the table to reach it. My hooves bump against the glass, and I'm trying desperately not to push it further in. My hoof lightly bats the jar closer to me.

Clink! Clink!

It goes teetering over the edge and drops into my hooves as they juggle the jar, trying to find a good grip. Being an earth pony, I wish I was a unicorn instead. Hooves are not meant for holding delicate objects.

My back hits the floor while I'm still clutching the jar to my chest. The glass is filled with some kind of rainbow mush.

The old mare takes the jar and sets it on the table. “Mighty thanks for helping me get that. You've been such a nice filly. I know just the thing to reward ya.” She rummages in a drawer for a wooden spoon and scoops out a large portion of that rainbow stuff. The colors seem to swirl in my eyes.

I open my mouth to decline. “Uh…”

A spoon is forcefully shoved in my mouth, halting whatever response I can come up with. A choked sound escapes my mouth. The spoon comes out with a pop as Granny smiles warmly. “It’s the first batch of zap apple jam. What do ya think?”

I nod slowly, trying to swallow it down with difficulty. It’s like having cotton mouth that doesn't go away. There's a dull tingling of flavor that may pack a punch to normal ponies, but to me, my mouth is numb to the senses for the most part. I give a polite smile, my teeth looking like they've been smeared by a rainbow.

There is the ring of a cooking timer. She starts pulling a tray of hot pastries out of the oven. “Good! Don’t be shy, have some more!”

I don't know how much time has passed as the next moment is filled with apple pies, apple fritters, apple pickles, and so on. Just a whirlwind of apple-based foods. If I ever have to eat another apple, it will be the death of me for sure. Walking out of that house feeling about ten pounds heavier, I flee towards the fields.

Straight rows of dug up soil line one of the fields. A lone plow sits in the middle of one of the unfinished rows. Walking circles around the farming tool, I give it a little kick and nudge. It barely budges.

A shadow falls over me. “Can I help you?”

My head turns to the voice, and I am met by a hulking red stallion.

“Shouldn’t be playing with the tools,” he says.

I shrivel slightly under his gaze. He straps himself with the harnesses attached to the plow. The harnesses grow taut as he pulls it along with the plow, the metal blade digging into the earth. The soils gives away easily to the pull of his tool.

While he works, I follow closely by him, examining the plow, the dirt, and of course the stallion himself.

He wears a large collar around his neck. There is a sprig of wheat in his mouth. His eyes are like Applejack’s. Same goes for the freckles that dust his face like hay seeds. A breeze blows through his mane like wind in a wheat field. His eyes takes quick glances at me when his cutie mark falls under my scrutiny. I can see the muscles working underneath his skin.

Up close, he is very big, muscles developed from working on a farm. Built like a bulldozer but quieter than a mouse. A gentle giant, he is. It's very hard not to stare at him.

This is a living, breathing stallion. Big, strong, and quiet. And also sweaty. He’s a hardworking pony who takes his work seriously. I can tell. It's in the eyes.

Walking side-by-side, we are almost touching each other. You'd have to get a book to fit something between us. Like a repelling magnet, he distances himself from me, causing a crooked line in the field. He looks uncomfortable. But then I remember: I'm a mare. He's a stallion. When a stallion catches a mare staring at him, it usually means there's an attraction. I haven't thought about love in a long time. That thing that made hearts go pitter patter. There were ups and downs and unexpected turns, just one big emotional rollercoaster. But it's not for me. Not right now at least.

Noticing his discomfort, I take that as my cue to back off and hold my curiosity. Have I ever met another stallion like him in my past life? I honestly can’t recall.

He clears his throat to catch my attention. “Been staring an awful lot,” he says.

I stare into his face before glancing at the plow instead. I hope he doesn't pick up on my embarrassment.

He shifts the weight of the harness, looking a tad more uncomfortable. “Do you want to try pulling it?”

My attention whips back to the stallion, surprising him, and I nod. I've wanted to try it since I saw it.

He stops to unhook himself from the simple contraption. I stand in front of the plow while he works on getting the harnesses on.

“You going to be fine with all those bandages?” he asks me.

I nod.

There is a little resistance at first, but once I start moving, it comes easily to me. I don't know why, but I love the feeling of loamy soil beneath my hooves. It feels nice. There's something comforting about it. Unlike what I did to him, the stallion chooses not to stare at me and only gives an occasional glance. Sometimes, he bumps me when I veer off and corrects my path.

“Eeyup,” he says to the silence.

I glance at him. “Eeyup,” I say back, earning a raised brow from him.

We eventually get used to each other, going up and down the rows, working methodically. His face seems to relax compared to the initial wariness held upon meeting a stranger. Even though it’s work, I feel good about it. Despite my lethargic movements from before, my legs are moving at a reasonable pace, like shaking the cobwebs out of dusty machinery. Eventually, he forces me to stop and unhooks me from the plow.

“Thanks for the help,” he says.

We’re done.

He gives me a thoughtful look, as if he's still trying to figure me out, and then shifts the wheat in his mouth before spitting it out. He holds a hoof out. “Big Macintosh.”

I just look at it for a very long time before hesitantly bumping it with a hoof. “Goldie.” I lick my dry lips. “It was…fun.”

Up until this point, I think that was the longest, wordless conversation I ever had with a pony. You don't need words to have a conversation, but it makes it a lot more interesting.

I don't know what to say at this point, and as if picking up on my awkwardness, he starts trotting away. “Gotta finish something in the barn. I'll see ya around,” he says that last part warmly.

I nod, even though his back is turned. “Can…” I begin. “Can I visit…again?”

He gives a glance over his shoulder and nods. “Eeyup.”

I feel relieved at hearing there was going to be a next time. Making my way back, I stop by the barn and peek inside. There is a tub in the center filled with soap and various bottles of liquid in hoof’s reach of the two mares trying to hold down the excited dog.

“Winona, would ya sit still for a sec? Fluttershy, can you reapply the shampoo?” Applejack asks.

When Fluttershy finally notices me, she smiles sheepishly. “Just a little while longer, Goldie.”

The dog also takes notice of me and bolts out of the tub, still sopping wet and sudsy. I close the door quickly and hear the scratches of claws on the wooden door, as well as the voice of an irate owner.

There is some comfort to having a leisurely stroll at Sweet Apple Acres than the Everfree Forest. No monsters for one. Also there aren’t any prickly thorn bushes or large shrubbery to get in my way. Being out here, I can think.

Among the dense forest of apple trees, one in particular stands out. A large treehouse is nestled in it, probably belonging to the little farm filly, Apple Bloom. It looks almost like a children’s playhouse, but bigger and more impressive. There’s even curtains and a flower garden by the window.

My hooves trot up the ramp leading inside. I know I really shouldn’t, but I can't help my curiosity. Sunlight brightens the empty room through the windows and doorway. The floor creaks under my weight.

There are drawings and posters taped along the walls and dolls and toys messily stuffed in a chest. A little tea set sits on the table, used for make-believe teatime with royal imaginary guests. Everything that made up childhood, condensed into one small room—so young, so innocent.

I am in awe of everything, though I suppose it has more to do with a lack of memory than childhood nostalgia. Yes, I know kids do these things, but I wish I knew what I was doing when I was younger. Maybe read a book or play with a favorite doll. Maybe if I had met a younger Fluttershy, we’d have played together. Wouldn't that be nice?

But I don't have those memories, just the ones I have now. I am just suddenly here. Dropped in the middle of the present. No past, no memory, no pony to tell me who I am. There is no recollection of the sugary dream of growing up in childhood or the nightmarish complications of adolescence.

There is a map on the wall on the far side of the room. A massive forest covers most of the map. Only a few landmarks are familiar. The small town of Ponyville and the Everfree Forest that borders closely by it. A red circle is drawn in the forest around a familiar looking hut. Why does a filly have a map of the Everfree Forest?

The door to the room opens with a little filly standing outside it.

“Oh. Uh, hi?” she greets.

I stand stock still. I look like a trespasser. Actually, I am trespassing, but it’s not like there was a sign I couldn't be here. This probably looks bad. What if she tells on me? What if she gets an angry mob? My face is already posted in front of town hall. One small spark can set my future on fire.

But instead of all of that, she says, “It’s you.” She holds a hoof to her chin. “Goldie, right? That's what Fluttershy called you.”

I nod slowly.

“What are ya doing in my clubhouse?”

I fumble for words. “Sight…seeing.”

She raises a brow. “Right… Well, this is the Cutie Mark Crusaders’ headquarters. It's where me and my friends work on getting our cutie marks.”

I glance at her markless flank.

“We’re still working in it,” she says, noticing my gaze. Her eyes drift away from mine and wanders to my left side. “You know, I never did get a good look at your cutie mark. How’d you get yours anyway?”

I turn to my flank, staring at my cutie mark as if it’s the first time seeing it. My favorite flower sits on my rear end. “I… I don’t…”

“Hey, that’s poison joke!” she suddenly says. “Wow, I wonder what you had to do to get a cutie mark like that.”

“Poison… Joke?”

“Yeah! Applejack and her friends stepped on some a while back, and it did all sorts of crazy things to them.” She circles around me, scrutinizing my cutie mark in every angle and lighting. “I'm surprised you don't know what poison joke is.”

I shake my head.

“So, how‘d did you get your cutie mark?”

“Don’t know.”

“Really? You don't remember at all?”

I shrug. The cutie mark on my flank is about as familiar as a stranger you’d meet on the train. I wouldn't remember it at all unless someone pointed it out. It’s just there, silently judging me.

Here is a question for those who already have their cutie marks: what’s in a cutie mark and why are we so driven to find out what it is? Since birth, we ponies strive to get our marks without so much as a thought on the introspective truth. But none of that matters as long as we have a place among our cutie marked peers.

Apple Bloom tosses her saddlebags onto the table. “Well, whatever. At least you got yours. Me and my friends still gotta get ours.” She grows a little sullen.

These fillies are at that age where cutie marks have consumed their thoughts. It must be tough not knowing your calling in life. Even children have their own problems.

“You’d think that with everypony getting their cutie marks there’s gotta be a reason for being here.” Her face hardens. “Every lock’s gotta have a key, and every jigsaw piece has gotta be part of a bigger picture. Everybody’s gotta have a purpose for ending up where they are. So why can't I find my cutie mark?”

She lets out a heavy sigh, burying her face in her hooves, and grows quiet, and for a moment, I'm concerned when she hasn’t said anything for a while. But then she says, “Sorry for ramblin’. I'm only just thinkin’.”

“What are you…thinking about…now?"

She looks at me and gives a small smile. “Why am I talking to some strange mare in my clubhouse?” She giggles. “But now, I'm just thinking why it’s so easy to talk to you. You just sit there and listen. I can hardly tell what you're thinking.”

My expression hardly changes. “Need…other ponies…to talk,” I say. “Otherwise…go crazy.”

“Then Big Mac would’ve gone crazy a long time ago,” she says, laughing some more.

I shake my head. “No… He talks,” I say softly. “More than words…can say.”

She tilts her head questionly. “Y’know, Goldie, you're pretty strange,” she says. “But that ain’t a bad thing. Just different.” She beams at me. “Granny says that it takes different kinds of ponies to make the world.”

I can see this filly will grow up as a bright young mare, especially being raised by a family like hers. With a wise grandmother, a hardworking brother, and a loving sister, she will turn out just fine.

But I can't match her smile.

Life is already hard enough without constantly being reminded that I don't have a family. I know I had to come from somewhere, I do. But if I have any living relatives, then why hasn't anyone come looking for me? They had to have. No letters, no visits, no word from the mare I used to be. But what if—and this possibility has come up before—no one cared about me. They could be living their lives as usual, not knowing the mare they’ve known was rotting in a ditch. To become forgotten like the millions of other ponies who are buried beneath the earth, like defective apple seeds that will never grow and never bear fruit. I’d weep for that mare if I could.

Her face twists into a look of confusion as my hoof gently pats her head.

I pull my hoof back. “I should go now.”

“I'll come with ya,” she says, following me out the door. It's nice to know she's not put off by my appearance or my dreary disposition.

As we walk, she talks about her friends and their cutie mark crusade. It's a one-sided conversation, but I don't mind. Soon enough, we reach the barn where Winona was being washed. The barn door is open, and Fluttershy is the first pony to notice me.

Most of her is soaked. Through her dripping mane, she smiles nonetheless. “We’re just about finished,” she says to me, wringing her hair. She turns to Applejack. “Most of the smell is gone. Just give her a few normal baths and keep her away from any skunks.”

Apple Bloom runs up to Winona and Applejack. “Sure’s a lot better than before,” she says, giving a cautious sniff.

Like Fluttershy, Applejack is also soaked. There's not a dry spot on her hat. “Thanks for the help, Fluttershy.” Applejack turns to the dog that's been bathed and dried. “You hear that, Winona? No more chasin’ skunks from now on.”

The dog only lets out a happy bark.

But then it notices me and starts sprinting, only for the leash to keep it from going any further. Applejack hardly struggles. “Sheesh, what's the matter with you? Do ya need to go on another walk?”

“Um, we’ll just be going now,” Fluttershy says as we hurriedly leave.

“Thanks again, Fluttershy. And it was nice seeing you again, Goldie.”

“Bye Goldie!” Apple Bloom shouts as she waves goodbye. “Come back soon!”

I glance at her as we leave. “I will.”

We hear the distant barks of the dog as we leave. Fluttershy and I make it to the entrance of Sweet Apple Acres before she starts a conversation.

“So Goldie,” she begins, “did do you do anything interesting while we were busy?”

I shrug.

“Oh… Any interesting thoughts?”

I pause to think. “No apples…for dinner.”

She laughs, and I find it very therapeutic listening to her.

Maybe this is what she wanted. Maybe that shapeless identity of mine needs the catalyst of other ponies to define itself. I am distantly aware of the embryonic personality that lies within my fleshy outer shell—that fragile pink zygote that still has a ways to grow. It’s there, but it's underdeveloped.

“The Apple family was nice, right?” Fluttershy asks hopefully.

“Yes…” I say. “They were nice.”

She nods while grinning. “That's good to hear.”

My mind drifts towards Applejack’s family and then toward my own. A somber thought pops into my head.

Somewhere out there, there is a home and a family with a gaping hole shaped like me, and sometimes I wonder if there really is someone looking for me. They'll be calling my name and waiting for an answer. But, no one will ever answer because I've forgotten my own name, and they'll keep on waiting for the pony that’s long gone.

But being me is not all so bad.

I found something special in an unlikely place. From the mare who took care of me to the ponies who treated me kindly, they are fortunate to know the feeling of having a family. I watch as their roots take hold of mine and my dead branches grafts onto theirs. I've become a part of something, though not exactly a family but something close to one, and I've never felt more fortunate.

“Goldie?” Fluttershy asks once again.

“Yes, Fluttershy?” I answer.

A feathered wing falls on my shoulder. “Let's go home.”

Walking side-by-side with a damp pegasus, I go over an old mantra in my head and add a few changes: Apple Bloom has two older siblings, named Applejack and Big Macintosh, who grow apples on a farm called Sweet Apple Acres. Together, they live with their sweet old Granny and their little brown dog.

The memory of all these ponies is more vivid now, and I will try very hard to never forget them.

Author's Note

This chapter was a lot more difficult to write than I thought. I'd much rather prefer to finish the next one. Also took some time off from writing to do editing work and other stuff.

Broken

Passing towns. Fleeting scenery. My eyes stare back at me in the reflection of the window. Where am I going? To what parts of the world am I accelerating towards? I’m changing, but into what? I have a feeling the answer to my questions lie with the ponies I’m traveling with.

“We’re almost there, Goldie,” Rainbow Dash says.

My eyes leave the window for only a moment before going back to gazing outside.

“Come on! Be excited!” she says, nudging my shoulder. “This is a Wonderbolts show, not a funeral. Do you know what I went through to get these tickets? I worked my butt off!”

“I’m sure she’s just anxious,” Fluttershy says. “I would be too if this was my first time going.” Today, she brought a coin purse that she can wear around her neck without the cumbersome weight of her usual saddlebags. Even Rainbow Dash has her own Wonderbolt themed bags for such an occasion.

A blue face joins me by the window. “That’s our hometown—Cloudsdale. Up there.” She points to the floating cumulus city afar. Then her hoof points lower where a town resides on the ground under the city’s shadow. “We’ll be heading towards Lower Cloudsdale.”

I stare at the city and then frown. It’s one thing to have a city in the sky. But having a city beneath it? Isn't it kind of dangerous if a pegasus drops something from the sky? I can only hope no one is keeping a piano in their cloud home.

Noticing my look, Rainbow Dash gives me a nudge. “You didn’t think Cloudsdale was just made of pegasi, did you?” She laughs.

The whistle blows and the train lurches to a stop.

When we get off, there is a bustling crowd at the station. There are ponies entering and leaving, and I am overwhelmed by the sheer number. More ponies than I've seen at Ponyville’s train station.

“I guess a lot of ponies are here for the show,” Fluttershy says, pointing out a passing group of ponies wearing blue and yellow facepaint.

Among the crowd of ponies coming today, I move cautiously, shoulders hunched and eyes on the ground to avoid drawing attention. I stick close to my living tour guides as we walk through the crowds of ponies.

Every now and then, Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash would reminisce and talk about an old memory of their hometown. Eating at a corner cafe. Shopping at a local market. Living on the clouds above us where all their friends and family are. Watching them make different faces and emotions while they bask in childhood nostalgia has me feeling left out. What do I have to do to be like them?

A bump to my flank brings my attention to Rainbow Dash. “Stick close to us, Goldie. We don't wanna lose you.”

I nod, and my legs pick up the pace. Fastest pegasus or not, she could at least slow down for me.

We stop in front of a stadium, the tallest structure in the city, not counting the ones in the sky.

“Welcome to LC’s stadium! It's one of the biggest stadiums in Equestria that allows both pegasi and non-pegasi,” Rainbow says to me.

It is very large. I'm pretty sure you can fit Ponyville in this place, not counting the apple orchards of course. The best part about it is that I don't need wings to get in or worry about falling through any cloud floors.

“Come on! I want to look around before the show starts,” Rainbow says, taking the lead in front of me and Fluttershy.

There's posters of the stunt fliers on hanging banners. Their faces are everywhere, even on the merchandise. Lots of families are here, parents and foals enjoying themselves.

“My dad took me here as a kid whenever the Wonderbolts were performing, and I've watched all their shows,” Rainbow Dash says proudly.

“Sometimes, she and her dad would take me too,” Fluttershy tells me and then smiles. “Of course, they had to convince my parents to let me go.”

“And it wasn’t easy either!” Rainbow Dash adds. She shifts her tone to something higher and softer. “‘Please have Fluttershy home by sundown and make sure she doesn't drink any soda too fast, otherwise she gets gassy.’ Right, Fluttershy?”

Said pegasus is now looking like a ripe tomato. “Right…” she mumbles. “Mom said that…”

I think it's rather adorable Fluttershy’s mother cares about her so much.

We stop by the gift shop and look around. While checking out a pair of goggles, Rainbow asks me, “Want a souvenir, Goldie? I'm buying.”

I shake my head, choosing to stand in the middle of store and watch.

A blue hoof around my shoulder leads me to shelf of Wonderbolt apparel. “Aw, at least get something. These are the Wonderbolts.”

Internally rolling my eyes, I pick a blue cap from the shelf with a Wonderbolt insignia branded on the front.

“That's all?” she asks.

I nod.

While Rainbow pays, I put on my new hat, squashing my long golden mane under it. My bangs block my vision, and it takes some adjustment to get my mane right. I stop by a display mirror to see the new look.

“Well, that looks nice, Goldie,” Fluttershy says, coming up next to me in my reflection.

The corners of my lips twitch slightly. “Thanks.”

“I say we check out the food court and then—”

An approaching set of heavy hoofsteps alert us to a group of grown stallions. They're all pegasi, maybe as big as Big Macintosh, except they don't have any of his gentle features. The unpleasant sneer isn't doing them any favors either.

“Well, if it isn't Rainbow Crash,” the stallion with the basketball cutie mark says.

A grimace forms on Rainbow’s face, a complete opposite from her earlier mood. “Ugh, not them. Not here of all places,” she groans under her breath. “What do you want, Hoops?”

He puts a hoof around her shoulders and gives an uncomfortable squeeze. “Can't some old flight camp buddies say hi to their pals?”

She bats his hoof away. “We’re not buddies, and we're not pals.”

“Fair enough. I see you also brought Klutzershy.” I watch as Fluttershy shrivels under the attention.

My body moves on its own as I step between her and them, feeling terrified on the inside.

“And who is this? Another one of your lame-o friends?” He takes one glance at me and nudges one of his buddies. I can feel their probing eyes on me.

They make a casual saunter towards me, but they may as well have been sharks circling their new prey as they surround me. “What’s with the bandages, toots? Run into Rainbow Crash too many times?”

“Her name is Goldie!” Rainbow shouts.

“Goldie, huh?” He lays a hoof across my withers and gives me a grin. “How about you ditch those two and we show you how to have a good time?”

I watch from the corner of my eyes as Rainbow Dash gives an angry snort, looking ready to charge in and knock this stallion’s lights out. But the blow never comes. A yellow hoof touches her shoulder, keeping her in place.

Fluttershy steps next to me. There is a new look on her face, a hint of confidence and courage among the usual gentle timidness.

“Um, could you please leave her alone?” she asks.

“Or you'll what?” They lock gazes, and for a moment, the stallion looks nervous, almost petrified by her stare. But the effect vanishes when her eyes drift away and hides behind the safety of her mane. The stallion returns to his smug expression. “That's what I thought. Let’s go, boys.”

The trio leaves, off to other parts of the stadium and leaving behind a fuming Rainbow Dash.

She flies up to Fluttershy. “Why’d you stop me?!” she shouts.

“I didn't want you to miss the show. It would have been a problem if you got kicked out for starting a fight.” Fluttershy moves the strand of mane covering her face. “Besides,” she says, “I’d like to solve things peacefully if possible.”

Rainbow lets out a frustrated groan before giving a heavy sigh. “Fine. Whatever. But next time, if it does happen again, I'm not going to just sit and watch. We’re Flight Camp buddies. That means we stick together. Got it?”

Fluttershy nods, and a small grin comes out from hiding. “Of course.”

“Alright. You coming, Goldie?”

I give one more glance in the direction of those stallions, trying to make sense of a strange new feeling in me, before absently nodding.

When we enter the show area, we hear the roar of crowds. Hundreds of ponies all coming to watch the performance. Our seats are in the front at the bottom of the stairs where we can see everything—just perks of being friends with a Wonderbolts fan.

“Carrot dog here! Get your carrot dogs !” a vendor shouts.

“Oh! Right here!” Rainbow Dash shouts back. “Hang tight, I'll get us something to eat.” She walks over to vendor and comes back with three carrot dogs.

Fluttershy takes one, but when she offers another to me, I decline.

“Not…hungry,” I say.

“You sure?” Rainbow asks. I nod. “Well, alright. More for me then.”

A voice is projected from the speakers, a stallion speaking some garbled words that are incomprehensible by the static and the noise of the crowd.

Rainbow Dash sits with barely contained excitement. “It’s about to about to start!” She’s practically bouncing in her seat.

Finally, we hear another roar coming from above and getting louder and closer. A trail of smoke appears in the sky behind a group of pegasi, all donning a blue suit. Flying in a uniform line, they circle above the stadium of cheering ponies. So, these are the Wonderbolts. They head towards the center and split off to the edge of the stadium, rolling into loops and then spinning as they climb. Hundreds of ponies throw their hooves in the air, trying to catch the tailwind.

In all of this Rainbow Dash shouts out the names of the maneuvers—stall turn, tailslide, Aileron roll. She's sitting on the edge of her seat as she cheers on the flyers. “Whoo hoo! Yeah, Spitfire! Go Wonderbolts!”

The Wonderbolts speed towards the center again, and just when it looked like they were going to collide with each other, they all pull up at the same time. Electricity arcs in their contrails until finally bursting into a massive fireball behind them as they reach their peak and split off, creating a fiery red flower to light the sky.

In that single moment, my eyes are not on the show. They're on the mare watching the show.

Caught between watching the show and blinking, Fluttershy’s face takes on a look of pure joy—eyes closed, like a little filly feeling the sun on her face for the first time after spending years of hiding in the safety of her room. Her face lights up like fireworks. From where we sit, we can feel the heat on our cheeks.

I wish everything can stay frozen like this. I’d keep this part of my memory locked and shut in my heart for my eyes only.

You and I know things can't stay this way. When the time comes, can you say it, Goldie? Can you say goodbye?

The mood is ruined by the voice in my head, and my heart is heavy like a lead weight in my chest cavity. I don't want to say goodbye. Why can't things just stay?

Everyone’s cheers reach screaming volumes as they stand up and cheer and stomp their hooves, while my ears are ringing as I ignore the voice in my head.

“Wasn’t that just awesome?!” Rainbow asks me. “Did you see the way they came close to hitting each other? It was like whoosh and then boom! But then…”

I nod and smile forcefully as Rainbow Dash delves deeper into her descriptive retelling of the past few minutes. To be honest, my mind isn't there right now. I'm still trying to work out some future anxieties and the possibility of psychosis added on to my list of growing concerns.

At some point, Rainbow Dash must have finished her narrative of the performance because she's now asking me something. “What did you think, Goldie?”

My stare is on the empty space in the sky where the Wonderbolts flew. “I like…pretty fireworks,” I say.

She chuckles. “Yeah, I knew you would. Glad I took you here, right?”

I nod.

It’s the intermission now. Fluttershy stands up beside me.

“Do any of you want snacks?” she asks.

“Oh, get me nachos and a drink,” Rainbow says.

“And for you, Goldie?”

I shake my head. “Nothing. I'm good.”

“Be right back,” she says as she squeezes past other spectators.

With Fluttershy gone, Rainbow Dash strikes up a small talk. “Say, Goldie?”

I look at her.

“Thanks again for coming.”

I tilt my head. I don't know why my presence would make this event any better. If anything, she should've brought someone more enthusiastic about this than me, a pony she just met a few days ago.

“No, really. You're pretty cool, Goldie, and I don't mean just today. I mean for sticking with Fluttershy.”

“Fluttershy?”

She nods and leans in closer to be heard. “It may not seem like much, but you being Fluttershy’s friend means a lot to her. It’s not that she doesn't have many friends. It just takes a lot for her to be this open around anyone else. It means she really trusts you.”

Trust? Me? If anything, I'm the one who put all the trust on her. When we first met, I hardly knew a thing about this mare. She could have screamed, run away, or just tried to put an end to me. But instead, she listened and talked. Looking back, I guess I got lucky with her.

A voice from the announcer rings across the stadium: “And now it's time to see who’s the fastest in today's derby!”

“What's taking her so long?” Rainbow Dash wonders aloud.

When Fluttershy finally shows up, she comes back empty. Her eyes are red. Her cheeks are damp. She's been crying.

No doubt Rainbow Dash is as concerned as I am. She wants to say something without bringing up anything uncomfortable. How does one tread around eggshells while trying to get to the root of the problem?

“You okay, Fluttershy?” Rainbow asks.

Fluttershy doesn't meet her gaze or mine. “Yeah… Just something in my eyes,” she says while rubbing them with a hoof. Her hoof also comes back damp.

“Bits…” I say.

She's missing her coin pouch, the one she carries around her neck.

She holds a hoof to her chest, trying to feel for the pouch. “Oh… I must have accidentally dropped it,” she says.

“We can go find it!” Rainbow Dash says. “Wait here, I'll just be quick about it!”

Rainbow starts to get up, but Fluttershy’s hoof on her shoulder keeps her in her seat.

“The show is about to start. You'll miss it,” she says. She forces a grin on her face. “Besides, it's only a few bits. So don't worry.”

Rainbow Dash looks at her for a long time before sitting down. “If that's what you want…”

I get up, my sudden movement startling the two. “Restroom…” I say.

Rainbow frowns. “You should have gone before.”

“Didn't have to go then.”

She glances at Fluttershy and then at me. “Well, get back quick! Do you know the way?”

“I'll be fine,” I reply.

I shuffle pass ponies in our row before finally getting to the stairs and trotting up.

The restrooms aren't hard to find. I make it to the filly’s room, but I don't step in. I physically can't go with this body. And even if I can, it's not why I'm here.

I'm sorry, Fluttershy. I'm sorry, Rainbow Dash. I lied.

I look through the crowds until I see the stallions I'm looking for by a concession stand. I even see Fluttershy’s coin purse in Hoops’s grasp. They're all holding a lot of food, the kind of junk that’s a nightmare for arteries. As I get closer, I can make out what they're saying.

“Lucky for us that Klutzershy dropped her money,” I hear Hoops says.

“Food and drinks on her!” another cheers.

The group of stallions is getting closer, but they're not the ones moving. Instead, I realize I am the one running and with newfound athletic focus.

My body twists around, and my rear legs connect with Hoops’s face in a way that would make an apple farmer proud. There is a startled yelp, as I send the stallion flying, scattering popcorn, cotton candy, and carrot dogs and whatnots all over the concrete floor.

Brought on by some animalistic fervor, I am moving faster than my usual sluggish pace and acting on instinct. I pounce towards one of the others and pin him.

He struggles against my hold. His punches feel like tiny taps to my chest. “Get off!”

His words are muffled by the background screams and shouts that are nothing but white noise to me. I bite into his neck, his ear, his face—any place that is unguarded. Not enough to tear away flesh, but enough to graze the surface. There is the sound of snapping teeth as I bite and miss.Something warm touches my tongue and lips, that iron tang of liquid life. Like a feral pony, I lose any restraint and just beat him up with nothing to gain from it other than to satisfy a heated urge.

“Stop! Whatever I did, I'm sorry!” The stallion underneath starts bawling.

I pause for a moment.

A body throws itself on my back, and I buck wildly until the back of my head butts someone’s nose, freeing me to continue my assault.

The thunder of approaching hooves alert me to a group of ponies in blue uniform, all carrying cuffs and blowing whistles.

Hoops and his other pal are on me again, trying to pry me off this screaming stallion. We’ve garnered the attention of every mare, stallion, and child within earshot of us. Cops and paramedics are already squeezing through the crowd.

I run, throwing the other two stallions off me and bowling over anyone who gets in my way.

Startled mares and foals shriek as I run by, and I can feel the bandages unraveling and ripping at the pace I'm going. I don't know where I'm going. I'm charging through merchandise stalls and concession stands like an angry bull without a care to myself or anything else. A banner gets caught on my leg and brings an entire rack of Wonderbolt paraphernalia with it.

I head towards the exit, jumping over the turnstile and lodging the junk behind me into it, and keep running. There are a lot of strange looks toward me, a mare running through the city with no clue where she's going except anywhere but back there.

There is an alley between a diner and a bookstore, and I dive through. My speed drops dramatically as I plod along. Traveling along the wall, I take woozy, weary steps like a pony who’s had one too many sips of wine. I feel unwell, a rare feeling given my abnormal circumstances. The burst of emotion from before has settled into my stomach, kicking like a baby, and it wants to get out.

The wretched sound of heaving leaves me as I empty my contents against the wall. Everything I’ve ever consumed comes out the way it came in, barely digested and left in a chewed-up mush. It's not a pretty sight.

I give an uneasy glance at the opening of the alley before hobbling towards the nearest dumpster. It's not the best spot to hide in, but I don't have much of a choice. Hiding under a bag of rotten hayburgers and spoiled fries, I wait.

For a moment, everything is quiet, except for the sound of buzzing flies. The sound of hoofsteps occasionally passes. To make things worse, I think my flank is sitting in melted cheese.

A door opens nearby, and I freeze thinking it’s one of the ponies looking for me. But it isn't. It's a low wage diner employee coming to dump more garbage and gripe about her job under her breath. She doesn't even notice me as she opens the dumpster and chucks the bag into my face. The dumpster lid slams on my head with a resounding thud.

I kind of deserve that.

What was I thinking? The answer is that I wasn't. Guided by my hot emotions, I just hurt those stallions. When the one I pinned begged for me to stop, I blinked. I'm not even sure if he did anything. But it took only a second for me to quell my screaming conscience and harden myself into a state of moral numbness.

It's so easy, yet so terrifying.

Being a creature of emotion is too burdensome. It was much simpler before, when there was nothing to worry or think about.

After waiting quietly for some time, I toss the garbage bags weighing on me out of the dumpster before stumbling out. Finally, all those heavy emotions hanging over my fragile brain falls. My knees buckle under the weight.

The light rain has collected into a puddle in front of me. Among the tiny ripples on the surface, my face stares back at me, looking a little worse for wear. If I was alive, I'd probably end up with more than a few bruises. I've also lost my hat, the one Rainbow got me. My lips are still stained red of someone’s blood. I left those guys in such a mess at the stadium. Nothing permanent, hopefully. If there was one thing to conclude from my actions today, it would be this:

I did that.

I hurt those ponies.

I am a terrible pony.

Splashing dirty rain water on my face, I try to scrub off the blood and grease. Eventually, I sit against the dumpster and press my forehead against the cool metal. Leaning back against the wall, I just sit there. I've never felt so much like a corpse before. My head droops down, feeling the blood settle to the bottom of my body like a shaken snowglobe. The rain has already extinguished whatever flame of emotion I had left.

My mind is caught in tumultuous waves—straining at the oars against the crashing waves, going nowhere despite my efforts. It capsizes and sinks, leaving a sensation of falling.

I am hurtling towards the earth like a bird with a broken wing, and looking up with panic-filled eyes is Fluttershy. Her lips move, forming syllables into a single word.

“Goldie?” her voice calls. It's very calming. A yellow figure steps into my vision. “Goldie, is that you?”

I look up, and it’s Fluttershy. The real Fluttershy. She stares at me with worried eyes. Her mane and coat are damp from the rain, just like mine. I don’t move. I don’t speak. I stay behind the garbage like a poor, abandoned animal. It’s a wonder how she even found me. How long was I gone for?

I only give a slow blink to show I'm not completely dead.

“You scared me,” she says, trotting closer. “Rainbow and I didn’t know where you went, and you just kind of vanished. We got worried so we started looking for you.” She stops in front of me. “Rainbow's probably flying around the stadium, still looking.”

My eyes fall to her hooves because I can't meet hers. She joins me by the dumpster and sits down. For a moment, we are silent.

“Are you okay?” she asks me.

I can feel her gaze on my dirtied face. Is there anything more absurd than a pony comforting a zombie? Why did I have to get involved? Why couldn't I keep my emotion in check?

She purses her lips. “I kind of heard what happened,” she says quietly, and I freeze. She knows.

“Um, did you hurt those ponies?” she asks.

Finally, she asks the question. This is the low point in my life, beyond dying that is. Why did it have to be her to find me of all ponies? I don't want her to see me like this.

In that one moment of poor judgment when I marched up to those stallions, all I could think of was Fluttershy. Taking all this bullying and putting on a brave face. I'm worried about what will happen to her. Will she strip away the fleshy emotions and leave behind a hardened skeletal husk? Or will she crumble to pieces simply because a pony like her can't exist?

Everyday the world grows a little more cynical, where ponies become a little more indifferent to things around them that once meant something to them. I'm trying very hard to care while protecting Fluttershy, but it's hard.

All it took was one moment—just one moment—for all my hard work to fall apart. This isn't progress. This isn't any of the kindness Fluttershy has shown me. I've taken a step in the wrong direction, and now I find myself lost. If I can't be as kind or as brave as Fluttershy, then who am I supposed to become?

But I can't think straight right now. I'm too tired to think of consequences or morality, right or wrong.

To Fluttershy’s question, my head miserably moves up and down. I finally gaze at her, feeling disappointed in myself and afraid what she might think of me. My eyes burn in their sockets, trying to will tears into existence.

She lets out a sigh, the kind given by a disappointed mother to a scolded child. “I'm not mad…” she says to my surprise, but then adds, “Well, not entirely. I can put together what happened.” She shifts uncomfortably on the bag of garbage she's sitting on. “Do you want to talk about it?”

I shake my head.

The hairs on my neck stiffen when a feathery wing brushes against it before resting over my withers. She doesn't say anything, but that's fine. Her silence speaks louder than any words of comfort as we listen to the pattering of rain. I press my face against her chest, listening to her soothing heartbeat.

Ba-bump. Ba-bump.

In what way have I earned her undeserved kindness?

When we have sat in garbage for a long while, she stands up. “Let's go find Rainbow Dash. She must be worried sick by now,” she says.

I nod my head, and it takes me a few tries to stand up. She extends a hoof for me to pull myself up. I trot forward at a snail’s pace, barely steady on my own hooves as if relearning how to walk again. Despite my slow pace, Fluttershy remains by my side, and I stick closely to her as if she's my life preserver.

We find Rainbow Dash at the front entrance to the stadium. She almost immediately bolts towards us as soon as she sees us. She looks a bit worried. “Do you two have any idea how long I've been looking for you?” She wrinkles her nose. “And why do you smell like you just rolled around in a trashcan?”

Fluttershy flicks her eyes towards her and then back to me briefly. “I'll explain later…”

I am cowering and shaking under her slim frame, only glancing out under the cover of her long mane. Even in my worst time, she watches over me like a kind guardian when I should be the one watching over her.

“We should leave right now,” Fluttershy says.

I give Rainbow Dash a pair of pleading eyes, unable to form words despite my growing diction before.

Picking up on our urgency, Rainbow Dash nods without question, and we leave the place as quickly as we can. No doubt I'm not welcomed here at the moment.

I never asked to be here. I didn't have a choice of being alive or a zombie or whatever the flying feather I am. I got saddled with this existence. Memoryless and emotionally stunted—I'm just a broken pony. And what I hate most is that I've hurt someone intentionally.

It’s funny, not in a humorous sense but rather in an absurd realization, how happiness can end in an instant. We spend all our lives seeking happiness, no matter how small, only for it to slip between our grasps and look for it again. And I can't help but wonder if we’re fools for trying or just optimistic.

~~~~~~~

It is night, and at some point, the rain has stopped. We are on the last train to Ponyville, and we are all exhausted. There isn't anyone else in the same train car as us, most likely due to the awful smell coming from us. Even Rainbow Dash has her limits as she sits at the opposite end of the train from us. She’s snoring away, no doubt tired from today.

Fluttershy and I share a seat. I have the window seat again. It’s pretty dark outside. Mostly, I just see the reflection from the inside of the car. Fluttershy has her eyes closed as she lets out a breath.

My lips tremble as a word hovers between the threshold of my mouth. “I'm…sorry,” I finally say in my broken diction. My eyes stare at the sky. The moon is hidden behind a blanket of clouds. “I'm sorry.”

Fluttershy opens her eyes and turns to me. There is a pause as she considers her next words. “It’s normal to feel that way,” she says, putting a hoof on my shoulder. “Being sad or angry is all part of being a pony.”

“Then…why?” I ask. “Why… No fight?”

Her lips form a thin line. It’s hard to tell what kind of expression she’s making in the reflection. “I don't know,” she says. “I guess I'm scared.”

I stare intently at the mare in the window, waiting for her to continue.

She lets out a heavy sigh. “I’m scared of what other ponies will say or do to me. And deep down, I'm scared of myself. I don't realize how scary I can be when I’m upset, and I'm scared that I'll end up hurting my friends.”

I slowly turn my head and catch Fluttershy in the midst of hiding her tears, trying desperately to wipe them. “It’s just so frustrating holding it in sometimes.”

My eyes stare at her, lips fighting for the words. “Why…do we have to be scared?”

“What?” she asks, sniffling.

“Why do we have to hide our feelings?” I continue.

It's strange how sometimes we have a need to hide our own feelings, walling off other ponies in a moment of weakness or helplessness. We built these walls so high that overcoming them has become arduous. Trapped in our own cage, we are eaten alive by feelings of self-doubt and self-loathing.

It was our own doing that we hid our true feelings away. We hold it in until we can't hold it in anymore, and we have only ourselves to blame for it. How is it that we even manage to find ways of hurting ourselves?

I turn back to the window. The stars swirl in my eyes as they refocus. “Why do we do these terrible things to ourselves?” I ask. The words coming out of my mouth are slowing down, like brakes put on a moving train. “Can't hold it in forever… What are we…supposed to…do?

Only the sound of the train’s wheels and Rainbow’s snores can be heard.

“I don't know, Goldie,” Fluttershy finally says. “I don't know…”

She sneezes and begins to sniffle. Her fur still feels damp as she leans against my side. She’s shivering from the cold. It doesn't help that I'm perpetually room temperature, otherwise I would've warmed her up.

I want to apologize for everything, and I mean everything. But saying sorry just isn't enough. How do I fix this? I'm left silent without any way to fix the somber mood.

I watch the scenery crawl by. Passing towns begin to darken as the lights go out one by one. I am going to dark unknown parts where abstract concepts like kindness are put to the test.

It hurts inside, but I want it to hurt. I can't ignore it and forget it's there. It's no different than being dead. I have to hold onto this feeling and bear with the good and the bad, while finding the pony I want to be.

If living is an exercise in agony, then maybe to keep on living means to find meaning among the suffering and agony.

Author's Note

Laptop's been broken for a few months now so I've been doing everything on my phone.

The thought of Cloudsdale being a city in the sky brought some interesting ideas to mind, like what's going on underneath it. So I thought, "Why not another city but for other ponies that can't fly?" Hope you enjoyed this chapter. Publishing roughly a month since the last chapter is probably as fast as it's ever going to get.

Healing

It's all my fault.

If I hadn't caused a scene at the Wonderbolts show, this wouldn't have happened. Now, Fluttershy lies before me, eyes closed and her hair strewn about in an unkempt mess. She was young. She still hasn't experienced everything else life has to offer.

Maybe I should have brought flowers. Like a bouquet. She would love a bouquet.

The sound of someone clearing their throat pulls me back to the present.

“I'm okay, Goldie. Really, I am,” Fluttershy says, opening her eyes before going into a coughing fit.

She looks like she's dying. Covered in layers of blankets and quilts and surrounded by many pillows, she looks very small. She’s shivering in her bathrobe, despite how warm she looks. Sweat matts her mane onto her forehead. Her nose is red and raw from blowing her runny nose. The silence is broken by pitiful sniffles and another bout of coughing.

I may not know what Fluttershy is sick with, but I do know that most ponies that die tend to be sick, usually from some kind of disease. I don't want Fluttershy to die. The thought of her dying would be like a world without sunshine. I'll be lost in the dark without her. But what can I do?

“Goldie…” she whispers.

I walk to the side of her bed, leaning in to listen to her closely as if it were her last words.

“Can you feed the animals please?” she says weakly.

I nod slowly.

“Thank you.” She closes her eyes and exhales. A sort of relief washes over her, as if that was her only concern with her current situation. In truth, she probably cares more about other ponies and animals than her own well-being. After all, she was the one who came looking for me.

With no more words to say, I leave her to sleep, shutting the door quietly on the way out, and make my way downstairs. With Fluttershy sick in bed, she can't do any of her other chores. It sounds simple enough. I think I've seen her do it enough times.

The bag of animal feed is where it always is. Inside a closet in her home is where she keeps all sorts of kibble and grains for whatever animal crosses by her place. Tucked in the corner, I find what I’m looking for and drag the bag outside. Bits and pieces of the food fall out, but it's fine. I'll clean it up later. Halfway through the door leading outside, however, the bag gets stuck on something.

I pull harder against the resistance.

The sound of tearing fills the air, followed by the sound of a thousand pellets pouring onto the ground. Food spills everywhere from a gaping hole in the bag. I find the culprit immediately. Part of the bag got caught on a nail sticking out of the door frame.

The problem solves itself as soon as all of Fluttershy’s animals show at her door and begin eating off the floor. I'm sure it will be fine. At least they’re being fed, and now I don’t have to clean up the mess. That I made...

I bring a hoof to my face and let out a groan.

No.

No, no, no.

I need to stop that. I’m not going to start pouting.

After the incident, there's been a metaphorical wall between me and Fluttershy. A sort of uncomfortable silence whenever we are together. With my silence and her awkward attempts at small talk, we’ve become more like strangers on a train than close friends.

I wish things were back to the way before.

I need to keep my mind busy. Adjusting the little blue flower in my mane, I pull myself together. As long as my body is moving, I can get through the day without lingering on any thought too long. Watering the plants should distract me. Whenever I watch Fluttershy water her garden, I feel relaxed. It’s something I’ve wanted to do. Now seems like a good time to start.

To water the flowers, all I need is a watering can. A quick search leads me right to the garden hose where I find what I’m looking for. After dropping the hose into the can, I give the water valve a turn. Then two. Three.

Oh horseapples.

The hose comes to life, whipping at the air like a vicious snake. The nozzle smacks me in the face and drenches my coat in a strong jet of water. My hooves do nothing to shield me as water sprays everywhere and becomes a growing puddle underneath me.

I quickly reach for the valve to turn off the water. In my haste, I hardly hear the sound of my hoof hitting metal before the fwoosh of running water. Now there's a gush of water spewing from the wall where the faucet snapped off.

I move the watering can underneath, but it fills up and overflows. Hooves do nothing to stop the fountain, no matter how hard I try to block the hole.

I'm wracking my brain on what to do. An idea comes. I run inside, careful to step over the small animals eating, and grab a towel from the bathroom. When I make it back outside, I start stuffing the leakage with the towel. The water goes from a spout to a trickle.

I let out a sigh of relief.

With the matter solved, sort of, I move ahead with my original task. Watering can in my mouth, I go by each plant—the daisies, the marguerites, the clovers—tilting my head slightly. I am careful with watering these flowers, like bringing water to the parched lips of thirsty ponies. These flowers need somebody. They can’t take care of themselves, but I like taking care them. Even a pony like me can do it. I want to take care of something like how Fluttershy takes care of her animals.

Then, a strange thought strikes me, and I wonder if Fluttershy sees me as she does her animals.

There isn't as many flowers as I’d like there to be, which is fine, of course. But, I need something to distract the thoughts buzzing around my head like a hornet’s nest. Guilt. Shame. Regret. Yesterday’s debacle has left me feeling uneasy, especially around Fluttershy.

Perhaps cleaning Fluttershy’s home will distract me.

The place has gotten more cluttered than when I first stayed here. There are more books on the table where Fluttershy spends her time reading these days. Stacks of newspapers sit on unoccupied chairs. When she's not too busy with me or her animals or her friends, her eyes are glued to a page, poring over words and engrossed in whatever she's reading.

She’s gotten busy lately.

I didn't expect her to be a messy person or be too preoccupied to clean. I think that's what happens when she has to care for another pony other than herself. A quick dusting is the most I can manage.

When I go in to check on her, she's still as she was when I left her, still sleeping but now with a pillow wrapped in her hooves. There's the quiet sound of congested breathing and the occasional cough. She murmurs something in her sleep as she tosses and turns. There is a pained look on her face, as she whimpers helplessly.

I exit the room and let out a deep breath, pressing my forehead against her door.

She doesn't look like she's getting better. It's hard to watch her like this. What do I do? How can I help her? Does she need some air? Does she need a new organ? She can have one of mine.

Oh, I just don’t know what to do. It would be much simpler if I knew what she needed. If I was just as sick as her, I might be able to understand what she’s going through. But I can’t. I can’t get sick, and never before has it been frustrating not understanding somepony. I can't do this alone. I need another living pony to help me.

Stepping over the mess of small animals and food, I make my way into Ponyville, where there are other living ponies. Surely, one of them must know how to help me.

The moment I walked into town, I knew I shouldn't have gone out. A pair of mares walk past me, one of whom is carrying a newspaper with a picture of a pony running through a crowd. It isn’t a very good picture. The pony in the picture is a blur in motion, and her eyes are hidden by a Wonderbolts cap.

“Can you believe that? A lunatic gets into a fight at Cloudsdale,” says a green unicorn.

“What was the reason?” the other asks. A shudder travels up my spine.

“The article doesn't say, but some poor stallion was hospitalized because of it.”

A gasp. “How awful!”

I hurry away from the two mares, holding my head down to avoid looking them in the face. I don't want to hear the rest of that conversation. I've done something awful, and I can't help but think about the next time this might happen. Where do I draw the line? At what point do I start craving flesh, now that I've gotten the first taste of blood? Whose life will I have to consume? Oh, I do hope none of the zombie clichés are true.

I shake my head, tossing the golden locks of my hair around. In my haste to hide from outside eyes, I find myself running towards the nearest building.

The backdoor to the place opens easily, and I stumble in hesitantly, shutting the door behind me. The place I'm at looks like a kitchen. Even though I shouldn’t be here, it’ll at least allow myself some time to think about what to do next. But even I'm not allowed a moment’s rest as a pink pair of hooves cover my eyes, accompanied by a singsong voice asking, “Guess who?”

“Who...?" I mutter.

“Not Who! Pinkie!” The mare releases her hooves, and she's in front of me all of a sudden—smiling and giggling at her little game.

I remember her. Yes, I definitely remember her. It’s hard to forget someone who talks so much. When I turn to leave, she’s already in front of me and trying to start a conversation.

The questions come pouring out of her mouth. “What brings you here? Are you here to buy something? Need a party planned?”

With each question, I shake my head, trying to get away from the mare.

“Are you sad?” she asks all of a sudden.

The last question catches me by surprise, and I finally look in her direction.

She still has a grin on her face. “You look like you could use some cheering up,” she says. “And making ponies smile is what I do.”

Before I can utter a single word, she tosses me an apron.

“Here. We’ll bake some cookies. That always cheers me up.”

With a little difficulty, I manage to put on the apron and close the distance between her and me. As I get closer, I notice something I have never noticed before in all my time in Ponyville. It’s a smell. It’s sweet like the rest of the bakery, only stronger and emanating from her. It must be from working in a bakery for a very long time.

“Now why don't you tell your Auntie Pinkie Pie what's the matter?” she says as she stirs ingredients in a bowl. Her hoof is almost a blur with how fast she stirs. My eyes can hardly keep track as they spin in their sockets.

My eyes focus on the ground instead, and I trace a hoof along the grooves of the wooden floor, trying to think of what to say and how much I should tell her. It’s all so hard to explain, and I don’t just mean my condition. I have a feeling that what Fluttershy told me is something that is told only in intimacy and through shared pains.

As if sensing my uneasiness, she says, “It's fine if you don't feel like sharing. At least give baking a try. We’re making cookies for the Filly Guides to sell.”

She gives the bowl to me, and I can only stare at the whisk, all covered in thick, clumpy batter—sweetness in its raw, unbaked form. My hoof tentatively wraps around the whisk as I dive headfirst into my first baking lesson.

~~~~~~~

“I'm guessing you don't bake often.”

I shake my head, not taking my eyes at the culinary debacle.

Flour is everywhere. It's all over her mane and coat, probably on mine too. I think there’s some egg yolk behind my ear. Only a few eggs actually make it into the mixing bowl. Worst of all, I lost my flower somewhere in the mess.

A hoof falls on my shoulder. “It’s fine if you don't get it right the first time. You have to keep trying.”

Brushing past the mare, I run out the door.

“Wait, where are you going?” she calls from inside. “It’s not so bad! We can still fix this!”

I've gotten sidetracked.

There has to be someone I know that will help. I would go to Rainbow Dash, seeing how she’s close with Fluttershy and to a lesser extent me, but I can't find her. She's probably doing weather work up in the clouds, where my voice wouldn't be able to reach her.

A dawning realization comes to me. Even though Fluttershy is my closest friend, I don't know much about her friends… I barely knew Rainbow Dash outside the times she has visited Fluttershy. The only time I learn about Fluttershy is by word of mouth or observation.

I don't really know much about Fluttershy.

There is a heavy feeling in my chest. Maybe guilt. What kind of friend am I? I’ve been living with her for days now. I am a freeloader, living as an invalid under her unsolicited care. Yet, I don’t know even know her birthday or her age. I’ve been too busy moaning and groaning about my own problems to even ask.

If only there was someone that fixes ponies.

Wait, hold on. There’s a profession for that. They’re called doctors. Fluttershy needs a doctor. I need to find a doctor!

But what does a doctor look like? What do I remember about doctors? They wear white. They are clean and professional. They tell you when there’s something wrong with you.

With all this information to work with, I search the town.

I see merchants, milkponies, and mailponies. Florists, farriers, and farmers. But, I can’t seem to find a doctor.

Off in the distance, I see a white earth pony with a red cross for a cutie mark, the kind you'd see associated with hospitals. She’s sitting at a table outside with a plate of sandwich in front of her. I make a beeline for her and walk the last few steps. When I am mere inches away from her, I cough to catch her attention.

I watch her body jolt at the sound as she turns around. She notices me and gives me a questioning look. “Can I help you?”

My eyes travel up and down her body. White hat. Red cross. A quick sniff of her coat gives off the sterile smell of a hospital. I am willing to bet my left hoof that this pony works in a hospital.

“Are you alright?” she asks worriedly.

There isn't time for me to explain. We’d be here all day if I had to talk to this pony. I do the first thing that comes to my mind and throw her over my back.

“Hey! Put me down!” she shouts, kicking and flailing her hooves. “Somepony! Help!”

I know this isn’t the ideal approach. But really, it's much faster to show her the problem. Though, it is much harder to carry someone else when they're flailing and screaming in your ear. Why does she have to scream?

I try to ignore the curious gazes of other ponies as I carry the mare on my back. The doctor’s screams have quelled by the time I’m trotting along the road to Fluttershy’s place. She even stopped struggling, only to give me a questioning look.

“Why are we going to Fluttershy’s home?” she asks.

I am caught a little surprised by her question, but I don’t answer as my attention is focused on the crowd of animals standing at the door to Fluttershy’s cottage. It feels like every animal in mile radius decided to get a free meal at Fluttershy’s doorstep. Not only that, but they also decided to make themselves at home in her living room. There were birds perched on every high shelf and rodents scurrying across all over the room, and they were eating anything they could like an all-you-can-eat buffet.

“More importantly, what happened here?” the mare asks.

In my head, I’m scrambling for what I should do. There are animals running around, but at least the first mess was cleaned up. I can get all the animals out of the cottage later. The doctor I had with me could take a look at Fluttershy first and see what’s wrong with her.

I trot up the stairs, stopping in front of the doorway to Fluttershy’s room. Opening the door, I take a peek inside. She still lies in her bed with her eyes closed, unaware of any of the animals beyond her bedroom door. I give a knock on her door and watch as she slowly drifts back to wakefulness.

“Goldie?” Fluttershy calls from her bed. She glances at the mare I’m carrying. “You brought a doctor?”

The mare scrambles off my back and falls on the floor. She gives an annoyed look before dusting herself off. “First of all, I'm not a doctor. I'm a nurse. Nurse Redheart.” She glares at us, though more specifically me. “And second, why in Equestria did you abduct me?”

I stare at her for a moment. “Fluttershy…sick,” I say.

Her eyes glance at Fluttershy before glaring at me. “Then take her to see an actual doctor. You know, like at a hospital?”

My ears flatten. “No...help?” I ask.

Her hoof reaches to massage the space between her eyes. When she looks at me again, I give her a pleading look. Out of all the things I've done today, I just want this one thing to go right. The pony exhales through her nose before saying, “Normally, we don't do house calls, but I'll see what I can do.”

The mare enters Fluttershy’s room, closing the door behind her. I stare at the wooden door for a long time. Whispered voices can be heard from the other side. I can’t make out the tone of their voices, and I don’t know whether I should be worried or relieved. It’s times like this that I wish I could do something to help. It’s just so frustrating being helpless.

When the earth pony steps out, I approach her.

“Doctor… Fix Fluttershy?” I look into her eyes. “Make…better?”

Her mouth moves as if to correct me, but then she switches to a more professional tone. “It’s a cold. Nothing serious, but this isn’t an official diagnosis anyway. I suggest picking up some medicine at the pharmacy for it. She's already resting, so that's good. Tell her to drink plenty of fluids and to take her medicine.”

Relief washes over me.

Her glare doesn’t leave me. “If I'm done here, I'd like to continue my lunch break.”

I nod as she takes her leave, being careful to step over the small animals roaming the floor.

Now that I know what to do about Fluttershy, I get to work. My body moves automatically, my legs gyrating through the motions. A short trip to town passes by in a blur. The pharmacy took some time to find, but I hardly remember the exchange of Fluttershy’s bits and the cold medicine from the local pharmacy. At least the pharmacist was helpful enough to give me what I needed.

Before I know it, I’ve returned to Fluttershy’s room with a bottle of medicine that’s supposed to make her feel better and a spoon from her kitchen.

Noticing me, she smiles. “Is that for me?”

I nod slowly and take the few steps that close the distance between us.

She sits up from her bed, her damp mane falls over her face. A hoof pulls it back, revealing her tired expression.

Opening the bottle, I pour the syrup into the spoon. Rivulets of red liquid fall out, some of it missing its target and falling onto the ground in splatters. With my unsteady hooves, it is an arduous task.

Her lips part open, revealing a pink tongue awaiting its delivery of medicine. With much hesitance, I bring the spoon to her mouth, and she downs the whole spoonful. She makes a face as the spoon leaves her mouth—an expression twisted in disgust, no doubt from the taste of whatever I had just given her.

But the moment soon passes, and she gives me a weak smile. “Thank you, Goldie.”

Even after she closes her eyes, I’m still waiting by her bedside, expecting her to instantly get better. Medicine is supposed to make her better, isn’t it? I don’t know how long I’ve been staring at Fluttershy, but at some point, Fluttershy turns over in her bed in my direction. Her eyes open a crack before they startle wide open.

“Goldie, you’re still here?”

Abashed, my ears fall flat. “Fluttershy...get better. I...help.” I fumble with my words a bit, but the message gets across.

There isn’t any malice or annoyance in her voice. “You’ve done enough for me. Thank you,” she says. “You should go rest after all you’ve done.”

I nod my head and walk out the room, but not before casting one more glance at her. She makes a gesture with a hoof, telling me to go on, and giving a reassuring smile.

Downstairs, I am once again greeted by the chaos that’s been waiting for me.

I sigh.

~~~~~~~

It took some work, but I managed to shoo all the animals out of her the cottage with the help of carrying around a broom and dustpan. Perhaps it was the threat of being smacked by a broom that scared them off. I would never do that, but it did make it easier to clean up any leftover animal feed.

It was a slow process, and by the time I finish cleaning up, it was already sunset.

Some of the decor Fluttershy kept in her living room had been knocked over and shattered, no doubt from the swarm of animals that made themselves at home. There wasn't much in the way of salvaging some of them, and they were swept away. All that was left was the plugged leak and the broken faucet outside. That was going to take some explaining.

Sitting on Fluttershy’s couch—though I've grown used to calling it my bed—I slouch in my seat and let out the loudest groan. I just can't do anything right.

What did I even do? I just cause a mess for other ponies, including Fluttershy. I'm such an idiot for thinking like I can waltz back into a normal life. I can't even do a simple task like feeding the animals or watering the flowers.

It would be much easier on Fluttershy if she didn't have me around to care for.

I’ve been thinking about it for a while now—about how different I am from a living pony. Living with Fluttershy has been the best days of my life that I can remember, but in all that time, I don’t think I’ve come any closer to understanding her. Where does her kindness come from and to what lengths will she go for someone like me?

My mind’s made up.

I strap on my saddlebag and throw everything I own in it. A single book is really all I have. I never had much to begin with, being dead and all, and food isn't really needed for where I'm going.

I leave behind the town of ponies and head into the forest, but not before casting one last glance at the little cottage by the creek, where a lone pegasus lives.

I do not understand her. I do not understand why she does the things she does or why she cares so much for me or how she can still smile at me after opening up her sadness. I don't know how to help her.

After all that time getting to know this pony, I just don't understand and that saddens me.

That's why I've decided to go back to the Everfree Forest, a place I've known since waking up the way I am. The forest is cold, uncaring, and indifferent to its inhabitants, yet it is the most familiar thing to me. There's at least one good thing I've taken from this experience, and perhaps I'm not as much of a zombie as I thought I was. I think I’m still hanging onto the part of me that’s still a pony—the part Fluttershy sees in me.

But, I can't stay here. I shouldn't be with these ponies. There are just some ponies that don't belong with other ponies.

Author's Note

Slow chapter for now. I had meant to post it in December of last year, but complications delayed it. This chapter and some others are a year in the making. I've been through technical problems, a broken laptop, and a hectic life in general, but at least this chapter's out.

This chapter is small, but I can only drag out such a slow chapter so long. But I look forward to publishing the next chapter.

Rain

I never would have thought that not thinking about things would be so difficult. Every time I tell myself not to think about Fluttershy, I end up doing the opposite.

Has she gotten better? Did the medicine work? I hope I got the right one.

She's in my head like a song I can't unhear. Her melodious voice wraps around my thoughts, filling my head with kind words. I try to bury my thoughts by focusing on the path in front of me, but all it can afford is a shallow grave before those thoughts resurface again.

Small plants sprout on the ground by my hooves—untamed and wild. Further into the woods, the path grows darker, despite the time of day. Branches belonging to dead trees stick out like frozen limbs, reaching out to grab unsuspecting strangers. I pass through these branches unperturbed. Wooden claws comb through my mane and coat. The feeling is all too familiar from my lonely days wandering, almost as if it’s welcoming me back.

I wonder if I should have left the Everfree Forest at all.

Ahead, there is a clearing with very few trees.

Circling the open area, I choose a tree by the edge to lean on and just sit there, letting the tree bark dig into my back and the grass prick at my bottom. I dump the contents of my saddlebags in front of me. A single book falls in front of me to an open page. I know my reading has improved. Surely, I can read it now.

So, I stare at the page.

And stare.

And stare…

And I can't get past the first line.

The words don't come to me even with my face so close to it. Its paper skin, covered in dark black blood, touches my face, smelling of old flowers and sunbaked pages. There are words, but it's all gibberish.

This isn't fair. We were both abandoned in the Everfree Forest. I thought this book would be able to tell me the secrets of my past. I thought I had changed. My face twists into a grimace, and I hurl the thing away, watching it sail far into the bushes. My head falls back against the tree so that I'm staring up at the cloudy sky.

Haven't I been through enough? What more do I need to do? What's wrong with me?

I never had to think about these things before.

It was much simpler back then. That pony I was before—spending days wandering around the Everfree like some dumb animal—felt like ages ago. I went from talking like a foal to saying complete sentences. Back then, thoughts came out like droplets from a leaky faucet. Now that I have these introspective thoughts, it's hard to go back to the way things were.

But maybe deep down, it's because I don't want to.

A wave of melancholy washes over me, pulling out groan from the depths of my soul. It stretches out, reverberating in my throat and leaving my lips with part of my soul. Just as suddenly as it came out, it stops, and I am left still feeling all the same about my current situation.

This is all too confusing.

Right now I need somebody to talk to, but there's not a single soul in sight. I dig deep into myself, hoping for the one pony who has a better idea of me than even I do.

"Are you there, Fluttershy? It’s me, Goldie," I say out loud.

I sit thoughtfully, waiting for a reply to come to me in my desperate time.

"Can you tell me what I'm doing wrong?"

My question is met with silence. The voice I've grown so used to hearing doesn't answer. A deep sense of despair fills me, clutching at my insides. What does it say about me when I'm turning to the voice in my head for answers and even it doesn't have anything to say?

My head lolls forward like a wilted flower as I sit there, unsure of what to make of things anymore. What else is there to do?

I loosen the grip on my consciousness and let my mind wander.

~~~~~~~

I dreamt a little, surprisingly.

Did you know I can dream, Fluttershy?

I dreamt that I wasn’t the only zombie in the world. Every pony in the world was a zombie. There were the awkward gaits and the wordless moans. Sickly complexions and endless stares. Everyone was a zombie with all the complications of being dead. They were like how I was when I first came to Ponyville.

It was awful.

Even though everyone was like me, I felt even more alone than when everyone was alive. No one talked like they used to. A solemn expression was etched on every pony’s face where once was a smile. Familiar faces looked almost unrecognizable. Even bumping shoulders with someone hardly elicits a response anymore. No more “hellos” and “goodbyes”. Ambition and drive disappeared. Emotions decomposed until there was nothing left.

The one pony who didn't show up in my dream was Fluttershy. If she had shown up acting like how I once was, I wouldn't know how I would handle that, let alone her death.

No one deserves this, least of all her. If anyone should be dead and buried, it should be me. I hurt ponies. I mess things up. I don't fit in with living ponies.

But life isn't always fair.

~~~~~~~

I don't know how long I've been like this.

Time seems to blur altogether. In all that time, I haven't moved. The untapped wild has grown accustomed to my presence. Birds have used my head as a perch to roost on. Small animals have crawled over me as if I was part of the tree.

These are my new neighbors, I suppose.

A squirrel climbs on me as if I'm part of the tree trunk. Its paws are on my face. The squirrel barely registers that I'm a pony, even when we are staring at each other eye to eye.

A twig snaps in the background, but it may as well have been thunder, shocking the life back into me. The animals scramble away at the sound. It might be one of the larger creatures that lurk the forest. I watch intensely in the direction of the snapping twig, unsure of what I’m going to do once it shows up.

Do I run? Or do I let myself become someone's next meal?

The bushes across the clearing shake and stir, accompanied by the grunts of a struggling pony.

“Consarnit!”

A small yellow body throws itself past the bushes and lands in front of me in an upside down heap. She jolts at first glance at me but relaxes as she slowly rights herself.

“Goldie, is that you?”

I blink my dry eyes. After a long uncomfortable silence, I finally move my stiff neck to get a better look at her, eliciting a series of cracks—my first movement in who knows how long. I imagine it would be unsettling for a child to find a corpse in the woods.

It's a good thing she doesn't see me like that at all.

The filly relaxes as soon as she sees me move. “It is you! Golly, you have no idea how glad I am to find somepony. What are ya doin’ way out here?”

Dry air escapes my lips as I try and fail to form words. I can practically hear the weary muscles in my jaw growing taut as they try to work my mouth.

She steps closer to me. "Are you okay? You seem a little under the weather."

I nod, struggling to sound normal with my raspy voice. "Just...fine," the words manage to come out.

She looks around and strolls around the clearing. The weight of her saddlebags shift around her sides as she moves. “Do you know the way back? I got lost myself on the way back from Zecora’s. She's a zebra that lives around here.”

I shake my head.

She lets out a disheartened “Oh” before stopping in front of me. There is a fleeting moment of disappointment on her face before it disappears. She smiles at me. “Haven't seen you in a while. How come you're all the way out here?”

I shrug.

“Did ya get lost too?” she asks.

I nod after a moment’s hesitation.

She puts a comforting hoof around my withers. “Hey, look on the bright side! At least we found each other.”

Just then, the Everfree Forest reminds us of its untamed nature with its uncontrollable weather as dark wet spots begin forming on the soil.

I stand onto all fours and step forward into the clearing. As I look up at the gray sky, something wet taps me between the eyes followed by more wet drops, confirming my suspicions.

The little filly winces when a raindrop taps her on the nose. “Gah! Just our luck! It's raining!”

Then, it pours, as if a pegasus just bucked a heavy rain cloud over us. But, there's no one above us to whom we can ask for directions because this is the Everfree.

“We gotta find a place to stay dry," she says as she looks around. Even being surrounded by trees, we aren’t protected from the sudden downpour. The rain slides off the leaves in dribbles, soaking our manes as we stand under them.

We briskly trot through the forest, looking for better cover from the rain. We must have gone to a part of the Everfree I've never been before. In an open area, there lies a castle. Abandoned. Dilapidated. Forgotten. An eerie landmark in the untouched woods. It stands out in the forest like a scab on the land.

A shaky bridge stands between the castle and us. I follow after Apple Bloom as she takes the lead of crossing it. The wood creaks with each step. Halfway through, one of the brittle planks gives under me, and my hoof plows right through as I stare at the gorging ravine below. I imagine this would be scarier to Apple Bloom, but she doesn't notice and continues on undeterred.

I pull myself up and hurry along.

When we've crossed the bridge, we make it to the castle doors as daylight begins to wane. The doors give away as I push. Creaky hinges echo in the great hall, waking up whatever ghosts slumbered in these walls.

We decide to settle near the entrance. Most of the roof is gone now. A big gaping hole opens much of the ceiling to the sky. The parts of the castle that remain are the ones being held by stubborn support beams and arches that stood against the test of time.

“This place gives me the creeps. But it's better than being out there at least," Apple Bloom says before sneezing. "Let me see if I can find a blanket or something."

I slump against the wall and stare at the rain coming down while Apple Bloom explores the castle. I can't help but think about how I usually spend my rainy days just sitting while it pours. Mud is caked to the bottom of my hooves. Dirt mixes with rainwater, causing my cream coat to take on a darker shade. Strands of my hair cling together and drip water from the golden ends. I never thought to keep up appearances, but Fluttershy would probably scold me to take better care of myself.

Apple Bloom comes back to sit with me. She's brought one of the torn tapestries and is using it as a blanket. She smiles as she pulls out a box of matches and a dusty, old lantern.

"Look what I found!"

Under normal circumstances, this would be the point where a responsible adult intervenes to keep the filly from playing with matches. But, this isn't a normal circumstance, and I am barely responsible enough to care for myself, let alone others.

She pulls out one of the matches and strikes it against the striker. The match bursts into flames, lighting the walls and our faces in an amber glow. After lighting the lantern and blowing out the match, she shines the light around the room.

The light reveals just how abandoned the place is. Motes of dust float around us after our disturbance. The pitter-patter of rain echoes against the walls as they enter the open hole in the collapsed ceiling. All the windows are shattered. I imagine this place looked more majestic before whatever violence took place. Now, only ghosts haunt the memories of the castle.

Apple Bloom sits beside me, setting the lantern in front of us. "Wish we had a real fire going. This place ain't got a lot of dry wood to burn," she says.

She nestles herself close to me, still wet and shivering. I’m probably just as cold, if not colder, than her. I wonder if she notices that or how I’m not shivering at all. The silence between us lasts only for a few minutes until Apple Bloom picks up the conversation again.

"So..." she begins, "who's Bluebell?"

I give her a questioning look at the randomness of her topic of choice. She reaches into her saddlebag before revealing a very familiar book.

“Um, I think you dropped this earlier,” she says as she places the book in my hooves.

I stare at her and then at the book, rolling the name around my head.

“I didn't mean to peek! It kinda just fell open in front of me. The name was on the front page." She glances at me apologetically. "Sorry."

Opening the book to the front page, I stare in stunned astonishment and whisper to myself, "Bluebell?"

Is that who I am? For a while now, I’ve been hanging onto the possibility that this book could be mine and that whatever was written inside could provide insight into my past. I flip to another page, and to my surprise, lines are starting to become letters—words.

There is a single sentence on one page.

I try to sound out the words, just like how Spike taught me. "Lu… Lo… Love…"

"What are you…?" she begins to ask, but I continue without stopping.

My eyes trace the contours of each letter. Each syllable that comes out of my mouth is dragged from the dark depths of my mind. It is a monumental effort to say each word, but I hang onto whatever concentration I can muster.

"Love can be found..." I say, surprised by my own voice. "In… In people who..."

I am panting, out of breath. It’s like running a marathon. The mental hurdles I'm going through are the hardest I’ve ever had to overcome. I look at Apple Bloom and try once more. This time, I'm not going to stutter through these important words.

“Love can be found in the people who taught us to love,” I say finally.

Apple Bloom smiles. “That sounds beautiful, Goldie.”

I smile.

It is beautiful. These words I can now read. These words that have been trying to reach me. Who knows how long these words have waited, waiting for someone to read them?

"I don't know who Bluebell is," I finally answer Apple Bloom. "But… I want to know who she is."

I flip the page, and Apple Bloom joins me in admiring the book's contents. As we browse through the flower collection in the book, a photo falls out from between the pages. It's a picture of a young Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. I must have forgotten it after breaking the photo frame.

"Hey, that's Fluttershy and Rainbow Dash. I wonder what that's doing in there."

I stare at the picture for a long time before closing the book and stowing it in my bag. My private talk with Rainbow Dash surfaces in my memory, and I feel ashamed of what she might think of me if she knew the reason I left Ponyville.

"You should get some rest," I tell Apple Bloom.

I thought she would object to the idea of resting not long after the sun had set, but she surprised me. "Sure, Goldie," she says, letting out a yawn. She must have had a long day. “What about you?”

“I’ll keep watch,” I answer her.

She tries to get as comfortable as a pony could possibly get on the floor with nothing but a torn tapestry to keep her warm. “It’ll only be a quick nap, Goldie,” she says.

When she grows silent with only the sound of her breathing, I turn my attention outside, and like clockwork, Fluttershy saunters into my thoughts...

~~~~~~~

I stare outside for a very long time.

It must have been long because the rain had stopped and the sky had darkened to night.

Turning around, I notice Apple Bloom wasn’t asleep anymore. The tapestry is discarded on the floor. She had crept away without my notice and was now sitting in the center of the castle below the open ceiling.

There was a break in the clouds, allowing the stars and moon to shine.

I sit next to Apple Bloom on the damp ground, watching her stare at the sky. She is uncharacteristically quiet when I approach her.

It's up to me to break the silence.

"What are you doing?" I ask her.

She glances at me but continues looking at whatever she’s looking at. “Sorry, I didn’t tell you when I woke up,” she says. She fidgets in her spot. “I’m just thinking about something.”

“About?” I ask.

She hesitates, and I wonder if I had overstepped the bounds of our friendship.

“My Ma and Pa,” she answers. Her amber eyes look into mine briefly, but I can tell there is a hidden sadness behind them. “Whenever I think about Ma and Pa, I want to be alone to see the stars. You don’t get this kinda sky in the city, Applejack says.”

I nod in agreement, being well familiar with the night's sky from spending night after night without a roof over my head.

“Princess Luna always makes the stars so pretty.” At that moment, two shooting stars grace the sky. “One time, I spent a whole night under the stars. Applejack was mighty upset the next day.”

My eyes focus on her for a while. A strange quietness falls on us as she stares up. “Were you thinking about them that night?” I asked. “Your parents?”

She only gave a slow nod of her head.

I stare up, trying to see what she's seeing.

How is it supposed to feel? To miss someone everyday, waking up each morning knowing you will never see them again?

A sudden realization strikes me.

Oh. I suppose I did that to Fluttershy. There is an awful feeling inside me, like a heavy weight pulling my heart. I think I've made a terrible mistake.

“What were your parents like?” I ask.

She solemnly shakes her head, but she doesn’t cry. “I can’t remember. I was too little to remember,” she says. “I can’t talk about it with Applejack or Big Mac or Granny. They’d get sad.”

As she digs a groove in the dirt in front of her, I contemplate my next choice of words. What do I say to a child who is too troubled to speak of her concerns? This can’t be healthy for her, and I know I shouldn’t be the one to talk to her about it.

“I think you should talk to them,” I tell her. “Talking about them will keep your parents alive in their memories.” I put a tentative hoof around her shoulders. “And they would want you to be a part of remembering them.”

She nods quietly, trying to rub at her eyes, but her eyes only grow red from where her tears had once been.

I allow myself a small grin. “You are very lucky, Apple Bloom. You are surrounded by ponies who care about you.”

She looks at me warmly and gets in one last sniffle.

“You're right," she says. "I've still got my friends and family. Even lost in a forest, I've got a friend."

I wonder what kind of face I'm making now. Surprised at the realization that I'm not alone anymore? Or a teary smile in being called a friend by someone else?

Most likely, I'm still wearing a stone-faced expression, but I like to imagine I'm making these faces.

Apple Bloom curls beside me, and my eyes stare at the stars while my mind fills with the thought of other ponies in Ponyville.

I think one of them is waiting for me.

~~~~~~~

An overcast day greets our morning. The weather has been following its own unplanned schedule, switching between rain and the occasional break in the clouds. I imagine most ponies wouldn't like the unpredictable nature of the Everfree Forest, but I think it's refreshing. After all, the plants and animals don't seem to mind. Even weak little flowers can thrive in the wild.

The air smells like wet grass and damp leaves, slick from the rainfall. Earthy. Fresh. I imagine it's what the world smelled like when it was new.

Beside me, Apple Bloom walks grouchily, probably from having to sleep on the cold, hard floor instead of a soft bed. "It feels like we're going in circles!"

Her stomach rumbles.

"I need a break," she says.

Hunger gets to the little filly as she starts looking around before settling on the grass in front of her. She bites a mouthful and chews on it for a bit before swallowing with a disgusted look on her face.

"Blegh! It’s so bitter! I wish we had some real food right about now."

We don't have any food or water, and I’m a little ashamed that I didn’t find something for her to eat. I would have to get Apple Bloom home quick. I can last a very long time without eating and drinking, but I don't think it holds the same for her.

So caught am I in thinking of how to get Apple Bloom home, I barely notice all the noise in the forest has stopped.

"What's wrong, Goldie?" she asks. "Is it about the grass? Look, I know it ain't proper and all, but I'm hungry here."

My hoof quickly covers her mouth. She lets out a muffled protest but stops at noticing my expression. The seriousness of my face reflects in her fearful eyes.

We stand as still as statues. I can feel Apple Bloom tremble as I hold her close to me. I feel as her heart pounds against her chest cavity as if trying to break free to escape this terrifying atmosphere.

Snap!

The broken branch acts as a signal for the predatory game. A manticore jumps out of hiding from a bush and races in our direction.

As I stand between the shrieking filly and the manticore, I can’t help but contemplate my actions.

Standing face to face with an oversized cat with an equally oversized stinger for a tail, I wonder if this is the right thing to do. The morality of saving another life and the burden of responsibility weighs on my mind. By the time I realize the ramifications and danger of my heroism, I’m already staring down the gullet of my poor choices and past mistakes.

Before I can even shout for Apple Bloom to run, a claw tears across my throat like paper, shredding my next word into ribbons.

Another swipe from a large paw bats me aside like a ball of yarn, sending me flying into a tree. There is a snap of broken bones and shattering of ribs. With the wind knocked out of me, my attempts to stand are feeble at best. In the distance, I hear the horrified cries of a filly. She is running for her life away from the manticore, while all I can do is watch her.

I don't know how dying is supposed to work. It's more or less why I am the way I am. The brain shuts down as organs stop working. The last thing to go are the memories and the part that makes me who I am. After that I am nothing, given enough time for nature to take its course.

But somehow, I'm still here.

And to me, that seems like a mistake because it's wrong and shouldn't be like that.

So why am I here? Have I been brought back for the sole purpose of saving this filly?

Something burns inside of me, glowing hot like molten metal. It's anger, but it's different from before. It lacks the apathy I had when I tore into those stallions.

In front of my eyes is a helpless pony, and more than ever, I want to help her.

This isn't about revenge or hatred. It's the need to protect the ponies I love and the anger of being helpless. This is a change, a necessity against the complacency of my own indifference.

“Goldie!”

Her shrill cries reach my ears again. My jumble of thoughts turns into resolve, and I start hobbling over to Apple Bloom.

I quickly close the distance as my legs carry me with the sole intent of saving that filly. Hooves leap off the dirt as I switch to a gallop, and for a brief moment, I am a living thing. I am a filly in her youth, full of heart-pounding, earthshaking vibrancy. The beat of my hooves thump like the beat of a heart. Each step shaves off another year on my weary, worn-out muscles.

Where does this energy come from that’s spurring me forward? Is it the strength to put kindness for another pony into action?

My legs kick like powerful springs as I jump onto the manticore’s back, and I sink my teeth into its neck before it could get closer to Apple Bloom—teeth that aren't made for tearing into flesh. But that's fine, as long as I have its attention.

The manticore rears up and swings wildly around. I hold on as long as I can until it bucks forward and throws me to the ground between its two front paws.

I roll to the side as a scorpion stinger jabs at the ground where I was lying. I suddenly have to put up all my hooves as a fanged maw lunges for my throat. My legs are pressed against its own throat as it tries to take a bite out of me.

Even with my throat clawed out, I still manage to speak a few raspy words. "You can't...have...her."

A glob of saliva pools onto my neck as it pushes closer. Even earth pony strength can't keep up with a manticore for long as I fight against the pressure.

“Get off her, ya oversized cat!”

The manticore gives a pained roar as it reels back with its eyes closed. A couple more rocks come sailing into its face before Apple Bloom runs up to me and begins desperately dragging my body out from underneath the beast.

“Get up, Goldie! Get up!” she shouts.

For once, my body does what I tell it to do, and we gallop through the forest as fast as we can without losing each other. The manticore barely gives us a minute before it starts its chase.

I can hear the shrubbery behind us crunch under its enormous paws as it catches up.

“There! I think that's the way out!” Apple Bloom points out.

Up ahead, there is a clearing in the forest, devoid of any trees. But as we draw closer, I realize how wrong Apple Bloom was when the ground just ended and opened up to a large ravine.

A giant maw nearly closes on us. Only a few hairs of my tail are caught in its teeth.

The grass is still damp from the earlier shower. While Apple Bloom tries to stop herself, I run forward instead and scoop the filly in my hooves. The slick mud sends us flying over the edge away from the manticore. There is a momentary feeling of weightlessness—a blissful feeling in my chest that makes me feel lighter than air as the wind whips through my mane. In this moment, this will be the closest I will be to being a pegasus with nothing but air between me and the earth.

Of course, it doesn't last very long.

I hold Apple Bloom close to my chest and brace for the impact. Something in my back makes a sickening snap against a rock jutting out of the wall. We tumble down a slope while I desperately try to cushion the blows with my body. My head cracks on a boulder. A rock digs into my flank. All the while, I am cradling this small body to my chest.

We roll to a stop at the bottom of the ravine where a small stream trickles by.

Wrapped in my hooves, she lies with eyes closed. All I can think of is her, hoping she is still alive. I don’t even allow myself to move as I wait for a sign.

Then, she stirs.

Her eyelids open slowly, revealing amber eyes. “Goldie…?” she whispers.

I don’t have the strength to say anything, so I nod, pressing my chin down on her bow.

“Are we dead?”

I think about it for a moment before finally shaking my head, despite my half-truth.

She trembles against me, and I hear the sniffles of a frightened child after a terrifying experience. There are small cuts on her cheeks and on her legs. Small red beads begin to form on the cuts of her face and stain the fur surrounding it. She looks like she fell off a scooter than falling off a cliff.

I do the first thing that comes to my mind and just brush a hoof across her back until she settles down.

Is this where kindness comes from? To help someone when they need it?

When enough time has passed for her trembling to stop, she turns her head to look at the sky and at the gorge we fell into.

“Lansakes! We fell all the way there?” she says, staring at the cliffside we came from. “We sure are lucky to survive.”

Just hearing her voice is a relief, but we’re not out of the woods yet. Until she is with her family, I won't let anything happen to her.

“Goldie,” she says. “Goldie, you're kinda hurting me.”

I didn’t even realize that I was squeezing her or that I hadn’t even let go since we fell. A quick glance around shows that the manticore didn't follow us down. My hooves tentatively loosen their grip.

Apple Bloom paces around the area, stepping over the stream as she contemplates. “Any idea how to get back home?”

As I stand up, I finally notice all the abuse my body has taken. Four angry gashes mark the right side of my body. Rocks have embedded themselves into my skin. There is the sound of a crack whenever my body moves a certain way. Of course, despite my body being beaten like a pinata, there is no fountain of blood to complete the gory mess. As for appearances, it can be fixed with a few stitches, but I have neither the tools nor the skills to do it. Even then, there is nothing that can be done for the inside.

While Apple Bloom’s eyes are wandering elsewhere, I adjust my saddlebags to hide the more grievous-looking wounds. But they can't hide the most obvious injury.

When Apple Bloom turns to look at me, her eyes lock onto my neck where the flesh has been cut—an open wound where the blood doesn't even dribble. She grows sickly pale at the sight of it.

"Goldie, your throat! Oh my gosh! Does it hurt?" Her sentences become a jumble of words as she starts bawling and hyperventilating. Despite putting up so much bravery, she's still just a little filly, and to her, she probably thinks I'm dying. Death can be very scary to children. She shouldn't have to see this at her age.

I place a gentle hoof under her chin and bring her eyes up to mine.

"Hey," I say raspily. "I'm fine."

She's trying hard to wipe the tears from her eyes, but it makes her face more of a mess.

"B-But… Your neck," she manages to say between breaths, but I silence her with a hoof.

"I can't die," I whisper. "Not until...I get you home."

She's speechless at first. Her face goes through many emotions—shock, confusion, before finally settling on awe.

"H-How?" she asks.

I shrug. "I don't know."

She finally gains control of her breathing and manages to calm down some. Her eyes glance at my eyes before falling on the wound.

"Gosh… So you really can't die..."

She reaches for her mane and undos her bow. I'm not sure what she's doing until she ties it over the gash on my throat, not caring that it's touching the pink cloth. When she's done, I'm left with a nice little bow on my neck.

"There. Much better," she says. "Sorta."

I touch the fabric at my neck and give a small grin.

When I finally stand up, I assess our options. The walls are too steep to climb. The only thing to do was go down the ravine until we find a way out.

“Let’s go,” I say. I don’t want to stick around to see how desperate the manticore is to follow us down here.

We walk in silence. Every few minutes, I check on the stream and glance at the clouds above us. Apple Bloom looks as if she’s about to nod off.

I nose under her barrel and lay her on my back. “Rest,” I say.

She doesn’t resist as I carry her. She rests her head on the back of my neck. As she does, a drop of water falls on my nose. It’s starting to rain again.

“Somebody's going to find us, right?” she asks.

I can only give a noncommittal grunt. I don’t even know if anyone knows we’re out here. But I have to keep her from worrying. In these times, someone has to be the optimist. “Everything will be…alright.”

As time marches on, the rain grows heavier, and we are exhausted, especially me. I feel like my body has reached its limit. My muscles are starting to stiffen as my movements grow more rigid. Are these the overdue signs of rigor mortis finally setting in?

Regardless, I push forward.

With all the rain, it doesn’t take long until my hooves begin to slosh in water. The stream has widened considerably as rain gathers in the ravine’s open mouth. Mud gathers on my coat with my hooves submerged in the muddy water.

This isn’t good.

I quicken my pace. We have to get out of here.

Debris, tree branches and loose soil pass by us. The water is already up to my back, and Apple Bloom is using my head to keep above the water. If she had still been walking beside me, she would already be underwater.

“We gotta get outta here! The water’s picking up!” she shouts with growing urgency.

I had just gotten to the side of the ravine when a sudden rush of water hits us without warning. Apple Bloom hangs on tight to my head, while I have to crane my neck up to keep my face from being submerged. “Hurry!” she shouts.

The flood worsens as another wave of watery debris washes over us. The current is strong enough to throw Apple Bloom off her balance and carry her down.

“Apple Bloom!” I shout.

I kick against the wall and let the current propel me in the direction of the filly.

I will not let her be taken. I will not let her be swallowed up by the giant maw of the Everfree.

My head goes underwater, and I am thrashing wildly, not knowing which way is up. I have to will myself to kick my legs to tread water. With every resurfacing, I call for the filly. One of those calls is answered by a cry for help.

“Goldie!”

Close by, I see her red mane. Before I lose sight of it, I head towards it as fast as I can and wrap a hoof around her chest. I barely manage to get her face above the water. A large branch floats by close enough for me to hold onto while carrying Apple Bloom. I paddle us to a depression in the walls of the ravine where a hill meets the forest.

I crawl up the hillside, sopping wet and covered head to hoof in mud with an equally dirty filly hanging over my withers. I settle her gently on the ground away from the rushing water and check on her.

She’s not moving. On closer inspection with my ear near her mouth, the horrifying realization strikes me when she’s not breathing. Alone in a forest with no one around and no direction to the nearest hospital, the situation is bleak. This filly’s life hangs in my hooves.

My hooves are on the filly’s chest, desperately pumping life back into her. After a minute, I tilt her head up and blow life-giving air through her lips. I keep repeating the process, hanging tightly onto the hope that I can save a single filly’s life.

There's water in my eyes. I wipe a hoof across my eyes to clear the rain. My vision blurs like a distorted spyglass. A strangled sound escapes my throat as I shiver uncontrollably.

I give her one last breath, filling her lungs to their fullest. I hang tightly onto the desire to save this girl. A young girl shouldn't have to die while I keep living in self-pity, and a loving family shouldn't have to wake up not knowing what happened to their little lost Apple. Can't you see that I want this?

As the last of my breath leaves my lips and into hers, I feel it—the slightest movement.

Relief washes over me instantly as her body starts racking with coughs, and she expels whatever water was inside.

It's one thing for my undead life to end. But I would never stand to see someone else's life pass away in front of my eyes. The thought of how different things could be if I hadn't resuscitated this filly plays in my mind over and over...

The dark thought cuts short. A pair of hooves wrap around my withers as Apple Bloom hangs with a loose grip around my neck.

“Goldie…” she croaks.

I wrap my hooves around Apple Bloom and hold her against me.

"I’ve got you," I say to her. “Everything’ll be alright.”

She weakly tugs on my mane to get my attention. "Goldie," she says again. "I saw an angel."

I look over Apple Bloom, hoping there wasn't a serious injury to her head. Her eyes are focused on me, and there's a faint smile on her face.

"I saw one. She stood over your shoulder,” she says. “Isn’t that great? It means you have someone watching over you."

"No more talking," I tell her. "Just rest now."

Apple Bloom's words have set me on edge. I'm worried there's something seriously wrong with her. I have to find help.

I carefully lift her onto my back and quickly trot along the stream. By some stroke of luck, I manage to pick the right direction. The forest's trees eventually become something more familiar.

I see apple trees, rows of them.

In the darkness, a beam of light cuts through the evening like a beacon. It's a ray of hope coming from the window of a farmhouse.

Inside, worried voices talk amongst each other. One in particular is louder than the rest.

“I ain't got time to rest, Big Mac! I need to go back out there to look for her!" There is the hasty rhythm of hooves on wood, like someone is pacing in circles. "Maybe I should stop by Rarity's place again and see if she found Apple Bloom."

Standing hesitantly at the door, I lay the filly gently by the entrance and give three firm knocks before bolting behind an apple tree. I barely make it before someone answers the door.

The light of the farm house reaches for the tree I'm hiding behind.

"Hello?"

The door swings open on creaky hinges, and I watch Applejack gaze around the dark orchard before it falls on the filly.

“Apple Bloom!” Applejack cries out. “Big Mac! Help me get her inside! I gotta get a doctor!”

She takes another look around the orchard. Dark circles ring her eyes, and under closer scrutiny, her appearance looks frazzled as if she's been running all day. Had she stayed up since yesterday looking for Apple Bloom? I press by back against the tree I'm hiding behind. Did she see me?

Applejack pauses for a moment before shaking her head and running off towards the town’s hospital.

I stare at the farmhouse a while longer before ambling away.

Four tired legs gyrate me forward like a machine, while my mind reflects on past events. It doesn’t take long for another voice to join those thoughts:

Scary, isn't it? This is how the rest of the world lives, yet everyone still manages to find a way to smile even though their next day could be their last. Your kindness and courage saved that girl so that she can smile another day. You should be proud about that.

I sigh. I probably left emotional scars on her, I think to myself.

The voice in my head is firm but kind.

Nobody is perfect, Goldie.

There is silence between us in the lull of our conversation. Of course, now the voice in my head decides to be chatty.

You've learned to open your heart to others. You have ponies who love you back. But what does it all mean if you can't love yourself? she asks.

I can almost imagine the look of motherly disappointment coming from her as she chastises me—Fluttershy, wearing a single blue flower behind her ear and shaking her head with a tsk.

I'm watching you take steps towards finding yourself. Each step is longer and more purposeful. You're already making leaps and bounds. Soon, nothing will ever hold you down.

You really think I can do all that? I ask the Fluttershy look-alike.

The voice in my head flashes a knowing grin.

You just have to be kind to others and more importantly be kind to yourself. You can start with the girl you're always thinking about.

I nod to myself. "Right…"

By the time I realize my surroundings, I already find myself at Fluttershy’s cottage again. It's all very familiar, like my first day in Ponyville.

A peek inside shows a scene I haven't been expecting. Fluttershy lies curled on the couch I used to sleep on. A quilt wraps around her body. On the table, there is a bowl of soup that has probably long gone cold and a first aid kit. Had she been waiting for me?

I slump on her doorstep, formulating an apology.

Outside Fluttershy's house, I stare at nothing in particular. My eyes stare straight ahead of me towards an unimaginable future, where I am finally comfortable with myself. I stare until my eyes grow heavy.

A gentle nudge stirs me from my rest.

There she is, wrapped in a quilt and standing before me. The pony who paints the inner walls of my skull like a mural. A martyr for kindness and all the right things she stands for.

Fluttershy smiles. “Welcome home."

I stand up slowly to meet her eyes. My mouth opens and closes trying to decide the right words to say before settling on, "I'm sorry."

"Goldie…" she begins, but I'm not finished.

“I’m sorry for making you worry," I say with absolute clarity, no longer held back by hesitation. "It was wrong of me to run off like that."

She holds my head against her chest while brushing a hoof over my withers. I can feel her initial hesitancy when her hoof finds the claw marks that peek behind the bow on my neck, but her touch becomes more gentle and caring.

"It’s alright,” she says, barely above a whisper. "It's alright, Goldie."

I rest my face against her, letting her heartbeat resonate within me. It's in my ears, it's in my cheeks, and I want it to live with me. Its rhythm echoes in my silent chamber of a body. But it's not mine to have. I haven't deserved it.

I gently push her away at arms length, shaking my head. "What I did back then—with those ponies—I did because I was selfish. Because I wanted to be a friend that could protect you." She looks at me with tired, teary eyes. “I want to live, not just for me, but for you, Fluttershy. So please... Don't hate me.”

"Goldie…" She lets a tear drop, but she smiles nevertheless. "I would never hate you. You're a good person through and through."

I only nod, exhausted of all the words I can possibly say right now.

"Also," she continues, "thank you for always thinking of me, Goldie." She wraps me in a bone-crushing hug, shifting my broken ribs and causing them to make an unpleasant sound.

Fluttershy squeaks sheepishly and lets go immediately.

"Sorry!" she apologizes. "We should get you inside."

She ushers me in, coaxing me towards the couch and slipping off the saddlebags that have miraculously stayed on me.

When I have settled into my usual seat, she starts unpacking the first aid kit. “It’s my turn to take care of you. So just rest," she says.

She leaves the room to get some warm water to clean me up.

I glance out the window, where among the inky darkness lies a forest where few seldom go. The Everfree is a thing of mystery. One day you can be walking in the Everfree, the next it could be trying to swallow you up. It is uncaring and merciless, much like many of the creatures that live there. After spending so long in Ponyville, perhaps I don’t belong to the Everfree anymore.

As I sit in Fluttershy's home thinking about the ponies in my life, my mind focuses on what that book said: "Love can be found in the people who taught us to love." I wonder if I was the one to come up with that quote in a life long forgotten.

I shift comfortably on the sofa while glancing at the stacks of papers and books on her coffee table. But then, something catches my eyes. There is a newspaper lying on top of one of the stacks. The words are now clear and coherent, no longer a jumble of meaningless lines. Among the articles of Equestrian news, there is a list of ponies with a description and a picture for each of them.

There is a young pegasus who is hazelnut brown with even darker shade for her mane. A white diamond mark rests between her eyes. Amber eyes like Apple Bloom's. A timid smile adorns her face. A blue flower sits behind one of her ears.

Her name is Bluebell.

And I'm reading the obituaries.

Author's Note

This has been a very busy year.

Towards the end of last year, I took a break from writing and had this chapter on Drive, which had been waiting to be edited. Then over the course of the last few months, I picked it up again to review what I wrote, which led to many changes and edits. There's still some parts I'm not 100% satisfied with but I think it hit a certain acceptance level.

Alone

If I had known being dead would be this lonely, then I wish I was buried under a blanket of dirt. At least I wouldn’t be bored. But then I would have to deal with bugs crawling inside me. Just thinking about it is gross.

You can never tell if you’re dead or not. I certainly didn’t know when I woke up. Though, I guess the stiff limbs and a missing heartbeat should’ve been a big hint. I’ve also noticed that every creature in the forest seemed to avoid me, even the big ones. But, I’m not complaining about not being able to meet a manticore up close. I doubt anyone would.

I guess I should count myself lucky that I don’t look like someone’s leftover meal. I’ve seen some poor animals look way worse than me. As for me, I got out with a limp and a most likely rotting corpse of a body.

I don’t remember much. I try to piece together my memory, but there are too many gaps, like pages torn from a book. I have some idea of how I died from what’s left of my memory. I think I was running. Yes, that’s it. Running. I remember it being dark in the forest. I’m pretty sure it’s the one I’m in now. All trees look the same to me. Everything becomes a blur after that. The next thing I know, I found myself lying in a ditch with my face in the mud. It wasn’t exactly how I wanted to wake up. A bad concussion, a broken neck, a heart attack--it could be any one of these causes. I try not to dwell too much on it. What's done is done. I wouldn't want to remember the gruesome details anyway.

At least I found a lovely blue flower next to me.

Patches of these flowers are around the forest. I make sure to pick up one or two flowers whenever I come across them. They make a great accessory behind my ear. When you’re as grossly pale as me, you’ll find anything to make yourself as close to beautiful, or at least normal.

I’d kill for some make-up right now. No, not literally. I don’t kill. Ponies will probably think that I do, but I don’t. With my zombie hooves, how can I? I can barely stand up straight. And what would be the point of killing someone? Just so I can eat them? Well, that’s pretty stereotypical. I can’t taste anything, and I don’t feel hunger anymore. I mean, I could try eating someone, but I don’t see any point in it. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I just want to talk, but in a forest filled with dangerous creatures, I don’t think that’s going to happen any time soon.

I go through the same routine everyday: wander around the forest for something new to look at, pick flowers, and stand around like the zombie I am. Right now, I’m standing in front of a creek. I’m staring at the pony in the reflection under the first rays of morning.

I look horrible. There are twigs in my mane, now ragged and tangled. The gold strands of hair have dulled over time. My coat and my hooves are dirty, days’ worth of mud clinging to them. My eyes have an empty look in them. They match the color of my flower, which is beginning to wilt in its place behind my ear. I will have to pick up more soon. I must have looked pretty once.

It’s sad. I’m staring at myself, trying to imagine what I must have looked like, but I can’t remember my name. I’ve lost the most important thing from my old life. You don’t really miss something until it’s gone. You come across so many names in your life that you don’t really think about your own name. It’s just something that you sign on a paper or give out like a greeting card. But now that my name is gone, I feel empty and numb, kind of like being dead itself. On the bright side, there hasn’t been anyone asking for my name.

I try to work my mouth. There’s only a numb feeling in my tongue and jaw, but I can see the pony in the creek trying to open her mouth. I should consider getting a toothbrush at the first opportunity I can. A heavy moan leaves my mouth. It’s full of dust from disuse, like many of the words from my old life.

It takes a couple tries to actually say something, but I managed to let out a feeble, “Hi.” It comes out raspy and forced.

I have to work on my greetings more. I need to learn how to talk to ponies again. But another part of me finds that thought silly. I haven’t seen any pony for days, and I don’t think they’d stop to have a chat with someone like me. It’s almost guaranteed that they’ll run away and scream their heads off.

I shake my head and trot forward into the water. It probably feels cold. I can’t tell anymore. I dunk my head under the water and swish it around to get the twigs out of my hair. My head pulls up, dripping wet.

My gaze is towards the sky. The clouds are moving towards the sun. I should head in that direction today. I walk out of the creek, only slightly cleaner than before and completely wet. I head towards the sunrise.

It’s always quiet wherever I go. Birds suddenly stop chirping. The leaves stop rustling. It’s as if I stepped in and ruined whatever mood was there.

I sigh.

It’s just one of the perks of being a zombie, I guess.

There’s a slight movement under a brush not far from me. I hobble over to it. What I find is a wolf made of wood. Timberwolves tend to prowl around the area, but usually in packs. This one was alone. It bares its teeth and lets out a low growl. I would’ve let it be after that growl of warning, but the odd way it was hunched over got me curious. I take a step closer to get a better look, but a loud snarl stops me from going any further. The timberwolf had a broken branch for one of its front legs. It must’ve been left for dead by the others.

I take a step back and trot away. About twenty steps away, I find what I need by a sizable tree. I come back to the timberwolf where it still remained, still as “friendly” as the first meeting. It watches me cautiously with its maw open and ready to bite. I walk slowly towards it and drop a thick branch from my mouth.

I can't let it die like this. I’m sure it would be thankful for getting a second chance at life. I know I would.

The malice in the wolf’s eyes fades away, replaced by curiosity. It crawls closer to the branch and lays its broken leg against it. A green glow shimmers around the branch and attaches it to its leg, melding it in place.

I watch with a blank look on my face.

Once it was fixed up, the timberwolf stands up and walks in circles, testing its new leg out. When it looks at me again, I reach out to it with my hoof. It runs away.

I’m alone again.

Now that it can run again, why else would it need me? It probably ran off to its pack or wherever in Equestria it wants to go. Anywhere but where I am.

I drop my hoof and moan. Nothing stays forever. It’s probably better off that way. I’d probably slow it down. Why’d I ever think it would stay around with a dead pony like me?

What is wrong with me?

I shouldn’t be so hard on myself. I did something good, and that timberwolf is happier than it was before I came along. Maybe someone will stumble into me and change my life too.

I continue my walk, going through the thickets and brambles and earning more twigs and leaves in my mane. I wish I can walk faster. I think snails crawl faster than me, and probably lap me a couple times too.

This was going to be a long day.

By the time the sun had begun to set, I made it to a patch of wild blue flowers. I’m giddy at the sight of them, though my face doesn’t show it. I walk to the flowers and collapse on top of them. I roll around, getting the petals on my fur and in my hair. I would pick up a flower and smell it, but I can’t smell anything. I imagine they smell good.

I stop rolling and lie comfortably on my bed of flowers, my face buried in the petals. I pluck one of them with my teeth and fling it onto my head. My hooves do the rest in fixing it into place behind my ear, replacing the wilted one.

I lie there for quite some time. Night arrives and the stars and the moon come to greet me. This is what I look forward to every night. This would be the second time I’ve seen a full moon since I woke up. I lie on my back to get a better view. The stars may leave, but they’ll always come back. Day after day, night after night, I wander the earth aimlessly as a corpse reanimated. If I’m supposed to be dead, then why am I here?

The stars don’t answer me. No one is around to give me answers. I’m alone with my thoughts.

I wonder if that timberwolf found its pack. What is it doing right now? No, bad question. It’s most likely trying to get its meal right now. Now I kind of feel bad. I helped a timberwolf live so that something else can die. Something was going to die either way. Everyone has to die at some point. Now that’s a morbid thought. But does that mean I’ll die again? This is too confusing. A walk ought to do me some good. Well, I’m dead already, but it can’t hurt, you know?

I trot out the field and follow a new direction.

I stumble in the darkness for who knows how long. I’m so bored. There’s nothing to see at night. At least during the day I’m not just staring at darkness for hours. If I could sleep, I would, but as I’ve learned, the dead don’t sleep. One can only dream. That’s funny. It’s nice to know my sense of humor isn’t dead.

I sigh. I miss being able to dream.

I pass by a sleeping hydra. You really don’t want to wake them up. Nasty temper and all that. And who can forget all those mouths that can rip a pony to shreds? I may be dead, but I’m not brainless enough to wake up a hydra.

Oh, gross.

Not far from it, I see the gory mess of its recent prey. I think it might’ve been a chicken or something at one point. Don’t look back and keep walking. I move a little faster to get away as quick as possible.

I come across something hiding in a bush. The snapping of a twig catches my attention. If that wasn’t obvious, then the rustling of the bush would be an obvious hint that something was there. I wait for a while until the bush shakes again, as if something was trying to grab my attention. This was new.

I hobble over to it, but by the time I get over there, whatever was hiding in the bush was gone. Another rustling of leaves draws my attention much further away. I follow it again. Some part of me hoped it was the wolf again. Maybe it wants to play with me. This long process of hide-and-go-seek keeps going.

The forest around me grows unfamiliar. I don’t think I’ve been in this part of the forest. It’s less dark. The moonlight touches the ground more often. Something new catches my eye: a hut made from a large tree. I try to peek inside through the window, but it’s too dark to see anything. But, there were definitely snores coming from inside.

Another twig snaps. When I turn to find where the next rustling bush might be, I, instead, find a worn dirt path on the ground. It’s a path probably used by ponies, though I wonder what kind of ponies would wander into this forest. Then again, I was one of those ponies.

I follow it.

The snapping of twigs and the shaking of leaves have stopped. It seems our game is over. The night brightens up the longer I trudge under the canopy of leaves. At the end of my path, I see an exit for the first time. I take a few steps forward and look back at the dark forest. I see a wooden tail vanish behind a tree. I would smile if I could. The best I can do is wave a stiff goodbye before heading to the exit.

A flood of sunlight washes me. I’m happy that I got to see the timberwolf one last time. In the distance, I see a small town. I walk towards it, knowing full well that there will be actual living ponies there, and for the first time ever, I don’t feel lonely.

Author's Note

An interesting little idea to get back into writing. When you're stuck in a slump, sometimes the only thing to do is just write anything. Even if it is 4 a.m. in the morning. Also, it feels great to try out different writing styles.