Stranger Things

There was a time, long ago, when Equis was still wild. Ponies huddled together for warmth and security in the dark, keeping a wary eye on the shadows of things they knew were there, but couldn't see. The thought of a building was a fleeting idea in the mind of a pony still years unborn, and the thought of nations was further off still.

In the place of civilizations and shops, politics and currency, there were vast expanses of land, uncharted and untamed. Trees grew tall, and their children reveled in verdant homes. Countless creatures lived in those forests. Forgotten species and lost truths were left in the forests of the Old Times.

Life is a cycle, and all things must end. So when ponykind made their first advances towards civilization, the time of unbridled nature gave way to invention, cities, and the like. When the first stallion reflected on distance and spatial relations, the blank parchment map of the world began to be filled in. Granted, the stallion was just wondering how to get to the other side of a canyon quickly, but all things must start somewhere.

And start it did. The flame of civilization had been lit, and it consumed the wild world, burning away leaf and wood, leaving in the ashes the building blocks for progress. The Old Times had ended, and modern Equis was born.

Of the billions of ponies, griffons, dragons, and other creatures going about their business on Equis, less than five thousand know of the Old Times even having existed. The subject isn't taught in schools, not talked about among friends, and and mentioning the name of the era would in all likelihood bring up the thought of nostalgia and reminiscence.

Of those few that know the truth, less than one hundred still live who lived through the Old Times. These creatures are dragons, alicorns, spirits, all of them extraordinarily long-lived, most of them very, very powerful. The experience of having lived through the Old Times lends an air of nobility and superiority among these survivors. They conduct themselves with dignity and respect, priding themselves on their wisdom and knowledge. These things are only fitting when it comes to those who experience - and endure - so much.

Most of those traits of nobility and dignity vanished from the mind of Cain when he woke at the bottom of a gorge, half crushed by a massive boulder.

Cain's eyes had opened slowly at first, flinching away from the sunlight. He went to roll over, to get his face away from the light, but something had him caught. Drowsy confusion told him to try again, but his second attempt failed as well. Something was holding his arm in place, and it didn't want to let go.

"What in hell...?" Cain's voice sounded as if it had been rubbed raw with sandpaper. Disorientation was having fun messing around inside of his head. Too much fun. Frustration snapped into existence like flame from a lighter, and Cain's eyes snapped open to find the cause for his discomfort.

A boulder the size of a small building was half-resting on top of him. Cain looked up and down the rock formation, and gave his arm another experimental tug. Nothing doing.

"Fuck."

The boulder must have crept over his sleeping form, not fallen, else Cain might never have woken at all. The rock covered Cain's limb from fingertip to mid-bicep, immobilizing it effectively. Cain had snarled at first, then tried worming his arm out from beneath the rock. When that didn't work, lifting came next, but that was just as useless. From his position, and weakness from having just woken up, Cain could no more lift the boulder than turn into a frog.

If Cain had been younger, he might have tried howling for help, hoping that someone or something would hear him and come to his assistance. Betrayal and paranoia had tempered that naivety, however, and Cain knew that if anything hungry chanced upon him while he was trapped like this, it would mean his life.

Which is still something I'm trying to hold on to. Cain thought, And no two-bit beast is going to take it from me.

Despite the bravado, Cain knew the words were hollow. If he'd been at his full strength, he'd have been confident that he could fend off anything that came hunting for him, despite his disadvantages. But having just woken up, having not eaten or drunken anything in however long? Thinking of the odds brought Cain's lips together into a thin grimace, a fair mix of trepidation and disgust.

His thoughts flickered back to before he fell into torpor, the sleeping curse that he'd been afflicted with. There were too many memories, too many near-deaths, too many close calls. There was many a time when Cain wasn't sure if he'd live to see the next dawn, but he'd come through. He was a survivor, even by the standards of his own kind.

Cain snarled at himself, determination replacing his reflections, chasing away the memories. He craned his head this way and that, taking in the surroundings, searching for anything that might be of help. He wasn't going to die here, Cain decided, and that meant taking things seriously. If he could find something that would help him, in any way, it might just make the difference.

But Cain was at the bottom of the gorge, with towering cliffs of red and gray on all sides. There were rocks, and other rocks, and some more rocks, and nothing that Cain could use to get free. His head slumped against the ground, lip curling in disappointment.

He felt like a wolf caught in a trap, doomed to wait for the hunter to -

Cain's eyes shot wide, and his attention immediately went to his arm. The idea kindled in his mind, still too new to be shut down. The wolf would be doomed to wait for a hunter to return, to find and kill him. It was inevitable, unless the wolf chewed his way out of the trap.

Looking at his shoulder like a hunter looks at prey, Cain surveyed the joint objectively. If he angled his head just right, he might be able to - Cain shook his head suddenly. "No. No. There's got to be another option." Chewing his arm off was ridiculous, and the thought of the pain alone was enough to make Cain's coat crawl.

"What other option do you have? Huh?"

"Something. Anything. I could try to lift it again, I could..."

"You could nothing, and you know it. There's one way out of this, Cain."

Cain clenched his jaw, and threw away the childish dreams Hoping for some miracle to happen was impractical, and he hadn't survived this long to let hope kill him. He glanced back at his arm. The muscles were tense, drawn like a bowstring. He hadn't made it through the hell of his life just to die here.

With a growing sense of dread, and although it took all of his willpower, although his lips were drawn back in repulsion, Cain brought his muzzle around to his shoulder and closed his jaw forcefully around his bicep. Lightning screamed up from his arm as Cain gnawed a mouthful of fur, skin, and muscle from his arm.

With a wet, tearing noise, he yanked his head back, and the amalgamation of his body fell with a thwack to the rock. Cain's face was contorted, as if tortured by a devil, and his breath came unevenly. His head fell back, and a silent, wordless howl ripped from his lungs. His stomach tensed and untensed, as if trying to force the pain of what he'd done out of his body.

Cain looked back down at his arm. Blood and raw, red and dripping. One bite. He panted, steeled himself for the next attack on his body. One bite. His bicep screamed at him, demanding to know why it was being tortured so mercilessly. One bite.

One bite.