>The trip back was laborious, sapping most of the strength you would normally use to hunt for food, landmarks or anything salvageable.
>You simply used a beeline route, following a series of gems you embedded into the ground.
>A slightly more extravagant breadcrumb trail. Normally, you’d pick them back up for later use, but your extra load made such a luxury impossible.
>Speaking of your load...she had remained unconscious throughout the trip, her breathing taut and heavy. Persisting just as you had found her.
>But you both made it back in one piece, that’s all what matters.
>Arriving at your safe haven, you gradually make the descent into its depths. Fortunately both the entrance and opening passage aren’t too steep.
>After around a minute of strained hoisting, you finally reach the main chamber.
>It’s your home; which you had stolen from those bipedal, raspy voiced dogs. Your home. It is a relatively spacious grotto. Featuring glistening walls, with jewels embedded at every end, all possessing a strange luminous glow that dimly lights up the cave in a swathe of gaunt colours.
>At first, you found them quite attractive. But now their light is nothing more than stolid glares, piercing an unwelcome, bitter atmosphere into your home.
>Despite that anxiety, this place is the only reason why you’ve lived so long out in these badlands.  
> Because the dogs who owned this place held a hefty amount of supplies here.
>For one, there was food.
> A good abundance of meat, mostly scrags, fat and dried produce. Most of it was kept in a broken meat locker.
>There was also a good deal of bread, all wrapped hastily in rough scripts of paper.
>Truly, some of the papers used were extracts from books, completely ruined into intelligibility.
>It was all stored in a rickety dresser. By now, you only have a few stale loafs left.
 
>Secondly, water.
>This cave has a large subterranean river running around it. The dogs created a passage deriving from an alcove leading to the river. Despite their apparent brusqueness, these canines truly were fantastic at excavation, as the passage is safe, aptly sized and well constructed.
>At first, you were heftily sceptical about drinking from it. Yet no other options were available.
>Since you haven’t died of cholera or fell terribly ill once, you’ve safely assumed it’s perfectly drinkable.
>It’s also been used for almost all your hygienic needs, although soap and shampoo are absent you’ve managed to keep relatively clean purely because of it.
>Frankly, its existence is nothing short of a miracle.
 
>Lastly, the shelter, furniture and equipment.
>Aside from the food containers, there were several beds. All were roughly constructed pallets, but they had mattress provided.
>Sure, they were all lumpy, flea-ridden, dog-stinking brown clumps of mass at first. But after a bit of cleaning, you were at least able to wash off MOST of the dog hair and indiscernible stains.
>That’s actually when you realized they were mattresses.
>Thankfully you hadn’t washed them in the river.
>While still disgustingly pungent and uncomfortable, they are grades upon grades above sleeping on cold, rugged stone.
 >There was also a table and a few scrawny chairs, too big for you to sit on or use functionally, but the wood has helped with fires and stabilising some of the pallets.
>Torches too were in supply, along with four packets of matches. You’ve been extremely moderate with their use, only using them during exceptionally dark nights and for cooking.
>You weren’t going to use them for cooking at all, until you realized creating a spark isn’t as easy as smacking two rocks together.
>Oh how many hours you tried.
 
>Several satchels and backpacks were left by the dogs too, all blackened and dirtied. They were profoundly durable though and have assisted you well with carrying equipment on your trips out of the cave.
>In these backpacks were a handful of tools. Some pickaxes, hammers, chisels. The most important of these tools was a knife, which you’ve used extensively during your time here.
>You’ve kept most of the gem cutting and mining instruments intact. You haven’t salvaged, let alone touched most of them. All over paranoia that an emergency may arise and such tools will somehow be necessary to remedy it.
>But the most extraordinary find was a first-aid box. By its appearance and almost untarnished structure, it seemed as if the dogs had stolen it, only for it to be never thought of it again.
>A good deal of bandages, dressings, painkillers and even saline were kept inside. You’ve been using the supplies quite often since and still a plenitude of content remains.
>You were never really good at first-aid, though you do remember a few odd details here and there.
>On the bright side, being here has let you practice your medical knowledge...if only SLIGHTLY.
 
>As for your personal possessions, you funnily wound up with several pieces of equipment from back at home.
>Your handgun, your watch, your wallet and your I-pod touch.
>You own two magazines for your pistol, one is loaded into your pistol already and the other kept secure in your trouser’s back pocket. You’ve only shot one bullet and each magazine contains fifteen rounds. Twenty nine bullets left, Anon.
>Your interest in firearms has never been too keen, but self-defence is something you value. Normally, you don’t carry this gun in public. It felt atypical, despite your views. Just this once, you’re truly happy you had.
>Your watch, a Tissot PRC 200, is broken beyond repair. You’re not exactly sure how it broke, but by its cracked glass and dented crown you can assume you fell on it when you first arrived in this backwards world.
>It has personal value. Aside from being with you for years and years, it was a present from your late parents. You can’t muster the courage to throw it away.
>Your simple, bifold wallet has been staying in your pocket. Inside, it has a ten dollar note and two quarters. It also has your driver’s licence, student card, debit card and a collection of train tickets.
>You only used it once in desperation. It was when trying to identify yourself after an attempt of communication with a pair of ponies. When they became frenzied with fear, you popped out your wallet and displayed your driver’s licence.
>It didn’t work.
>Finally your I-pod. It’s fourth addition, with a solid collection of music you’ve accumulated over two years. When you arrived, it had full battery charge. Even with strict use, that charge is now merely a quarter in size.
>Its music and videos have kept you sane here. You really don’t know what you’ll do when it seizes to respond.
 
>With everything predominantly in check, you haul your patient into the centre of the room.
>Steadily and slowly, you reach one of the aforementioned mattresses situated on a pallet.
>Delicately, you adjust the mare off from your back, unlocking her hooves between your arms and letting her slide softly onto the beddings.
>Despite your tactful steadiness, she winces and lets out a hushed cry. Her body conforms uncomfortably to its new surface for a few seconds.
>Her appendages huddle closer to her body defensively. You frown; it is such a faint, hopeless motion.
>Then you can’t help but flinch after seeing her grotesque wounds again. Her condition is gruesome, fixing this doesn’t seem as plausible now that you start to examine.
>Taking a deep breath, you begin composing your mind and reach out for the first-aid box.
>Flicking it open, you kneel down beside her. As you begin plucking out a variety of medical equipment, a strange question abruptly clicks into your head. Just a single word.
>’Her’?
> Shaking out such nonsense, you swallow a massive lump of anxiety right back down to your guts. It’s now or never. Live and let die. Go for broke. Heaven or hell.
 
>It’s been at least two hours now, full of gruelling treatment, cleaning and dressing.
>But to be frank, you think you’ve done a decent job.
>She’s now patched up in all areas where wounds were most dominant. Gauze covers most of her underbelly and back, as well as several ambits around her neck, forearms and legs. The larger wounds were covered more extensively, both to control bleeding and for comfort.
>Her head suffers a single bandage over her crown, which you administered extremely carefully. Though a few plasters are stuck across her cheeks and forehead, admittedly with a little less grace.
>Of course, there were the procedures before the bandages and plasters were applied. Cleaning her wounds was perhaps the most nerve wrecking.
>What made it worse was that it was the first step.
>Wiping the interior of cuts caused her body to twitch and hiss in agony. Cleaning them out with water and some saline took a good deal of time, but you were meticulous and managed to get almost every wound thoroughly sanitary.
>However stone and large blots of skin had made their way into the wound too. You had to pluck them out with tweezers, which is when she began sweating profoundly. You’d never felt so stressed out in your life, you honestly thought you were making it worse for her at this point.
>Furthermore this was your first time applying first-aid to another living creature, even now you feel the sweat trickling down every part of your body.
>With determination and persistence, you every cut foreign object free.
>Most of her wounds were lacerations in the end, but she also possessed a few burns and abrasions.
>You were able to join most of the lacerations with the short supply of butterfly enclosures you owned, which of course resulted in a series of whimpers.
>With the burns, you simply smeared some burn ointment and applied a very thin gauze layer over them. The bottle provided wasn’t particularly large; you used it all entirely on all of her burns. As for the degree of burns, they appeared to be second-degree at least.
>The abrasions were cleaned out with a cloth; they weren’t as complex as the lacerations fortunately. But they were quite dirty, which meant you had to exert a little extra force with your wiping.
>After you thoroughly cleaned all the wounds, you had to apply a massive number of bandages and dressing.
>Dressing an animal is harder than it appears. The difference in anatomy made some wounds difficult to cover at first.
>Plus her legs were...uh.
>Full of glory holes.
>It only took a bit of experimentation to properly get the cloth fully wrapped around her though.
>That only had to be repeated over a hundred times more and then you had to do it ALL OVER again with the bandages.
>The only comfort you had during this part was the fact her perspiration had loosened up. As well as the fact she hadn’t made another noise of protest.
 
>Either way, after that, it was over. And you remember feeling a massive, sweeping sensation of relief pushing everything in your body over until you collapsed onto your back.
>That’s where you are now. On your back, looking up at cave’s canopy, with only the gemstones gazing back at you.
>You feel incredibly heavy, both physically and mentally, the entrancing flickering from the gemstones making you drowsy.
>Man you’ve done a good thing, you deserve a little nap after something so backbreaking.
>You close your eyes ever so slowly, your arm adjusting slightly, which causes an abruptly loud shuffling noise and a muffled clatter.
>Damn, must’ve knocked over the first aid kit or something. Whatever, you’re too tired for this.
>After all, this is the first time you’ve felt so eager to sleep on this planet – if only this balmy, toasty breeze would stop hitting your face you’d be out in no time.
>It kind of reminds you of your first kiss.
>...Wait what?
>You open your eyes reluctantly.
>Two massive, surreal green orbs are gawking at you, suspended on a dark silhouette adorned with teal dishevelled hair, which is depressing below and tickling unpleasantly into your cheeks.
>Everything is so blurry; you can hardly make sense of the shape before you.
>After another humid waft of air hits against your face, you notice what appear to be pupils narrowing inside the two, dark emeralds.
>You recognise them as eyes now, every muscle is starting to seize up in your body.
>Fear completely overwhelms you. You remain in a state of stupor, paralyzed by your fear and lethargy.
>You suppose that's why.
>It rears back. A maw slowly breaches from underneath its eyes, uncovering a set of fangs, saliva drips voraciously from each brandished blade.