//------------------------------// // Out of the frying pan and into another frying pan // Story: Lord of the Everfree // by TheInvisiblePony //------------------------------// As Everfree heard the snap reverberate across the clearing, he didn't dare look back. There were too many possibilities, and he was just about done with all of them. Out of fear, that small part of him that still thought he was trapped told him to shut up and stand still, and so he stood. With his back to the sound, it seemed like ages. “Oh sweet Celestia, What did I do to deserve this? Was it those pranks I pulled on the captain?” Moments passed and seconds turned to minutes, and still nothing happened. Reasoning that whatever snapped the twig would be gone by now, Everfree risked slowly turning his head. As he craned his neck, he was surprised to make eye contact with two very insectoid blue eyes. Everfree couldn't help but laugh, as he spoke towards the familiar face. “Ha! You got me, but I must admit, I wasn’t expecting to see you again… wait. What was your name again?” The changeling craned its neck in confusion, but Everfree didn’t leave much pause, “No, no. Don’t tell me. Drone Omega, was it?” Again, there was no response from the changeling, but Everfree didn’t care much. “I apologize; we didn’t leave on the best of terms. Perhaps I was a bit rude, but I’d like to make amends. After all, you did free me, and I did give you some love.” This the changeling reacted too. Upon hearing its traditional diet, it took a threatening pose, fangs bared and wings fluttering. The wooden pegasus gave a confused look, “Omega?” As the changeling began advancing, Everfree took a step back and noticed for the first time a shape in his peripheral vision. Another changeling! And… another one, and another one… Everfree nervously counted out about seven of them, give or take any still behind the tree line. “I’m guessing you aren’t Omega?” With very little ground left to cover, the changeling leapt forward and in the nick of time the pegasus ducked underneath. “I’ll take that as a no!” He didn’t stick around for a response, as Everfree bolted into the tree line with the small horde in pursuit. Looking back he saw there was some distance as nothing knows a forest like a tree, so in the absence of danger within five hoofsteps, he began mentally chastising himself. “It was those stupid pranks, wasn’t it? And you just had to mention you had some love to spare? This is very, very bad!” He ducked a low hanging branch and hopped over a root as he continually glanced over his shoulder. The first few changelings weren’t quite as good as navigating the forest floor as he was, and for a second he actually thought he was going to get away. Then he heard a buzzing sound and the changelings in the back started flying forwards, easily making up the lost ground. “Oh, Celestia strike me down! I forgot about the wings! Wait… don’t I have those too?” He flared out his own wings to make sure they were there. He cried out in an odd mixture of joy and mortal terror (given the small chase scene behind him) as he looked upwards for any sort of space in the leaves he could use. Low and behold, there actually was a small gap! Without much time to lose, Everfree burst through the foliage with majesty akin to a dodo in a jetpack. Which is too say, there certainly wasn’t any elegance to the whole thing, but it was effective. Soon Everfree was back in the domain of the sky ponies, and he was loving every bit of it. Or maybe that was the escaping imminent death thing. Maybe both. Regardless, he was snapped out of his thoughts as he heard an odd buzz in the air. Glancing backwards, he noticed the changelings were breaking free of the foliage as well. To add insult to injury, they looked much cooler doing it. Once again panicking, Everfree kicked it into high gear only to notice that, as wood, his high gear was significantly lower than he thought it was. The seven shape shifters were finally beginning to close the gap between them, and it looked like there was nothing left Everfree could rely on to evade them… unless… Everfree looked up more, straining his neck towards his last hope. Was it… it was! A fairly large sized cloudbank! With little time to lose, the pegasus rushed towards this welcome deus ex machina, practically flying as fast as his somehow aerodynamic wings would take him. It certainly wasn’t a long flight, but with as the changelings approached that five hoof step distance, every second slowed down as the universe itself seemed to be holding its breath. Then, Everfree burst through the first clouds, and immediately banked a hard left, hoping to lose the changelings following him into the clouds. The only shame was that neither the changelings nor Everfree knew how the weather worked this deep in the forest. It took a little more than a few seconds for the first lightning bolt to strike out towards Everfree. “What the-“ He was interrupted as this time a cloud full on collided with him, almost as if it had a mind of its own. “Who the-“This time another lightning bolt struck. “Why the-“ Another cloud, although this time Everfree dodged by a hair. He practically shouted out “Would you let me finish my questions?!” Just then, all Tartarus broke loose. He couldn’t be sure if one of the changelings just slammed into his face through the fog, or if it was another cloud, but one thing led to another and soon Everfree was plummeting through the sky, back towards the forest. He tried to stretch out and flap his wings, but he was falling too fast. The best he could manage was slowing his fall enough to not be fatal, but then gravity introduced him to a little thing called sudden impact, and he collapsed through the trees. It hurt. Like, a lot. So much so that he was surprised he could be sore in his everywhere. Well, he wasn’t initially surprised. More unconscious, but when he came too he was in for quite the (painful) shock. As he stood up, he flapped his wings only to feel a twinge of more pain. He gave himself a brief look over, noticing several scratches but nothing more, until the sight of his scratches sunk in. “Wait… I bleed sap? Weird…” Trying his best to ignore the current situation, he looked around only to notice a very different sight in the forest. Looking around, he noticed several strange mucus green strands interconnected between what could be considered possible escape routes. In fact… it looked sort of like… a cage? “Oh, you have got to be kidding me.” In between the strands were the familiar blue eyes just staring at him, almost as though they were expectantly waiting for something. Luckily, it was still just the seven from what he could see. In fact, it was really quite strange. They were just… sitting there. They weren’t feeding on him. They weren’t trying to beat any love out of him. They weren’t doing anything. THUD! Everfree whirled around only to see an eighth changeling jump down from the treetops. “There are eight?!” Only, this one was different. It was larger and more muscled than the others. Not unlike the physique of one of the royal guards, as he mused what happened next. It bared its fangs, as Everfree realized what was happening. “Cage fighting!? Really?! Changelings partake in cage fighting!? What purpose does that even serve, for the love of Celestia?!?! IT MAKES NO SENSE!!” The larger changeling hissed through bared teeth, actually speaking much to Everfree’s surprise. “It’s fun.” Then it pounced, much more accurately than the lesser ones. Everfree was sent reeling towards the edge of the cage. He put a hoof on the strands blocking the way to steady himself, only to realize it was sticky. His hoof was stuck. “FOR THE LOVE OF-“ Everfree was interrupted by a familiar laughter, as he glanced to his right; an annoyingly but equally familiar draconequus appeared in his peripheral. All he had to do was crane his neck a little more and he was well able to give a deadpan glare that had the spirit of chaos in hysterics. “Sure. Why not? What else could go wro-“ Everfree’s speech was interrupted as the super-changeling took the pause to position himself just right to buck the pegasus into the strands, which responded in very much the same fashion as a slingshot would. Mid thought, Everfree was launched into the air and landed face first into the center of the area. Wiping a tear from his eye as his laughter dimmed down, Discord spoke up through brief chuckles. “Oh my, I picked the best moment for my reappearance. Why, if I had missed this, I might actually have been upset! Oh, this almost makes up for the time I was stuck in that infernal statue!” As he continued pointing and laughing, Everfree proceeded to feel what could only be describe as ‘the pain has been doubled’. Honestly, this eighth changeling knew how to give a beating. A few minutes in, Everfree was desperate. “Look, Discord. I kno-“ Again the pegasus was bucked into the strands, but he continued “-I know we aren’t exactly fr-“ An uppercut, this time. “-friends… but could ya help me out?” Another slingshot across the clearing, followed by a brief fisticuffs brawl as Everfree tried to stand up. Discord put his talented hand to his chin, mocking serious thought. Coming to a conclusion, he spoke up. “Oh very well. If you’re this desperate.” He snapped his fingers, and Everfree couldn’t help but feel relieved. Until, of course, the changeling continued hitting him across the forest floor. He stared dumbfounded as his foe looked exactly the same, but in a top hat. “THAT’S NOT HELPING!” The changeling looked at him as if he was crazy, and Discord broke out into hysterics. “Au contraire, mine leafed friend. It’s much harder to take him seriously now!” The changeling looked left and right in confusion, not sure what to make of the situation. He hissed towards Everfree “I’m beating you within an inch of your life for sport. Why do you think I would help you?” Everfree blinked, again dumbfounded. “You mean… you can’t…” The realization dawned on him, “SON OF A COCKATRICE!” Discord again broke into laughter, and tried to speak in between more hysterics “You mean… you didn’t know… I was a figment of your… imagination? That’s just priceless!” And so the next few minutes stretched out in a fashion similar to this: The changeling wailed on Everfree (coming to the conclusion he had beat him senseless already), Discord warping Everfree’s perception left and right, and Everfree himself slowly building up rage. Eventually, he was fed up. The changeling threw another punch, only this time Everfree caught it as his wooden hoof met the hole-filled hoof. “You know what? I’m done. I’m done with you, I’m done with pain, I’m done with this, and I’m. Just. done.” He whirled around and threw a buck that connected solidly with the changeling’s jaw. If it wasn’t a shape shifter, it wouldn’t be looking very pretty. By this point, Discord even stopped messing with him, and instead conjured up a bucket of popcorn. “I even think I know why I’m done. I think it’s your fault. Even before you starting knocking me around for about the past hour, I was in a bit of pain. I think you just knocked me full circle. I am in so much pain; I don’t even think I can feel pain now. And you know what else? Thank you. Because you’re a changeling, and because a being that exists in my mind has been messing with me for the past half an’ hour, I was able to steal a little magic. Just enough, in fact, to do this!” Everfree closed his eyes, as trace amounts of green flame flickered around his hooves. Slowly, it rose, as the flame engulfed him. The changelings went wide-eyed, the lead one took a step back, and Discord was on his second bucket of popcorn. As the flames sputtered out, Everfree stepped forward, unscathed and looking completely unharmed. The lead changeling’s look was that of pure fear. Indeed, as Everfree looked around, all of the changelings looked stricken with panic, and one by one they began to flee. Even the eighth one began to take a few steps back, before turning tail and fleeing, as he seemingly phased through his own magically conjured strands of green mucus. “Yeah, that’s right! You’d better run! Anything you can dish out I can use to heal!” Everfree shouted triumphantly, as he stamped his hoof on the ground. Discord looked curiously at him, before chuckling. “Bravo on the performance, but they weren’t running from you. Turn around.” The pegasus gave a curious glance towards the chaos god, before realizing whatever scared off eight changelings was probably dangerous. Whirling around for the umpteenth time, Everfree came face to face with an unmistakably threat. The slithering tail, the snaky bottom, the beak and feathers: standing in front of the pegasus was a full grown cockatrice. Everfree didn’t waste a beat before breaking off on another speech. “I don’t think I’m even upset with this. With the time I’ve been having, I think I’ve pretty much come to terms with the fact that the universe will literally stop making sense in order to give me a bad day. So, you know what? Lay it on me. Turn me to stone. I ain’t even mad.” Everfree stared dead into the eyes of the cockatrice and… nothing happened. It took all of three seconds for the pegasus to notice something was wrong. Though he had never seen a cockatrice, he had studied them as a royal guard enough to know what they looked like, right down to the red, demonic eyes. This one had clouded, milky-white eyes. “Wait a tick. Are you blind? A blind cockatrice?” Everfree practically jumped for joy, realizing that the universe didn’t hate him as much as he had thought. In fact, it probably even saved him from the changelings. Sure it roughed him up, but it offered an apology, in the shape of a mythical misfit. In response to the sudden whoopee coming from the front of it, the cockatrice recoiled into a threatening pose. Everfree felt instantly guilty for startling it. “Let’s see… cockatrices feed on stone, which they gather from petrifying living flesh. I am neither flesh nor stone, so it won’t attack me from smell. It is remarkable though… this poor sap must have lived off of reputation and scraps alone for its entire life…” Everfree, in a moment of pity, looked around before scooping up a small pebble and offering it forwards. “It’s okay, I won’t hurt you. If anything, I feel your pain. I myself am pretty much overlooked by lady luck.” Hesitantly the cockatrice inched forward, operating from smell alone, before darting forward, snatching the pebble, and retreating a few steps. Even in the Everfree, moving trees were unnatural, and the already cautious critter was understandably cautious. “I know you can’t understand speech, but I assure you, I am no threat. You can’t understand words, but what about tone?” Trying to take on a soothing tone, he again outstretched a hoof. The cockatrice was smart enough to work out some instinctual reasoning in this situation, and a moving tree would provide a mobile nest. As a creature always on the move for fear of staying anyplace long enough for predators to catch on to its weakness, a mobile nest was a pleasant thought. In what could only be described as an enthusiastic jump with a flutter of wings, the cockatrice hopped onto Everfree’s back, just barely being small enough to fit. Everfree chuckled “Wonderful! It would seem you’re my first friend I’ve found in this forest!” Discord, who watched with some interest but mostly disgust, decided the cockatrice had ruined his fun. Glaring at the thing, and knowing it couldn’t hear him but not caring, he muttered under his breath. “Party pooper.” Everfree gave a threatening look behind him and gave a dead pan stare before starting to shimmy underneath one of the few openings in the magically conjured webbing. Forced to follow in tow, the draconequus simple hovered behind the two, thinking of ways he could mess with his sole source of entertainment.