But ack.... They were lost. Due to the lack of direct memories, and Toby having passed out upon the crash landing, they had no idea which direction they were headed, or where they even were at this point.
Laxed couldn't fly up in the air to get a better look at the surroundings. Not if he wanted to keep his wings intact. They were far from recovered yet.
Neither cared much for the journey right then though, they were both still just smiling in their own general direction, but this time, keeping an eye on the road, so as not to approach more danger than they could handle, or better yet, not approach danger at all. Any place was an adventure, outside of safe walls, and any adventure meant the possibility of battle, travels or, as they disgressed at the thought of, danger.
They were trotting along their unknown path, still within the open forest, consisting of the occasional tree, flowers and grass as far as the eye could see, ending only as they met a mountain-side in all four directions. The valley was huge, but it still met its ending point before the sightsline did, due to how tall each mountain stood. Whether to consider it paradise, save for the dead-lands they had been on earlier, or just a less visited place than normal, was beyond his guess, but one way or another, silence filled the valley with only their breaths, heartbeats, hooves and an occasional stroke of the invisible natural and soothing force flying by to keep it filled with sound.
But silence was not the strong side of the younger of the two, even as the pegasus was delighted over it beyond recognition, almost soaring in the clouds, mentally. The boots only helped strenghtening the image, eyes widely opened or not. Toby though, had decided that there had been enough of this boring, and mentally dull silence, and as soon as he found something to talk about, there was no stopping him.
Laxed had to find his mental ear-blockers to kill any sound and go back to soaring in the clouds, as hard as that was when this time, Toby paid attention to him, and therefore shook him whenever his thoughts headed in different directions. There was no escaping the insane amount of words Toby somehow managed to blurt out through just a small portion of time. He was starting to wonder if the unicorn ever caught his breath, or just inhaled enough for ten fully grown stallions, only to let it all out in a nonstop go. But no. The green-furred talk-a-lot machine was inhaling, even while talking.
Every time he tried to wander off into his own thoughts and peace, Toby noticed, and pulled him straight back in. He wanted to explode in anger and fury at this point. The talking had hardly been bearable when he was not even there mentally, and if he couldn't even escape, that small portion that kept him from boiling over was gone. That paper-thin wall that hindered him from mentally losing it was cut, and fell.
His left eye started twitching, and his mouth was shaking as his eyes grew more shallow by the second.
"Uhm... Are you alright?"
Finally... FINALLY!
With that question, Toby had gone quiet. If just for a few seconds, it was those seconds of peace he could truly feel.
He kept on going without responding, and those few signs his face had thrown off left Toby unwanting to pull him back from his daydreaming, even as he seemed to have calmed down.
The unicorn no longer walked side-by-side with Laxed, but rather, a little behind. He didn't even speak either. He had gone completely silent, and the smile he had previously had, no longer remained, disappearing as slowly as he felt like walking. He knew something was off, but he feared the answer too much to pursue the case.
Laxed, whom he had only seen in pain, fear, happiness or asleep, had thrown off a gaze that was frightening just to look at, and even as it disappeared, he could see it clearly whenever he got close enough to look at the black pegasus, and so, he stayed back to avoid having to see it again, hoping it would eventually fade, but to no avail. Whenever he got close enough, because Laxed was off in the skies, slowing his pace, and he caught up, the face returned.
They kept on going forth, but with neither to keep them going at a normal pace, Toby ensuring to stay behind Laxed, who was far slower than usual, as nothing kept him going but himself, lost in his thoughts and the skies, their progress was lacking. They had only gotten a mile or two from their last spot, and that was through the entire day.
Even worse, both of them were paying the tolls of not having eaten for a while. The sun was setting, but it still shed some light, enough to last for a small scavening hunt. Both went in their own directions to look for anything edible, having decided on a meeting point below the largest tree in the area, to ensure neither missed it.
=================================================
He had managed to gather some berries, along with 'Taste leaves', known to be very rare, but they were also infamous for their peculiar 'ability' of tasting anything anypony desired, and that made them exquisit enough for even Princess Celestia herself to eat them right off the bat. He felt pretty achieved to have found them, though when returning to the tree, Toby had yet to come back. There was still some time on the clock before darkness once more fell, so he decided to simply patiently wait.
But victory wasn't his this day, and he could sense something had happened as the night finally fell without neither sound nor sight of his pony partner. The worst of thoughts got him, and leaving the food by the tree, his plan to find Toby and return, he sprinted off in the general direction he knew Toby had headed, shouting for him every 10th second.
He didn't consider that his voice might be attracting other things than his grass-green buddy, he just had to find him. He knew what happened if the poor colt was left out there in the wilderness without attention, even just for a few hours, and just now did he realise how bad an idea it was for them to split up and search individually, Toby's idea or not. He should have refused when he didn't, but it wouldn't be the first time the two of them got in a mess, or just Toby for that matter.
One way or another, whether Toby was in a mess or not, he had to go out there and search. If not injured, he would most definitely be scared. Especially since this was the time of 'Tricksters'.
Then he heard voices. Whether they were friendly or not, was for his eyes to judge. Silently approaching the source, he saw Toby surrounded by four large, strong and armored ponies in various colors, shaping up a small rainbow. They somewhat reminded him of Celestia's personal escort, but their armor was neither quite so fancy, nor was she usually in chains, like Toby was. Their armor was consisting of badly mended metal plates that might very well shatter to a well-placed kick.
So, he had decided to slowly follow them. If he tried to explain his way out of this one, he was more likely to be walking next to Toby, equally chained up. One end around his neck, the four others around his hooves, giving limited mobility.
"HALT! We set camp here for now!" the fifth one, ahead of the other four shouted. He was dressed entirely differently, the only one with a helmet that was definitely resembling one the guards at Canterlot castle had. He also had a cape, crimson red, and going from his neck and to his rear hooves, he made out the clear leader of the group, the other four
He sat and watched them feast upon whatever meals they had brought along, like soldiers tend to do after a long journey. That only meant they were headed towards home, and had been away from it for a long time. But if they were armored, they either belonged to a small villager, or perhaps a castle preparing to take the shape of ruins. Their armor simply couldn't belong to any army a majestic kingdom had.
Hours passed before they all finally decided to lull into sleep. Four loudly snoring ponies spread across various spots on the ground. The fifth was nowhere to be seen, and quite frankly, he didn't have time to stay around and hope to spot him further away from the group, and asleep as well. He simply had to trust his luck. Even if that meant risking the possibility of success. He found the keys attached to one of them, but based on how heavily the armored pony snored, Laxed had his doubts about him waking up
With a swift move, making him feel like one of those ninjas he had read about, the keys were his, and he softly approached another sleeping pony. The chained one.
He unlocked the chains, hoping the *click* that there was no chance of silencing wouldn't wake either of them up. Looking around, not a single one of them had awokened, and were all sleeping softly. He managed to get Toby on his back after a few strainful pulls, and even as that meant the unicorn had to lay directly on his wings, causing both his wings and back to sting, more than just lightly, it was a price he had to pay.
But his luck was running out. He had just made it out of the lair, looking back at the four sleeping guards with a sheepish grin, mumbling 'Too easy', and as he turned his head away from the camp and straight ahead where he was headed, he found himself looking up at a taller, and much stronger pony than himself. It was the leader, and he was looking even more terrifying up close.
"And where do you think YOU'RE going?" He grunted out like an angry dog.
"E-Err.... I was just taking my friend and going... You know... Far away from you guys?" He nervously laughed, hopening to mooden up the serious pony before him, and immediately ran off.
He could even see the leader's jaw drop and his eyes opening wide that the pegasus had even just done that.
"In all my days.... GUARDS! GET OFF YOUR LAZY HOOVES AND CHASE AFTER THEM!" He shouted, seemingly insulted, and started sprinting after them as well.
The darkness was their only chance of escaping. He couldn't outrun a single one of them. He wouldn't even be able to if he wasn't carrying Toby, whom was waking to due to the sudden gallop causing him to shake back and forth atop Laxed's back.
Diving into the first bush he could, hoping he was out of sights-line, the darkness practically making the two invisible anywhere past a close-up, he managed to accidentaly throw Toby off his back and right into a few branches, leaving large cracking noises. The few seconds they had got on the guards were now for luck to make up.
Toby saw the pegasus' worried expression, and luckily knew to keep still and remain quiet, even as he was just waking up.
He heard hoovesteps. Too many to count. They all ran ahead, and he let out a breath of relief.
His heart stopped in the next second though. From atop the bush, a armored head stuck in. It was the leader, and his helmet-covered face that was gazing down at the two.
"Boo!" He shouted in a whispering manner, and the two nearly jumped at it. They tried running off, but he only had to grab hold of the unicorn to stop Laxed from sprinting off.
"That's a good boy" He excitedly spoke, expecting just that outcome.
"Let him go! We've done nothing to you! We just want to be on our way, and if you can just let him go, we will!" He shouted back, fear of what was likely to wait him coming out into his emotions as his words left his mouth.
"No can do that... Can't really tell you why, but I can tell you that I can't do just that. You'll find out soon enough, I'm sure... Now, if you want to leave your pony brethern to me and just sprint off, that's fine. I probably can't catch you both, and the other guards decided to look in their seperate directions, so they won't be back for the next few minutes... Oh how I wish they were more brains than brawns at times... But enough about that... You can choose to abandon him to his fate, or you can join him and at least try to comfort him for what awaits" A sly grin curled up alongst the lips of the caped stallion.
Now that he had more of a time to actually look at the 'leader', he was gray, with a rather stubby mane. Unlike the guards at Canterlot castle, his just stuck up the hole and hung to the side like a flat mane often does, but it didn't go much past his ear level, and at the end, it was jagged, his hair white. He must've been fairly old, and he didn't seem to have neither wings, nor a horn. He was indefinitely an earth pony. His tail was much like his mane. Short, jagged at the end, and flat. He didn't stand THAT much taller than an average pony, but he definitely had height, and where that failed, his muscles were superiour. He was also likely to be one of the smarter ponies out there. Just how much, he couldn't tell, but the possibility to rival Twilight in knowledge, he feared was a reality.
"You..." Laxed sighed. "You win... I'll come..."
He did as he had said, and walked over to the gray earth pony, and as they made their way back to the camp, the only thing he could think of, was trying to find an escape route. There was none. The leader had brought chains in a small bag he seemed to carry about, and they were now both chained up. He couldn't fly off either, the bandages didn't just keep his wings from falling apart, but also hindered them from spreading out for him to just fly as he pleased.
He was pretty much tied down now, and all he could do was obey.
The guards returned, and it seemed like not a single one of them were returning to sleep as the camp they had set up was being brought back down, and anything they could re-use, was being packed down.
And so, they set off, with two prisoners having no idea where these soldiers were taking them.
- End -