A Walk Through the Forest

The Everfree Forest-normally a dangerous place for anypony, especially so for the young filly venturing alone through it tonight. She kept her wits about her, listening intently for any change in her surroundings, keeping her eyes and ears focused to perceive any threat to her as she walked through the forest. Tonight was an especially chilly night to be out and about in the forest; it was on these kinds of nights that the forest felt more ominous. The extreme darkness and strange background noises could make a pony panic. All around her, strange growls and grunts from the creatures of the forest created a sort of tension-filled ambience, setting her on edge.

Apple Bloom knew this fact very well; she had been adventuring through the forest many times with her friends Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle. Today, however, she didn't have the comforting luxury of her friends by her side. All that she had was her own wit and brains as she made her way home from a small hut in the forest, carrying a collection of herbs with her. Apple Bloom’s sister Applejack, and Twilight, Applejack’s close friend, had been talking earlier about venturing into the forest to obtain some herbs which Twilight needed for a new experiment. Twilight had been experimenting lately with biomedical practices, finding different ways to cure ponies with herbs and plants instead of magic.

Apple Bloom had overheard their conversation and taken it upon herself to retrieve the herbs for them. She remembered thinking that this would be the perfect chance to earn her cutie mark. After all, how hard could it be to follow a path through the forest that she had taken many times before? Not to mention the fact that she could be helping Twilight find the cure to some horrific disease or illness. How cool would it be to have a cutie mark in medicine. She could even become a doctor pony if she played her cards right!

Unfortunately for her, Apple Bloom hadn't anticipated the fact that it would take her so long to reach Zecora's hut by herself, nor did she anticipate that she would lose track of time visiting with the lonely zebra. Seeing as how Zecora rarely received any visitors to her place in the forest, Zecora had spent a good while exchanging stories and entertaining Apple Bloom. Both of them had been too engrossed in their conversing to notice the slowly approaching darkness falling over the forest like a blanket, carpeting every path with a layer of pitch black. As Apple Bloom stumbled her way through the thickets, she couldn't help but think about a story that Zecora had told her earlier as a forewarning to her return home through the Everfree.

Apparently, more and more ponies had been seeing... something hanging around the outskirts of the forest. According to local rumor it was gangly creature, strange in both appearance and behavior, though those that witnessed had seen only fleeting glimpses of its figure. Nopony knew where it had come from, and nopony knew when it had appeared. They only knew that they had never seen or encountered anything like it before. Many told of frightening occurrences since the first sightings of the creature; on one occasion, Fluttershy had even returned from the forest in tears, claiming to have seen a few butchered animals near the outskirts where predators rarely ventured.

Most ponies—Applejack and most of her friends included—had passed the sightings off as a hoax, or possibly a stray predator wandering too close to civilization. Some ponies, however—ponies like Apple Bloom—weren't exactly sure of what to think. There were some crazy conspiracy theories going around about aliens, undiscovered species, and even an escaped government experiment running loose in the woods. Apple Bloom found herself wondering, if only for a moment, if the creature was real.

If it was real, what could it possibly be? What did it want? Why was it prowling about, staying so close to civilization? Her mind began to wander as she continued to walk along the path away from Zecora's home. Was there some reason that it was so close to society, but still always out of sight? Was it friendly, or was it an evil creature from the very depths of the forest, stalking ponies in order to find its next meal? The sharp snapping of a twig brought her out of her revery, immediately putting all of her senses into full alert.

She looked around the large clearing in which she found herself, her eyes scanning the all-encompassing darkness like a hawk, searching for the slightest of changes in the foliage. Where had that sound come from? It had to have come from something... Apple Bloom looked down, seeing a broken twig under her own hoof, and chuckled nervously to herself. She still felt uncomfortable as she attempted to laugh the fear off.

As she observed the clearing more closely, and with an increasingly clear head, she realized something that brought a chill to her spine: she had no clue where she was. Nothing about this particular part of the forest was familiar to her at all; the trees and plants seemed all out of place, menacing even, and something else just felt... off. She began to break out in a cold, nervous sweat. Where was she? How was she supposed to get back? This place had to be close to the entrance of the forest, right? That was where she had been heading before she had deviated from the path; she couldn’t have drifted off too far.

She looked off at all of the branching pathways leading into the forest. She knew she couldn’t just walk off along any random path, that would likely get her even more lost than she already was. Sitting down for a moment, she tried to brainstorm a way out of her predicament. Her hoof lifted in excitement as an brilliant idea shot into her head; she could just mark all of the trees! That way if she found herself lost or going in circles, she could look at the marks to see which direction she was going and where she had already been!