Breathtaking

My screams began as sorrow. After opening my eyes and seeing the frightened horse in front of me, they transformed into a bestial bellow, a war cry that would be heard for a thousand yards on a clear day. Momentarily forgetting about my broken leg, I lept to my feet with the spear in my hand. The poor creature in front of me continued to scream, but didn't run; apparently she was paralyzed by fear.

I leaned forward to charge, but my leg gave out. The pain was incredible. Now, with no IV and no magical solution to inject, the effects of my injuries came back with a vengeance. My yelling stopped as I fell on my face. Son of a bitch. Pushing myself up with the spear, I looked up just in time to see her scamper off into the brush. Gone. I sat down with my back to the tree, spear still at the ready and pointed in the direction she left, panting softly through the pain.

After what felt like an hour, I dropped my arm and relaxed. She was gone and nothing was coming to retrieve me. I was still relatively safe, wasn't I? It was already the middle of the day. I was surprised at how chilly it still was, it must still be early in the spring months here. I thought about what to do now. I couldn't move, that much was obvious. The pain in my leg was too great to put weight on and my ribs could realistically crack further and pierce a lung. I was stuck.

Dammit, what is your choice now, John? You gonna choose freedom over a hospital bed? I coughed. Man, this itch in my throat sure cropped up fast. I struggled to get to a more comfortable position. Fact of the matter is, when you don't have a shirt on, bark isn't all that comfortable. I tried stirring the coals in my fire back to life, but I had no luck. Something kicked dirt over them, snuffing out the flames and ending my warmth. I heaved a loud sigh. At least I wasn't being poked and prodded by some kind of mad scientist, right? I found another unbroken cigarette in the pack and lit it with my zippo. If I could gather materials, a new fire would be easy, but no, things never work out according to plan, do they?

Several hours of pure, unadulterated boredom later my cough was worse and I was a lot colder. The sun was not yet falling below the horizon, but I could tell it was getting closer to the evening. I hoped I could survive the night. If not, then who cares. I'm not going to die on an experimental lab table and that's what counts. I felt sleepy. All I wanted at this point was a bed and a cup of coffee. Warm coffee would do me some wonders right about now.

While sitting under this tree and wishing for things that won't happen, I came to the realization that I wouldn't live much longer. I silently closed my eyes and took it. The things I've seen and done.. Well, lets just say the world would be a better place without me anyways. Life was empty. What little money I had, what little life I had, what little relationship I had with my family; it was all just a drop in the bucket. My material possessions, my girlfriends, my "accomplishments" were all meaningless to anyone else. I never made a difference to anyone in my life and it was pointless to even think that I thought of anyone but myself. These thoughts burdened my soul until I was too tired to keep my eyes open.

I woke up again in the middle of the night. Protection from the elements should have been my first priority, but I guess I didn't think enough to prepare correctly. Now, I was cold, miserable, and not dying fast enough. The cast on my leg was poorly constructed and falling apart already, meaning flexing the leg was easier. Of course, this meant further injuring the leg was easier and my ribs still hurt like a son of a bitch. What a miserable way to die. Now, I really felt sick.

My breathing was as ragged as my coughing and I had a headache to boot. There wasn't much I could do about it though. Twenty four hours in the cold with a possible infection in my leg, yeah, it'll be soon. Without food or water, my body was beginning to shut down and exposure to temperatures at least below 60 were killin' me. Metaphorically, of course. Unless I developed hypothermia, then it would be literally. As I wallowed in my self pity, once again going over what I did to deserve such a fate, I failed to notice a small white rabbit run up. When it saw I hadn't taken notice, it kicked the living shit out of my bad leg.

"OH HOLY SHEEIT!"

The pain was incredible. Nothing like a jolt to your system to remind you that you're still alive. It was just out of reach now, scowling at me. Yes, the rabbit scowled at me. Oh, Mr. Rabbit.. if you only knew how much you look like supper right about now. Hasenpfeffer, yum. I lifted my hands and mimed shooting it with a pistol.

"Pow."

The rabbit smirked at me. Son of a bitch. Then, in a maneuver I can only describe as magic, it produced a large carrot and held it out for me to take. Man, either I was hallucinating or this was the coolest rabbit I have ever seen. I reached out to accept the gift of friendship, but it jumped back out of reach, cackling at the wonderful trick he pulled on me.

"Yeah yeah, real funny asshole."

The rabbit smiled again and ate the entire carrot like a connoisseur would sample a wine. Just ate the whole thing. I felt my empty stomach as my thoughts reverted to eating the little beast.

"You know, there's a special place in Hell for critters like you."

Ohhh, it knew it too. Laughing again, it threw the uneaten carrot greens in my face before running off into the bushes. Little devil. Oh well, carrot greens are edible too. I slowly munched on them, wishing to hell they were washed on account of the amount of dirt I was chewing up. I lowered my head and started to shake it back and forth.

What was I doing? I thought I already agreed to let death take me? The temperature was well below 50 now and I was shivering like a newborn puppy. I recognized this as my body attempting to maintain temperature, but it wasn't working. Before long, I was falling asleep again amidst another coughing spell and chest pain.

I still don't remember the details. My eyes opened for a brief spell and all I could see was this big eyed angel with a soft voice. I had been outside for another day, exposed to the elements. At that point, my body broke. I wasn't storing warmth, not creating energy, not getting water. I was dying. The hypothermia set in sometime during the third night, but I was expecting death from dehydration before exposure.

From what I can gather, I was loaded into a hay cart or something and pulled away from my impromptu campsite. I don't remember what she said, but she sure sounded nice. And she had a pretty voice. We arrived, presumably at her home before I realized she was the pegasus that I threatened my first day in the woods. My consciousness still wavering in sickness and pain, I had no control. I couldn't escape if I tried. Besides, at this point, resistance was futile.

I finally awoke completely in a small bed set up in a country cottage. My leg and ribs still hurt, but the cough was gone. Immediately, I was formulating a plan for my escape. Suddenly, I had an epiphany. Why was I still running? Why was I bothering with escape and evasion? This isn't right. I'm not dreaming, that's for sure. I've been here too long to be dreaming. Shit, I've gone to sleep and woken up at least 4 times now, right? Can't be dreaming, but I still found three talking horses, a unicorn and a pegasus, not to mention a rabbit that was meaner than a copperhead snake.

This wasn't Germany. This wasn't Kazakhstan. This was another place. A place where there were brightly colored ponies that lived, breathed, ate, spoke and apparently ran hospitals. This sudden realization of truth hit me like a ton of bricks. Before I could stop myself, I leaned over the side of the bed, vomiting on what looked like beautiful hardwood floors. At least they were at one point. Now, they looked like they were covered with two days worth of tomato soup and crackers.

Through the sounds of my retching and the resulting splash, I heard a flurry of movement from the next room. In flew the yellow, winged angel. My savior. She immediately began cooing and fussing over me and the mess I made.

"Oh, you poor thing, just look at this. I thought for sure you were going to keep your food down this time. And you ate it so good for me, too. Let me clean this up and I'll bring you something to make your tummy feel aaaall better."

I shook my head and tried to stand.

"Oh miss, you don't have to do that, let me handle it. I'm perfectly capable of- AHHHHH!!!"

I fell back into bed with pain flowing freely up my leg. She must have not expected me to talk because a slight squeak escaped her lips before she darted behind a rocking chair in the corner of the room. I immediately felt guilty. This pony took me into her home, fed me, helped me until my fever broke and here I was, scaring the shit out of her again. I slowly sat back down and apologized as she poked her head out, eying the door and myself as if contemplating escape.

"I'm so sorry ma'am, I didn't mean to scare ya like that. I just don't wanna see ya go to all this trouble cleanin' up after me and such. If you could please get me a washrag or somethin' I could go ahead and clean it up myself."

With that, she edged out from behind the chair, looking at me with intense curiosity. She spoke softly, trying to make herself seem as harmless as possible. Or maybe she really was this harmless. She took a step forward.

"My goodness, I didn't realize you could speak so well.. Twilight said you had some kind of voice, but I didn't know she meant as good as us."

I stopped for a moment, trying to remember the events in the last few days before answering.

"Well, if I remember right, the only word I've said since I got here to anyone was 'horsey.' "

She giggled a little bit. Good. She was starting to relax. "Well, no wonder they were treating you like an animal. Oh, by the way, what are you? I mean, if you don't mind telling me that is."

I remembered what the veterinarian said while I was being restrained. "Well, y'all don't have anything like me round here. Where I'm from, we're called 'humans.' "

"Wow! I've never heard of a human before!" She said excitedly. "Tell me, what is it like to be a human?"

"Well, sometimes it hurts a lot," I said ruefully as I held my chest. "We don't get hurt as easily as birds or smaller animals, but we aren't exactly the stoutest creatures out there. I'm pretty stout for a human, but my bones break just as easily as most others."

"That's terrible. What happens when you get broken bones?"

"Hah, it hurts. Alot."

"Don't you do anything about it?"

"If its bad enough, we find someone with the know-how to fix em. Y'all have doctors too though, don't you?"

"Oh, yes. We do." She looked at the ground, embarrassed for some reason. Did she think she offended me? She must be incredibly shy, so I decided to ask for her name.

"My name's John. John Marshall. What's your name, miss?"

"Oh, silly me, I should have introduced myself. My name is Fluttershy. You might not have noticed, but I tend to be a little shy." Oh really? I had no idea. Keeping my sarcastic commentary out of our little dialogue, I continued on.

"Well, Miss Fluttershy, I wanna thank you very much for your hospitality. You certainly didn't have to come and... well save my life like you did after I scared the hell out of ya." She blushed and started to kick at the ground.

"Well, I just couldn't see an animal suffer like that. I have a passion for helping creatures. N-Not that you're an animal or a creature, I just mean-" I halted her in mid-sentence with a reassuring smile and a chuckle.

"You're fine miss, don't you worry. I'm not easily offended. When you live in a place like I have, gettin' mad at everyone that offends you would take forever, now, if you don't mind, I'll clean this up if you'd be kind enough to bring me something to clean wi-" Now was her turn to stop me in mid-sentence.

"Oh, no. I couldn't let you do this in your condition. You need to lay back down and heal. Besides, I don't mind helping you. Why, if all humans are as nice as you, I would feel just awful if I didn't help."

I flinched. If only she knew just how 'nice' humans could be. Yeah, because we always stood over folks with a huge smile on our faces and found a polite way to end their lives. I withheld this from her. Shy as she is, I don't want her in fear of her life while I'm here. She looked quizzically at my arm.

"That sure is a strange cutie mark." What? I decided that I had to ask.

"What's a cutie mark?" She looked at me like I had just slapped the shit out of a small child.

"You don't even know what a cutie mark is? How do you know your special talent? Everypony gets their cutie mark when they discover their special talent in life. Its how ponies know what you do and how you know what to do."

I thought to myself that these cutie marks sound an awful lot like my tattoos. Written on my forearms from wrist to elbow , right to left was my favorite Bible verse. John 1:5, The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has never put it out. It was just something that I liked to hear. Something I always thought would have a meaning to me later in life. I certainly wish it did now.

She walked out of the room as I settled myself back into the bed. How did all of this happen in the first place? How am I being grilled for information by a lemonade colored mare with a pink mane? I'm shot in Afghanistan. I remember that. I remember passing out and dreaming of Texas. I remember everything going black again. Then I fell out of the fucking sky. Into this place. I was drawing a blank as far as how this was even possible, but there had to be some way to find out what happened. I pondered this and more questions in silence. Fluttershy returned shortly with a rag. And a familiar face. The white rabbit I had affectionately thought of as 'Satan's Asshole' was sitting on Fluttershy's back. I looked up and adopted a twisted look of anger on my face.

"YOU!"

Satan's Asshole pointed right back at me and chittered something in rabbitese. Fluttershy looked back and forth at us

"Oh, yes, you've met Angel before. I had him take you a carrot the day before I finally came to get you. He's such a good bunny, yes you are, Angel!"

My eyes narrowed at the rabbit. You bastard. Fluttershy's eyes cut towards me, expecting praise, but the look on my face must have spoken volumes. While her back was turned, Angel's expression changed completely to one of pure apology and pleading. Yeah, I know your angle.

"Whats the matter John? Don't you remember Angel?"

I gave both of them a winning smile and said "Oh, of course! How could I ever forget the bunny that gave me the hope to keep going! He truly is an Angel!" Fluttershy cleaned up the vomit with her rag and walked off to rinse it out. Angel bounded up to me and looked at me thankfully. "Yeah yeah, guy. Guess what? You owe me now." Angel held out his paw for a handshake. I accepted this as his word that he would do me one favor. Oh, what a powerful tool to have in a strange place.

There was a flash of lighting and a thunderclap outside. I loved watching thunderstorms go across the prairie. I wanted to run out there and be outside with the elements. What I needed before anything else thought was to get my leg fixed. With the help of Fluttershy, I was liking my chances of survival more and more by the minute.

*footnote: This chapter was hard to write for some reason or another. Forgive me if it gets too wordy, awkward. repetitive sounding, etc. Any suggestions are welcome.