Not Always Anticipated (Or Welcomed)
Most ponies would claim that the toughest part of their day was getting out of bed, but for Big Mac it was always the midday lunch break. Granted, his midday came much earlier than most, but something about the front path just snared his hooves and slowed him to a trudge.
It didn’t help that his sisters somehow retained their morning enthusiasm.
“Hey Big Mac!” Apple Bloom galloped out of the house, saddlebags full. “I’m off to meet Sweetie Belle and Scootaloo!”
“Did you finish your chores?” Mac grunted as she flew past.
“Uh huh I’ll be home for supper bye!” she hollered as she continued her mad dash for freedom.
Mac wished he were able to join her. Maybe if AJ helped him, he could finish his chores while there was still light—
“Big Mac! I got to catch the train to Canterlot for the play rehearsal! Can you finish wintering up the barn for me?” AJ shouted as she hurried down the path toward the station.
Big Mac watched his dream of an afternoon off wither on the vine, and managed a pained “Eeyup.” With a heavy sigh, he turned aside from the house and its tantalizing promise of food and relaxation. He crossed the yard to the barn and nosed the door open. AJ had done most of the work at least, so maybe he could enjoy the sunset.
***
She watched from the bushes as first the filly, then the mare left the farm, leaving her all alone with the one she considered the true master. The old mare was sleeping in the house, her nose told her, so she dismissed her. She frowned as the heavy barn door swung shut, denying her the chance to slip inside after the master, but she was patient. She could wait.
She turned, sniffing the cold air as she ran along the trails between the trees. Branches and hidden holes reached out to snare or trip her, but she knew this ordered forest as well as those who'd planted it. In a flash of pride, she considered herself to know it better. After all, it wasn't the masters who kept the ground animals from making dens on their land. It wasn't the masters who tracked when the flying animals tried to roost in the trees, though she had learned to tolerate the blue pony's presence. It wasn't the masters who marked the border so the more dangerous animals knew who's territory this was.
With a chuffing bark, she reminded herself that even though she did a lot of the work, the masters were still her alphas. They provided her shelter from the rain, food enough she had no need to hunt, comfort from the pain of loneliness.
Through the trees she continued to weave, duck and jump, until finally she shouldered through a hedge into a small clearing. Her jaws parted in a dreamy smile as she let her last scent-memory of the glade occupy her thoughts.
***
Mac stifled his yawn as he shuffled up the stairs, lantern swinging with every step and casting shadows along the hall. The barn work had thankfully been straightforward, and he’d been able to enjoy the setting sun with a bottle of aged cider from the cellar.
Winona had come back from her usual routine of running around the farm, and Mac had made sure her water bowl was filled before he’d started up the stairs. She’d been affectionate as normal, though he swore he’d caught her watching as he left the room. Was probably his imagination.
He set the lantern down on his dresser and shut his door, yawning again as he shouldered his yoke off to lean against the foot of the bed. Glancing out the window, he smiled at the sight of the full moon rising at the correct pace into the sky.
“Glad that Discord monster got turned back to stone…”
He shuddered as the memories came back again. He’d heard from Applejack how reality had started warping around Canterlot, the castle hedge garden twisting into incomprehensible shapes, the very ground beneath their hooves changing.
Big Mac remembered seeing a strange discoloration in the sky, an almost visible grease stain spilling through the air and washing over Ponyville. He’d heard distant laughter on the rising wind , and then—
He bit his lip hard enough to taste blood as he fought the memories down. He’d had nightmares in the weeks after Discord’s attack on the town, like many of the townsponies. They’d begun to fade as time went on, but every so often he’d remember popping out of the ground, panting like a dog, licking fur…
He shook his head with an angry snort. “It’s over, Mac. That monster’s back to stone again, and Twilight’s stripped out every trace of him. I ain’t afraid of no bad dream.”
The words rang hollow to him as he climbed into bed, and he knew that tonight’s dreams were going to be unpleasant.
***
As he thought, the dream was the same as before. He felt the caress of magic as it sank through his skin and into his brain, body shivering at the sheer wrong of it. He’d felt magic before, normal unicorn magic, but this was something entirely different. He fought it, stamping his hooves as his eyes rolled wildly—
But he suddenly stopped, tongue lolling out as the odd tingling in his head vanished. He couldn’t remember what he’d been so afraid of, but a cautious sniff didn’t turn anything up, and with a cheerful woof he set off, nose to the ground. The world looked a bit different than he thought he remembered, no reds and more grey, but the smells, so many smells! He dug at the ground, wondering why his paw looked so weird, and shivered at the plethora of scents it dug up. He wanted to, needed to sniff more; and set to digging further into the dirt, eventually squirming his entire body into the ground. He briefly emerged, panting happily, before digging further into the dirt.
He lost track of how far he’d burrowed, but his ear flicked as he heard a familiar voice from above ground, and he eagerly dug up. Popping his head out of the ground, he saw a purple pony standing at the gate. He sniffed curiously, and his tongue flopped out as he recognized this smell! She was a friend! Maybe she could play with him! His tail twitching inside his tunnel, he licked her cheek and vanished again.
He dug himself out of the ground some distance away, looking back to see if the mare was going to play. But she seemed more interested in play fighting with the other two ponies, and using her strange headlight on them. The light spread, washing over the two of them, the grey mare gaining more color and her smell becoming more like the purple mare’s.
He whined and started to run back toward them, when a different smell caught his nose, pulling him deeper into the trees.
Thump thump.
He stopped, head tilted at the strange thumping. He didn’t remember this from the before. He started to move again, the smell getting stronger, a faint sense of movement ahead spurring him on.
Thump thump thump thump.
He growled as the noise returned, the dreamscape wavering around him as his concentration slipped. He was so close to the scent now, right on the other side of those bushes—
Thump thump thump thump thump thump thump thump thump.
Mac half-groaned, half-barked as he lurched up from the dream. The thumping followed him, now a real sound at the door.
“I’m comin’, I’m comin’... I swear, a pony can’t get no decent sleep around here…” he grumbled as he opened the door. “Who’s banging this time of night?”
An empty hallway greeted him, and he glanced toward Apple Bloom’s room for a second before he remembered she was still at Sweetie Belle’s home. He shook his head to clear the cobwebs of sleep from his brain and turned around.
Thump thump.
Winona sat there, tail wagging happily against the foot of his bed.
“Winona? What in tarnation are you doin’ up at this hour?” He blinked, eyelids heavy, and dismissed it. “Whatever, I gotta get back to sleep…” He gently pushed Winona out into the hallway. “Now go on, get back to your own bed.”
Winona whined a little, and it seemed to Mac’s sleep-deprived mind that she shook her head.
“No, bad girl! No whining at ponies, you know better!” Big Mac closed his door firmly. He shuffled back across the room, but paused as he heard scratching at the door. “I said no!” He stamped his hoof for emphasis, and heard the scrabble of claws on wood as Winona took off downstairs. “Sheesh, don’t know what’s gotten into that dog’s head…” He lay down and closed his eyes. Hopefully, the dream wouldn’t pick back up where it left off. He usually woke up before running into the woods, and had no interest in finding out whatever else he’d done while under that monster’s influence.
***
She paced in a circle, half-growling under her breath. She knew, somehow, that he hadn’t been himself before, but thought at least he’d remember! She whined, ears flattened back, her upper lip curling to expose fangs. She’d let herself think that it had meant something.
She remembered the wave of sick-air, and how it made things change. She remembered running into the woods to try and escape the worst of it. She remembered the scratch of branches on her skin as she’d hidden in a dense thicket, cowering as herds of bunnies that towered into the sky galloped past, and off-grey clouds poured brown rain that made her sick to her stomach when she tried to drink it.
She thought the world was ending. There’d be no more hugs, no more treats snuck under the table by the youngest master, no more sticks thrown by the eldest...
But then he came, crashing through the trees, tongue hanging out, barking madly. At first she was confused, shying away from him with a snap of teeth. But something about his smell was… off, not the smell of a master, but more like her smell? She cautiously sniffed at him and recoiled as he sprang forward, bowling her over into a full-blown tussle.
As she broke free into a headlong rush to escape, she looked back to see him chasing eagerly after her, and realized that whatever the sick-air had done, it had made him more like her.
But then the sick-air had vanished, and he’d gone back to being just the master.
Well, if he wasn’t going to be interested in her, she’d have to show him what he was missing. With a bark that almost sounded like half a sob, she nosed open the door and ran off into the night.
***
Bang bang.
Mac opened one eye, only to wince as sunlight poured into it. Throwing the blanket off, he shambled into the hallway and down the stairs.
Bang bang bang.
“I’m coming, I’m coming!” he half-shouted as he opened the door. A solid wall of pink greeted him. “Pinkie, why are you banging on my door so early in the morning?”
“I’m sorry to bother you but Gummy’s missing and I don’t know where he went and my Pinkie Sense isn’t telling me where he could be except that he’s outside. But then I remembered that Winona is really good at tracking ponies and missing cows and things and I thought that if I asked nicely that she’d help!” Pinkie stopped to take a breath and continue, but Mac waved a hoof.
“I think I get it, Pinkie… or at least most of it…” He turned toward the living room. “Winona, come on, girl! Need to put that nose of yours to work!”
Silence answered, the fluffy dog bed, usually occupied, now vacant.
“Huh. Must’ve gone out the door last night.” Mac turned back, eyes narrowing as he saw something in the yard. “Sorry, Pinkie, but Winona’s not in right now. But maybe I can find her.”
“Ooooooh, how’s that? You got some secret Apple family dog-training technique?” She giggled briefly at the notion, but then her ears drooped, eyes falling to the floor.
“No, but I got a pair of working eyes,” he replied, pointing to the dog prints that headed off toward town.
“Ooooh, it’s a mystery!” Pinkie reached behind her, pulling out a pipe, magnifying glass, and hat.
“Uhhh, sure,” Mac muttered as he followed the prints.
***
“I’m confused, why would Winona come to Sugarcube Corner before Gummy went missing, only to head back to Sweet Apple Acres? She can’t see the future, can she?” Pinkie paused mid-bounce. “Big Mac, you’d tell me if Winona was some kind of timedog, wouldn’t you?”
“Eeyup,” he replied, not really listening. They led into the east orchard, following a path close to what he had run when under Discord’s influence. Fighting off the shudder that accompanied the thought, he kept moving, weaving between the trees. Pinkie followed him, her usual bouncing skip reduced to a normal trot.
“Something’s bothering me about this,” she muttered as the hairs along her back stood up. “It’s definitely Pinkie Sense, but it’s not one I’ve felt before…” She stopped abruptly as she almost walked right into Mac’s hindquarters. Blushing, she realized that Mac had stopped right at the edge of a row of hedges, a small clearing just beyond. Her ear twitched as she took another step forward, hearing a panting whimper from beyond the hedgerow. “Mac, what’s going on? You’re not making any… sense…” Pinkie had to close her eyes as she pushed through the hedge. Her nose wrinkled at the almost sour smell that wafted over her as she opened her eyes. They kept opening, becoming wide as saucers at the scene in front of her, mouth hanging open as she for once found herself speechless.
Mac was frozen, ramrod stiff as he beheld a sight he’d take to his grave. What made it worse was the fact his faithful pet was staring right at him. “Uh, Miss Pie, you might not want to look…” he stammered, his face burning as the last of the dream memory came rushing back, of exactly what had happened on the other side of this particular hedge. He’d done his best to deny it, had refused to talk to Applejack or Granny Smith, let alone Apple Bloom. But he couldn’t hide from himself that he’d enjoyed being a dog for the afternoon… with all that came with it.
“GUMMY, JUST WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!”
“WINONA! YOU GET YOURSELF UNTANGLED THIS INSTANT!”
Author's Note
So, I got this idea while partially drunk and asking myself what ships I'd never seen done for Jake's contest. This story was written while sleep deprived and caffeinated on entirely too much coffee. I regret nothing.
