Snap

Mental fog is a strange thing — it can make a pony believe, if only for a moment, that their sins were just terrible dreams. Unfortunately, the fog of sleep didn't last long as Fluttershy opened her eyes, quickly remembering where she was, and who she was with.. or whose parts she was with, anyway. She thought for a moment.. it was time to address it. She nearly laughed — she was going to think of it as the 'elephant in the room', but her thoughts quickly replaced it with 'the mangled corpse in the room'. Yes, that was much more uncomfortable than any simple elephant.

It was time to start removing the bags from her home, and begin relocating them into the forest. She sighed; she had no time to waste. Standing from the red-smeared green couch, she began lifting bags — luckily, she could carry both the foreleg bag and the head bag, easing her mind as the trip was cut a little bit shorter. She dragged the two bags outside, tying a rope firmly around them, securing them into one package. This would be much easier to carry — not to mention, she'd rather have the taste of old rope in her mouth than blood stained linen..
Right. She sighed, picking up the rope in her teeth, and began to flap her sore wings, attempting flight. Sore — it must've been from the muscles she used to.. take things apart earlier. Oh well, she'd just have to power through it. Gritting her teeth in determination, she flapped her wings through the deep ache, taking to the air as she began her journey.

She wouldn't have to go very far, that was for sure — nopony would go more than five hooves into the Everfree, unless they were heading to Zecora.. That's what she'd need to be wary of. She turned away from the direction of the zebra's hut, instead going towards the deepest part of the dark expanse of twisted trees. Sweat was already rolling down her stained forehead, and she knew she didn't have the time to linger hovering above the trees, debating where to go — she just had to go. Settling on her direction, she flew briskly over the treetops, just watching the various discernible landmarks — a tall rock shaped like a pony sitting down, an old tree that seemed to have been struck by lightning, a little pond full of unnaturally dark water.. Yes, she'd be able to find her way there and back again, no doubt.

She stopped by a small clearing, and decided to walk ahead a bit to cover her trail for good — it was now easily dusk, the sun making its way down the sky at a surprisingly quick pace. Time felt foreign to her, stopping and starting erratically, her mind perceiving minutes as days and hours as seconds. She didn't want to stay long enough to hear the Timberwolves, but it didn't seem like she quite had a choice. Laying the bags on the rocky dirt ground, she took a few deep breaths from her strain, regaining what little composure she had left. Her tired wings drooped as she accepted reality — now, she had to make the trip two more times.

The second trip went about as well as the first, carrying the hind leg bag, but with the added trouble of being even more worn out. It had been a long, long time since the frail pegasus had flown such distance with such weight. If she hadn't felt as if it was life or death to do so, she wouldn't even be attempting it.

She was a panting, sweating mess by the time she returned for the final parts — the shovel, and the torso bag. She sighed, closing her eyes a moment as she prepared to drag the contents outside so she could secure them. Reaching down, she bit the cleanest edge of the bag she could find, pulling hard — oh.. Oh, no. She pulled harder, frantically dragging it across the floor. Tears of frustration quickly welled in her exhausted eyes, and she spat the bag out as she grasped the whole lumpy package in her hooves, pulling as hard as she could, grunting and straining in effort — the best she could do was scoot it across the floor, leaving a massive bloody streak, flopping unceremoniously out the door in a heap. It was heavy. It was too heavy. She couldn't fly with all that weight.

She cried out softly in frustration and anger, sobbing, hissing out silent screams from her dry throat. The world just couldn't let her have this. No, that would be too easy. She had to dive back in one more time to finish this, cruel life ignoring all her cursing and pleading.

It was a good few moments before she had regained control of herself, forcing herself back to reality, her mind spinning — would she have to use a cart? Pull the bucking thing into the forest? No, a cart could never make it past the treeline. Drag it by hoof? No, no, that would take days. She'd surely be eaten by Timberwolves before getting even halfway. No, despite her anguish, she knew deep down there was only one solution — break up the weight. The weight of the corpse's torso. The weight which was only flesh, bone.. and organs.

At least the horrors she was forced to endure kept her hunger at bay — it had been an entire day now she'd been at this. Daisy had come in the morning, and now it was evening, getting darker by the minute. She didn't have the time to linger. Sighing, closing her eyes, she bit down on the bag — the pegasus winced as the sharp, cold, bitter taste of blood hit her mouth instantly, flooding her senses. She hadn't looked where she bit down, and now all she could taste was cold death. It didn't matter though, not now, not anymore. She dragged the bag slowly back into the silent house, her body numb and unfeeling as she once again resigned to something she never once in her life imagined.

The bag was heaved over the side of the bathtub, thudding into the white basin, streams of red beginning to trickle towards the drain — she opened the cloth cover, gripping it in her now off-colored teeth, yanking it hard from the tub. As she expected, the torso flopped out of the bag, thudding to the white ground, the tail now a horrible mess of green and red, caked in blood, both dry and new. She dropped the bag to the floor, ignoring the stains now throughout her entire house — she could worry about that later — and grabbed what she had brought. The knife's handle fit comfortably, familiarly back into her hooves, the feeling somehow comforting, as if it was waiting for her to pick it back up. Well.. she wasn't going to be using it for precision this time.

She shoved a hoof into the torso, flipping it onto its back, exposing the underside — it looked as though the poor pony had dyed her coat dark red, only a faint hint of her vibrant pink color still visible. She remembered for just a moment the mare it had once been.. Kind, for the most part, just ignorant. If she had just explained it to her, then maybe she wouldn't have...

No. No time for that. She blinked the tired tears from her eyes, taking one last breath, resigning herself to her fate.

She began cutting. The knife's blade slid easily into the cold flesh, splitting the corpse down the center. She could feel the metal drag across the sternum, scraping bone, but she didn't stop. Her hooves mechanically drove the knife down, through skin and meat, until the entire midsection had a clean line sliced through it. Blood was pooling at the bottom of the now crimson bathtub, steadily headed for the drain.. Her yellow hooves were stained the same color as well, all the way up her limbs, dried on her coat. The only clean, yellow spots still visible of her skin now were the streaks her tears left on her cheeks.

She began dragging the blade diagonally, slicing two shorter cuts, one at the top and bottom of the first slice, making openable flaps out of the flesh. When she had finished, her knife plopped softly into the pool of blood, the sound muffled by the thick liquid — now, she just had to..

Her stained hooves squelched as they began to push into the cuts, the feeling of the wet, cold flesh against her touch enough to make a pony lose their mind, but she couldn't stop. She slipped her hoof into the body cavity, under the skin, and began peeling back the flaps, opening it up like peeling a terrible, nightmarish orange.

It all happened at once.

With the sound of wet suction releasing, the flap split wide open, and into her hooves spilled the contents of the pony. It was so, so wet sounding, making her skin crawl, a scream wanting so desperately to escape her dry lips, though it somehow didn't. The organs.. there were so many. No, she knew how many ponies had, but seeing it there in front of her.. leaving a nearly hollow abdominal cavity, bloody and gaping.. She retracted her hooves from the.. flesh pile, staring blankly at the bathtub in front of her. A dead, disembodied torso was split open, all the organs spilling outlike sugar cubes from a torn bag. They glistened and shined in the evening glow, cold and unforgiving, daring her to touch them again as she knew she had to, to finish what she started.

A part of her soul was gone. Gone forever. Dead, so very dead. The Fluttershy that had once existed was no more, a piece of her soul escaping her mortal being forever as she shoveled organs into a bloody bag with her bare hooves. Her eyes were vacant, empty, emotionless as she cut the last connections with her knife, severing both intestines and bowels alike. Soon enough, her bathtub was consistently draining blood, an empty, hollowed out carcass sitting by its lonesome in the center. The organs were all scooped up into a linen bag, filling it with soft, lumpy, dripping contents. She leaned over the side of the tub, picking up the meaty rib cage, feeling how light it now was in her hooves. Not terribly light by any means, but light enough to carry. She shoved it inside a bag, forcing the tail in as much as she could, though matted strands still stuck out the top — it was good enough.

She drug the two bags down the hallway, back outside, the moonlight now shining down on them. Slowly, her pinprick pupils drifted upwards to the moon — it was night now. It would be more dangerous.. She didn't care. She hefted the torso bag with her teeth and took flight, her burning, aching wings numbed from the mental trauma.

She dumped the bag with the others, but before she turned to retrieve the final piece, she noticed movement in the corners of her eyes.. Large movement. Large, looming, hungry movement.. She felt she was being watched by quite a few eyes, though.. it was strange. She didn't feel threatened. She felt as if they were hungry, yes, but not for her.. They felt curious. Expectant. Impatient. She flew quickly to the sky, and then to her once innocent cottage.

The organ bag had quite a few flies buzzing around it, trying so hard to find a way in, to make the slowly rotting flesh their new home, but she had tied it slightly too well for them. They'd just have to wait. Before the Pegasus flew, she remembered the burial she'd have to make, and turned her gaze to the shovel.. Yet.. she didn't feel as though she'd need it. There wouldn't be a true burial. At least, not by her hooves. She felt as if her part was at its end, and the rest wasn't for her to interfere with. The bag tasted like death, and the flies buzzed around her face, landing on her blood encrusted skin, keeping her company as she ascended for her final trip.

The sky was empty, the moon and stars clear above her. It made navigating a bit easier, but still cloaked her to any curious eyes — she couldn't have been luckier with her timing. As she flew closer to the clearing, she felt.. odd. Something was different, she could tell. As her red hooves landed on the gritty dirt, and she began walking to her clearing, she could finally tell what it was. It was the sound. The sound of beasts feasting on pony flesh. The sound of teeth ripping and tearing through bloodied skin and broken bone.

She numbly stepped forward, her legs carrying her almost against her will, to the center. Her hooves stopped just a few feet from the pile of bags, now torn open, the contents being picked over by three ravenous Timberwolves — the three monsters stopped their frenzy, turning their bloodied muzzles to face their unwitting provider. Their eyes shone in the darkness, cutting straight into her very being, yet she wasn't afraid. How could she be afraid now that she was no better than them, murderers out of instinct. She took calm, monotonous steps towards them, to the center of the gore heap, directly before all three wolves.. and dropped her last contribution. The bag popped open, the organs spilling from the damp sack, and immediately the hounds shoved their snouts into the pile, as if they had been starved until she arrived. They were enamored with their fresh offering, tearing gluttonously into the meat, hardly noticing as she turned to leave — her work was done, besides collecting the remains of her bags later. Now, if anypony did go searching and find the mess, they would simply assume the poor mare was ravaged by the beasts. It was as if the forest was giving back what she had given to it all these years, taking a weight from her shoulders she couldn't have ever imagined carrying. Walking back through the trees, the shadows swallowing her form, obscuring her movements and hiding her presence, she felt.. peaceful. The forest felt safe, like it knew her. Like it welcomed her — like she had given it the sacrifice it desired, thus proving herself to its tangled depths.

She flew mindlessly back home, her wings struggling with pain and exhaustion, yet she still made it, stumbling to the ground outside her home. The cottage loomed in the night sky, casting a shadow over her.. but it was her shadow. This house was forever tainted, corrupted, darkened.. but it was her own doing. She stood before the prison she had built, accepting her place, and slowly stepped back into her home, closing the door and looking ahead — blood.. Everywhere, blood. Everywhere..

Her legs ached. Her body ached. Her mind ached. Her soul ached. Her legs carried her upstairs, and soon enough she stood before her bed. What mattered most was that the body was out of her hooves — all that remained was superficial cleaning. Her time with Daisy was finally over.

It was with that one last thought that she collapsed into her bed, sleep quickly enveloping her exhausted being.

Weeks had gone by, nearly a month now. Fluttershy cared for her animals, helped her friends when they asked, and tried to live as though she was herself, unburdened, unbroken. The papers quickly noticed Daisy's absence, and the town made sure not a soul was unaware of her missing status. Twilight even made a few announcements about it.. Those were difficult to sit through, but she managed. She would have to manage.

They had just found the body. Some brave soul had gathered a search party and scoured the Everfree — it wasn't long before they reached the clearing. Yet, when all seemed lost.. the forest heard her plea, and the forest had answered. They found only a few bones left, the rest gone to the beastly animals that lurked the dark of the trees. It was quickly and immediately determined to be a terrible accident.

The story goes that as she went to deliver the flowers to Fluttershy, she got lost, ending up in the forest, where she was unfortunately victim to a brutal Timberwolf attack. The only thing that changed was the way ponies marked the path, adding more warning signs. That was it. They held a small funeral, ponies grieved, and then moved on. They continued living, and they would slowly forget.

Well.. all but one.

One pony could never forget.