Equinophobia

by Film Falm Brothers

Chapter 2

“Ah still think this is a tad bit over reacting.” Applejack said, scanning over the three chalkboards Twilight had filled with intricate plans. Ever since last night when the creature showed up, the whole town had been in a tizzy. The mayor had even called an emergency town meeting, and Princess Celestia had been told about what was happening (though she seemed more concerned about the spell that brought it here than the creature itself). Now a new scouting party was going out every hour on the hour, and Twilight was working herself into a lather. Applejack had decided that it was best to pretend she hadn't seen the thing charge into the Everfree.

“OVER REACTING? Applejack, look at what that…that THING did to Pinkie Pie!” Twilight pointed at the pink pony, who was in a fetal position, leaning against Fluttershy. Pinkie had lost it when the beast charged her, and fainted on the spot. Since regaining consciousness, she hadn't said a word or reacted to really anything.

“Still…” Applejack didn’t know why she was defending the thing anyways. Maybe it was her good nature kicking in, but it just felt like the thing, whatever it was, hadn’t done anything wrong.

“I must agree with Twilight on this one Applejack,” said Rarity, taking her eyes off the blanket the creature had left, which she had been studying ever since the six of them had met at the library, “While I’m sure it isn’t dangerous, I feel we should simply have this nonsense done with. All these adventures have already taken far too much time out of my planning for the summer fashion season, and I simply have a mountain of orders to fill at the moment.”

Rainbow Dash put down the book she had been reading, “Who cares about some silly thing that ran through town? It didn’t do anything anyways. Besides, weren’t you trying to summon something from some other dimension, Twilight?” Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but smile at Twilights conflicted face. She might not act like it, but Rainbow was pretty fast on the uptake.

“Yes- no-well…it doesn’t matter what I was trying to do! A creature is loose somewhere near Ponyville, and we need to catch it!” A soft throat clearing interrupted what was most likely going to be another rant from Twilight about messing with her friends (as if the point hadn’t been hammered in during the last three).

“Umm, Twilight… Don’t you think you’re being a little harsh?” Fluttershy said, continuing to rock Pinkie Pie back and forth like a foal.

“No, I am being realistic!” Twilight shook her hooves in exasperation. Fluttershy had been her worst enemy today: ever since the meeting, Fluttershy had been the most vocal against hunting down the creature, like she had some kind of loyalty towards it.

Fluttershy frowned at her (at the moment) mentally unstable friend. “This is no time to panic.”

“This is the perfect time to panic!” Twilight turned towards her chalkboards, going over her intricate plans once again. “If it isn’t time to panic when a deranged creature from another dimension terrorizes the town, then there IS no time to panic!” Twilights’ eyes shifted around the room, as if looking for threats, “I think we need to get the Elements and call a Code F.”

Applejack sighed. “Twilight, we agreed that we wouldn’t use a Code F unless a majoritay-” Applejack’s tongue stumbled over the big word , “Until most of us agreed that we needed to.” Applejack had never liked the thought of using the Elements willy-nilly, and had strong hoofed her friends into setting up the democratic system for using them unless it was clear that they needed to.

“Fine! I call a Code F emergency vote!” Twilight shouted, “Yay!”

“Yay.” Rarity said, returning her attention to the fabric.

“Neigh.” Rainbow Dash turned a page.

“Neigh.” Fluttershy said.

“Neigh, and even if we DO decide tah’ use the Elements, Pinkie’s in no shape to.” Applejack frowned: despite being such a level headed, bookwormish pony, Twilight could get a little hot headed at times. The unicorn snorted.

“Fine. Fluttershy, use the radio and check in with Spike.” Spike, upon request from Twilight, had taken her hot air balloon to scan from the air. It may not have been the best idea the group could have come up with, but Spike had been raring to go after a few encouraging words from Rarity, and had taken off like nopony’s business.

“Alright.” Shifting Pinkie’s weight, Fluttershy picked up the walkie talkie which connected with Spike’s, “This is Treefort Six to Red Dragon Five: do you copy? Over.” Fluttershy sighed as she said the ridiculous names: if Spike was going to play hero, he should at least take it seriously.

After a few seconds of static, the radio reply came back, “This is Red Dragon Five to Treefort Six: Twilight, I think I’ve got something. Over.”

Twilight snatched the walkie talkie from her friends hoof, who squeaked in surprise. “Treefort Six to Red Dragon Five: WHERE IS IT!?!...Over.”

A moment of silence came from the radio. “…Red Dragon Five to Treefort Six: There’s no need to yell Twilight. And it’s heading towards Canterlot on the banks of the Hoof River. Over.”

Twilight’s grinned looked like it could have split her face in two, “Treefort Six to Red Dragon Five: Keep visual contact with target, reinforcements are on their way. Over.”

“Red Dragon Five to Treefort Six: I copy. I will maintain sight of the target until reinforcements arrive. Over and out.” Static blared from the walkie talkie as Spike turned his end off.

The unicorn turned to her friends, a dangerous glint in her eyes, “Let’s go kill-catch us a monster.”

With varying states of sighs and eye rolls, Applejack, Rarity, and Rainbow Dash got up and headed towards the door. Hurrying to get out there and give this thing the beating it deserved, Twilight turned back towards Fluttershy, who had made no move to leave, “You and Pinkie gonna be ok?”

Fluttershy smiled, “We’ll be fine. I’ll get her up to my cottage, and she can rest there.” Fluttershy motioned for the four of them to leave, “I’ll get Discord to cheer her up. She’ll be her old self in no time.” I hope, Fluttershy thought to herself.

Twilight wasn’t exactly sure Discord could be trusted to handle Pinkie in her current state, but more important things were on her mind. “Alright, we’ll meet you there,” Kicking up her front hooves, Twilight shouted, “We’re off!”, and the four ponies galloped away. Sighing, Fluttershy looked down to her friend, still somewhere in Lala Land.

“Come on Pinkie, let’s go.” Fluttershy nudged her friend to her hooves, and began the long journey to her cottage.

* * *

IhatehorsesIhatehorsesIhatehorsesIhatehorses, Victor thought to himself as he peeked around the tree he was hiding behind. Victor had learned three things during the long night: One, this was definitely not a dream, no matter how hard he tried to make himself think it was; Two, he was definitely not on Earth anymore, given the fact that he had ran away from a wolf made out of wood, seen horses in every color of the rainbow, some of which had a horn or wings, and some kind of insect that reproduced by belching its offspring directly into his face; and Three, THE HORSES WERE HUNTING HIM.

There was no other way to explain it: the horses were organized, they were structured, and they had a mission. It’s like Planet of the Apes gone bad, Victor thought as he picked a twig from his t-shirt. Thankfully, it wasn’t the middle of winter wherever the heck he was, or else he would have ended up a man flavored ice cube overnight. Still, his t-shirt, flannel pajamas, and wool socks had taken quite the beating. If this wasn’t bad enough, the hour or so he had had asleep (up a tree, which didn’t help his mood) had been interrupted by another party of horses shouting, or what he assumed was shouting, on the path. Victor was glad that he couldn’t understand what they were saying, because it sounded angry, and his imagination had not helped his heart beat come down much over night.

“Alright, let’s think,” Victor whispered aloud as soon as he was sure the horses were far enough away, “The horses are all coming from that way, so my best bet is to go the other way down the road.” Quietly as was physically possible, Victor inched his way through the forest, always keeping the path in sight, and hiding whenever he heard another group coming. Slowly, ever so slowly, he made his way through the forest, with more scrapes and close calls than he could keep track of. After what felt like forever, but was more like an hour or so, Victor looked up from his now tattered socks, and saw salvation: A small house, with no horses anywhere around it.

“Thank you thank you thank you!” Victor muttered to himself, edging towards the road. Slowly poking his head out, he looked down the road: nothing in sight. Getting the first good feeling he had had since he saw Hat Horse, Victor steeled himself. You can do it, just run and get into the house. Anything would be better than these damnable horses. Taking a final breath, Victor zoomed across the dirt road.

The frantic run only lasted about five seconds, but it felt like he was running a marathon to Victor. This is what war probably feels like, Victor thought as he reached the wooden door of the house, slamming it open and closed. Almost not believing he had really done it, Victor slowly looked around: it was a house, nothing really crazy about it. There were a lot of bird houses and tiny staircases around, but considering what he had seen in the past day, it was about as strange as tusks on an elephant. Finally, after hours on the run from murderous horses, he was safe. Sighing, Victor slumped on the ground finally able to rest.

Alright, I’m safe. Victor looked at the room more closely: it seemed as if the room was one big piece of wood, almost like a tree had been carved out to make the home. Victor was surprised to see that birds flew in and out of the room almost at will, all of them vibrant colors. Alright, that’s a tad weird… Oh, great, I’m in a hippies place. The total lack of technology confirmed his suspicion that a nature loving tree hugger called this place home; the most advanced thing he could see were picture frames, all of which seemed to hold pictures of the demon horses that were currently on the look for him. Gotta hand it to the guy, it takes balls to live around so many horses. Maybe he trained them... Yeah, that’s it. Victor had had the thought that the horses were sentient or something after he saw how organized they were, but them being trained was much more likely. Victor stood up to examine the photos more closely: lots of them were of one yellow horse with a tattoo of butterfly’s on its butt surrounded by other animals, while a group of six horses took up a good chunk of the rest of the photos. Damn, he’s the one who’s sicking the horses on me... Now I just need to find him and explain.

A sudden noise above his head got Victor’s attention back on the here and now. The sudden sound was coming from almost directly above him, probably from a second floor. Victor gulped. From what he could figure, the hippie had just heard him and was coming downstairs. Victor tried to make himself presentable as he walked over to the stairwell in the corner of the room. Wish me luck. But just as he was inhaling to talk, the man upstairs interrupted him.

“What in Celestia’s wide flanks are you making all the noise for, Fluttershy? You know how much I need my beauty rest!” Victor couldn’t decide whether he was happy or scared by the voice: on one hand, he had been right about there being another human around, but on the other, he hadn’t exactly planned what he was going to say to the hippie yet. Trying to sound as calm as possible, he yelled up the stairs.

“Actually, sir, I-I happened to see your cabin and thought I would ask for your help.” Victor was starting to get nervous: the man had stopped walking as soon as Victor started talking, “Y-you see, I have no idea where I am, and there are…horses chasing after me, as strange as it may sound.” The man upstairs burst into laughter.

“Hahahaha! So you got one of Ponyville’s famous warm welcomes! Haha! Oh, priceless,” The man stopped to catch his breath, “But I think you’ve come to the wrong thing for help, my dear chap.” Victor’s heart skipped a beat; the man was walking down the stairs. Victor stood like a statue as the man’s feet came into view. Or, to be more accurate, the things feet came into view: one looked almost like a deer leg, the other, an overgrown iguanas.

“Wh-what are you?” Victor stuttered as the rest of the thing came into view. Victor couldn’t process everything about it fast enough; his mind was just too far gone with panic. The thing was about his height, with what could only be described as a dragons tail trailing behind it. Not one thing was normal about it: aside from the mismatched feet, the things arms, wings, and horns were mismatched, like God had decided to throw the scraps left over from other animals together for a laugh. To top it all off, the creature was dressed in a stripped nightcap and nightgown. The thing stared back at him, a smirk further emphasizing its giant canine tooth.

“I could ask the very same of you, my friend. But I,” The thing snapped its fingers, and two self-drumming drums appeared, almost as if to build tension as the thing dramatically paused, “Am Discord, lord and master of all chaos.”

Exhaustion and the long night on the run finally caught up to Victor. “Makes about as much sense as anything around here.” Victor managed before he dead fainted. The thing looked down at him.

The mismatched creature grinned like the Cheshire cat, and let out a chuckle, imagining all the fun that he was in store for once the thing awoke. Not wanting the creature to get a bad first impression of everything in Ponyville, Discord carried Victor up the stairs, and laid him in Fluttershy’s bed.

“And now we wait for the fun to begin!” Discord chuckled as he summoned a bucket of popcorn, munching on it as he waited for the thing to wake up.

Comments

[HIEfan]

Aaaaah, love how very true Discord is still to hos personality in the cartoon, he may be good "sorta" now but he still now how to be a troll and to have some fun.

[MemeShitlord]

Discord talks english?

[Ardwolf]

The one person who can speak with him (by magic?) and it has to be Discord. And why is Pinkie so OOC? She'd be aaaaaaaaaaallllllllllllllllll over the newcomer, finding out everything she could. I wouldn't put it past her to be able to talk to him either.

Now Spike spotted him on the road, wouldn't he know he ended up in Fluttershy's house? Are the hunters going converge on the cottage? With Fluttershy defending and Discord causing "fun"?