Moonlight 04

>Late Afternoon, God-Forsaken woods, Anonymous

>Today has not been your day.  You wake up lost in the middle of this damn forest, nearly get mauled, get menaced by a rabbit and held up at gunpoint by a magical purple pony.  Add on top of that, you're starving, tired, your head still aches and you're being followed.

>At least, you suspect you are.  From where you're sitting you couldn't help but notice how your tracks seem to glow with an eerie green light.  God Damn.  What happened?

>After that damn bunny showed up, you flipped (yeah, not very smooth, but today hasn't been your best day) and stood up right into the ceiling.  The yellow pegasus flew right at you and you panicked some more.  You hadn't really intended to hit the thing (girl?) but you missed anyway.  In a moment of clarity, you realized that the way out was open and the only thing between you and the door was your backpack.  That was all it took.  Out the door, down the path and over the bridge, stopping only momentarily to get your bearings.  There was the woods.

>You sprinted the whole way.

>And you didn't stop there, you kept going for a full five minutes until the adrenaline wore off.  You found a soft-looking bush, spun around, and fell right back into it, your pack slipping off your shoulder onto the ground.

>That's where you were now, and that's where you wish you could stay for the foreseeable future.  Man, have you ever been this tired?  You need to eat something, but they could be coming for you right now.

 

>They?  Who are they?  WHAT are they?  Your breathing starts to accelerate again, you're getting yourself worked up but you don't really have the energy for it.  Calm down, just calm down...

>Alright, here are the priorities:  1. You need to eat.  2. You need to sleep.  3. You need to hide.  4. You need to remain unmolested by magic ponies and wildlife.

>Should be easy.

"Heh, yeah..."

>What the hell did you get yourself into?  You laugh to yourself; how absurd is this?  You're a grown man, running from a pair of crayola ponies and their lizard friend.  This is fuckin' hilarious.

>A sound nearby breaks your mood like a bucket of cold water.  It's time to go.

>You try to stand up and find it way more difficult than it should be.  Your torn jacket has snagged on the bush.  Ditch the jacket.  Standing, you turn around and extract everything from the jacket pockets you can and shove them in your bag.  You withdraw your gun, knife, bear-spray and canteen.  Digging through another pocket, you find your holster and small box of ammo.  You never pack much, only around two dozen rounds (plus what's in your gun), but ever since your run-in with a mountain lion a few years back you've always carried extra.  Now you wish you had brought your survival rifle.  It was only a .22, but you could have carried a great deal more ammunition.  Dammit.

>Wait, are you really thinking of shooting those ponies?  Thinking back, you realize that they hadn't actually done (or said) anything you could consider dangerous.  Actually, considering that the yellow one caught you in her home, they've been downright hospitable.

>All except for that rat-bastard rabbit.  You'd put a bullet in that thing and sleep better for it.

>Friendly horses or not, you don't think you're ready to talk with them just yet.

 

>You hear another sound, why are you still here?  You attach your holster to your belt, check your gun.  It's a shiny .44 Smith&Wesson that you've only had to use once (missed every time... you're no marksman).  Hopefully you won't need to use it now, but you definitely weren't going to bet money on it.  You slip the gun into it's home.  Next comes the knife, you slip it halfway out of it's sheath and catch the silvery glint of metal.  It's a much larger knife than most would carry, but that's not the point.  You don't keep it for the size, but for the material it's made of.  You slide it home and snap it next to your gun.  Your spray clips to a carabiner on your other hip.  You stand.

>You're ready.

>You start off into the forest, chugging from your canteen as you go, your tracks still glowing.  You reach into a pocket of your pants and pull out a chocolate Cliff bar (delicious).  Think, how can you hide from something that can follow your trail without problems?  You glance behind you at your glowing footprints.  Well, time to experiment.  You look above you at the tree cover, the boughs sag low as if to pen you in.  If you didn't know any better, you'd think the trees didn't want you here.  Good thing you know better.  Low branches make easy climbing.

>You finish your snack and take another big gulp of water.  It's getting pretty empty, you'll need to find more soon.  You stow the bottle and wrapper (don't litter, kids) and walk up to one of the trees.  It's covered in knots and moss, but you think you can manage.  Jumping up, you grab a branch and start to pull yourself up.

>Not going to happen, too heavy.  You drop, slip on a root and land on your rear.  There's no way you're going to get up there with all your gear, especially as tired as you feel.  Something else then?  Wait...

 

>You turn around and stare at your glowing footprints.  It looks like you stepped in a vat of broken glowsticks.  What could be doing that?  It's obviously magic (wtf) of some kind, but how does it work?  You squat down and poke a print; your finger comes up clean.  No smell and no liquid so it must be some kind of passive effect.  You press your hand into the peat, no glow.

>Off comes a boot, the ground is cool and moist.  No glowing.  Ah, so that's how it works.  You walk a few steps with only one shoe.  Every other step glows.  Off comes the other boot and in a short time you leave your glowing tracks behind.

>Next, you need to eat.  You tie your laces together and sling your pack around to your front.  The boots clip onto their own carabiner.  Rummaging around in your bag, you finally pull out a vacuum-packed emergency ration.  As you fiddle with the packaging, you realize something.  Most of your stuff, the gun, your large knife, the bear-spray, the emergency rations, you have them all because you screwed-up.

>Wild dog attack you could have avoided.  Now you carry a revolver.

>Treed be momma bear, shouldn't have yelled at those cubs.  Now you carry bear-spray.

>Awoke to find food looted by racoons, should have stashed it better.  Now you carry emergency MREs.

>Barely survived an animal attack that changed your life...  Now you carry that knife.  Not that it really does any good now, the damage has been done.  No, it's more for other people to protect themselves from you than for your protection.  You keep telling yourself that, but would you really give someone the knife to use on you?

 

>You shake your head and break your reverie.  There is no time for dwelling on the past.  It was unfortunate, but happened none the less.  Actually, you're quite lucky to be alive.  You look around.  Maybe things haven't turned out the way you intended, but at least you're still living.

>The ration tastes horrid (not unexpected) and does nothing to satisfy your grumbling stomach (unexpected).  You just inhaled almost 2000 calories but you don't even feel partially full.  Your mind drifts back to that steak you had to abandon earlier...  Dude, quit doing that, you don't have the time.  Those ponies could be coming after you right now.  Food, check.  Now to find a place to hide.

 

>Where to hide?  You've been wandering around but nothing seems like a good place to disappear.  You're definitely lost, but isn't that the point?  That's when you fall in the ditch.

>It wasn't deep, but it definitely surprised you.  It was about three feet deep and five long and seems artificially dug.  By now your feet were quite wet, it was getting chilly, and the sunlight was starting to decline.  This was the spot.

>You drop your bag in the hole and dig out your tarp (another thing you pack because of a bad experience).  It's a pretty big tarp and covers the whole ditch easily.  Adding some tent stakes to edges, you think it'll work.  You cover the tarp in a thin layer of dirt, dry leaves, moss and sticks.  You take a step back and survey your hideout.

"Wow, that's pretty good." you say.

>You don't get to admire your creation long as you hear some rustling.  What direction did that come from?  Voices drift into your awareness.  Time to test your hole.  You get down and squeeze under the tarp, hoping that most of the camouflage will stay in place.  Once inside the hole, you pull out your gun and wait.  It's dark in the ditch, and you contemplate retrieving your light when you hear the voices again.  They're much closer this time, you can almost make out what's being said.  Creature... trail... lost...  Yep, that must be them, and they're looking for you.

 

>It's dark, the sun set over an hour ago and yet you still hear the sounds of searching.  Nothing has actually approached your hiding place, but they've definitely been around.  There are six or seven of them, judging by the voices, and you think that they're mostly women with one kid...  Should you think of them as mares with a colt?  You don't know what to think.  Shit, they're coming closer!

"Ah' don' know, Rarity," says one "this is feelin' more like'a waste of time than anythin'."

"Oh, I know dear," replies the other (Rarity?), "this really isn't how I thought I'd spend my evening.  I still have costumes to finish and instead I'm wandering around in this dirty, dirty forest."

>Ooookay?  What kind of name is Rarity?  The first one continues.

"What Ah'm trying to say is, Ah' don't think this weird animal even exists."

"What do you mean?" asks the second.

>Her voice grates at you for some reason...  Ah, because it sounds like your mom when she's trying to be fancy.  You keep telling her that she comes across as completely fake, but she persists...

"Think about it," continues the first, "some strange animal appears at Fluttershy's.  The only ponies who see it are Fluttershy and Twilight.  Twilight claims it's some unknown intelligent meat-eater that somehow escaped into Everfree Forest before she could catch it.  That smells mighty fishy ta' me."

"You don't think that-" starts the second voice.  She's promptly interrupted.

"What Ah' think is, is that Twilight is tryin' ta make Nightmare Night scarier this year by inventin' some critter and havin' it 'escape' into the woods."

"What?  Nooo!" interjects the second.  "Twilight would never-"

>Some form of visual communication must be going on, because they stopped talking for a moment.  Then the first start talking again.

"Jus' think about it.  We're wanderin' around the Everfree Forest at night so we can catch some critter?  I think Twilight's jus' gettin' us all worked up so that we'll help spread'er story around town.  Then, come Nightmare Night, she'll dress up Fluttershy's bear er'somethin' and chase it through around, claimin' it's 'the creature'."

"Well, when you say it that way, it does make sense," says the second voice.

>And you agree, this sounds just like a prank you'd play on your friends.  Create monster, monster escapes, fruitlessly search for monster, let the tension rise, scare the shit out of everyone.  If you ever get home, you'll try it.

"So what do we do?" asks the second voice.

"Ah'm not sure what we CAN do 'til Twilight decides we've looked enough.  Ah' recon she'll 'stumble on' some tracks or other sign-"

>The voice stops short, did she see you?  Shit, shit, shit!  You were paying so much attention to their conversation that you hadn't noticed exactly how close they were getting.  They're nearly on top of you!

>Calm down, chill.  They probably haven't seen you yet, just let it play out.  Listen, they're talking again.

"Applejack?  What's wrong?" asks the second voice.

"Rarity, are you seein' what Ah'm seein'?"

"Seeing?  Seeing what?" Rarity (that really must be her name, odd) asks.  "All I see are- OH!"

>The jig is up, they've found you.  You prepare to spring from your hiding place and confront the pair.  What they say next causes you to pause.

"Is that a sword stickin' out'o that there tree?" asks Applejack (truly weird names around here).

"I, I think you're right." replies Rarity.

>Sword?  What sword?  You didn't remember seeing any swords while you were preparing your hideout, unless... You reach down to check your knife but find it missing.  SHIT.  What happened?  And then you remember, you used the serrated saw-blade on the back edge to cut down a few larger branches.  You thought they would disguise the hole better if you placed some large branches over the top.  You must have left the knife stuck in the tree and forgot about it!  Dammit, what do you do now?

>You could jump up and engage them.  This sounds pretty good since there's only two of them.  Or, you could wait and hope they leave it where it is.  Actually, that will probably work.  How could those horses pull it out of the tree, much less take it.  They don't have hands!

 

>You should have jumped out when you first thought of it.  While you were busy arguing with yourself, you heard a tinkling sound followed by something being wrenched from a tree nearby.  You don't know how they did it, but they obviously have the knife now.  As you think about it, you realize that they must have used magic to get it down.  Damn, there's no way you're going to go up there now.  Not only are they armed with your knife, but they have magic.  You should sit this one out.  They continue talking.

"Wow, look at that, Rarity," says Applejack.  "What do ya' think it's made of?"

"Well, let me find out out." Rarity replies.

>There's a slight humming and then a flash of light.  Both ponies (are you even sure they ARE ponies?) gasp in surprise.

"Why, it's silver!" states Rarity.

>Well, duh.  You could have figured that out without flashbombing anyone.  It's written right on the blade above the handle...

"Silver?" questions Applejack, "Why would you make a sword out of silver?"

"Well, I don't know, dear," Rarity answers, "but that's exactly what it is.  A Silver Sword!"

"We should get Twilight and the others over here ta' see this" says AJ.  "TWILIGHT!  SPIKE!  FLUTTERSHY!  PINKIE PIE!  RAINBOW!  HEY, EVERYPONY!  GET OVER HERE, WE FOUND SOMETHIN'!"

>The volume of her shouting startles you.  Ouch, go yell in someone else's ear, damn horse.  Not five seconds later you hear a loud gust of wind.  Actually, it sounds more like a small aircraft coming in for a landing.  Either way, something happened and a new pony joins the conversation.

"What's going on, did you find the creature?" asks the new voice.

"No, but look at what we DID find!" replies Rarity.

"Woah, that's awesome!" the new voice says.  "Where did you find it?"

"It was jus' stickin' out'o that there tree" answers AJ.  "Can ya' go'n tell the others?"

"Sure, I'm on it!" says the new voice.

>With a sound reminiscent of a jet, the new voice was gone.  How does someone simply appear and disappear like that?  You remembered the pegasus from earlier, she could fly but didn't make any sounds like that.  Maybe she--- FLASH.

>Your thoughts were completely derailed by a massive, pink strobe going off.  Even through the tarp and debris, your eyes received a blinding dose.  Squeezing your eyes tightly shut, you fought with the instinct to curse.  Don't give yourself away now!  From the sounds of it, you weren't the only one caught off guard by the sudden flash.

"Oh, my eyes!"  "TWILIGHT!"

"Sorry, girls," says the newly appeared individual.  "Did you find it?"

"I already told you, they didn't find the creature," said the voice from before.

>Wait... didn't she run off?  How the hell did she get back here so quickly?...  They can fuckin' teleport now?  You were definitely getting jaded to the whole 'magic' thing.

"So, if you didn't find it," started the newcomer (Twilight?), "what did you find?"

"We found this!" Rarity answers.

>You hear a bunch of Oooo's and Aaah's.  How many are up there?

"I know, isn't it glorious!  It's made of silver!"

"Made of silver?" asks the new voice. "It must belong to the creature!"

"Nah, hold on Twilight," Applejack starts.  "This has gone on long enough."

"Huh?  What do you mean" asks Twilight.

"What we mean, dear," replies Rarity, "is that it is time this charade should come to an end, and you should tell us what is really going on."

"Charade?  I don't know what you're talking about!"

"Twilight Sparkle, do ya' really expect us ta' believe that story 'bout a creature ya' found at Fluttershy's?" asked a peeved Applejack.

"Wha-wha-bu-but i-it's true!"

>It seems there's a little animosity between these individuals.  What kind of name is Twilight Sparkle?  It sounds like something from a little girl's TV show...

"It is true!" says another voice.

>Wait, that voice seems familiar...  Oh!  It's that yellow pegasus who's house you broke into, the one with the white bunny.  What was her name?  Something-Shy?

"Fluttershy?" asks Applejack quizzically.

>That's it!

"It's okay to come clean, dear, we know Twilight put you up to it." says Rarity.

"She did no such thing." Fluttershy answers.  "There WAS a creature in my house and it DID run away."

>The group is interrupted by a wolf howling in the distance.

 

"Uh, guys," starts a new voice, "I don't mean to be mean but... maybe we should go home now."

"Pinkie's right," said a kid's voice (that lizard from earlier?). "we should go back to Ponyville for the night and look for him again tomorrow."

"Yeah"  "Uh huh"  "Sounds good"  "Yes, let's"

>You soon find yourself alone.  You ache all over from maintaining your crouch for so long and roll over.  Your watch says it's only 8:27, but you're completely exhausted.  You close your eyes.