- >You wake up once more some time later, but as the memories of what happened right before you fell asleep come rushing back you resist the urge to get up and stretch, instead laying there completely still.
- >For several minutes you listen to your surroundings carefully, trying to discern any noise that may indicate any potential presences.
- >Hearing no breathing besides your own, you gently unearth yourself from the hay in which you slept, bringing the pitchfork with you.
- >You scan your hay loft for any potential intruders before carefully going down the ladder, checking there for any intruders.
- >Seeing no creatures had snuck in during the night, you let out a sigh of relief.
- >It seems that you were safe for now, even if you weren’t for much longer.
- >You feel a bit hungry as well as a bit thirsty, and that reminds you that you can’t hide here for forever. You have to find a way to get out of wherever you were.
- >You creep over to the door and open it a small crack in order to spy on the outside world safely.
- >Outside the door is a barren looking field, empty of all plants. Beyond that, you see some grassy looking plains and some trees beyond the field.
- >After listening for any more movement, you open the door just enough to scoot through and make your move, immediately looking towards the sky.
- >You see no giant insect-horses, nor anything else that looks out place. The pigeons flying through the air, however, almost give you a heart attack before you realize they are regular sized.
- >You are pretty sure you could take a flock of pigeons in a fight as long as the fight was indoors.
- >Smiling a bit at that absolutely absurd mental image, you take a closer look at the surroundings, keeping an eye out for anything large moving all the while.
- >There is what looks like a farmhouse near the edge of the field, and a dirt trail leading… somewhere out of sight due to some trees sticking out from the edge of a forest you didn’t notice was there before due partially to being an unobservant motherfucker at times.
- >Weighing your options, you decide to make your way over to the farmhouse first and then check out where the road leads later.
- >The fields, although still easily identifiable as fields, looks like they haven’t been tended to in a while. To you, that meant that odds were that there was nobody home.
- >You carefully make your way across the field, all the while looking in a rotation at the sky, then looking behind, finally back in front of you.
- >You are NOT planning on being snuck up on.
- >Reaching the house, you rest for a moment. You were glad to have a roof protecting you from aerial attacks.
- >Before you continue, however, you press your ear to the door in an attempt to listen in.
- >You hear no noise from inside, and as such you open the front door in silence.
- >The inside of the house is completely trashed, in contrast to its comparatively well kept looking exterior.
- >Due to the fact the outside of the house appears fine, you believe that the inside was either trashed in a struggle on someone picked over the inside of the building looking for something.
- >The presence of ponies having fun in the few pictures that remain on walls tell you that this house was built for pony habitation.
- >So they DO have emotions other than hunger, what ruined this place if it was pony inhabited, though?
- >While considering what caused the place to be trashed, you decide to just blame it on the bug-horse.
- >It would probably not be good for your already high stress levels to think on what else could have caused this.
- >Without further thoughts in that direction you do a quick sweep of the house in order to give you a rough idea of what you are dealing with here.
- >The single story house is quite like what one could have back home, albeit significantly lower tech.
- >There is not much you can make use of due to almost everything being either useless for survival, designed for ponies, or broken. While there is complete lack of essential supplies, you did find the bedroom which has some spare bedding.
- >Perhaps you could move the bedding underneath the bed itself and sleep down there in order to minimize how noticeable you are when the night comes.
- >Although not too useful, you also found the living room, which was definitely the entry point that the intruder used to get in.
- >The fact that the glass is on the floor inside tells you that the broken window was where someone or something entered by force.
- >It is then an idea strikes you.
- >You walk back to the bedroom and rip a piece of the curtains off before making your way back to the living room.
- >Picking out a sizable piece of glass from the debris of the broken window, you tie the piece of curtain around the shard, creating a makeshift shiv.
- >It is certainly a strong enough backup weapon should a pony get in too close for the pitchfork to be handled optimally, and it is just about the right thickness to still be thin enough to stab with while being thick enough to be able to withstand a few uses. You slip it into your pocket.
- >With your makeshift weapons in tow, you leave the building, checking angles of possible approach all the while, before going over to the dirt path and walking down it.
- >Soon after you come over the top of a hill you spot the thing one of the things you would not expect to see: a town. Its architecture is quite similar to the architecture on the farm, to you indicating to you that it was pony inhabited.
- >Fuck that noise.
- >You start to turn around before your body reminds of your lack of food or water back at your little makeshift base.
- >An adult could go without water for what; two, three days without dying? You could either do this now or later, and the town does look pretty empty right now.
- >Begrudgingly, you continue your trek towards the city.
- >As you come closer you realize why it looked so dead from the distance.
- >The buildings and streets are utterly trashed.
- >Broken glass is everywhere, there is heavy damage to some of the buildings; busted down doors, shattered windows, the whole works one would expect to see if everyone started rioting at once.
- >You shiver a bit at the thought of what could have driven the ponies into unrest followed by them never going back to their homes again. It was proof, at the very least, that they were civilized enough at some point though.
- >Again, you just blame the bug-horse to stop yourself from thinking up something worse and perishing from a heart attack.
- >Picking a random house, which happens to have its front door open, you creep into it.
- >Quickly enough you find the kitchen, which looks rather intact.
- >You check for any traps before crouching down and opening some of the lower cupboards.
- >Fucking jackpot.
- >There is a whole bunch of canned fruits and vegetables as well as quite some amount of bottled water down there, which was a fucking miracle for your continued survival.
- >As you reach to grab it you hear the sound of hooves banging against something rapidly.
- >You freeze up immediately.
- >Rapid strikes against wood echo through the house, emanating from a room upstairs.
- >Struggling, perhaps? It seems likely that there was someone or something being eaten alive upstairs.
- >You could either leave the house with the food and fuck off, or you could put yourself on the line to save someone from being killed and perhaps gain an ally…
- >Screw it, when a pony is eating something they are probably almost at their most vulnerable.
- >Besides, being eaten alive is a shitty way for anyone to go.
- >You tiptoe your way up the stairs, now hearing many small gulps as you come closer to the source of the noise.
- >It is evident from how many gulps you hear that the predator is probably not anything too gigantic, fucking luckily.
- >After getting to the door at the end of the hall from which the noise is coming from, you gently open it.
- >Inside the room is a winged pony with a spring bud coloured coat and a downright gleeful expression on her face. You assume it is a her, at least. You haven’t seen any males of their species yet to give you a frame of reference. It also worried you a bit that there was a flying species of pony too.
- >From her jaws a pony’s mint coloured flank and back legs stick out, kicking against the floor.
- >You suppose that explains the noise.
- >The pegasi’s wings were flared out wide, and her eyes were closed too, just like during the feeding you had witnessed previously.
- >How the fuck is the cannibal pony even eating something the same size of her whole? You have no idea.
- >Perhaps you could get the answer and an ally if you save the almost eaten pony’s life.
- >Now how to go about this…
- >You raise the pitchfork and tread lightly over to the pony, positioning your strike.
- >Her eyes are closed and it gave you the perfect place and time to strike.
- >Come on, you can do this. You can save a life if you do this, even if it is a meat eating horse life.
- >If the victim turns on you, though, your plan is to bail through the window.
- >Pulling the pitchfork back, you drove it into the mare’s eyes as hard as you could. Due to the downright freakish size of their eyes compared to their bodies, two of the prongs went in one eye and the other two in the other.
- >The prongs stab in deep, to the point that one would have to damage the structure of the skull itself to drive it in deeper. It definitely went into the brain.
- >As the eye fluids as well as blood gushes from the rather grisly wounds, both the swallowing and the kicking stops abruptly as the pony drops to the ground.
- >You did it, you took a life. You are now a killer.
- >As that reality comes to you, you remove the pitchfork and take a step back.
- >You have now took a life, just like how everyone else you have seen so far has either attempted to do or has done.
- >It is a tiny bit hard for you deal with on an emotional level.
- >The mint pony begins trying to get a grip on the ground as she says something muffled, sending you back into reality as you try and make your next choice.
- >You put the pitchfork down nearby and double check the position of your shiv.
- >You walk over to the mare who is currently trying to free herself from the throat of the corpse, and you are most certainly careful to stay out of the way of any place she could kick you.
- “Hey, I’m going to help you, just don’t try anything, alright?”
- >You hear a muffled response of agreement.
- >You are still going to be cautious, though.
- >Grabbing onto either side of the mare, you start pulling to help her out.
- >This greatly speeds up her progress as she slides out of the dead pony’s throat with increasing speed.
- >Soon enough, with a wet shlick her head comes free and she immediately falls on her behind.
- >”Urghh…”
- >You notice is that she has a horn, which almost sends you right into panic mode before the rational part of your brain kicks in.
- >Calm down, she probably isn’t as dangerous as the bug-horse. After all, she was getting eaten, she probably isn’t as capable of immobilizing your entire body and swallowing you whole.
- >Well, probably the second part but she is, which is bad enough on its own, but she wouldn’t do that to someone who saved her, right?
- >Still, doesn’t hurt to be sure.
- “You alright?”
- >She snaps out of her stupor and scrambles to all four legs as her eyes go wide at you. This causes you to reach for your hidden shiv as subtly as you can. Just to be sure and all.
- >”Y-yeah… thanks to you.”
- >She smiles and takes a step towards you.
- >You take a step away.
- “Please remain at a distance.”
- >”Why? I only wanted to give you a hug for saving me.”
- >You point towards the corpse both as a reason and a subtle warning.
- “I don’t have a good track record with physical proximity here and I make a habit of not getting in physical contact with anything or anyone that can swallow me whole. Mind telling me what your name is?”
- >”Lyra, Lyra Heartstrings.”
- >She seems to be rather nervous about your presence, perhaps the corpse is doing that.
- “Lyra, is this your home or the home of any of your friends?”
- >”No, I don’t think so… why?”
- >With that her nervousness turns to confusion.
- “I found some canned food and water downstairs. You can take half.”
- >She seems to almost take a step towards you to try and hug you again, but she apparently decides against it.
- >While it may seem like a bad survival move, you had your reasons. It is packed in not-so-little pony sized serving cans and bottles. There is enough there that you are going to have to take several trips to get even half of it.
- >Besides, it doesn’t seem like she would be able to carry it all by herself. Worst case scenario she takes a bit over half and you move it somewhere else so she doesn’t come back for the rest.
- >”Really?”
- >She tilts her head in a way that rather reminds you of a dog.
- “Yes, really. Get your half and get out before I change my mind.”
- >”Alright, thanks!”
- >You cringe a bit at her loud volume as you step out of the way of the door.
- >She walks by you rather happily and pick up the pitchfork again as she goes down the stairs.
- >Looks like you just scored yourself a friend. Granted, she was a friend you couldn’t trust with much as all the ponies you’ve met so far seem to want to devour someone whole and alive.
- >You wait until you hear no more noises downstairs before creeping back down, checking your corners of course.
- >You don’t trust that pony to not lie in wait for you.
- >When you reach the cupboard you note that she did indeed only take half. That was a fairly good sign if you are to run into her in the future.
- >First off, you take as much as you could carry and set it aside before moving the rest to various locations in the house which are relatively out of sight.
- >Behind the couch, under the bed, the works when it came to hiding shit.
- >With your armfuls of supplies and a pitchfork very awkwardly balanced over your shoulders, you leave the town, doing your full watch rotation as you go.
- >The trip goes, luckily, without incident.
- >Soon after you get back to the farm, you set all the cans in a couple cupboards, eat and drink your fill of canned vegetables which are just as bad as old canned vegetables back home.
- >After that full day of scavenging and nearly pissing yourself at imaginary circumstances, you stuff the extra bedding under the bed itself, and crawl under there to pass out.