The mare walked slowly down the forested path. The cold pecked away at her body like thousands of hungry vultures as she struggled to step through the foliage. A shroud of darkness surrounded her, limiting her vision to only the few feet in front of her hooves. Every breath she took sent another shiver down her already weak body as she limped along. She didn’t know why, or what she was looking for. But in her heart she knew it was the most important thing she could find right now.
Step after step sent shockwaves of cold numbed pain up her legs, making it hard to continue. But the noise behind her reminded her that she didn’t have such time for breaks. The gargling, swiveling, swishing noise of flesh, skin, and all sorts of evil sounding things chimed behind her in the distance, echoing around her figure. Her heart raced and her wings failed to spread. What she wouldn’t give to leave, fly and leave forever and never think about the dark forest with the cold pain and creepy noises ever again. But, as the thought crossed her mind, she knew she was still searching and couldn’t go, not until she found what she was looking for.
Tears flowed from her eyes as the pain went from a dull throb to an excruciating tremble. Her legs aching as if a drummer were pounding down on them with all of his might. She trudged like this for a long while, not stopping for rest or looking behind her. Fear evoked her every move, but she didn’t know what she had to fear.
Finally, the mare came upon something, something unlike the trees and plants surrounding her. There before her was the very thing she knew she needed to find, the very thing she needed to do something… something she couldn’t remembered. The mare decided to gap that bridge when she got to it. Before her was a lone tree, obstructing the otherwise clear path. The tree was irrelevant however; it was what was attached firmly to its oak wood that was needed.
Without hesitation, the mare grabbed at the piece of paper stuck to the tree. As soon as it came into her mouth, she felt the coldest, most soulless breeze brush across her fur. The mare’s breathing became quickened as she shivered intensely. With a gulp of air, she whirled around, expecting to meet something awful behind her.
Nothing, there was nothing there. The mare sighed in relief, taking a step forward as she broke a twig. She stopped in her tracks. She could here the twig snap… The noise that had been trailing her for so long vanished into what seemed thin air.
‘la la la la la la’
The mare spun around again, nothing was around her.
‘They always come, they always leave
A twinge of disappointment, a hint of their disbelief’
“Whose there!” The pony called out with a shaky voice. She backed up towards the tree, cringing.
‘What drives them here, what drives them mad?
The things they lost, the things they had’
“Stay away!” The mare called out once again, her back fully to the tree now.
‘Yet, they always come here
And they always forget
That for what dwells here, one must take care’
Silence. The voice had been silenced. The mare frantically looked around her, for a suspect, for a cause, but found only herself still surrounded by the shroud of darkness. Cautiously, she took a step forward, and then another. But she stopped, halted by what appeared in front of her from nothing. In front of her stood a tall stallion, much taller than her; his face was featureless, leaving craters where his eyes and nose should be. He seemed to be dressed in a suit, but the back was crudely torn open, as large appendages swished and swirled from the hole. Just at that moment, the mare experienced every emotion she had ever felt as once, as if she were living through them before they were sucked from her soul. She wanted to scream, run, kick, fly, and leave. But something kept her still. Whether it was fear or pain or both she did not know.
‘For the thing that stays here, wrapped in pain
Is the one, the only, Slendermane’
She didn’t even have the chance to scream.
***
Cold and sweaty, Fluttershy woke up late night in her bed. She shook her head violently and shivered with fear. What was that dream...? The mare gulped as she began to frantically turn on every light in her room, as she often did after such bad dreams. She rubbed her tired eyes with her hooves and checked the clock. Still very early in the morning.
The Cream colored Pegasus sat there, staring out of her bedroom window with innate fear and spine-chilling coldness. Why did she have a dream like that… and why was it so vivid? For the time that she was dreaming, she actually felt as if she were there, staring at that…that thing. The rest of the dream was a blur, nothing made sense but the focused image of the tall stallion with the horrible face (or rather, lack thereof), who seemed menacing and yet curious at the same time.
For a long time, Fluttershy stared outside of her window like this, pondering the dream and what meaning it could have. After a while, the shy pony gave up and turned off her lights. She got back into bed, threw the covers over herself and settled in, hoping to have a more pleasant dream this time as she lay her head on the pillow.
just as she closed her eyes, the Pegasus heard a faint tapping on the window, she looked outside, and her eyes met was a crudely drawn picture that almost looked as if it were drawn by a young foal on a piece of paper taped to the outside of her window.