Striving To Belong

I gazed around the dark and looming woods that surrounded me, In a complete state of shock and confusion as I took a few steps around. My breathing started getting heavier and heavier, nearing a borderline panic attack. The taste of bile slowly crept up my throat, my eyes went wide and I started to dry heave.

I couldn't stop it.

Bending over quickly, I threw up everything that was in my stomach, which was only the coffee I had about twenty minutes ago. I covered my belly with my arms, as I continued to wretch even when nothing was coming up. Spitting out one last glob of bile-flavored saliva, I stood back up and began to further investigate the woods that surrounded me, and the clusterfuck that just landed in my lap.

Every tree was tall, and had vines cascading down from the branches everywhere. It seemed like a swamp, but it was pretty dry, the only water being a small puddle pooling around a particularly larger tree. It also didn't help that it was dawn, and the sun was about to set. I could barley see the sun at all, but what I did see of it interested me.

It seemed... bigger. Not massive, but definitionally noticeable. I also didn't see the moon at all, even though it was supposed to be a full moon tonight. It was probably hidden behind a tree, or one of the scarce clouds. But after watching the clouds move for a few minutes, there was nothing behind any of them.

Snapping back to reality, I remembered the the ordeal I was in. My heart sank a little thinking about it, but I couldn't stand there and ponder about it.

"I've gotta find help. There must be a highway, or some other kind of civilization around here." I muttered to myself. Looking around one last time, I slowly started to walk East. I mean, I don't have a map or a compass. Hell, don't even have shoes on! I have nothing but the clothes on my back, and my knowledge from all the camping I did. So, at the very least, I could make a fire if I can't find help.

Nearing the end of the clearing, and the start of the clogged forest, I stopped to circle around one last time, taking in my surroundings, then pushed my way through the vines.

Well, it certainly was a full moon after all, as without it it would be pitch black right now. Only that the moon wasn't the one I was used to, neither were the constellations. The moon was nearly devoid of any and all craters, as the only one's present were very shallow and barley visible. None of the constellations were recognizable, but I could defiantly make out a few unique shapes. This is about the exact point when I realized that I probably wasn't on Earth anymore, but I didn't have time to panic. I needed to find help, if there was any kind of intelligence on this world

Even with the moon being so bright, it was still quite dark, as the leaves from the trees blocked out most of the natural light. I wasn't able to find anything non-organic. No trails, trash, or previous campsites. Now that I think about it, I didn't even see any animals, aside from some insects (some weirdly familiar, and some not). That's when I heard it.

Or rather, didn't hear it. All noises had stopped. No owls, crickets, or any other type of critter (All of which I had heard previously). It was dead silent, aside from the slight breeze. I knew what this meant. There's a predator around. But one question crossed my mind.

Am I the predator?

I mean, it would make sense. None of the resident animals know what I am, so they would naturally fear me. But this line of thought was cut off by the some rustling in a nearby bush. Whipping my head around to look at what had caused the noise, I froze. I stared directly into it's glowing green eyes. It seemed to be a wolf, but it was made out of a mismatch of different twigs and logs.

Heh, a timber wolf? What a fitting name.

Shaking my head slightly, I directed my gaze back to the strange wood-wolf. It was large, but not massive, probably a runt. It was also alone, most likely a lone wolf. Lucky for me.

It lowered itself into a battle position and began to slowly move towards me with a snarl on it's wooden face. Running wasn't an option, as I didn't know what kind of speed it possessed. I was also not going to lie down and let this thing have it's dinner either. I didn't come this far in life to give up without a fight.

Squinting my eyes, I spread my legs slightly and bent my knees, placing my left foot slightly in front of me in a battle stance as as we began to circle each other. I stared into it's green glowing eyes and contorted my face into a nasty snarl, trying to hid my fear. Growling slightly, I build up the courage to taunt it.

"Come get some, motherfucker!" I shouted, before pounding both of my fists on my chest twice, signaling to start the fight. At my words, the beast charged. It ran a few feet before leaping at me, jaws wide open looking to chomp down on my throat. I quickly ducked down and dove underneath it, rolling midair to land on my side. I took a second to recover, but the monster had leapt for me again. I wasn't quick enough to dodge this time, so I instinctual threw my forearms in front of my face.

As the creature landed on me, I felt it's wooded teeth dig into my left forearm. I fell backwards, taking it with me. I felt blood ooze through it's teeth, and the pain made me yelp. I tried to shake my arm out of it's grip, but it wouldn't relent. I raised my right fist and hooked the wolf in the temple, the punch affecting both of us. I mean, it was made of wood for fuck's sake, but it was my only option. My throbbed, and it felt like some of my knuckles might have split open. The beast was affected to, as the punch had sent it into a wobble. It had released it's grip on my arm, and that's when I saw my opportunity.

I used to be a wrestler in high school, so I was familiar with this kind of fighting. I wasn't national level good, but I did make it to regional a few times.

Leaning up, I grabbed and pushed it's wooden head down with my left hand, and wrapped my right arm around the things neck, putting it into a guillotine. Immediately, the wolf began to struggle and try to break free, but I had set the choke in nicely. I squirmed around, growling and whimpering as it desperately. I felt it's wooded claws scratch my skin, and some of them hurt more than the other, probably deeper wounds, as I felt the warmth of my blood trickling out of them. Straining my face, I squeezed it's neck with all of my might. It began to yelp and howl, but was cut off buy an audible pop.

Instantly, it had turned into nothing but a pile of wood. I scrambled back, pushing the ruble of the wood-wolf off of me. I just sat there, dumbfounded. I just fought a wolf, one made of fucking wood mind you, and won. Pain started to creep it's way into my left forearm, and I looked down at it. The bite was deep, and blood was flooding out each tooth mark. Quickly realizing that the wound was serious, I gripped the collar of my t-shirt and lifted it off of me. Wrapping the shirt around my right bicep, I tried to tighten it as much as I could with one hand. I ended up using my teeth to help with the tightening, making sure that the tourniquet was tight.

It was uncomfortable, but I just had to suck it up. Simply wrapping it around the wound wouldn't get me anywhere, so I had to stop the bleeding. If I couldn't find help, I'd resort to using my pants as a bandage, or larger leaves.

Looking over the tourniquet one more time, I steadily rose to my feet, leaning my right hand on the ground while I rose. Seeing as there was nothing else here for me, I looked at the pile that used to be the wolf one last time, I continued to wander into the woods.

I was exhausted. I had been walking for hours on bare feet in search of anything aside from trees and bushes. I was hungry, thirsty, and tired. The adrenaline from the fight had worn off rather quickly, so I had been feeling like this for a while now. The bite had stopped bleeding, but I had gotten some other injuries in the fight other than that. Mostly small cuts, but I had a few deeper ones from the wolfs claws that dug into my legs and lower abdomen. They stung like hell, and one particularly nasty one on my stomach bled for a while.

I had been stumbling around for hours now, not wanting to rest, mainly from being on edge from the incident. It proved to me that I was no longer on Earth, and that more creatures like that, some probably worse, are kicking are this area. I could barley feel me feet. They'd gone numb a while ago, as I didn't arrive here with shoes, and had been walking for hours.

The sky was starting to brighten, signifying that morning was almost here.

I stopped, seeing as there was no opening in the thick foliage around me. I staggered up to one of the thick bushes and pushed myself thought it, getting my foot caught on a root in the process. I tripped, staggering a few steps, then fell flat on my face.

My chest had taken most of the impact, resulting in my being winded for a good minutes. As my staggered breathes returned to me, I rolled onto my back and stared up. I stared at the sky, the clear sky. There were no trees blocking my view. I felt the ground around me, for there to only be dirt, no grass.

I was on a path.

A new spark of life shot up within me and I jumped to my feet, taking in the newly discovered area. It was definitely a path, as I stared down to the right side I saw no trees on it, and even a bridge. Looking in front of me, I saw that there was a deep ravine a couple yards ahead, and there was another path on that side too. Something on my path caught my eye, though. Looking closer at the ground, I noticed that there were some tracks. Fresh tracks. I couldn't identify what had made them, but they were definitely not paws. Looking to my left, which was the direction they were going, my jaw dropped.

There, in all of it's glory, stood the ruins of a monolithic castle. It was old, like, really old. Trees, moss, and vines were growing all over the outer was of the ruins. But I couldn't stand there and gawk at it all day, I need to see who was here, I they were even still here.

Rushing as fast as I could (which wasn't very fast, more like a staggered speed walk), I made my way to the entrance of the ruins. There was a small stair case leading up to a massive pair of double-doors. I slowly ascended the staircase, but about halfway up, I fumbled and fell forward, catching myself with my hands before eating a stone step. Pushing myself back up, I quickened my pace, noticing that my exhaustion was worsening.

After taking about three minutes to climb the short staircase, I limped over to the door. The doors were cracked open slightly, and there voices coming from inside, but I couldn't tell what they were saying. But what I did know, is that they were speaking English. It puzzled me that an alien planet bore the same language, but I didn't care. I need help.

Holding a hand on door, I hesitated only for a second, before pushing them open wide. The conversation ceased, and was replaced by momentary silence, before several gasps came from everyone in the large room.

They were... horses, I think. They seemed more like ponies with their small sizes. They barred some resemblance, but only a little. They looked cartoonist, and had almost human sized heads, and big eyes. There were five of them.

The first one I saw was orange with piercing green eyes, freckles, and a stetson hat. It seemed to squint it's eyes when I eyed it.

There was a light blue horse with a messy rainbow mane, and matching tail. It was also bore wings, making it a pegasus. It also squinted when I observed it.

There was another pegasus, but this one wasn't flying. It had a yellow coat, with a beautiful pink mane and tail. It seemed to shrink when my eyes landed on it.

The pony standing next to the yellow one was pure white, had a frilly deep purple mane and matching tail, and a Goddamn horn. It was a unicorn. It somehow turned even paler when I eyed it, it's eyes going wide, pupils shrinking.

Then, at the center of the group, was a purple pony. It had a horn AND wings. It inhaled sharply when I gazed upon it.

We stared each other down for about thirty seconds before the orange one spoke up.

"Twilight... You know what that thing is?" It said in a heavy southern accent. It's voice was feminine, so I guess it's a female. The purple one shook it's head.

"I... I've never seen anything like it before." The purple pony said. It was also female. Looking at the rest of the group, I noticed female feature on all of the, such a long eye lashes.

"It looks hurt, maybe it needs help." The yellow one said in a quite manner. She began to slowly walk towards me when the purple one, "Twilight," I'm guessing, put a foreleg in front of her.

"It may be dangerous. Everypony stay put. Applejack, Rainbow Dash. You two detain it if it tries to attack any of us." The orange mare and the blue pegasus nodded at Twilight.

My breathing became staggered, and my eyelids fluttered open and shut. This didn't go unnoticed though, as they all got uneasy looks.

"P..Please..." I whimpered. All of their eyes flew open, and all of their mouths dropped.

I couldn't hold myself up any longer. I fell onto my knees, my palms on the cool stone floor. More gasps came from the crowd when I fell. Looking up at them, they all had worry on their faces.

"H..Help me."

With that, I collapsed onto the floor. The last thing I heard before passing out was hooves on stone galloping towards me.