I am no normal pegasus. Inside, I have a power, a certain power that stands out. The ability to control fire.
No, I'm serious, I could do it.
I patted the cloud I was slumped on, I allowed it's fluffiness and warmth to be directed into my right hoof.
My orange mane was swept slightly backwards from the gentle sunset breeze, my mane had one spike of hair at the top, hooked slightly downwards. Below that, were two spikes, curved slightly upwards, and below that, a spike that wasn't curved in any direction. My pure yellow eyes were locked onto the beauty of the setting sun. Looking around my body again, I saw my red
coat of fur, my wings were tucked at my sides. Finally, getting to my cutie mark, I looked at the fire shaped mark. Roughly 30 degrees upwards, were two yellow lightning bolts.
I never took summer flight camp. I just didn't like to be pushed around by rules, you won't believe the relief I felt once my parents said I wasn't going to go there. Instead, I just practiced myself. The results were pretty damn impressive, I was able to manage 700 mph. I wasn't able to breach the sound barrier like Rainbow Dash, I just couldn't, no other pegasus has, and she was five to ten times faster than the sound barrier anyways. So if I did breach it barely, then I still wouldn't be much of a match in speed against her.
I'm not particularly well known, I never wanted to show my unique ability in front of anypony, in fear of them thinking that I was showing off. I also found that I, was totally immune to heat, of any kind. I felt lucky of that, but at the same time, cursed. But I decided to give in to that, because if I did commit suicide, then I wouldn't get a new body, so I had to play along.
I have made a few moves with my talent, but I've never been good at naming, so they may be downright horrible.
From the most destructive to the most destructive of my moves:
Scorch Flare
This move has me shoot four flames, one for each hoof. They travel a hundred meters before stopping.
Fire Swirl
This move, creates a fiery tornado to put it simply.
Incinerating the Sky
All clouds in half a kilometer radius will be set ablaze, this move however, drains plenty of my energy.
Blazing Shock Wave
A shock wave travels horizontally, the shock wave is coated in flames and anything below it, goes on fire. It only works for a kilometer radius and is so draining, that if I don't have full energy, then I'll pass out. You don't wanna know how I found that part out. Actually, the radius depends on how high I am, over five kilometers, fifty meters. Fifty meters, three kilometers of range.
But I do have to thank for it, it has saved my life once. When a dragon tried to singe me with fire. It also made me feel like I was a goddess of fire.
After a few minutes, the sun had set completely, leaving me in the darkness and coolness of the night. I've always enjoyed the sensation of coolness on my skin, so I decided to stay for a bit longer.
My red coat stood out in the darkness, but since nopony was there, nothing ever noticed my presence in the night. I was used to that. No attention was fine with me, and I never did expect much from my unfortunately deceased parents. But I got attention, and it was still quite painful to adjust anyways. Somedays, I feel aggravated and cranky that they were gone, but then, I remember that I can't do a darn thing about it. But it doesn't stop me from wishing I had some friends. Of course I probably wouldn't be that comfortable in the spotlight, but I just needed some. My socializing hasn't been very successful, unfortunately. I've been considering giving up on that a year ago when I was twenty.
Since that, my life has been a burden. My parents have always wished me a happy life. I've tried to grant their wish for years, but I'm failing. Nothing was exciting, which was ironic. I must've been the most depressed mare in all of Equestria. I mean, Equestria is normally quite the place of happiness, right? The bitter bite of that fact, and that it didn't apply for me, had haunted me for years. I longed for something exciting, like having friends, being able to hang out with them, and most of all, something I long craved for...
Adventure.
And I needed to make friends.
I didn't make much money, I'm basically a street performer on Ponyville. The most common things that I would do were:
Setting my body on fire
Looping around in the air
Everything you could think of that isn't totally chaotic!
And at the end of each day, I could only earn five to ten bits. And that's only if I do perform for eight hours a day. I hated having to work for fifty-six hours every week for only thirty-five to seventy bits. In other words, I had barely enough to survive,
even with all the effort I was putting in. I'm just lucky if Rarity comes by, she gives about three bits normally, enough to keep me going for an afternoon. Unless she thinks what I'm currently doing is only what a ruffian would do.
But this night, I was gonna make sure that changed, or at least I hoped that this would be the night.
"Goodbye," I thought in my head, preparing to abandon the fluffiness of the cloud.
As I flew off, I pondered on the possibilities, no matter how improbable they were, they were still possible. Welcoming the familiar thrill of flying, I flew below the clouds. I kept on cruising until Ponyville came into sight. I wondered if I would have any adventures this night.
My experience after my parents died helped me not take things for granted, and if anything did go horribly wrong, then that trait I applied through the years would help me.
I nose-dived at Ponyville, now the possibilities would be absolutely endless.
As Ponyville came closer, the more I rushed. I was so focused on getting there as quick as I could that I didn't notice a shouting, cyan, rainbow maned pegasus hurtling down at me, once she collided with me, I was sent hurtling down at the stone streets. Getting up to my hooves, I shook the dust off my head and glared at her, only to have my eyes meet Rainbow Dash's mischievous smile.
I glared at her her cerise eyes, which happened to be full of life. It was pretty much impossible to not see the lighting in her eyes.
"Sorry," she laughed,"New trick, didn't work out. Thanks for cushioning the fall!" she began laughing harder, going as far as to tumble over.
"Yeah, your welcome," I told her, sarcastically.
"No, wait," she stopped me,"Since you came to Ponyville nearly a year ago, I practiced tricks during the morning and after sunset, just thought I would tell you. Cause I make up the nuttiest tricks ever. But it never gets boring to see your face that way!"
My response was a mixture of aggravation and pure anger,"AND YOU DIDN'T BOTHER TO TELL ME, AFTER ALL THIS TIME?!?!
Pulling the pegasus off my body, I proceeded to engage in a slow trot down the street. After about five minutes, the Sugarcube Corner was near. My body got stiffer and stiffer, until it reached the point it would explode any second. I walked around it as far as possible to avoid being spotted by Pinkie Pie. But then, I spotted her prancing happily towards the window. I needed cover, fast.
Diving behind a nearby bush, I stuck my head out, and peered at her. She had reached the window. Opening her cerulean eyes, she scanned the area, and unfortunately they seemed to stop right in my direction.
Dammit.
She busted the window open and shouted,"Hey! Streakflare!"
But it was too late, I had already began flying off.
I tore through clouds, ignoring the ticklish feeling of passing through them. After a few more seconds of flying, I stopped behind Twilights library. Peering out of my cover, I didn't see a bouncing, pink, earth pony headed my way, so I breathed a quick sigh of relief.
My lungs were half emptied. I don't believe I mentioned that I hate the feeling of being out of breath, I don't know, my best guess is that being out of breath made me feel helpless.
I enjoyed the relief but I was interrupted soon after.
"Hey Streakflare!" shouted an enthusiastic, excited, and horribly familiar voice.
Bolting off again, I sped off in excess of 600 miles per hour. The resistance was pretty much trying to tear my skin off.
I flew so fast that the wind that my wings generated literally ripped some of the flowers off their roots. I would've measured
about 14.5 wingpower.
Fluttershy's cottage came into view, and so I nose-dived at the entrance. Smashing through the front door, and opening it dangerously close to Fluttershy's face. The amount of force produced enough wind to blow her mane back and shut her eyes.
"Help!" I shouted."Pinkie's after me! you gotta cover me!"
She was too shocked to respond, the most she could muster after half a minute was a slow nod. I kicked the door shut, rattling the entire building so hard, I would've sworn that the structure would collapse.
After a few minutes of catching my breath, I walked up the stairs, only to be face to face with the one pony I didn't want to see.
"Okay," I muttered."You win, what do you want with me?" I braced my self for eternal annoyance.
I was answered as a jet of water soaked my face. Once most of the water cleared, I saw Pinkie laughing hysterically, holding a empty bucket of water. After a few seconds, I couldn't take it anymore, I burst out laughing. I haven't laughed since Pinkie threw me a huge blowout welcome party.
I gave her a high five and trotted away to the window, flying off into the night sky. Maybe Pinkie could make a nice friend.
I smiled at the very thought.
I waited for a few hours before I went to my next stop.
My next stop was Rainbow Dash's cloud house.
I let the friction brush against me, allowing the lovely feeling of cool air and freedom overtake my fears. Once I had landed on the entrance, I peered inside. Rainbow Dash wasn't home yet. And just when I was going to invite her to go admire the moonlight on the clouds. Shrugging, I flew off, my body cut through the air like a knife through water. The friction in the air was also tense, and I found my mouth's sides being pulled back by the speed. I was determined to go to the one place that I had in mind next, Twilight's library.
In front of me was the library itself. Although it really just was a tree hollowed out and protected by a magical lightning rod, it was more than it looked. Inside seemed bigger than the outside even. The balcony wasn't occupied, the windows weren't open, and so, looking inside, I saw that Twilight wasn't anywhere in sight. Although there was the chance of her being upstairs, it seemed deserted, except for a sleeping Spike.
The door was unlocked, strangely. Taking a step inside, I saw nopony, nothing, except for furniture. The only things sentient were me, Spike, and Owloysius. It was quiet, too quiet.
Owloysius's head turn 180 degrees to face me, then his body.
"Uh," I said with plenty of anxiety,"You're Owloysius, right?"
"Who?"
I sighed and slapped my face, this was gonna be harder than I thought.
"Where's Twilight?"
"Who."
"What is that supposed to mean?!"
"Who."
"Agh!"
"Who."
"Oh great," I muttered."You're barely gonna help."
"Who."
I watched Spike's chest rise up and down slowly, indicating deep sleep. His green eyes didn't stir at all. Shortly after that, he sighed contently. I'd hate to interrupt his sleep. I hated the feeling of guilt, even though I was kind of good at dealing with it. But
I decided that I needed to, if not, then this night wouldn't be successful. And believe me, I'm not known for being patient.
A moment later, I quickly and forcefully wrenched the blanket off Spike's content body, instantly waking him up.
"Wuh, wuh!" he shouted, I could tell that his vision was blurred and still in the slow process of clearing up.
As he looked up to face me, he shouted,"You're not Twilight!"
"Sorry for interrupting your sleep, but, it is I who want to to know where Twilight went," I replied.
"I-I don't know!"
My eyes narrowed,"Are you sure?"
"Seriously, I don't know!"
I tried moving on to bribing, but he still didn't have an answer, and so, I finally decided to give up on my best lead. Trotting away without another word.
Going outside, I asked my next lead, the first one I saw, Pinkie Pie. She was in sight five minutes later.
"Hey Pinkie Pie," I greeted her.
"Oh hey Streakflare!" she greeted me back.
Turning the subject, I asked her the question,"Have you seen Twilight?"
Luckily she did have a reply,"Oh, she's right over there!"
Looking where she was pointing at, Twilight was at the entrance of her library.
"Oh..." I said, looking down. I slapped my own face a second later. And I did it hard.
I trotted to where Twilight was, she had opened the door and was just about to slam it shut when she saw me.
"Uh..." She said straightly, then asked,"Are you Scorchflare?"
"Streakflare."
"Okay," she told me,"But I really need to go back and, you know, catch up on some studies!" She slammed the door shut.
That was one success, one failure, and four more to go. It was much better than I ever got. This is huge, if I weren't so "busy" then I would have been friends with Pinkie from the start.
In the distance, I could've sworn I heard Pinkie ask Twilight where I was, and get replied with,"Isn't she right over there?" But I passed it off as my imagination.
I stretched my wings. They ached a bit from rapidly flapping to propelling me forward from the last half an hour. The joints were the most sour part of my wings. But I could still fly. Ignoring the sting of my wings, I took off to revisit Rainbow Dash's cloud house.
To minimize the amount of flaps and pain, I spread my wings to their full wingspan, roughly three feet and a half. Gliding through the night sky, despite the fact I had a red body, I doubted much of the ponies below noticed me gliding across their heads.
Speaking of attention, I've been working on a new move, where I would coat my body in flames and do something. I thought of calling it Blitz Crash. It definitely would grab plenty of attention. Yet, my fears of being viewed as a show-off kept me.
Enjoying the coolness on my skin, I nearly forgot to stop by the time reached my destination. Landing on the front porch, I knocked on the door.
The door opened to reveal a irritated, aggravated, exasperated Rainbow Dash. (Even though those words pretty much mean the same thing)
"What do you want, Streakflare?!" she more yelled at me than asked me.
"Hey, Rainbow Dash,"I replied in the opposite tone to hers,"You wanna bring out some punch so we could lie on the clouds and watch the moon all night?"
Dammit, I said it too soon again. What is wrong with me?!
Rainbow scratched her head, the offer obviously tempted her. Unfortunately, her response was,"No, it's midnight, don't you realize that?!"
I looked down,"Oh..."
Disappointed, I flew off. I made no care to not strain my wings, I got too much hope. And now that it was declined, the disappointment was greater than ever. I felt the craving for friends and adventure stronger than ever, I was barely able to hold without going mad. I flew away as quick as I could so I could rest. I decided to perch onto a steep, rocky cliff with a grand view of Ponyville. I could see all the buildings, the white houses, reinforced with pink wood. The straw thatched roofs. I could see all of the stone streets, the closed stalls. The sleepy, idle, town. It was definitely a grand view, but it made me feel incredibly unimportant. I only had three more tries for this night. I only had succeeded with Pinkie, really. But after all, she's probably the friendliest, most hyper, and easy to socialize with of all of the ponies in Equestria. I mean, SHE wants to be friends with everypony.
What am I saying?! She IS all of the above, not probably.
I landed and looked at my bed for the night, a cloud. It wasn't a proper one, I didn't even have a proper home, I just slept on the clouds.
Lying down on it, I breathed a little sigh of comfort. Before I knew it, I was asleep...
My vision was blurry, unclear, and shaky. As it slowly cleared up, I saw that I wasn't on a cloud anymore. I was inside a cave. With a Ursa Major. Its purple body, it's chest rose up, and down, slowly. It was asleep
I covered my mouth with my hooves to cover up my scream. The Major was even larger than I envisioned. It would tear up Ponyville with unbelievable ease. Looking closer, it was in deep sleep, lucky me.
I thanked that being a pegasus meant a lighter body and slowly began to sneak away.
My body tensed at every step, the feeling was so horrible, that I was sure that my body would explode into a million pieces any second. The feeling was so horrible, I was certain I would never be able to hear a roar or something without jumping, EVER.
The Ursa began to stir. Making me freeze in my tracks, maybe I was making too much noise.
It began to stir more, flipping over every second. It wasn't long before it got up and spotted me.
"Heh, heh, heh," I said, anxious to get out of here.
Without hesitation, I bolted away, faster than I ever did, in fact, I could have dislocated my rear leg joints. Going away at speeds so quick, that practically nothing could be seen. Nothing but a blue and white blur. Despite this, I somehow knew the way to go.
Finally stopping to see where I had gone, I realized that I had gone all the way to Canterlot. Hovering above it's spires. Then, I felt a sharp pain at my spine and consciousness seemed to slip away from me...
I woke up, panting hard. I could hear my heart's adrenaline rush, the it thumped so hard, I was sure that there was the remote chance of it bursting out of my chest. It was ten minutes before my heart rate was normal again.
"It was only a dream," I thought to myself repeatedly. But it felt, so, real.
What could have been the point of the dream? I couldn't make heads or tails of it. Maybe it was pointless after all.
I never dreamed much, and when I did, I normally had random ones of me, doing a random or just plain idiotic thing, my brain seems to work that way. And then, stupid reality interrupts. Hey, my real life is already a bust. I know I dream of stupid stuff.
That's why I normally liked sleeping, I could escape reality. Just the thought of that made me want to sigh with content. Shaking my head and snapping out of it, I began flapping my wings.
However, my brain was so full of trash that I almost forgot to flap my wings, sending me into a wild frenzy of panic. Kicking around, I managed to just gain control as I got uncomfortably close to the ground.
I breathed a quick sigh of relief. I began a slow glide at low altitude, my wings were stiff from being cramped all night and I needed a nice stretch for them.
I reared backwards for the launch. I took off, like an arrow flying from an overstretched bow. Slicing through the air, I felt myself going forward at speeds that would've drained any normal pegasus in mere seconds. But not me, I've trained harder than most pegasi, resulting in me being able to hold seven hundred miles per hour for five minutes. Propelling myself past several clouds, and pretty much doing all the work for the weather ponies, I continued to fly.
Lowering altitude, flying only four metres above the streets, I managed to ignore the angry screams and went forward quicker instead. Somehow, I took my determination and converted it to fuel me on, and I had enormous amounts of that.
Suddenly, I felt a mach cone building around my body. It only lasted for half a second but, now, I was the other only pegasus to break the sound barrier, and everypony in Ponyville was present to witness it. I could even see Rainbow Dash looking out one of her house's windows. But I wasn't able to initiate Rainboom. Except I never intended it. Oh I hate it now, I was sure that I would be forever deemed a show-off. But it never came. Relief surged through my body.
That didn't matter. Then all my determination slipped away as I dropped to the nearest pile of grass and caught my breath.
I knew that I probably wasn't gonna be able to do it again, because my determination was probably even stronger than Rainbow Dash's determination to join the Wonderbolts. But, that power seemed to slip from me now, and it probably wouldn't happen again.
In a way, I knew what I did was selfish. But again, I knew I never intended it. I knew the truth was a morning stretch turning into flying at mach one. In a way, it was pointless. Literally pointless
"So much for modesty," I thought.
I tried taking off again, but, my fatigue was worse than I ever expected. My wings literally felt like they were burning, inside out. The pain was irrecoverable, I don't think I felt anything worse in my life, and I was sure that I would be grounded for a few hours, at ;east. It was obvious that I didn't break a bone or something but, of course, it felt like my wings, would just fall off. And I had the nagging feeling that I wasn't gonna like being grounded.
Walking down the streets, the chatter and things were normal again, it was as if nothing had happened, if you exclude a few fruits and vegetables on the ground. And just about all of them were in at least two pieces. My hyperactive mind made me think of how their family would feel, but I knocked the thought out by thinking that it wasn't an intelligent life form anyways.
I sat down, on the soft grass. The warm sunshine began bathing my body. I frowned, I always preferred the breathtaking feeling of cool air to warm sunshine. I, just didn't like to be hot. It feels horrible after a while. If it weren't for the fact that the Sun is vital for life, I don't think I would tolerate it at all even. There was this time where I enjoyed sunshine, but in short bursts. Now, I don't like it one way or another.
I could have sworn, just then, that the temperature suddenly rose.
Not to mention my mind is always full of trash, resulting in the most random things in the world coming to my head. But most of the time when I work for money, my thoughts are consumed by how things would've went if my life went in the opposite direction. But when something random pops up, my brain goes into an uncontrollable frenzy. I can't shut my brain up no matter what. The only cure is a distraction popping up. And whenever I think of this, my brain always overloads with junk. But the strange thing is that I love it most of the time.
I tried distracting myself by looking at the water cascading down a nearby waterfall. I ended up yelling in frustration when it didn't work. Now I was thinking uncontrollably about TWO things.
I trotted away, shaking my head.
I knew I had no room in my head for such nonsense, I had to continue my quest. For friendship.
I allowed myself to breath in the crisp, fresh, morning air. Trotting forward, I headed in the direction of Sweet Apple Acres...
The red barn lay ahead of me, somehow, the area that always caught my eye first, was the bell. I don't know, shiny things just do that to me. But the enormous acres of apples trees never failed to impress me.
My eyes rolled to rest on Applejack. The orange mare was kicking an apple tree. All of the apples fell down as if an earthquake or something happened. My awkward brain suddenly got me thinking of how it would be like to be an apple tree. I didn't know if they could feel of not, but either way, I felt lucky to be a pony. I slapped myself to snap myself out of it.
She heaved two of the baskets to her sides, and leisurely strolled to a large cart, supposedly for gathering apples. I didn't see why the cart needed more apples, it was so full of stuff that it looked like the top stack would collapse any second. And it somehow didn't. I mean, it was overloaded by two whole metres! It was even more miraculous when none fell off when she pushed it away like it was no big deal.
My eyeballs practically burst out when she kicked the cart into the barn, and not a single apple was to be found on the ground. Next, she kicked the door shut, rattling the door frame. She then proceeded to continue to buck apples, filling another cartload. The process repeated for half a hour, and she only bucked a half of the orchard. It was beyond obvious that she was much too busy. Anyways, why would she spend a hour or two with somepony she barely knew in the first place?
"Well, damn," I thought.
And there went Applejack from my list.
I was trotting down the street, my wings still burned. But it was a numb pain, not sharp, luckily. They still throbbed, as if four earth ponies had just stacked on them, two for each. I soon noticed that the sun was getting hotter, and the air was getting humid. My body was getting sticky and sweaty. It felt like it was being fried, and I didn't like the idea of being fried pegasus. The feeling was getting unbearable, I just hoped this wouldn't become a drought.
Then, the temperature suddenly dropped, as if the world was taken, and stuck in a huge pile of snow. I mean, it was BEYOND freezing. I gave in to the temptation to ignite myself and flew away, my body alight.
"Strange," I thought," The weather ponies didn't schedule a blizzard."
I mean, it was absurd. It could have been a gang of naughty, teenage pegasi. But again, it was unlikely, I mean, who would do that? How could the temperature change so quickly? This thing is getting really fishy.
I bolted ahead, leaving a huge, flaming trail behind me. The temperature was getting lower, and the snow was getting even heavier. By now, I was just above the mountains, and the snow was able to creep through the fire even! With absolutely no concerns about energy consumption, I made the flame hotter. Now, it was a searing, scorching, bright, white flame. I could barely see ahead of me.
Then, the temperature spiked up again. Now, it was extremely uncomfortable being coated in a white flame. I shut off my fire.
My body was pretty much coated with soot. My body only fried further in the sunlight. I may be immune to heat, but I wasn't immune to the uncomfortable heat of the sun. My immunity only protected me from being burnt. I don't get that so-called red hot feeling when I touch something really hot, it just feels warm. But that wasn't enough for me to not suffer in the rapidly intensifying heat.
I started to head downwards, to the nearest cover I could find. This whole thing was beyond awkward. Everything couldn't have happened coincidentally, the changes in weather were far too sudden.
Flying down under a cloud, I breathed a quick sigh of relief. The cool feeling of shade was most welcome for me in temperatures like this. For an extra boost, I jumped on top of it, and bolted under it, allowing the cool water rain on my body, cooling its temperature considerably. My burnt black body's colour slowly restored to its usual, natural red colour. I pushed another cloud under my cover, and then used it as a bed.
Grabbing a piece of fluff from the cloud, I stuffed it into my mouth, it tasted like nothing, but they were what I ate if I didn't have any money remaining. Not to mention the fluff was full of water. I chewed the fluffy morsel, sucking its soft texture. The wind was blowing my mane back, but the breeze was humid, reducing the comfort greatly. Whenever I got too hot, I'd merely
send down another short burst of rain down. I lay there for, I don't know, half a hour?
The temperature changed again.
"Okay," I thought," That's it!"
I was gonna go on to adventure.
Without friends.
But first, I needed preparations.
Well, my first stop was Carousel Boutique.
You know, I had decided to go and see what was the cause of this damn madness. I couldn't tolerate the constant changes in weather. It was worse than when Discord came over in the middle of my shift. Got only one bit that day. Right now, I knew that what I was doing would blow a lot of cash. I only have a hundred and fifty bits. And that's all. I know it's quite a large sum of of money but I earned them on rations for three weeks. Ate nothing but clouds. Now, I needed proper sewing of a few pretty big rips in my saddlebags.
As I got closer with every step, I remembered that each hole of that size was two bits, and my bags had five. And my budget was fifty bits.
Then, I saw five bits on the ground. I scooped them up and dropped them inside my right bag. I needed every bit of money I could lay my hooves on.
When I reached the door, I was ready to buck it open. But then, I remembered that it would cause property damage. And so, I reluctantly lowered my back hooves and knocked on the door.
The door came open in an instant.
Rarity had a pretty positive face. I mean, I can't really find any other words than "pretty positive". Well, apparently I didn't need to ask her the obvious, because she noticed the gaping holes in my saddlebags right off the bat. Her eyes quickly widened, her pupils shrinking. I knew what she was going to say next.
"Oh those holes! It's as if dragon claws had gotten a hold of that elegant red bag! It matches with your fur!"
Personally I didn't think my bag was elegant at all or something, I never cared a bit about how I looked or whatsoever but I guessed that the best thing I could do was to not put anything unnecessary in conversation.
"Uh... yeah, I need these holes fixed," I stammered. I opened the right bag and handed her ten whole bits.
She just stared at them blankly at first but after a few seconds insisted,"No, after all, those bags really compliment your body colour!"
"Well," I said, racking my brain for words,"I guess they do."
She took them, emptied their contents, and instantly started to sew the stitches together. After 5 whole minutes, she levitated them to me. I was impressed. She wasn't as good as they say she is. She's better. I couldn't even tell where the holes were, they were fitted together like well oiled gears of a clock tower's clock. And I was convinced that the stitches would hold better than a section that WASN'T stitched.
"Oh," she blurted,"Those bags look just PERFECT now! I'm so happy that you can have proper ones now!"
Then she began describing it like mad, and it was pretty obvious that she would keep on going for a hour or so, so I quickly slipped outside of the posh building and bolted away. Despite her current condition, I was shocked she didn't notice anything happening.
Next stop, food. The Sugarcube Corner. I was perfectly willing to go inside now, Pinkie wasn't as obnoxious as I previously thought, and that was great. Probably the best thing that happened to me in a year or so. And that year had taught me to appreciate gifts and be more optimistic when negative results end up happening.
I had to face it that I didn't have much luck.
I stretched my wings, getting ready to take flight. I bent my knees, ready to bolt upwards. When I finally released the energy I had stored, I welcomed the cool air against my body, and burst forwards at extreme speeds. It was strange that Rarity had made no mention of the weather. Maybe she was too absorbed in her work to notice. Even though that seemed rather unlikely. And by the ways, I needed some daisy sandwiches and salt. Did I forget to mention that I LOVE salt? Its flavour just seems, well, just good to me. I'm horrible at describing a type of flavour. Who cares if it's bad for my kidneys? Well, I do ration my salty foods consumption. But there was a better usage for salt right now. I could use it to preserve my foods for longer periods of time. By the time I had arrived at the building, I could have sworn that the candy like building seemed like it had melted a little right now. Walking inside, I was warmly greeted by Pinkie's bright smile.
"Hey, Pinkie," I started,"I need three daisy sandwiches, now. And a bag of salt would be nice."
"Okie-dokey!"
She was back in only twenty seconds, with everything I had ordered.
"So, what do you need it for?" she asked.
"Uh..." I was gonna have to tell her it, luckily, she wouldn't think I'm crazy for it at least,"You know the weather? It's total MADNESS! Whatever caused this crazy screw up of the weather is what I'm trying to find! It could be anything, from a dragon to a manticore or even the Cerberus! Even though that last one was unlikely. Or more frightening, a Ursa Major!" Why was I freaking myself out by the possibilities that had popped into my head?! But the only thing that kept me from dumping this quest was that I was a free creature, and I do not approve of the insane weather pattern!
Why was I talking so much?!
"Oh!" she cried out with more enthusiasm than fear."I'll go too! It sounds fun! Or more like exciting? Just like that time I brought Gummy down to the sewers to show him where all the poo goes!" Several of the ponies eating suddenly lost their appetite due to Pinkie's random rambling ending up turning to the sewers.
"Well," I didn't want to disappoint her so I let her come,"Alright kid, come on. Lets go kick some butt!" I had to force enthusiasm into the last part. True that Pinkie was fun, but she does get annoying every once in a while.
I strode out, trying to look casual as Pinkie followed me, and at the same time, she was pretty much letting every thought that went into her head out. I decided that I could screw my next destination, and just head right to the river for water. I pulled out a water bottle that I had found on the streets. I doubt it would last the whole journey because it only contained half a litre, but Pinkie fixed that by bringing three more bottles out of seemingly nowhere, two for each. (Duh) So right now, I was pretty much set to go.
"Well, Streakflare," Pinkie suddenly blurted,"You just hogged quite a bit back there."
"What are you talking about?! I only took three daisy sandwiches!" I replied, only I was shouting.
"I mean you used a lot of words!" she replied, her temper in perfect order, but not her over excessive cheerfulness and enthusiasm.
"Um... What are you talking about?"
"Uh... I don't really know..."
I broke off from her conversation by rather impolitely turning away. Rude, but effective. I had enough of breaking conversation the nice way. I began to start my route away from Ponyville. We were near the Town Hall, and I was crossing the bridge to a bunch of tents which none of them I have ever went into. Ever. Crossing those tents, I was on the road to the Everfree Forest.
The Everfree Forest, where animals take care of themselves, where clouds move on their own. But none of these never really freaked me out. I checked behind, me, Pinkie Pie was right behind, me, bouncing as if no danger was ahead of us at all, completely oblivious to how dangerous the Everfree was. Surprisingly, I entered the forest rather casually, despite all the facts of what was inside the forest.
When I had entered, the forest looked exactly as they described it. Tall trees suffocated the life below, and limiting your line of sight. Leaves slowly pirouetted down onto the soil below. I couldn't tell if the soil was rich or not, but again, I'm not the best pony at plants. And you would constantly get this awkward feeling that you were being watched. There were very faint lines of light littered on the ground, but they weren't very bright at all. For the Everfree, though, they were quite bright. Something told me that when I was coming out, I wouldn't be able to open my eyes for a minute at least.
At this point, we were about thirty metres into the forest. I mean, I know it was about only that far, but, it felt more like I've been strolling for half a kilometre at least. At this point, the Everfree wasn't as dangerous as portrayed, but that was probably because I hadn't encountered any monsters yet.
"I mean, there's gotta be something worse than this, right?" I thought. While I knew all I was doing was making myself further nervous, I failed to shoved it out.
After not long, I encountered several gleaming yellow eyes, which probably belonged to Timberwolves, but of course, it's the Everfree, you can't expect to go far without encountering some rampant beast or something.
I looked up, I thought maybe I could escape by flying above, but nevertheless, they had swarmed above me as well, waiting on the trees. I guess the wolves were tired of having their prey running away from them, and made massive hunting groups to make escape next to impossible.
It was at that fateful moment, I discovered that escape was futile. Flight was useless, and I had a pack of hungry, determined wolves that would stop at my slightest error to place a part of me in it's stomach.
But letting my fear show would just guarantee death.
After just five seconds later, the first one sprung at me. I bent my front right hoof to counter its charge. It wasn't even a moment before my hoof connected with its left cheek. I pulled my rear legs together to unleash a powerful buck to its face. Sure enough, it knocked consciousness away from it.
Mere moments later, another wolf took its place, only to find two rear hooves collide with its jaw, making it fall back and wince uncontrollably at the amount of pain I had unloaded upon it. Looking in front of me, I noticed that Pinkie was nowhere in sight. I had forgot about her for the last minute. Had it really been only a minute. My rational part of my head said yes, but it seemed more like a quarter hour in hell to me.
Three more wolves took its position, and without giving me a chance to recover they charged blindly at me. Luckily, they didn't react fast enough to me leaping to evade their brutal onslaught. They ended up tackling some their own kind.
But, I was completely of guard from a air assault right after I evaded the charge, and that's what I got. Two wolves had lunged at me from above, one missed, but one got me in the stomach.
He stretched his mouth open, aiming for my neck, ready to end my life any second now. I closed my eyes and prepared to accept certain death.
Suddenly, a loud BANG boomed over the horizon, as if a cannon had been fired. Several of the wolves fell back at the force of balloons, large birthday cakes, and tables. They rest of the wolves didn't stand their ground, and just ran.
Behind all of it, was Pinkie Pie herself. In front of her was a pretty fink and white party cannon. Steam poured out of its barrel. Hard to believe such a pretty object could inflict so much pain and panic in just one shot. She stood there, a triumphant grin spread across her face.
"Where did you get that cannon?!" I asked her.
"Well, I'm not sure... Someplace called hammer space maybe?"
I didn't know how to reply to the fact that Pinkie could pull object from seemingly nowhere. In fact I thought it would come in handy.
"Thanks Pinkie," I told her,"You sure saved my butt."
"Anytime!"
I strolled ahead, the injured Timberwolves trembling in fear. I passed them with a rather menacing look, to lower the chance of a surprise attack. How embarrassing it must be, for Timberwolves to be at the mercy of two ponies.
What I didn't know was that far worse awaited me.
As I walked forward, I noticed something was wrong almost immediately, I could hear fierce roaring over the horizon.
All I knew was I probably needed to reveal the fact I could use fire to fend it off.
