Human Nature

by Blank Page


Act II: A Dream Come True

The snarling reverberated off the sterile, white walls of the maze. I tried to escape it, but each turn I took led to more and more corridors. How long have I been running? Minutes? Hours? It felt like it would never end.

Nearby doors would slam shut as I approached them. I pounded on them with my fists, begging for help, but there was never a response on the other side. Each stop cost me precious time, but I was desperate. I knew what would happen when the beasts caught me, and any chance to get away from them was worth the risk.

I dared to steal a glance behind me. They were getting closer; beasts made of twisted wood and shadows. Their sickly eyes radiated in an animal hunger. Their teeth gnashed at my heels between snarls.

“You could have prevented this,” the world rumbled around me. I struggled to keep running as the walls trembled and the floor shook beneath my feet. My chasers seemed unphased. “You could be home now. You could be safe. We would have protected you.”

Another turn. Another hallway. More closing doors. This maze was endless, and I was quickly running out of hope. I was going to die here.

The sound of snarls slowly drowned in a sea of thunder. I stole another look behind to see the beasts changing. Their glowing eyes grew to grotesque sizes. Dark manes sprouted out of the backs of their heads, and their sharp claws were replaced with rumbling hooves.

“But you sacrificed yourself for a bunch of animals,” the world continued in disgust. The hallway seemed to stretch for miles, and I couldn’t find another turn. This path was a dead end, but I kept running, hoping to buy more time before my pursuers caught up to me, even if it was only a little. “You traded away your home, your friends, your family, just so a handful of ponies could make it back to theirs.”

The end was approaching fast. A single door at the end was my only chance of escape. I charged forward and rammed into it with my shoulder, but it didn’t even budge. I pounded on it with my fists, begging whoever was on the other side to open up, but there was no response. I pressed my back against the door, watching helplessly as the dark horses stalked closer.

Something was wrong. There was another figure behind them all. It was hard to see it, and every time I tried to focus on it, the world began to shake. It had an unsettling air about it, like an uninvited guest.

“But far be it from us to make your decisions for you,” it said, throwing up its arms. The horses were getting closer. I shrank down into a corner, hoping that by some miracle I would disappear. “Let us hope you can adapt to the consequences of your actions. Welcome to your new home, Hunter.”

The horses lunged forward. I barely had time to shout.

<><><>

White light flooded my vision. It was so abrupt, I was blinded for a few seconds. Voices were shouting to each other over a primal scream, which I soon realized was coming from myself.

“Doctor, the creature is awake!”

“I can see that, nurse!” a tense voice replied.

There was a weight on my chest, anchoring me in place. My body felt numb to the world. My thoughts flickered back to the nightmare, and I thrashed around in the bed against the pressure. It refused to budge, but that didn’t stop me from trying to rip it away.

“Everypony, get out of here,” a voice barked. “Somepony call security!”

“Where are Nurse Redheart and the sedatives?”

By then my eyes had somewhat adjusted to the harsh light. Though everything was still hazy, I could tell I was in a hospital room. A rough strap constricted my bare chest, and another was loosely around my ankles. Multicolored blurs surrounded me, running around, barking orders, or trying to put as much distance between me and them as possible.

My fingers danced across a buckle on the strap across my chest. Something bit into my right arm as I worked, but escape was all that was one my mind, and all I could afford was a strained yelp. I hurriedly unfastened it and shot up to work on my ankles. With my restraints gone, I scrambled off the stiff mattress and fell on the floor. Jolts of pain raced through me as bare skin collided with cold tile.

“Quick, get it while it’s down!”

Heavy objects piled on top of my back. My forearms were ablaze from the added weight. Despite the raging fire, I pushed to the side and rolled on my back. A small chorus of grunts punctuated the end of my fall as I slammed into something soft and hairy.

A metallic cart towered over my left. A pair of arms reached out and anchored themselves onto it. I managed to pull myself up halfway until it toppled beneath my weight, spilling its contents on me as I fell back on my captors. They gasped for air as my body rammed into them.

A scalpel landed on my exposed chest. My right hand gingerly picked it up, and as it pulled away I noticed the river of scarlet that was growing and weaving around my forearm. Fresh blood pumped out faster and faster to the panicked cadence pounding in my ears. My left hand clamped down the wound, trying to slow the flow, but I could still feel it oozing beneath.

A migraine was pulsing through my head. A single thought looped in a seemingly endless mantra. Run. Invisible strings tugged at my body, trying to pull me up. I rolled off the ponies, careful not to fall on any of the medical equipment that now littered the ground, and pushed myself back to my feet. The room pitched and spun beneath me, but I managed to shamble over to the door.

The ponies were recovering quickly. I threw the door open with a bloodied hand and found myself back in my nightmare. A cold, sterile hallway greeted me as I slammed the door closed behind me. Both ends branched off into what felt like the beginning of an endless maze. I could hear voices and movement on the other side of the door behind me. The ponies had come back to their senses; I needed to move.

I took off in a direction I could only hope led to safety. As I half-ran-half-hobbled through the halls and my thoughts became clearer, I started assessing my condition. The sound and feel of my bare feet slapping against the tiles nearly made me stumble in my tracks as a realization struck me. My clothes were missing. Other than my worn boxers and a few bandages, I was completely exposed.

The scalpel was still in a death grip in my right hand. As impractical as it was, it was the only protection I had now. The rivers of red pouring down my arm had dried and scabbed over. I found the small hole in my forearm responsible for the bleeding and kept it plugged with a thumb. Another bandage was wrapped around my left forearm. A dull pain burned beneath it, and a brief memory flashed of a timberwolf’s jaws locked on my arm. My left calf was bound in gauze. I couldn’t see what was wrong with it, but I could definitely feel what was with each step I took on it.

I found a metal door at the other end of a hallway. The sign above it glowed a red “exit”. My hopes began to lift, only to be dashed away at the sound of voices and heavy footsteps behind me. They were close.

I ran with all that I had. My head was getting light, and the hallway stretched for miles. My eyes were burning to stay opened. The hallway was flickering in and out of focus before it blinked out entirely. I could’ve sworn it was only for a second, but by the time my eyes managed to open again, I was on a collision course with a wall at the other end. I rolled my shoulder into it to take the brunt of the impact.

My breathing was heavy, and it felt like the only thing that was anchoring me in this world. I doubled over, hoping it would help keep my body together. It felt like my head was about to roll off. What did these ponies do to me?

Thunder reverberated off the walls. I could hear shouting, but I couldn’t make out the words. I looked up in time to see three ponies coming to a halt; a stallion and two mares all garbed in doctor and nurse’s attire. The stallion, a unicorn with an orange coat and a wavy, brown mane, was at the head of the pack. He took a couple cautious steps forward.

“Stay back,” I growled slowly through grit teeth. I pointed the scalpel in their direction. Blood was slowly dripping off my arm to the sterile floor. My left arm was too busy supporting myself on the wall to plug it.

It was three on one. I was wounded, my back was against the wall, and I felt like I was going to pass out at any minute. They had a unicorn and the strange power that came with it, but they didn’t appear confident in spite of their advantage. They had a wary look in their eyes, like they had just cornered a rabid animal, but I doubted their fear was going to keep me free forever.

The door was just a few paces to my left, but it might as well have been yards away. I inched closer towards it, and the ponies took a few more steps forward.

“I said stay back,” I snapped. I wondered if they caught the desperation in my voice. They recoiled slightly, but held their ground nonetheless. The stallion braved a few more steps.

“Now, now, let’s all calm down and think for a minute,” he started slowly. My eyes and scalpel were locked on him. “You’re hurt,” he pointed out. “And you’ve lost a lot of blood. You won’t make it very far in your condition.”

“Watch me,” I growled. I was nearly in front of the door. My hand felt the handle.

“You need to stay here,” the doctor protested. “By the looks of it, you’ve already reopened one of your wounds. We’re the only ones that can help you right now.”

I barked out a short laugh. “‘Help’ me? Oh, no. I don’t know what you’ve done to me already. I’m not staying in this mad town any longer.”

My fingers found the handle and grabbed at it. It quickly burned my hand and turned by itself, and next thing I knew it flung backwards with me still attached to it. I fell inside the base of the stairwell, dazed, and heard a sharp gasp.

I looked up to find an equally shocked Twilight staring back at me. We froze for a moment before I tried to scramble back up to my feet. Her horn hummed to life, and a scalding, purple wind knocked me out of the stairwell and back into the hallway. My head connected to the hard tile, and my hands shot up to cradle it while I tried to come back to my senses. Heavy weights fell on top of me, pinning me down, and I couldn’t find the strength to push back.

“Redheart, the sedatives,” a strained voice said above me.

“On it.” A pair of white hooves pried one of my arms away. I tried to pull it back in, but the moment if felt the needle puncture skin, I froze. The medicine burned its way through my blood. Once the needle retracted, the ponies jumped off, leaving me curled on the floor.

“Miss Sparkle, if you would?” the doctor asked. Twilight nodded, and as her horn ignited again, a small purple dome formed around me. The ponies had visible relaxed, although they kept their wary eyes glued to me just in case. The doctor turned his attention to Twilight, and his voice came in slightly muffled. “Thank you for your help, it couldn’t have been timed better. It would have been troublesome to catch the creature otherwise. Although next time, could you be a bit more gentle? We have our hooves full enough trying to patch it up as it is.”

Twilight’s ears bent back, and she gave an apologetic smile. “Sorry, it startled me; I may have pushed it back a little harder than I intended to.” I rolled over and managed to push myself to my hands and knees. My head was pounding, and everything was starting to take its toll on my body. “How did this happen?” Twilight asked, redirecting her attention to me. “I thought you said you had it contained.”

It was the doctor’s turn to look embarrassed. “We did,” he explained. “We had it sedated, but it woke up earlier than we anticipated. I’ll be sure to add more security this time.”

Their voices were starting to devolve into meaningless sounds as the drug began to take over. I tried to stand, but my cage wasn’t tall enough. The best I could manage was a kneel. I planted a hand against the translucent wall. It was warm, almost burning, and I could feel whatever blood was left sputter and pop against the barrier. The ponies paused and gawked, and their wary eyes were all trained on me. My body was lulling me to sleep. I tried to fight back, but it was a losing battle.

My eyes were heavy. I wasn’t sure when I fell back to the ground, but the cold tiles suddenly felt very inviting. “You’re all monsters,” I grimaced, and my last grip on reality began to slip.

<><><>

I couldn’t tell how long I was asleep; just that it seemed to stretch for an eternity, which made the nightmares seem to last forever. The nightmares were always the same, and they seemed to play on a neverending loop. I lost count of how many times I had ran through the cycle, but I had stopped trying to keep score a long time ago.

One night the continuity broke. I assumed it was night; there were no windows in my room, but the lights were turned off. I took in a few shaky breaths to calm myself from the nightmares. A hot stream burned its way down the side of my face from the corner of my eye. I stared where the ceiling should have been, my body unable to shift due to the new restraints.

I cherished the pause in the madness and enjoyed the first few relaxed breaths I had had in a long time. A faint smile broke my face; in spite of it all, I managed to find some sort of peace. Soon even the small itch on my nose didn’t even phase me. But the sudden change brought only questions. Why was I awake? Was this planned, or just an accident on the ponies part? How long had I been here for? Days, weeks, months?

“So, how is the creature’s behavior?” Twilight’s muffled voice asked. For a second, I thought I was still in my nightmare. Light from the hallway leaked into the room. I laid still and closed my eyes, not wanting to attract unwanted attention. “Princess Celestia is very eager for updates about our visitor.”

“It’s hard to say, I’m afraid,” a male voice replied. There was a soft click, and the room lit up in artificial light. I dared to crack open an eye and spied Twilight and the orange unicorn in doctor’s apparel standing near the door. “Ever since it tried to escape, we’ve kept it constantly sedated. It helps with the procedures, but we always have somepony from security with us while we work just in case. We only recently took it off its medication for tomorrow.”

Twilight moved closer to the bed, and I quickly closed my eyes. “Why not just keep security posted here at all times?”

“We only have a hoofful of guards, Twilight,” he pointed out. “Although we’re looking into hiring more for just that. We try to keep at least one down here at all times, but you never know when somepony might try to sneak in and steal another book.”

An apologetic laugh came from Twilight, and she changed the subject. “So, how far are we in classifying it?” I heard her hooves move away from the bed and hesitantly opened an eye.

“I wish I had better news for you,” the doctor started, “but this creature has stumped us at nearly every turn. It’s a bipedal mammal, and that’s the most we have on it.”

“Really?” Twilight asked in disbelief. “That’s it?”

“This is a hospital, Miss Sparkle. We work mostly with ponies, not creatures that come from the Everfree,” the doctor deadpanned. “But even if we did, I’m sure we would still be at a loss. Here, let me show you.” They moved to the other side of the room, which was barely still in my field of vision. They stopped at a counter, and various papers and vials glowing teal floated up to greet them. “These are a some of the x-rays we have on the subject,” he explained. “I’ve never seen anything like this.”

“But, it’s a hand,” Twilight pointed out confusedly. “We’ve seen plenty of those. Spike even has something similar.”

“Yes, yes, I understand that, but look at it,” he stressed. I thought I caught a hint of fascination in his voice. “It’s just so much more… elaborate than any other skeletal system I’ve seen in Equestria. Look at all of those bones in the wrist; they look as if they were just thrown in there, yet they fit together perfectly. Not to mention the bones themselves look so bizarre in structure.”

“This is all very interesting, doctor, but how does this help us?” Twilight pressed. The x-rays floated closer to her and traded their teal glows for purple as they moved closer to the ceiling lights.

“Well, it doesn’t,” the doctor admitted. “Like I said before, I’ve never seen anything like this. But trust me, this is all leading to my hypothesis.”

Twilight tore her eyes away from the images and cast him a glance. “You said you wanted to show me something about its samples?" she asked with interest.

“Yes, I couldn’t describe it accurately enough during our last meeting, I’m afraid. Please, this way.” The two unicorns moved yet again, this time somewhere just outside of my vision. I found a mirror hanging on a wall that luckily reflected their image clearly, albeit small. A vial filled with a dark liquid floated to the doctor as they stood next to a cart with a metallic tray on top. “Forgive me for the lack of professionalism, but,” the lid of the vial popped off, and it tilted over, spilling a few drops into the tray, “would you mind cleaning this up?”

“Excuse me?” Twilight demanded confusedly.

“Please, Twilight, you’ll understand soon enough. It’s difficult to explain; I just want you to see for yourself,” the doctor explained. “Do you recall what you told me about your first encounter with the monster; how it managed to break through your force field?”

Twilight cast a couple uneasy glances between the stallion and the tray. “Yes…”

“Well, I decided to conduct an experiment of my own,” he started. “I noticed something peculiar whenever we were trying to patch it up. It’s body seemed to reject any healing spells, so we decided to take some samples for testing. I’m not sure how much blood the monster can lose, so we are always very careful whenever extracting it. I accidentally spilled some the other day and tried to pick it up. However, whenever I used my magic… Well, you should probably see for yourself.”

She gave him an odd look and directed her attention back to the tray. The vial floated closer to her and glowed purple. Her face twisted in concentration, and her horn grew brighter. She looked perplexed at first, then, after repeating the ritual a few more times, became more agitated. “Why isn’t this working?” she demanded as her horn fired up one last time.

A puff of crimson smoke erupted before her face, causing the frightened mare to scream and reel back. The glass vial fell to the floor and nearly shattered before the doctor dove for it. “What just happened?” Twilight sputtered.

“That’s just it, I don’t know,” the doctor admitted. “We’ve ran tests on the beast’s blood, its hair, its skin, its claws, even the rags it was wearing, and they all show either violent reaction or an unnatural immunity to magic.”

“But— How is that even possible?” Twilight demanded. “Magic can’t just be… ignored like that. Are you certain there’s nothing else that can be causing this phenomenon?”

“We’ve checked for any contamination in the samples that would lead to these results,” the doctor assured. “But other than an old strain of hay fever we thought was extinct, we can’t find anything wrong with the creature. I’m afraid we just don’t know how or why, but the monster is just immune to magic.”

Twilight started pacing in and out of the mirror. “But that just doesn’t make any sense,” she muttered to herself. “Everything in Equestria has some kind of magic inside of it, no matter how small. It’s what keeps everything connected to each other. But the fact that the monster rejects magic… That would imply that it doesn’t have any magic.”

The doctor followed the pacing mare with his eyes. He looked like he was building the courage to speak up. “Er, Twilight?” he started. Twilight stopped in acknowledgement. “I realize this might sound a little farfetched, but…” His brows furrowed as a scowl formed on his lips.

“What is it?” Twilight pressed.

The doctor hesitated. “What if this thing isn’t Equestrian?”

Twilight gave him a confused look. “What do you mean?” she asked skeptically.

“I don’t know, it’s just a hypothesis,” the doctor said. “It’s just so bizarre… We have no documentation of anything like it. What if the monster isn’t originally from Equestria? Or what if it is the beginning of a new… Oh, what’s the word I’m looking for?” His mane bounced back and forth as he shook his head. “What if it is a new spirit? I know it is a radical proposal, but with all of its abnormalities and oddities, all of its unnaturalness… this could very well be a spirit of the Everfree rather than a beast for all we know.”

Twilight looked unsure, but shook her head. “I don’t know. That might be too extreme, but, still…” I closed my eyes as she cast a glance at my body.

“Thank you for your time,” she said, her hoofsteps moving across the room. “This information has been very useful. I’m sure the princesses will love to hear it.”

“I’m glad I could help, Miss Sparkle,” the doctor replied. “Are you sure you still wish to begin the interrogation tomorrow?”

“Most definitely,” Twilight answered. “This creature, or spirit, has been here long enough, and it is high time it started answering some questions.”

There was a soft click, and the room was bathed in darkness again. I looked up in time to see the door closing behind them, and I was once again left alone in the dark. As the sound of their hooves faded away, Twilight asked one last audible question before their voices became too muffled to hear, “So, how is Sweetie Belle recovering?”