The door to Fluttershy’s home opened and she sat Cyril down by her couch before opening the door, Cyril however didn’t budge, this cage now belonged to him and he would not part with his home so easily. Fluttershy walked away but Still Cyril refused to leave his cage. It wasn’t until Fluttershy returned with a dead fish that Cyril showed any movements.
Placing the bowl at the edge of his cage Fluttershy moved back a bit to let him get a better look at the food. Cyril moved towards the food slowly before snatching the thing and dragging it to the back of his cage. It wasn’t until he had finished eating the damned thing that he realized what was happening.
“How long have I been a fox!” he thought to himself. If he remembered correctly he had been out in the Everfree for awhile, and when they had left Twilight's Castle it was dark. It had been almost a full day since he had first transformed. He’d have to get out of here soon.
“Um...I already had a bed made for you, I mean that’s if you wanted it,” Fluttershy commented.
Fluttershy was admittedly having trouble with her new housemate. Since the fox had woken up, he had yet to speak to her, or any other animal. It was...different. The news of a pony who could understand animals had traveled far and wide in the critter community as such many animals knew about Fluttershy and all of them were desperate to talk to her, to let somepony know about what was troubling them, yet the fox before her acted like an animal of the Everfree. He took care of himself and had a deep mistrust of Ponies.
Eventually Fluttershy had given up trying to coax the fox into speaking, at least for the day, and she quickly made sure the rest of her animals had what she needed before she went upstairs to sleep. Cyril noted, with a bit of distaste, that Angel, the white Devil, had been glaring at him from across the room. It wasn’t until Fluttershy went to go to sleep that Angel followed soon after, his bed being close to Fluttershy’s no doubt.
When the house finally quieted down, Cyril made his move. The cage door had been left open, so transforming wasn’t required, and he saw that the back door had a doggy door which had been left unlocked. Cyril had to sigh, it wasn’t the most daring of escapes but it would work.
The backyard was fenced but once again the gate was left wide open, it was a simple matter to simply walk out of the gate and head back into the Everfree forest. Cyril had to wonder at his luck, was he really getting away without being spotted? He thought so and thus with that thought he didn’t bother hiding or creeping away.
Life however is not always as we think it, for as Cyril walked out of the gate he didn’t see a small white form sitting up in the window that overlooked the backyard. Angel’s face turned a deep shade of red as his foot tapped furiously on the windowsill, before he jumped off and got Fluttershy.
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Twilight was up and about, the news that the fox had run off last night had kept her awake all through the night. Spike still rested easy though, the young drake had had enough excitement the past couple of days, and he was still a baby, he needed his sleep more than anypony.
Even though the fox had gotten away under Fluttershy’s watch, Twilight didn’t blame her. The mare had an affinity for animals, and even though her house had birdcages, the doors had either remained opened or had the doors removed all together. Twilight couldn’t blame Fluttershy for wanted to the fox to feel comfortable in her house.
What Twilight was mad about though, was that despite how quickly the message had gotten to her that the fox had disappeared, she couldn’t find any trace of it. She thought the wolf’s den might hold some answers as to where the fox might be, and if not she’d at least be able to get the wolf.
Twilight had no luck with the den, as it had been completely demolished. It looked like something large had torn it apart from the inside out, leaving Twilight to suspect that it might have something to do with a manticore or a timber wolf. It was hard to say but what ever did it, was powerful.
It wasn’t all bad though. Fluttershy had been able to help track the fox to a degree. It seemed like the fox was staying near ponyville. For whatever reason it didn’t want to stray far, “Probably because of an abundance of food” Fluttershy had said. Twilight didn’t care why it was staying close so long as she got some answers.
Twilight of course realized that she may have been taking things a bit too far, after all the samples she had gotten yesterday had indicated that the fox was just that, a fox, there were a few irregularities with the protein and iron content in it’s blood, and it’s stool had traces of berries and other things that wouldn’t normally be found in a fox’s diet, but other than that, it was just a fox. There was nothing special about it other than it’s fur.
Twilight considered forgetting about the fox, sure it was a bit strange, it’s fur and lack of a magical presence certainly made it an oddity, but that was it. It was only Twilight's need to understand the unknown that had been driving her, and Fluttershy had told her that her actions were a bit irrational.
Twilight sighed. The prospect of letting the fox go pained her, but she couldn’t think of a way to track the fox, and keep it contained. The idea of dropping everything and getting some much needed rest was starting to look better and better the longer she thought about it. Looking at her charts and equipment Twilight made up her mind, and began to slowly clean up.
She was going to put everything up, but she stopped for a moment as she noticed the chart that held the a portion of the wolf’s DNA sequence. It was perhaps this section that baffled her the most. The gene sequence here didn’t make any sense to her and Twilight had brushed it off as junk genes. That to was soon put away in a box that would later be shelved.
A ding caused Twilight to turn and look at a machine that began to slowly spit out paper. Putting her things down Twilight went to it and began to look over the contents. It was the DNA results of the fox. Twilight nodded to herself as she looked over the paper. This confirmed her suspicions. The fox wasn’t anything interesting.
She was about to put that away as well, when she stopped and noticed something strange. Digging into the box that held the DNA results of the wolf, she retrieved the papers she had just put away, and began to scan over both. A gasp escaped her lips the paper dropped from her magical grasp.
“This, this is...this changes everything,” she said, as she turned and raced out of the room to go retrieve her friends.
00000
“Woo-Hoo!” Cyril shouted as he jumped from the top of a tree into the swampy lake below. Falling into the water Cyril made a big splash before he surfaced only moments later, covered in mud and slime. Dragging himself to shore, he shook himself off before sitting under a tree
“I should have come here a long time ago,” he said aloud as he relaxed. “I wonder why I never did till now?” No sooner had he said that did a large crocodile spring from the water and snap at him.
Rolling away from the crocodile Cyril transformed into a bird and flew into a nearby tree before he returned to normal, giving the crocodile the middle finger when he was sure he was safe. Cyril's heart was pounding a mile a minute, as he watched the crocodile snap at him a couple more times before returning to the water, though Cyril kept a hawks eye on him.
“Now I remember,” he snarled out loud. “Froggy bottom bog has too many crocs,” he spat in the water before transforming into a bird and flying away from Froggy bottom bog. His stomach was rumbling and he was tired. He’d need to find a new food source and a new home. H regretted having to tear his old den apart from the inside, but well it was a bit cramped and devoid of sunlight.
Cyril just flew out of the tree line of Froggy Bottom bog before a shadow passed over him. Looking up he nearly Screeched in fear before he did a sharp turn and retreated back into the tree. Landing on a branch Cyril watched the sky carefully. There he spotted her. Her prismatic mane was hard to miss, and it often left a streak behind her. She was circling a wide area, with her eyes scanning the ground.
Cyril’s eyes narrowed and he knew something wasn’t right. Twilight had to be behind this. She wasn’t going to give this up.
00000
It had been hours since Twilight had first called her and Applejack to explain what it was that she wanted the two to do. Rainbow Dash could recall it even now, despite her focus being on trying to find the fox.
Rainbow Dash had nearly crashed into another window, but thankfully the window had already been busted out, and while she appreciated the fact that she would have to pull glass from her mane again, it didn’t mean that her landing was any more gentle than if she would have crashed through the window.
Skidding acrossed the floor on her side Rainbow Dash came to a rather harsh stop when she bumped into a bookcase. The force of her momentum had caused the bookcase to shake. Seeing the books coming down Rainbow Dash covered her head with her hooves. Several seconds went by before she dared to open her eyes and saw that all the books were being held in Twilight's magic.
As Twilight put the books back on the shelf, making a mental note to reorganize them later, Rainbow Dash picked herself off before moving to stand by Applejack, who had been standing there the whole time. The two mares said nothing to each other as Twilight moved to stand before them and started to talk.
“Rainbow Dash, I’m glad you came, I didn’t want to have to explain twice,” She said as she used her magic to levitate two sheets of paper before she held them in front of the mares to show them. They were the DNA results of the fox and the wolf respectively.
“What’s this about sugercube?” Applejack asked as she looked between the two sheets of paper confused.
“Yeah, all you’ve said is that it’s important and you wanted us to come as fast as we could,” Rainbow supplied.
“Well for the past few days I’ve been trying to locate this wolf out in the Everfree,” she started to explain.
“This the same critter Applebloom was going on about?” Applejack asked with a raised eyebrow.
“Yes. You see I’ve seen the wolf twice, and I’ve even managed to get a sample of it’s fur, but I wasn’t able to catch it. Yesterday however Zecora found a fox, and I brought it back to the castle,”
“Yer not making much sense here Twilight, what’s so special about this wolf and fox Yer telling us about.” Applejack asked again,
“There green Applejack. Both the wolf and the fox share the same physical trait, that shouldn’t be possible in either animal. I wanted to find out why so I did some tests,”
“That’s all good and everything Twilight, but you still haven’t explained why were here?” Rainbow Dash cut in causing Twilight to nod her head.
“Right, well the fox escaped. Normally I wouldn’t mind and I was even thinking of just leaving it alone...until I saw this,” she said as she brandished the two pieces of paper in their faces. “These are DNA scans of the fox and wolf, but do you see this section of DNA sequencing?” she asked as she pointed at the area’s in question.
Both mares nodded before Twilight continued. “Well I did to. At first I thought it was nothing, but these are the same genes.”
“Twilight, not everypony is as smart as you, maybe you could lay it out a little clearer?” Rainbow scuffed.
“These aren’t two genes that look alike, these are the exact same genes, as in they came from the same source,” That seemed to get their attention. If anything they looked a bit confused.
“So if yer saying what ah think yer saying, ya’ll think these two critters...are the same animal?” She asked still a bit confused.
The conversation quickly escalated at that point, and Rainbow found it hard to follow, but something she did understand, what that Twilight wanted her help. That was why she was flying around right now. Twilight had asked her if she could keep an eye out for the fox and Rainbow agreed, though now she wished she’d said no, because as far as she was concerned it was…
“So boring!” She yelled to herself as she did another circle around the fields. “I don’t even know what I’m suppose to be looking for,” She mumbled to herself, though Twilight assured her she’d know when she spotted it. “As if,”
Looking towards the horizon she could see that the sun was getting awfully close to setting, they wouldn’t be out here for much longer, so at least that was an upside. Sighing she looked down at the fields a final time before she stopped in mid air. Something had moved down there. Narrowing her eyes she flew a little closer to the ground to get a better view. She roved over the flowers and greenery several time but couldn’t find anything.
Rainbow was about to shrug and turn away when a pair of white colorless eyes opened and stared directly at her. Not that she knew what she was looking at, the outline of the face of the fox began to come into view. She nearly gasped with how easy it had been to completely overlook the thing. Before she could do anything though, the fox turned and bolted in the opposite direction.
Catching her senses, Rainbow Dash flew higher to watch its movements before she called out, “AppleJack, this way!” she shouted getting the mares attention. She had been patiently waiting in the grass and hiding, now though with the shout from Rainbow Dash, she emerged from the flowers and retrieved her lasso from under her hat and quickly gave chase in the direction that Rainbow had pointed in.
Twilight had also been nearby, though the Alicorn had placed a spell of brief invisibility upon herself, now that the chase had begun though, she quickly cast the spell aside and gave chase along with Applejack, forgoing her wings and opting to run alongside her friend while Rainbow kept an eye in the sky.
“It’s headed to Froggy Bottom Bog!” she called getting the two mares to put on an extra burst of speed.
They were gaining on it now. it was slowly coming into reach. In a moment of pure instinct Applejack threw her lasso. Time seemed to slow as the rope soared through the air before it found purchase on something. Applejack Whooped when she felt the tug on her lasso and quickly began to reel the rope in. Twilight was excited and the victorious shouts from Rainbow Dash proved the same for her.
The celebration was short lived however as the rope snapped and the fox turned tail and put on an extra burst of speed. The chase began anew but the fox had gained a lot of ground. The three mares could just make out the fox as he escaped into the trees of Froggy Bottom Bog, but the chase was not over yet.
Breaking the edge of the field and finding purchase into the swampy marsh of Froggy Bottom Bog, Twilight and Applejack gave a holler of triumph as they saw the fox in mid air jumping over an area of water. Twilight's horn lit to freeze the fox in mid air, but before the spell could be cast, the water’s surface was breached.
A large crocodile had jumped from the bottom of the swamp before engulfing the entirety of the fox in its maw. The two mares heard a sickening crunch as the crocodile snapped its jaws shut and fell back into the water. The fox hadn’t even yelped in pain. It was over before it even knew it was lunch.
Twilight stared wide eyed at the spot where the crocodile had retreated into the water, a look of utter shock and confusion on her face. The fox was dead, and with it her answers.