Off the Beaten Path

by wonderkid125

Chapter 4

The shrill ring of a school bell pierced through the air, dismissing classes for the day and snapping Rainbow Dash from her thoughts. She looked up, only to see the other students in the room getting up and leaving.

“Alright, everyone be sure to let me know if you have any questions,” The teacher said at the front of the room. “It’s important that you know this stuff. You can never be too early to study for finals,” He cautioned.

Aww man… how was I supposed to remember all of that junk? Rainbow thought while fighting the urge to groan. Oh well… I guess there’s always next time. She smirked to herself as she got out of her chair and exited the room.

The hall outside was already packed with mentally drained ponies on their way out of school. Rainbow waded her way through the crowd, barely even paying attention to anything or anyone. Her eyes searched the area ahead until they focused on a familiar yellow mare. Once she saw her friend, she smiled and picked up her pace.

“Hey, Fluttershy!” Rainbow called as she neared the shy pony.

Fluttershy looked over as she heard her name called. She smiled brightly as she saw the cyan mare trotting up to her. “Hi, Rainbow Dash,”

“So… are we still on for tomorrow?” Rainbow asked, hiding a bit of eagerness behind a patient facade.

“Yeah, of course,” Fluttershy nodded. “I wouldn’t miss spending some time with you,”

While the pair was chatting, they suddenly noticed another pony walking up to them. As they turned to look, they noticed the stallion they had met recently.

“Hey guys… what’s up?” Blue Bolt asked curiously, glancing between the two mares. They were glad to know that he was starting to see them as friends enough to just walk up to them.

Rainbow Dash shrugged her shoulders. “Eh… nothing much,” She thought for a moment before perking up. “Although, me and Flutters here were just making plans for the weekend. You could join us if you want,”

“Really?” Blue raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Are you sure you wouldn’t mind?”

Both of them shook their heads. “No, not at all. We would love for you to join us,” Fluttershy explained.

“Yeah,” Rainbow Dash added. “We can play some hoofball, see who can pop the most clouds… and if you’re lucky, I might give you another shot at beating me in a race,” She smirked at the stallion impishly.

Blue Bolt cringed slightly at the suggestion. “I don’t know about that one. As much as I would love the challenge, you kind of creamed me last time,”

“Well, you never know. Things might go differently if we both start at the same time and make it official,” Rainbow Dash suggested. The stallion looked back at her and cocked an eyebrow, causing her to smile nervously.

“Yyyeeah-”

“Probably not,” Rainbow nodded along with the blue pony as they both came to the same conclusion. She shared a chuckle with him and Fluttershy as they all started making their way through the hall together.

Unbeknownst to the cyan mare, something was waiting for her outside of the school building; something, or rather, someone.

High above the steps outside of the main entrance, two stallions were lying in wait atop a small cluster of clouds. One had orange fur and a brown mane, while the other had brown fur and a cream mane.

The brown stallion groaned from boredom while lying on his back and staring up at the sky. “Come on, man… we’ve been waiting here forever. We probably missed her when everyone else came out.”

The orange pony, who was lying on his stomach and diligently looking down at the ground below, shifted his attention to his companion and glared. “She’ll come out sooner or later; and when she does, she’s going to get the scare of her life,” He chuckled deviously before looking back down.

“Remind me again why we’re doing this?” The brown pony asked. “Couldn’t we just rough her up or somethin instead of this?”

The other stallion raised an eyebrow warily. “Dude… you’d beat up a girl? That’s a new low for you,” He shook his head. “We’re just going to teach her a lesson… then she’ll think twice before mouthing off again,”

“Well, we better be teaching this lesson soon. I’m falling asleep over here,” The brown pony said, holding in a yawn.

Suddenly, the orange pony caught a glimpse of movement down by the entrance to the school. He peered over the edge of the cloud, his eyes lighting up as he saw the cyan mare walking out of the building along with two others.

“Ha! There she is!” He exclaimed, being careful to keep his excitement from being too loud.

Down on the steps, Rainbow Dash and her two companions stepped outside while still chatting with each other. Rainbow stole a glance over the edge at the bottom of the steps, briefly admiring the sight of the other floating buildings further down and the beautiful landscape far below.

“So, do you guys want to hang out for a bit before heading home?” She asked, turning to her companions.

Fluttershy shook her head hesitantly. “Sorry, but I can’t today.”

“Yeah… I should be going too,” Blue Bolt added. “I’ll meet up with you guys tomorrow.”

Rainbow Dash shrugged in disappointment. Still, she was glad that she would be spending time with the pair all weekend. “Alright, I guess I’ll head home too. Bye guys.” She waved, starting to walk down the steps all the way so she could take off.

Unheard by any of the three pegasi, the two stallions above were urgently rushing to strike before their opportunity vanished.

The orange stallion hopped up and down on the cloud frantically, trying to elicit a small flash of lightning and some thunder. However, the cloud seemed to have other ideas.

Off to the side, the brown pony watched his companion struggling with the cloud before shifting his gaze down to the steps. “Uh… she’s leaving. You better hurry it up man,”

The other stallion grunted from exertion, still hopping as forcefully as he could to get a reaction out of the puffy ball. “Gah… what gives?! Dude, where the hay did you get this cloud?!” He growled to his friend in frustration.

“The sky… where did you think I got it?!”

Meanwhile, the muffled noise being made by the pair started to become noticeable further down. Blue Bolt raised an eyebrow and glanced upwards, only growing more confused as he saw a few clouds overhead and a hint of orange bouncing up and down.

“What the…”

“Grr…” The orange stallion was practically fuming with anger by this point. He pulled air between his teeth and glared down at the cloud like it was actively thwarting his efforts. Finally, he gave one last mighty jump. “Work you stupid little-” Before the pony could finish his statement, he felt the cloud beneath him giving a little more than usual as his hooves sank in.

As well as shifting from white to black alarmingly fast, the cloud started undulating and emitting sparks across its surface. Near the bottom of the cloud, a gathering of electricity could be seen and heard. The stallion on top of the cloud widened his eyes nervously and backpedalled off of the offending ball and onto a friendlier looking white cloud.

An unnerving buzzing sound filled the air, causing Rainbow Dash to pause mid-step. The sound seemed to be coming from above her.

“What the h-”

“Rainbow Dash, lookout!” Blue Bolt shouted from behind her.

The cyan mare turned and looked up, only to see the blackened cloud sitting directly above her. By the time she looked, a stabbing flash of light was already traveling down toward her.

Rainbow Dash started to tense up and scream, until she was interrupted by something slamming into her and pushing her backwards. The next thing she knew, a deafening bang cracked through the air, and she caught a glimpse of a blinding white light before clenching her eyes shut.

Her ears were ringing, and her eyes were stinging a little. It took her a solid second to realize she was falling. In a panic, she spread her wings and yelped while frantically trying to right herself in the air. As she opened her eyes, she managed to stop her descent so she could at least try to get her bearings.

The world around her slowly shifted back to normal as her hearing came back.

“Blue Bolt!”

A faint voice screamed from somewhere above. Rainbow Dash looked up, only to see Fluttershy staring down at her from the edge of the mass of clouds the school sat on. However, the yellow mare didn’t seem to be looking at her. Rather, Fluttershy was looking past her, and there was a palpable sense of terror in the yellow pony’s eyes.

All at once, the realization of what had happened hit her like a ton of bricks.“Blue Bolt!” Rainbow Dash darted her head downwards, feverishly searching for the stallion. She feared that the bolt of lightning he just pushed her away from hit him instead, causing him to fall. While she was dreadfully darting her eyes along the ground far below, frantically searching for a faint blue shape plummeting toward certain doom, the blue shape she was looking for came into view, only it was much closer than she first assumed.

The Blue stallion was lying in a crumpled heap on the rooftop of a building sitting on a cloud further down. It was a little hard to see his condition from how far away she was, but the cyan mare could tell that he was on his side, and that he wasn’t moving.

Rainbow Dash beat her wings and swooped down toward the stallion. She swiftly closed the distance and landed on the roof of the building, her face growing pale as she got a closer look.

There were a few small cracks in the roof of the building spiraling out from where the stallion had impacted. There was also a small amount of blood underneath his head that looked very concerning. However, perhaps the most disturbing looking thing was the stallion’s wing, which was completely snapped in the wrong direction, seemingly from him landing on top of it.

“Oh… oh my gosh, Blue Bolt.” Rainbow Dash nearly fell back onto her haunches in shock as she saw the blue pony lying still before her. “Blue! Can you hear me?!” She reached over and gently shook the unconscious stallion.

Hearing wing flaps approaching, Rainbow looked up and saw Fluttershy hovering in the air a few feet away. And behind the yellow mare, the two stallions were also present, staring ahead with pale expressions.

“Is he ok?!” Fluttershy asked urgently.

“Oh man! I’m so sorry… I didn’t plan on this happening!” The orange stallion shook his head, a shocked look on his face.

Rainbow Dash narrowed her expression instinctively as she saw the two ponies that caused this mess. However, her disdain for them was swiftly replaced with concern for her friend. “Don’t just sit there, go get help!” She yelled up at the pair.

While Fluttershy flew down to help the cyan mare, the two stallions shared a nervous glance with each other before scrambling to fly and bring back someone better equipped to handle the situation.

“Oh no…” Fluttershy cupped a hoof over her muzzle, her eyes shakily examining the stallion’s injuries. “Is he breathing?” She asked, silently praying that Blue Bolt was still alive.

Rainbow Dash had to forcibly stop herself from going into a panic even greater than the one she was already in. She reached a shaky hoof over and checked for a pulse. “I think so… Oh man, what do we do?” She briefly ran a hoof down her face before returning to her efforts of waking the stallion. “Come on, Blue Bolt… please wake up!”

The time it took for others to arrive and transport Blue Bolt to the hospital was roughly ten minutes. However, it might as well have been an eternity for Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy. The two mares stood in the lobby of the hospital and watched as their friend was whisked away on a gurney. The many nurses and doctors tending to him shouted orders and bits of information back and forth as they went, and none of it sounded good.

Despite Rainbow Dash’s insistence that she be updated on the stallion’s status every few minutes, she and her yellow companion were forced to sit and wait.

“Oh my gosh… oh my gosh…” Rainbow paced back and forth, only taking a few steps at a time before going back in a new direction. She could hardly keep still, and it looked like she was having a panic attack. “This is all my fault! If he didn’t push me out of the way, none of this would have happened!”

Fluttershy frowned with concern as the cyan mare thumped back into a chair and covered her face with her hooves. “Dashie… you can’t say that,” She reached over and tried to put a hoof on Rainbow’s shoulder, only to have her friend pull away and sit forward.

“I can say that, because it’s the truth!” Rainbow Dash had to take a minute to calm her breathing, much to Fluttershy’s relief. She rested her face in her hooves, still anxiously rubbing them up and down.

Suddenly, the doors to the lobby burst open and another pony rushed in. It was an older looking stallion with light blue fur and white streaks in his black hair. He looked around the lobby before settling his eyes on the nurse behind the desk at the back of the room, a sense of urgency and concern about him. “Where’s my son?!” He asked, probably a bit louder than he intended, as he rushed over to the desk.

The nurse behind the desk seemed a bit concerned for how upset the stallion was, but she understood why. “Sir… your son was in an accident. We’re doing everything we can to help him,”

The stallion’s eyes widened as he heard such shocking news. He prepared to bark more questions at the nurse, but decided to take a minute to calm himself before startling the poor mare. “Can’t you let me see him?”

“I’m sorry, but that’s not possible right now,” The nurse explained. She pointed over to the rows of seats by the two pegasi. “Please, take a seat. We will let you know as soon as anything develops.”

Although that was probably the last thing he wanted to hear, the stallion sighed and nodded before walking off. He sulked over to the waiting room chairs and took a seat a few empty spots down from Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy.

Rainbow Dash watched him, a somber look of sadness on her face. She felt smaller than a parasprite, but somehow she felt a gnawing desire to at least talk to him. She looked down uncomfortably before taking a deep breath and sighing. “Are you Blue Bolt’s father?” She asked an obvious question, hoping to bridge the gap somehow.

The stallion looked up, noticing the two mares for perhaps the first time since he arrived in the lobby. “Yes… I am,” He replied calmly, though he still sounded worried. “Do you know him?”

Rainbow Dash swallowed uncomfortably and nodded, a bit of a shameful expression on her face. “Y-yeah… a little bit,” She explained. “I met him a few days ago after school,”

Much to her surprise, the stallion nodded as if he realized something. “Ah… so you must be Rainbow Dash,” He said. His words weren’t harsh or accusatory at all, but somehow they created a nervous pit in the cyan mare’s gut.

“E-excuse me?” She tilted her head, trying to hide her nervous sweating.

“Blue Bolt told me about a mare that whooped his tail on the racetrack,” The stallion flashed a smirk before returning to his casual expression of gloom. “You must be pretty fast,”

Rainbow Dash flashed a smile as well. “Well… heh… I don’t like to toot my own horn,” She rubbed the back of her head nervously, unsure of how to feel. Hearing a slight chuckle, she looked back up in surprise.

“I can see why Blue likes you so much…” He stated. His eyes shifted down and grew distant as he withdrew into his thoughts briefly. Seeing the stallion so sullen only made Rainbow Dash feel worse.

The cyan mare opened her mouth to say something, but she was interrupted suddenly by the doors on the other side of the room opening. All three of them looked over, only to see a stallion clad in a white coat walking out with an expression of passive unease barely being concealed on his face.

Rainbow Dash looked back over as she noticed the older stallion getting up. He trotted over to the doctor by the back of the room urgently. Rainbow listened anxiously as the two started to talk.

The two stallions were talking quietly enough that she could barely hear them. She missed a few words here and there, but she could tell that they were referring to Blue Bolt.

“Is he ok?” The blue stallion asked, trying to coax the doctor into being as honest as possible. “Is my son ok or not?”

The doctor looked away for a moment before seemingly sighing and looking back somberly. “We’ve managed to stabilize him, but… his wing was damaged pretty badly,”

The pair continued their hushed conversation. Rainbow Dash tried not to listen in, but she couldn’t help but glue her eyes and strain her ears to hear every pertinent bit of information about Blue Bolt. Somehow, despite the difficulty she had in hearing some of their conversation, the words ‘never fly again’ graced her ears. Rainbow sat back in her seat, feeling like someone had just punched her in the gut. She just stared ahead blankly while the blue Stallion dealt with the doctor’s statement in his own way.

“Blue Bolt… I’m so sorry,” She muttered to herself sadly, fighting back a few tears.

---

.
…
…..
*Drip*

*Drip*

*Drip*

Rainbow Dash suddenly found herself awake amid a haze of blackness. Her senses had barely even started to come back to her, and her head felt like a cluttered mess. She slowly creaked open her eyes before losing the battle with her exhaustion and closing them again.

*Drip*

Something cold and wet abruptly fell onto her cheek, causing her to tense up. After a brief moment, another drop assaulted her still fragile senses, jerking her back to reality much sooner than she would have liked.

As she sluggishly lifted her head up, a myriad of aches and pains came to her attention. There was a dull throbbing coming from her head and the wing she was apparently lying on, and her whole body had shooting pains that would come and go.

Another cold drop landed on her face, making her look upward. The apparent culprit of the cold and wet interruption to her slumber was a leafy branch above her steadily dripping water down.

“Wh… w-what?” She muttered to herself while craning her head around and taking in her surroundings. From the look of it, she was in the midst of an expansive forest. The ground was wet and muddy, with various wild grasses and plants poking up from the ground and nearly covering it in places. The trees around her varied in thickness and shape, but all of them were tall. Along with a ton of muddy rocks and debris from the mudslide, broken branches and twigs littered her immediate area, seemingly having come from above.

As the haze slowly lifted from her mind, she thought back to what she was doing before ending up here. She remembered the hike and the following morning. She remembered racing against the approaching storm. And finally, she remembered the mudslide, and her short descent into the forest beneath the cliff. Most of all, however, one thing was racing around in her mind.

“Blue…?” She called weakly before shooting her eyes open and rushing to get to her feet. “Blue Bo- AGH!” She yelped suddenly and fell back to her side. When she tried to get up, the throbbing in her wing intensified until it was a mind numbing stabbing sensation.

Rainbow Dash grit her teeth and tensed up as she waited for the wave of pain to stop. Being extra careful to move slowly, she rolled off of the feathery appendage and craned her head to see what the problem was. Much to her initial shock, her left wing was bent out of shape, and any attempts to move it were met with intense pain.

“Oh man… gahh…” She cringed while slowly standing up. Her sore body wasn’t making things any easier, but somehow she managed to get on all fours and stagger forward.

“Blue Bolt?! Are you here?!” She called and looked around again. Nothing but trees, branches, and underbrush greeted her as far as she could see. However, turning around was met with the cliff face that she and the stallion had fallen off of. The rocky wall extended upwards, far past the thick canopy of trees and out of sight.

As she was still looking around, a soft groan came from the left. Rainbow Dash spun around and scanned her eyes around the area while listening for another sound. Much to her relief, she heard another groan and saw some of the grass and low branches shifting between the trees.

“Blue!” Rainbow cheered happily as she saw a glimpse of a blue shape standing up. She walked as fast as her injuries would allow toward the stallion.

He seemed to be just as beat up as she was, judging from the many cuts and bruises along his body. The many broken bits of tree branches around him indicated that this was where he had fallen after she let go of him in mid-air.

Blue Bolt clutched his head and looked around in confusion. As he heard the cyan mare calling him, he turned to see her limping over. “R…Rainbow Dash?” He muttered drowsily, apparently having just woken up.

“Oh, thank the princess you’re alive.” Rainbow Dash smiled in relief while walking up to hug the stallion. Before she reached him, she stopped and nearly fell as another fit of pain overtook her.

“Are you ok?” Blue Bolt frowned in concern as he watched his companion struggling to get back to her hooves.

Rainbow Dash accepted the stallion’s outstretched hoof and climbed back to a seated position. “Ugh… I think so… gah.” She cringed briefly before looking up. “I’m pretty sure my wing is broken though… it hurts like hay.”

Blue Bolt looked to the bent appendage and was taken aback by shock. He looked to his own wing and frowned slightly before trying to unfold it. Judging from the shaky movement, it seemed as though he was having trouble even articulating it. “Gah… I think mine is too… I can’t move it.”

“Oh man… isn’t that your bad wing?” Rainbow Dash asked uneasily. She covered her mouth and groaned anxiously as she thought about how catastrophic a second wing injury to the same wing could be.

“Uh… y-yeah… I guess it is, isn’t it?” Blue Bolt sighed sadly. “Well… it doesn’t look nearly as bad as last time… and it definitely looks better than yours. Are you sure you’re alright?”

“Yeah, yeah… I’m good… all things considered,” Rainbow said while looking up. “Man… it must have been a rough fall. How long have we been out?” She asked rhetorically, though she would have been open to a guess from her companion.

Although it was hard to see, the sky above seemed to be more gray than black. The water falling down on them also seemed to be left over rain dripping down from the trees rather than actual rainfall. The far off sound of thunder all but confirmed the ponies’ conjecture; they had been out long enough for the storm to pass over them.

“H…how are we going to get out of here if we can’t fly?” Blue Bolt asked hesitantly.

The question troubled Rainbow Dash into a brief silence. “Umm… I don’t know,” She shrugged. “Hey, maybe the others are still up there?” She suggested before turning to look up at the cliff.

“HELLO?! TWILIGHT… APPLEJACK?! ANYBODY UP THERE?!” She yelled. Only the cyan mare’s echoing voice came back to them, giving them a small idea of how far out the forest extended around them.

“I don’t think they’re up there anymore,” Blue Bolt reasoned.

Rainbow nodded slowly. “Yeah… they probably headed back to Ponyville to get out of the storm and get some help… hopefully,”

“Well, I don’t think we should stick around and wait for help to arrive,” Blue said, turning to the overwhelming forest they had been swallowed up by. “Especially since every predator within a mile radius probably just heard you shouting.”

“Hehe… yeah,” Rainbow Dash chuckled nervously while shifting her eyes to the darkened woods that were surrounding them. There were all manner of noises that indicated the presence of life, and she did not want to run into anything larger than a raccoon with how injured she and the stallion were.

“Maybe…” She muttered while deep in thought, struggling to come up with a plan of action. “Maybe we can… Oh! What if we follow the cliff to the edge of the forest? We weren’t that far away when we fell… I’ll bet we can make it to town before nightfall if we hurry,” She suggested eagerly.

Blue Bolt smiled as well. “That sounds like a good plan,”

Pushing through the aches and pains surging through her body, Rainbow Dash headed through the trees parallel to the cliff. Blue Bolt followed after her, making sure to stay close so neither of them would lose each other.

Making their way through the forest wasn’t as easy as they first thought. The ground was muddy, to the point that their hooves were sinking in slightly; it was also rough and uneven, with miniature dips and slopes and tree roots making their progress slow and uncomfortable. Due to the storm that had passed through while they were out, they were forced to slog through cold and damp vegetation on top of the mud. All in all, they were pretty miserable and eager to be back home.

Rainbow Dash hugged the side of the cliff as much as she could, using the small layer of angled rock that met the ground to partially avoid the mud. Still, the occasional tree that impeded her path forced her to move around.

Blue Bolt watched his companion’s sluggish and slow movements with a concerned expression. She seemed to be having trouble walking, but she was powering through whatever pain she felt to keep going. “Are you sure you’re ok? I can help you walk if you want,”

Rainbow glanced to the side, accidentally locking eyes with the stallion. He had a genuinely worried look on his face that she hadn’t seen in a long time. “N-no... it’s fine, I’m just a little sore,” She replied while shifting her eyes to the ground uncomfortably.

Oh man… of all the people I could have gotten stranded with, why did it have to be him?

“Y’know…” Blue spoke up, drawing Rainbow out of her thoughts. “I can’t believe you did that…”

Rainbow Dash tilted her head in confusion. She turned to face the stallion. “Did what…?”

“Back there, when you jumped over the edge like that to catch me,” Blue clarified.

“Well… what was I supposed to do, let you fall?”

“Heh… I guess you haven’t changed much. You’re always putting friends first… if we are still friends… that is,” Blue Bolt looked away hesitantly. He remained silent so long that Rainbow turned away and kept going, but eventually, he spoke again. “Rainbow Dash…”

She paused and turned toward the stallion again. The troubled expression on his face immediately made her uneasy. “What is it?” She asked, though she feared that she might already know what was coming up.

“I’ve been thinking a lot about the past recently,” Blue explained, struggling to articulate his thoughts into words. “Ever since you and the others came to see me when I first got to town, I just… kept thinking about what happened between us,”

Rainbow Dash offered a hollow chuckle and rubbed the back of her head. “Well, we did have some good times… minus your wing getting broken of course, hehe…” She trailed off as she saw that her companion wasn’t laughing.

“You know I’m not talking about that… I meant what happened between us at the big dance,” Blue Bolt said, his mouth set in a somber line. Rainbow Dash’s expression fell as he continued. “I’ve thought about at least a hundred ways that night could have gone, but the way it turned out… You have to understand, I…” He shook his head in frustration, seemingly struggling with something, before sighing and looking at her with soft eyes. “I’m sorry about what I did… Leaving you like that was the last thing you deserved after everything you did for me,”

Rainbow Dash opened her mouth to say something but stopped herself midway through. She shifted her eyes to the side and rubbed the back of her neck with an uncomfortable sigh. With the silence in the air, the soft sounds of the forest around them briefly grabbed their attention. “Blue… let’s just keep walking,” She suggested, offering him a pleading expression and nodding to the side.

Blue Bolt hesitated for a moment, looking straight ahead at the cyan pegasus before his eyes fell. “Ok…” He said simply with a nod. Although he was sad to hear his companion’s avoidance of the topic, he understood. If she wasn’t ready to talk about the past, then he wouldn’t force it on her, at least not just yet.

The pair continued making their way through the forest, more silent than ever, and each harboring a bit of a gloomy expression on their face that wouldn’t fade for some time.

As she was walking, Rainbow Dash’s ears perked up and she snapped her attention ahead as what sounded like a twig snapping was heard.

Blue Bolt paused abruptly as he noticed the mare ahead of him stopped in her tracks. “Hey, what’s wr-” He fell silent as she stuck a foreleg out and stopped him from continuing. She silently motioned for him to keep quiet before looking around in a paranoid fashion.

Up ahead seemed to be just more trees, much like everywhere else around them. Before the ponies could satisfy their search for danger, however, a rustling sound cut into the silence and a flash of green moved out from behind a tree.

At first, Blue Bolt thought that the green lights were simply floating by themselves, but as he looked closer, he reeled back as he noticed that the strange glowing was, in fact, the eyes of a creature. The animal was wolf shaped, and it was larger than they were by a frightening margin. Its body was seemingly made out of animated pieces of wood, making it blend into the trees around it.

“Sweet Celestia, what is th-” Blue felt a hoof being clasped over his mouth, cutting off his panicked exclamation.

“Ssshh…” Rainbow Dash whispered nervously before turning to see if the creature had heard them. Thankfully, the wooden wolf was still walking around slowly, sniffing the ground and most likely looking for prey.

Blue Bolt kept staring at the creature as both he and Rainbow Dash quietly hid behind a nearby tree. His mouth was agape in shock, yet he made sure to refrain from making noise. “What in Equestria is that?” He whispered while still watching the beast’s movements.

“It’s a timberwolf,” Rainbow Dash replied directly.

“Wait… that thing is a timberwolf?” Blue glanced at his companion in stunned astonishment before looking back to the predator stalking around.

Rainbow raised an eyebrow and looked down to the stallion huddled next to her. “You don’t know what a timberwolf is?” She asked in surprised confusion.

“I know what they are…” Blue Bolt rolled his eyes. “I’ve lived in Fillydelphia and Cloudsdale my whole life. I’ve heard of them, but I’ve never actually seen one,” He said, a mixture of fear and excitement in his voice.

“Well, today is your lucky day. Now how about we go around it and hope it doesn’t try to eat us?” Rainbow Dash suggested through gritted teeth. She kept darting her head between looking at Blue Bolt and staring at the timberwolf, half expecting it to have gotten much closer in between glances.

“But… we’re almost out of the forest. There’s just one of them, can’t we just run past it… or maybe fight it? It’s made out of wood, right? Let’s just smash it to bits,” Blue suggested with an uncertain shrug of the shoulders. The unimpressed look he was receiving made him reel back slightly.

“Are you being serious right now? It’s hard to tell,” Rainbow said, receiving a nervous smile in return. “Ugh… alright, I’m putting a kibosh on that right now. I’ve tussled with these things before. Even if you can manage to break them apart, they just form back together. We’re giving it a wide berth and going around it, alright?” She said with a stern leer.

“Alright, alright… we go around it, sheesh,” Blue Bolt replied dismissively as he followed the cyan mare away from the tree. “I mean, it’s not like it knows we’re here. Let’s just get past that ugly thing before it-”

*SNAP*

A stick breaking underneath the stallion’s hoof made the pair freeze up and cringe. Up ahead, the timberwolf stopped what it was doing and let out a confused growl while perking its ears up. It started sniffing the ground more intently, making a feeling of dread firmly cement itself in the ponies’ guts.

Rainbow Dash slowly turned to Blue Bolt with an icy glare of disbelief. She probably would have chewed him out, but she was interrupted by a more vicious sounding growl coming from behind her. She turned back, only to see the timberwolf looking their way, and it didn’t look happy to see them.

“RUN!” She yelled to her partner, though he needed no confirmation as both of them darted into a run in the opposite direction.

The pair beat hoof through the twisted mess of trees, roots, and mud as their feral friend gave chase. They could hear the timberwolf’s feet pounding against the ground, along with the barks and snarls that it was making as it anticipated ripping into them.

Rainbow Dash could feel her lungs burning and her wing starting to do the same. Her injuries weren’t helping her run, but her adrenaline was overriding any pain she felt. Still, she barely managed to keep from smacking into trees as she frantically raced to get away.

Looking to her side briefly, she could see Blue Bolt running beside her. Although he was forced to dip around any trees that came his way, he was trying to stay close to her. “This is totally your fault!” She yelled angrily.

“My fault?!” Blue yelled back, hesitating while he jumped over a particularly large tree root. “How is this my fault?!”

“Because if you didn’t… fall… off of that cliff, then I wouldn’t have had to save you, and we wouldn’t be in line to be that thing’s lunch!” She cried, lungs burning.

“I’m starting to think I should have stayed in Fillydelphia!” Blue exclaimed.

Despite their situation, Rainbow couldn’t help but smirk. “Welcome to nature, city boy! Now run like the wind!”

With the snapping jaws of the timberwolf hot on their tails, the two pegasi were fighting a losing battle. The forest around them was no place to be losing a vicious predator in an outright chase, and the wolf showed no signs of stopping. Soon, their stamina would collectively run out, and their lack of wings would literally come back to bite them.

Though they paid little attention at first, the ground started to slope up as they ran. Gradually the slope increased until they were practically running uphill. The trees around them started thinning in number, and soon a clearing could be made out up ahead, along with something else.

Rainbow Dash looked ahead from checking on the timberwolf’s progress. As she did, her eyes lit up as she saw the last thing she expected to see.

The gentle slope they had been going on abruptly ceased at a rocky face that seemingly divided the forest. There were still trees dotted around in fewer number, though the opening created by their absence all but vanished up on top of the miniature cliff. The thick groupings of the tall wooden spires returned in full force past the cliff edge and seemingly continued endlessly.

“Blue, look there!” Rainbow exclaimed eagerly while nodding ahead. The stallion turned to look at what she was pointing out, and his eyes widened as he saw it. While most of the cliff was insurmountable without their wings, there was a thin fallen tree leaning up against it that looked near enough to the top that they could jump up if they ran up it.

“I’m not sure if that thing can hold our weight,” Blue Bolt reasoned uneasily.

Rainbow Dash lowered her eyebrows and let a small smirk creep across her face. “Only one way to find out,”

Racing to get ahead of her companion, Rainbow Dash made a beeline for the fallen tree. She leapt up past the exposed roots, landing near the base of the tree and finding her balance as it shifted downward slightly. The end of the tree was holding fast against the cliff for the moment, but it looked like it could slip at any time.

Blue Bolt shook his head and sighed before gritting his teeth and following the fearless pegasus. While she carefully rushed up the tree, he jumped onto the base and silently tensed up as he expected it to fall. Much to his surprise, the tree was still holding, though it was creaking and knocking rocks loose from the cliff.

“Holy cow… I can’t believe this is working!” Blue chuckled while steadying himself on the trunk. The sound of wood thumping along the ground behind him made him turn his head, only to pale as he saw that the timberwolf was catching up. “Oh man…”

“Blue, get the lead out!”

Turning his attention back ahead, he saw Rainbow Dash already near the top of the tree making a run for the cliff.

Without wasting any further time, the stallion made his way along the tree as fast as he safely could. The higher up he got, the thinner the tree trunk beneath him and the more intimidating the drop below him got.

Up ahead, Rainbow Dash finally reached the edge of the cliff. The top of the tree was close enough that she could jump up and grab the ledge to pull herself up. However, the leaves poking out of the tree and the few branches on this side of the trunk made things a bit difficult.

“Come on, Rainbow… you can do this,” She muttered to herself in the hopes of boosting her confidence. Looking down to her injured wing and noting how sore she was, her chances didn’t seem very high.

Somehow, Rainbow Dash managed to get around the branches and up to the cliff face. She could feel the end of the tree trying to give way underneath her, only to be stopped by the rocks it was wedged on. Without so much as a thought for safety, she jumped up and reached for the ledge, managing to just barely grab it with her hooves. She grunted as she pulled with all of her might to hoist herself up. Although she found a few footholds along the cliff, she was still using all of her limited strength to get herself higher.

“Gah…” She let out an exhausted sigh as she rolled onto the grass beyond the cliff. Her brief rest abruptly ended as she thought to her companion and turned her head toward the drop off to her side, only to gasp. “Blue, hurry it up! It’s right behind you!” She exclaimed as she saw the timberwolf climbing the tree after the blue stallion.

Blue Bolt looked up, spotting the pegasus above him at the top of the cliff. “I’m well aware of that, thanks for reminding me!”

Rainbow Dash watched anxiously as her friend raced to make it up the tree. The predator behind him seemed far less concerned with whether or not it fell as long as it caught up with the fleeing pony. Much to their alarm, the tree started creaking more violently and even shifting downwards slightly.

The combined weight of both Blue Bolt and the timberwolf so near the end of the tree was putting immense pressure on a precariously balanced system. The top of the tree that was wedged into the cliff looked like it was about to slip downwards, and as it started moving, the ponies’ fears were all but confirmed.

“You’ve got to jump for it!” Rainbow exclaimed, paling fearfully as she watched the tree shifting downwards.

Blue Bolt sprinted across the last few inches of ground he had to cover. He heard the timberwolf running behind him to get at him, causing the tree to lose its fragile balance with the cliff. All at once, the tree snapped downwards, and his view was jerked down as well.

“AHH!” He yelped while leaping into the air and scrambling to find something to grab on. Unfortunately for him, the edge of the cliff was far out of his reach, and gravity was only going to pull him further down.

Before the stallion accepted his fate, he felt another hoof reaching down and grabbing his outstretched foreleg. He looked up, only to see Rainbow Dash dangling off of the cliff and holding onto him.

The tree finished its fall to the ground, and the timberwolf let out an agitated howl as it fell along with it. The creature smacked into the ground hard. As it did, its wooden body broke apart in places, leaving it to scatter along the ground and settle into a crumpled heap. The green glow of its eyes vanished almost instantly, leaving the once proud beast no better than a pile of firewood.

The two ponies watched the dust settling below from their position at the top of the cliff. Finally, they faced each other and blinked a few times while processing what had just happened. They couldn’t help it as wide grins fell across their faces.

“You know…” Rainbow Dash said with a brief chuckle. “This is the second time today that I’ve saved your tail from falling off a cliff,”

Blue Bolt scoffed playfully. “Yeah, like the first time counted. Look where we ended up,”

“I don’t think you’re in a very good position to be judging what counts or not,” Rainbow added, nodding below.

“Well, what are you going to do? Just let me fall?” Blue replied.

Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but smirk. “Alright… hrk… let’s get you up here before splinter brain down there pulls himself together,” She grunted while slowly reeling the stallion upwards. It was a slow and awkward process of her moving backwards and him finding footholds to help out, but eventually, the pair managed to finish the climb. Soon enough, they were both lying on the ground and trying to catch their breath.

While they were down on the ground, they took a look around at their new surroundings.

As they suspected before, the forest continued all around them as if the cliff hadn’t even been there to interrupt it. The ground was still at a decent slope, leading even further up. The one plus side to being on top of the cliff, other than being away from the timberwolf at last, was that there was a break in the trees near the edge of the cliff that let them see the sky, gloomy and overcast as it was.

Blue Bolt could still feel his heart racing from the chase he had just survived. Still, he had a smile on his face, as the cyan mare beside him did as well. They both felt relatively good all things considered, perhaps as a side effect of going up against a fierce predator and winning. However, as he looked around the area around the cliff and the forest to the side, a thought occurred to the stallion; a very troubling thought.

“Rainbow Dash,” Blue said while sitting up, a hint of unease in his voice that went undetected.

“Yeah?” Rainbow glanced her eyes toward the stallion, refusing to move from her resting position.

“Where are we?”

With that simple question, Rainbow Dash narrowed her eyes before suddenly widening them. She shot up from the ground, darting her head around and searching for the one landmark that they had in this seemingly endless forest. Her heart sank as she realized that the cliff they had been following was nowhere in sight.

“Oh man… Don’t tell me we’re lost,” She fretted anxiously.

Walking to the edge of the cliff and looking to her left, she hoped to see a sign of the distant cliff they had fallen from in the first place. Unfortunately, the trees on the ground below were so tall that they reached eye level even up on the cliff, effectively blocking the view past the small clearing. And with how many twists and turns they had made in the heat of the moment while running from the timberwolf, they couldn’t be sure if they ended up facing the same direction as when they started.

Blue Bolt ran a hoof down his face and groaned in frustration. He let out a breath and tried his best to not let the situation get to him. “Alright… what’s the game plan?” He asked curiously, turning to his partner for suggestions.

“Game plan?” Rainbow Dash chuckled sadly and shook her head. “Blue, there is no game plan. Following that cliff was pretty much our one ticket out short of picking a direction and walking until we run out of forest,” She sat down and let her ears fall as she stared at the ground with a defeated look in her eyes. “Ugh… I wish Fluttershy or Twilight was here. One of them would know how to get us out of this mess,”

The stallion looked at her with a surprised expression. He wasn’t used to seeing her give up so easily. Deciding that he would have to be the one to cheer his friend up, Blue sat down next to the sulking mare and looked at her sympathetically. He sat there for a moment or two, struggling to find something to say.

“Rainbow Dash… you can’t just quit and give up. Sitting here isn’t going to fix anything,” Blue Bolt said softly, hoping to reassure the gloomy pegasus.

Rainbow Dash perked her ears up suddenly, shifting her eyes to the side. “Blue… stop talking,”

Blue Bolt raised his eyebrows in surprise before frowning sadly. His companion must have been completely broken if she was so set on being left alone. “Hey, don’t be like that. I’m sure everything is going to be f-hmf!” He was interrupted as she abruptly shoved a hoof onto his mouth.

“No seriously, be quiet for a minute,” Rainbow Dash said, shifting her eyes around and seemingly concentrating on something. “Do you hear that?” She asked softly.

Despite his initial confusion, the stallion did as instructed and listened intently to the sounds of the forest around him. At first, he didn’t hear anything but the trees shifting in the wind, and the occasional insect or another animal, but then he noticed something.

It was faint, and he could barely tell what direction it was coming from, but the stallion distinctly heard the sound of rushing water.

“What is that?” Blue asked curiously.

“It might be our way out of here,” Rainbow Dash suggested eagerly. With newfound determination, she got up and walked along the cliff a short ways until she hit the edge of the thick trees that led further into the forest. She listened for a moment before smiling to herself. “Sounds like it’s coming from this way,”

Rainbow looked to the side, only to see Blue Bolt walking up beside her. He stared into the distant trees before shrugging and turning to her. “Well, what are we waiting for? I don’t want to be stuck in this place any longer than I have to.” He stated while walking into the trees toward the noise.

Rainbow Dash smirked slightly as she watched the stallion moving ahead and braving the unknown. “I guess you haven’t changed very much either,” She muttered to herself. Her smile briefly lowered as she thought about what else that could have implied.

“Rainbow Dash, are you coming or what?” Blue Bolt called from up ahead, snapping her from her thoughts.

“Yeah, yeah… don’t get your tail all bent out of shape. I can’t help it that I’m slower than you, seeing how I fell off a cliff trying to save your sorry butt,” She raised her voice, ensuring that the stallion heard her as she started following after him.

“Well maybe if you were better at saving people, then we wouldn’t be in this mess. Did you ever think about that?” Blue replied impishly. Rainbow Dash rolled her eyes and shook her head before continuing into the thicket of trees.

The pair kept walking for a solid minute or two, honing in on the distant sound until it became clear as day. There was running water somewhere up ahead, which indicated the presence of a river. Soon enough, the ponies paused as they saw another clearing in the trees ahead. As they got closer, they were stunned into silence at what was waiting for them.

There was another steep drop-off leading into a small chasm ahead of them, with a waterfall off to the right flowing into a river at the bottom. The river was moving fast, and it had many rocks that looked rather intimidating when combined with the violent current.

“Woah… I was not expecting this.” Rainbow Dash said while admiring the sight of the waterfall. The mist flying off of the rocks as water smacked into them made the air near the river cool and humid, even where they were standing.

“You think this connects to that stream we had to cross back at the campsite?” Blue Bolt asked curiously, trying to see how far back the river went in either direction. While the river went on as far as the eye could see to the left, it was impossible to see very far up river due to the waterfall being slightly higher up than they were and embedded into a cliff.

“Maybe… but it doesn’t really look like we can follow it from this side,” Rainbow Dash stated.

The cliff surrounding the waterfall wasn’t very high, and they could practically see a little bit over it. However, the cliff face was too steep to climb, and just out of their reach. They had seen the cliff to the right when they were approaching from the forest, and it seemed to have no way of going around it. And due to the river descending into the small ravine, they couldn’t follow it to the left.

Blue Bolt looked across the way curiously. Sure enough, the ground on the other side of the river sloped down further to the left until it eventually met with the riverbank and kept going. “So how do we get across?” He asked somewhat rhetorically while looking for an answer himself.

The obvious choice came in the form of another fallen tree in front of them that spanned the length of the divide. However, the pair wasn’t sure if they wanted to chance crossing over that way. While the height from the top of the chasm to the river wasn’t actually that high, and the trunk of the tree was so large that falling off would be difficult, the surface of the tree was soaking wet from the previous rainfall, and the many rocks down at the bottom and the violent current would make it a rough landing if they did fall.

Other than the tree, there weren’t many options without the use of their wings. The slope on the other side was the only thing in sight that led to the level the river was on, at least as far as they could see.

Rainbow Dash walked over to the tree and climbed on it to see if it would hold her weight. The ends of the large trunk seemed to be far enough away from the edges that it was as stable as it could be, given the circumstances. “Looks like the easiest way would be straight across,” Rainbow said while turning to her companion confidently.

“You sure about that, Rainbow?” Blue Bolt asked, looking over the edge warily.

“Oh come on… don’t get cold hooves on me now. You just outran a timberwolf, what’s a little more adventure going to hurt?” Rainbow Dash jested playfully. She was surprised to see her companion still wearing an uneasy expression. “Alright, how about we go one at a time? That way it will be nice and safe for you,” She suggested with a reassuring, if a little bit sarcastic, expression.

Blue Bolt sighed before walking over to the tree and climbing up. He moved past the cyan pony and stopped to look at her. “Fine… if this is really how you want to do it,” He turned his head back to the front and took a cautious step forward.

“You want me to go first?” Rainbow Dash asked, noting the hesitant expression on the stallion’s face.

“No…” Blue scoffed while turning back to her. “What do you think I am, some kind of big baby?” He chuckled before turning his attention ahead again and trailing off. He exhaled and stretched his legs before putting on a determined expression. “I got this,”

Rainbow Dash watched as the blue stallion carefully made his way across. He stayed as close to the middle of the trunk as possible, and he made sure to move slowly.

As he neared the halfway point, Blue Bolt paused and looked over the side. The sight of the roaring waters below was much less fascinating and beautiful to him now. In fact, the sight was quite unsettling. “Oh boy…” He muttered to himself, trying to prevent his knees from getting weak.

“You doing alright over there?” Rainbow Dash called from back on solid ground. Blue turned his head to see the pegasus watching him with a raised eyebrow.

“Y-yeah… I’m great, just… just admiring the view,” Blue replied, hiding the nervousness in his voice.

Rainbow Dash tilted her head in surprise. “Wow, you’re really freaked out aren’t you? I mean… I know you have a broken wing and all, but it’s no big deal. It’s not even that big of a fall,”

Blue Bolt stiffened himself up as he realized that he was being more transparent with his unease than he intended. “That may be true… but it isn’t the fall I’m worried about,” He replied.

“Are you kidding? There’s like nothing but water down there. You can swim can’t you?” Rainbow Dash asked curiously.

“I can swim just fine!” He snapped in frustration before taking a moment to calm himself. He didn’t like feeling so judged in such a vulnerable state. “Look, it’s just… that current is going so fast, and there are so many rocks down there, that it would be really hard to get back out if I fell in,”

“Good point,” Rainbow Dash nodded understandingly. She looked down pensively and bit her lip as she tried to find something comforting to say. “Well just don’t fall, then,”

Blue Bolt rolled his eyes and sighed. “Sage advice, Rainbow… Sage advice.” He shook his head and kept going.

The trunk beneath his hooves was practically so slippery that he could slide on it if he wanted to. Despite how anxious he was to get off of his precarious perch, Blue managed to get most of the way across.

As he was just about to hop off of the tree and onto solid ground, a noise from up ahead made him look up. A slight rustling could be heard, followed by the crunch of a twig.

“What the hay…?” Blue Bolt muttered quietly while scanning through the trees in an attempt to find the source of the noise. Before he could get too paranoid, a flash of movement caught his eye off to the right.

Back in the trees, something was walking slowly across and skirting the clearing; and as Blue saw a glint of green light and caught a whiff of a terrible odor, he immediately knew just what that something was.

On the other side of the river, Rainbow Dash sat with a mildly confused look on her face as the stallion started backing up and slowly going back over the tree. She started to call after him to ask him what was wrong until she saw movement off to the side. “What the…” She fell silent as she made out the outline of the last thing she wanted to see. She turned to her blue friend, a new feeling of concern welling up inside of her as she realized the danger he was in. “Oh no.”

Blue Bolt was moving backwards as slowly and quietly as he could, all the while keeping the timberwolf in his line of sight. The wooden beast seemingly hadn’t noticed either of the ponies and was simply stalking the forest in search of potential prey.

Please don’t see me… He repeated frantically in his mind. He might have been calm and collected on the outside, but he was having a miniature heart attack on the inside.

As he turned his head briefly to look at his cyan companion, he saw her looking back at him with a similarly pale expression to his own. Apparently, she had figured out what was going on and was silently waiting for him to get back across.

An abrupt creak coming from the tree beneath his hooves drew Blue’s attention downward. It sounded like the bark of the tree was shifting somewhere, but it still felt stable. As he looked up to get eyes back on the predator, he was shocked to see the wolf sniffing around intently as if it had heard something.

*CRACK*

All at once, his back leg sank down and he fell to the left as the once solid wood seemingly gave out on him. Blue Bolt yelped in surprise while trying to grab onto the rest of the trunk and hold on. However, his momentum and the already slick surface of the tree meant that he was unable to do anything meaningful before he slid off and his leg was painfully ripped out of the hole that had opened up in the tree.

Rainbow Dash gasped as she saw the stallion falling down into the river below. “Blue Bolt!” She reached a hoof out toward him, but nothing she could have done would stop what was happening. She was forced to watch as her friend splashed down into the harsh waters below.

Much to her relief, she saw him popping back up to the surface after his brief submersion. He tried to swim toward the shore, but the current of the river was pushing him downstream at an alarming rate. Finally, he smacked into a rock and put his forelegs around it to hold on for dear life.

Blue Bolt gasped for air, a task that was made more difficult by the constant splashes of water flying in his face, as he clung to his rocky bastion of hope. He lowered his head in an attempt at keeping water out of his eyes and sputtered.

“Blue, are you alright?!” Rainbow Dash’s voice carried from up on the cliff.

The stallion carefully looked up, only to see the cyan pegasus standing on the edge of the chasm staring down at him. “I’m fine! Just… just a little disoriented!” He yelled back.

As he shielded his face from yet another wave of water, he found himself looking at the shore on the right. If he could use the rocks dotted around to pull against the current, then he could probably get back to dry land.

“I’m going to try to get across!” He announced to his cyan companion before preparing himself for the arduous task before him.

Up on solid ground, Rainbow Dash watched anxiously as the blue pony tried to reach for the nearest rock to him. He seemed to be having a hard time with fighting against the current for long enough to even get to another rock.

As her thoughts turned to the wooden beast that had started this whole mess, Rainbow looked up to the forest across the way. Her eyes widened as she found the timberwolf and noticed that it was much more aggressive looking than before. The wolf was slowly stalking toward the slope that led down to the shoreline where Blue Bolt was, and it seemed to be looking right at him.

“Oh my gosh… ohmigosh ohmigosh ohmigosh!” Rainbow Dash muttered to herself frantically while racing to come up with a way to help her friend.

As she looked down to her wing and gently moved it, the stinging pain that resulted reminded her that she was still grounded. Finally, she realized that the only thing that she could do was to take the timberwolf out of the equation.

“HEY!”

Blue Bolt looked up again as a loud yell came from his companion. He saw Rainbow Dash rushing over the tree bridge and waving her forelegs wildly. As he turned to see what she was looking at, he nearly jumped when he saw the timberwolf much closer to him than he remembered it being.

Rainbow Dash trotted to the middle of the wooden bridge, being careful to avoid the hole that her friend had fallen into. She looked to the timberwolf, smirking slightly as she saw it turn toward her in confusion.

“Over here, bark breath! You want some nice and juicy pony steak? Well come and get it!” She taunted loudly, making herself as visible as she could.

“What are you doing?!” Blue Bolt exclaimed from down below.

Rainbow Dash turned briefly to see the shocked stallion staring up at her while he clung to his rock. “Don’t worry about me, just get out of the water!” She replied.

“Are you crazy or something?!”

“You know, I get that a lot for some reason,” Rainbow chuckled confidently. She fell silent as she heard growling coming from up ahead.

The timberwolf had definitely changed its course. Now, it was heading straight for the tree bridge that the cyan mare was on, and it looked hungry.

Rainbow Dash smiled as she saw that her plan was working. “Alright tough guy… come on.” She muttered while backing up slowly. She wanted to keep the beast’s attention, but she did not want it to get within pouncing range. She had it on good authority that timberwolves were less concerned with their well-being than she was with hers; and while the wooden beast could put itself back together easily, she could not.

Much to her initial surprise, a second growl came from behind her. Rainbow Dash turned her head back, only to widen her eyes as she saw something that made a tingle of fear shoot down her spine.

There was another timberwolf creeping toward the fallen tree from where she had just come from. Apparently, all of the noise being made had attracted another predator. Rainbow Dash wouldn’t even be surprised if it was the first wolf they had run into, having somehow found a way up the cliff so it could follow them.

Blue Bolt looked up to see how his friend was doing. His face went pale as he saw the second timberwolf approaching the wooden bridge the cyan pegasus was on. The beast jumped up onto the tree, trapping Rainbow Dash in the middle with the other wolf swiftly closing in on her as well.

“Rainbow Dash!”

“Don’t worry, I’ve got this handled!” Rainbow Dash called down to her companion. Her brave façade melted away as she looked up and saw the sharp teeth of a timberwolf waiting for her. “Y-yeah… I’ve totally got this handled,” She smiled nervously while backing up a step.

The noises behind her reminded her of the second predator and made her spin around to face it. She was trapped between two of the fiercest predators known to ponykind, and she was running out of escape plans.

Suddenly, the timberwolf behind the cyan mare barked as it made a running leapt at her. Its claws and teeth were bared, and it was ready to tear her to shreds.

“Woah!” Rainbow Dash yelped while stepping as far to the side as her precarious footing could allow. The large wolf landed beside her, mere inches away from her face. Before it could turn and bite at her, she swallowed any fear she felt and shoved into it hard with her shoulder.

The wooden wolf flailed wildly as it was sent hurtling over the side. It let out a shrill howl as it plummeted straight into the river, and straight onto a rock.

Blue Bolt watched in amazement as the first predator broke into bits from the impact of the fall. The many wooden sections of the wolf swiftly plonked into the water and zipped by him with the current. However, his amazement quickly turned to terror as he looked back up.

Rainbow Dash’s ears perked up as she heard movement behind her. She turned around just in time to see the other wolf in mid-air, coming right at her. Her surprised gasp swiftly turned into a painful grunt as the beast knocked into her and sent her to the ground.

The timberwolf snarled down at the pony, sending droplets of vile saliva down onto her face. Rainbow Dash tried to sit up, but her shoulders were being pinned by the wooden predator.

“Hnng… get… get off me!” Rainbow protested angrily while trying to push the wolf off of her body with her hooves. She wasn’t making very much progress.

Suddenly, the timberwolf lifted its right paw off of the pinned pegasus. Before she could react, it swiftly raked its claws across her body.

“AGHH!!” Rainbow Dash cried out in agony as her midsection burned. She shakily looked up, only to see the beast’s claws dripping with blood; her blood. She could already feel the crimson fluid flowing out of her and pooling around the doubtlessly grizzly wound she now had.

The timberwolf growled deeply, preparing to take another swing at its prey. Its glowing eyes held one very clear thought that was plain as day to see. It was going to kill her.

As she stared up at her own impending doom, an idea popped into Rainbow Dash’s head. Using all of her remaining strength, she yanked herself to the side and rolled left. She yelped in pain again as the wolf’s other set of claws raked across her shoulder as she moved. However, she didn’t care very much about her new injury.

With the wolf’s right leg still raised in the air in preparation to strike, the pegasus rolled right under it and off the side of the tree. As she went, the timberwolf tried to snatch her out of the air, resulting in it losing its balance and falling with her.

“AHHHH!” Rainbow Dash screamed as she plummeted down. The fall that she thought wasn’t so high before might as well have been a bottomless pit now. However, this pit did have a bottom, and it was fast approaching.

As she splashed down into the water, she flinched her eyes shut. Her momentum was slowed to a safe level before any real damage could be done, however, she did bump into the riverbed hard enough to cause some pain.

The roaring of the waterfall sounded like thunder constantly pounding in her ears. Rainbow Dash could already feel the current dragging her along. She bobbed back up to the surface, taking in a huge gulp of air as she breached the water.

A second or two after she got her bearings, a second splash came from right in front of her as the timberwolf completed its descent. The wolf clipped one of the rocks she had apparently missed, knocking its fragile body to pieces like a poorly built log cabin.

Rainbow Dash groaned in pain while clutching her midsection. The water around her was starting to take on a deep shade of red, indicating just how badly she was bleeding. However, her instinct to protect her injury was short lived as the current kept pulling her along.

“Rainbow Dash!” A voice from off to the side called out to her. She looked over, only to see a familiar stallion hanging out from one of the rocks and reaching out to her. “Grab my hoof!”

Rainbow Dash tried her best to swim forward, but the current and the many rocks made it nearly impossible. She reached out and cushioned herself from smacking into one of the rocks before turning and stretching her free foreleg out to her friend.

“Blue!”

Despite both ponies reaching out as far as they could, Rainbow Dash was swept right by the stallion and just barely missed his grasp.

“Rainbow Dash!”

The cyan mare watched her friend getting further away, a fearful expression frozen on his face. She kept reaching for him, vainly hoping that somehow she could get to him despite the current.

“Blue Bo-”

*CRACK*

Rainbow Dash’s cries were cut off abruptly as she felt something hard slamming into the back of her head. The world in front of her blurred and the feeling of the cold river faded away. Her foreleg dropped and limply sank into the water, and everything went black.