Hold on, I’m pretty sure that you guys are more than a bit confused aren’t you? Well then should I probably explain it to you then? You see, it started like this….

Hours earlier: on the road.

We had been walking for nearly a week now and honestly I was getting a bit bored. So I decided to be a bit of an asshole and play a game with Lightning.

“NOOO!!! Jack! Stop this please, it drives me crazy.” She finally snapped and I knew that this was the time to finish it. But I still managed to catch a smile on Eve’s face, she was starting to come out of the deep part but its still a long way to go. I will definitely need to talk with her. But for now…

“Lightning.” I spoke up getting her attention “Where exactly are we going?” I asked her and she just shook her head in frustration.

“To Manehatten.” was the simple reply I got from her and I started to snicker. I mean Manehatten, REALLY? But I just tried to shrug it off, chalking it up for coincidence.

“Because we need a ship to carry us to an island.” Now this was an interesting piece of information and I could see that Eve was interested as well.

“And why do we need to go to that island?” I asked her again but I saw that she was a bit reluctant to answer me. Seems like she had something in common with this island.

“There is a certain… zebra there whom we would be advised to meet.” the way she talked about that other zebra… now I was sure that something happened between her and that place, high probability that its with that other zebra. But I won’t nag her about it. It’s her choice whether she tells us or not.

“And why is it important for us to meet that particular person….zebra?” I tentatively asked her, not wanting to upset her. She looked at me sadly and spoke on a sorrowful voice.

“I think you of all….” here she trailed off, searching for a good word to express herself and I decided to help in.
“People?”

“Yes, people. You of all people should have guessed why we are going there. That mare is one of the best shamans of the zebra tribes. If anyone, its her whom knows something that could help us.” Now i knew why she wanted us to go there. Memories of that night started to flood my brain as I remembered how my life started a down spiral in just matter of hours. I quickly shook those thoughts out of my head.

“I see you realize the importance of this, Jack.” by now, Eve also got the situation and looked considerably sadder as she too, remembered that night.

“It’s Zebrabwe.” that did it. That simple name did it and despite the seriousness of the I burst out laughing. I started laughing so hard that I couldn’t stand upright and fell face first onto the ground.

“OW! Hahaha “ *huff* “Hahaha-hehehe.” meanwhile my two companions did nothing more than watch me as I made a fool out of myself….erm… I mean a BIGGER fool.

“May I ask you what’s so funny, Jack?” came the dangerously calm voice of the zebra next to me and I realized that I better explain it to her or I will get hurt.

“Well it’s just that, that your island’s name sounds like a place from Earth, just with it’s name Zebrafied. And the Name of the city where we are going sounds like a ponified version of a city on Earth.” I tried to explain but it didn’t seem to make my chances better with her.

“Oh? And pray to tell what would those names be?” she asked me and I knew that this was my last chance.

“Well the city’s name is Manhattan and there is a country named Zimbabwe. So do you see now what I found funny?” I asked her as I finally stood up and dusted myself off. She held her gaze on me for a little while, contemplating if she should forgive me or not while I sweat under her visage. Meanwhile Evelyn just stood there on the sides and smiled as I was being whipped by looks alone from a smaller than me zebra.

“….Fine, you are off the hook this time. But better be careful next time as i won’t be so nice.” and with that she turned away and started walking away from me while I let out a relieved sigh and started following after them since they didn’t wait for me. Running after and catching up to the two girls

“Oh come on, it can’t be only me that can see the joke in it. And if it still bothers you, I can honestly say that the place where I was born doesn’t have that much better name.” I tried to salvage some good grace with her as I walked next to her, with Eve on my other side.

“And what is the name of that place then?” asked Eve and I prepared myself for some embarrassment.

“It’s Hungary…” well now that it was out I just had to wait for the inevitable laughter or lame ‘Are you hungry?’ puns. But to my surprise and relief, only small chuckles came from my travelling companions. Well more from Evelyn than Lightning but I managed to find a small smile on her muzzle, so there is still hope for me. YAY!

“By the way Lightning, how long will it take us to get there?” I asked her and she stopped, thinking about the answer.

“Well, if we go at this pace it will take us another two months to get there.” wait, what?

“Two months? And by that you mean getting to Zebrabwe, right?” I asked her, hoping that it won’t take that long for us to go there. But that hope was quickly crushed when I heard her answer.

“No, two months until we arrive to Manehatten.” Seriously? Darn, this place is freaking big if it takes that long to reach a city then, or just our transportation method sucks.

“Isn’t there a faster way for us to get there?” I asked her but she just shook her head.

“No, there isn’t one, unless you can do something with that magical bag you have.” Now I felt like I should hit myself in the face, hard. How could I not think about it sooner? But then again I never thought of this thing taking so long which in hindsight was a pretty bad idea. But then the question arises, what to use? A skateboard? Nah, not big enough for all of us, maybe those brooms from the Harry Potter books? No, I don’t think Lightning could hold onto those, but then what?

I stood there for nearly five minutes, thinking about what to use when an idea hit me like an incoming train at top speed. “Would that work? I have no idea,but lets try it out.” And with that in mind I concentrated on the thing I wanted to get and smiled when i felt the correct texture of the desired item. Grasping it I started to pull it out and to my surprise I found out that it was already rolled up, enabling me to actually pull it out, although not without a bit of a struggle, since even rolled up it could hardly come out.

From the outside it must have been strange to see me struggling with a rolled up fabric as Lightning and Evelyn looked at each other with a raised brow, non hf them having an idea of what’s going on. After minutes of struggling I managed to free it from its confines. The girls walked next to me in hopes of finding out just what I got myself. But what they saw was not what they were expecting.

It was a fairly large carpet, big enough for at least three ponies or two full grown griffon. But as giddy as I was about the possibility that this carpet represented, the two girls were equally unimpressed with it. Seeing their faces I scoffed.

“Bah! You don’t realise how much this could help us.” I stated but only got raised eyebrows from the two of them.

“It’s a carpet, I don’t know how it could help us.” asked Evelyn innocently and i just chuckled.

“It’s magic, I ain’t gotta explain shi-...nothing, I ain’t gotta explain nothing.” good thing that I had managed to catch myself there, no need for her to hear something inappropriate. But Lightning decided to remain the skeptical one and spoke up.

“It doesn’t seem anything special to me.” I waved my hand with the pointer finger extended.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk, My dear Lightning, you underestimate the power of magic. Allow me to show you...” I turned to the motionless fabric on the ground and raised my hands over it.

“UP!” I said with a commanding voice and surprise, surprise nothing happened. I coughed a little then tried another thing.

“ABRAKADABRA!” Still nothing and Lightning was getting a bit annoyed with my wasting time. I was getting a bit anxious, but considering the ticking time bomb that is called Lightning, behind me it’s not a surprise.

“Erm..Shazam?” Now I was just being pathetic and wasting the time of everyone. As a last desperate attempt in recovering some pride I tried something that no living being would try.

“....Please?” but when nothing happened again the girls had decided that enough was enough and started walking away from me, leaving me standing there in shame. I glared at the carpet, wishing with all of my might that it would spontaneously combust, but alas it mocked me with not doing so. “This is all your fault.” and then started to follow after my companions when a thought entered into my head.

“Well, if you won’t burn by yourself.....why not let me help you?” I asked the lifeless object in front of me while getting a pack of matches. Stepping closer to it, I lit the match and was about to set it on fire when I experienced pain in a place where no man should be ever hit, kicked, maimed or harmed in any way.

I let out a yelp of pain and collapsed on my knees while holding my family jewellery and looked up to see the very carpet that I was about to set on fire stand in front of me, shaking on of its tassels at me, like it was a fist.

“Why you little...” I leaped at it, only for it to dodge and for me to get a face full of earth. Spitting it out I turned around to see that it was making its way towards the girls, whom were none-the wiser of this. But I wasn’t about to let it do anything to them.

Blinking directly over it I managed to grab it by its midsection, surprising it and making it crash to the ground. But what I didn’t expect was for it to turn on my and start to strangle me. I mean that its just a carpet but damn, this carpet can strangle like a boss. In retaliation I started to tighten my grip on its midsection, seemingly ineffective as it doesn’t require any air for it to live. However it didn’t stop here, as our fight quickly degraded into a small fight between the two of us.

“DANIEL! What the hay are you doing?” shouted an equally part surprised and angered zebra at me, with a giggling griffon at her side.

“Can’t you see it? I’m fighting.” i replied casually with the carpet nodding its...head, yeah let’s go with that.

“That much I understood, but why?” she asked me but I had no real answer for that so I just shrugged.

“I don’t know, but I wasn’t about to let it get to you. Who knows what it would do to you two.” this only got me a right hook from carpet to which I responded with a withering glare but it just shrugged it off. Then it started to make complex looking motions with its tassels. Lightning, Evelyn and me just looked at each other, none of us having any idea about what its trying to say.

Letting go of it, I stepped next to the girls and quietly whispered to them. “Any one of you have any idea what it is trying to tell us?” both of them shook their heads and I sighed. “as I thought. Having no other idea I turned to the carpet and addressed it.

“Uhmm, Carpet?” this seemed to snap it out of its silent tirade and listened to me. ”What are you going to do now?” I asked it and after some consideration it shrugged, not having any idea. I pressed on. “Would you like to come with us then? We...uh kinda need a ride if it wouldn’t be a problem for you.” I could tell that this piqued its interest since its positure changed into a more eager one but then it caught itself and pointed at me.

“Me?” i pointed at myself, not knowing what it wanted with me. It nodded. “What do you want from me?” I only got another set of movements but it seemed like it wanted me to apologise for something, the crossed arms (corners?) at the end of it helped a lot.

“You want me to apologise?” I asked it and it nodded. “But for wha-” and that’s when I remembered one crucial thing that I wanted to do with it.

“Oh-oooooooooooooooohhhhh. Uhmm, yeah sorry about me trying to set you on fire.” I got incredulous looks from Lightning and Eve so I quickly continued “But I didn’t know that you were alive so I have to ask for forgiveness. Can you find it in your woven heart to do so?” considering the looks i got from the girls next to me, it wasn’t the best choice of words, but I had to go with it now.

Carpet looked like it was in deep thought and after minutes of consideration, it slowly nodded and held out one of its tassels for a handshake, With that finished Carpet sprung up with a sound akin to a rubber band snapping and swept all of us away. When I could finally see what happened I couldn’t believe my eyes. We were flying with carpet under us, just like in Aladdin (what? it’s a good cartoon) and I could see the world getting smaller as we reached higher and higher.

Looking back to my companions i saw that they still had their eyes closed but I wasn’t about to let them miss out this amazing thing. “Hey you two, open your eyes and look around. Tell me what you see.” when they did so, they had the same reaction as I did. Shakily standing up, trying not to lose their balance and fall off they looked around, amazed at the sight of the world from above.

Under and to the right (probably to the west) to us there was a vast expansion of green as far as the eye could see with varying shades of green, probably different kinds of trees. To the left of us I could see something blue, probably the ocean that we needed to travel through. The sparkles caused by the rays of sun could be seen from even here showing just how beautiful can this world be.

Looking behind us I could see the mountainous region of the Gem Fido, slowly disappearing due to the distance and the mist that surrounded the high mountains. “Somewhere, there lies Trot, where it all began.” shaking my head in hopes of chasing away the bad memories, I glanced back at Evelyn and Lightning, both of them still gazing around in wonder I could hear Lightning mutter “Beautiful” softly. “But not as much as you.” I thought to myself, wait, where did that come from? This got me thinking, do I really think about her that way? She was the first person...pony...zebra that I met here and she showed me nothing but kindness.

She helped me get better after I have arrived, she let me stay with her and taught me the Equestrian customs. She helped me when I brought Evelyn on that fateful night and above all she decided to help me with everything and anything I needed. So I could say that yes, I could see her in that light, but then there is one big problem. She is an entirely different species, If I would have been a pony or another zebra then that wouldn’t have been that big of a problem, but I’m not. I’m something much, much different.

And even if I could see past the species thing, would my human mindset allow it? After years of being human, could I really start a relationship with her? And even if I manage to take that problem out of the way, there is still the question that whether SHE likes me. But that’s a bridge that shall be crossed when we arrive to it. Now I had more important business, mainly mischief. Leaning down, I whispered something to carpet, low enough that the others wouldn’t hear it but it would.

After some contemplation it nodded slightly and we set out plan into motion. Grabbing the end of carpet slightly i pulled it up, making carpet go upwards at a 90% angle, thus making me and my companions cry out. Me in joy and the others in fright.

“WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! THIS IS AWESOME!” I shouted to the skies as I made carpet do a large backflip while Eve and Lightning continued to scream. After an Aileron Roll Evelyn stopped screaming in fright and started to laugh with me, enjoying the sensation and the thrill of this kind of flight. “And now, for the Grand Finale...” I whispered what I wanted to do to carpet and it nodded fervently, agreeing to my idea.

Carpet started to rise higher and higher until we were so far from the ground that we couldn’t distinguish one tree from another, at all. Then it stopped for some seconds, letting us look around in awe. Then came the descent, slowly at first but gradually picking up speed, we went faster and faster with each second. Evelyn and me started to laugh while Lightning continued to scream.

The treeline was getting gradually closer and closer and it seemed like we would crash into it carpet pulled up at a sharp angle, making me cheer about the success of the maneuver and Lightning breath heavily due to the adrenaline rush wearing off. Looking her over i saw that she was genuinely scared due to those stunts and I felt bad for making her feel like that. Scooting next to her I put an arm around her and pulled her close.

“No, no I’m not. Jack, please don’t something like that, it scares me.” she sounded so frightened that I felt really bad now.

“When i was just a foal...I climbed up a tall tree but suddenly I had lost my balance and fell off of it and broke my leg. Ever since that I have been afraid of falling, so please Jack, please, don’t do something like that again.”

“Okay Lightning, I promise I won’t do that with you okay?” she nodded feebly and I just held her tighter to me. I made carpet go higher, this time at a slower rate until we were flying just under a longer cloud formation. Seeing that the sun was going down I did something that I have always wanted to do. Gently going up, we broke through the thin layer of cloud and I heard Eve and Lightning gasp softly at the sight. Because of the setting sun the cloud under us was painted a mix of deep orange and red, a beautiful combination.

Flying like this for minutes I saw that it was about time for us to find a good camping place for the night, so I had carpet go lower so that we could search for an appropriate clearing. Soon enough Evelyn pointed out one that suited our needs and we set up our camp there (meaning: I set up the whole thing.), just in time as the sun had already went down the horizon, making way to the moon. Quickly gathering some branches from the surrounding trees I made a basic campfire so we could see somewhat.

Our dinner had been quite simple, some sandwiches and fruits but it was enough. Lying on my back and looking at the beauty of the night sky I heard the others go into the tent I set up, wishing me and each other Good Night with me doing the same. Turning my attention back to the stars I looked at the constellations, some was similar from those that could be seen from earth, some were completely different but each and every one of them was beautiful beyond comparison.

I could feel the tiredness slowly get to me so I decided to sleep outside, since it was warm enough to do so, and let sleep take over me, hoping that I would have a restful night, for the first time since we started traveling. But alas it was not so easy to get a good night sleep.

In my dreams:

Darkness, that’s what surrounded me again and I was getting quite used to it, since this was what greeted me in my dreams ever since we had set out for our journey, two weeks ago. It was always like this, nothing else, no smell, sound, sight, sense of touch, nothing.

But after a while this changes as the screams come, screams I remember oh so well, since I have heard these same screams in that cave all those nights long ago. The last voices that those cultists gave off as they were brutally murdered by the very own thing that they wanted, and to some degree managed, to summon.

Then came the sight. I could see myself as I killed the lead cultist, watching him drown in his own blood and seeing the life leave his eyes. I don’t say that I wouldn’t do it again, no it was quite the opposite, I would kill him as many times as it would be necessary just to make the world free of that scum. But watching it over and over again every night was starting to concern me. Since I didn’t wanted to worry Lightning or Evelyn, I didn’t tell them about this, this was my own problem and I would deal with it...I just have no idea how.

But suddenly something has changed, the scene in the cave blurred away and unlike when I was waking up it changed into something else. Slowly the image cleared and I could see that I was in some town, during the night as everything was dark but for some reason I could see everything. Another thing was that I felt like I was two being at the same time. Two different person, each with their own emotions and feelings. On one side there were my emotions: anger, anxiety, happiness and calmness. But the other one was just.....empty. No emotion, no feeling, nothing, it honestly scared me. The fact that one thing was able to exist without anything was just a frightening concept in itself.

I tried not to think about it so I tried to look around but found out that for some reason I couldn’t even look away from the focus point of whatever this scene was focused on. I felt whoever or whatever was this move through the dark, never staying in whatever little light was present and never stayed in one place for too long. Always on the prowl, like a predator stalking its prey, and that may haven’t been so far off the mark.

However when it moved next to a window and looked into it for whatever reason I felt my heart stop. Because nothing stared back at me. I mean something was staring back at me but it had no face, it was just a white head with no features at all. That was the point where I realised where I was and what was happening, somehow I was seeing the memory of Slendermane and we were in Trot now, since I recognise some of the buildings. It suddenly turned away from the window, seemingly hearing something that I couldn’t.

Suddenly the world went dark for the briefest of seconds, and I found myself in something that could be described as an office. The room from, what little I could see about it, was fairly large and well furnished with a large desk in front of the window that looked directly out at the town. In front of the desk were two comfortable looking armchairs with a similar looking one behind the desk. However the focus of Slendermane wasn’t on the room but the sole pony sitting behind the desk, with a stack of papers muttering something about “That damned paperwork.”. He was a mid-sized black unicorn with a golden mane and a pair of glasses, currently concentrating on the papers very hard. I started to have a very bad feeling about this.

The small lamp at the desk started to flicker on and off rapidly, getting the attention of the pony sitting there. I saw the room darken in an unnatural way and started to feel something new. Fear, and this was neither from my or Slendermane’s side. It was from the pony himself, whom I presume is the Mayor of the town. It felt strange and yet at the same time it felt good, and that was something that really scared me. I felt Slender take a step out of the shadows, towards the Mayor, finally deciding to show itself.

The Mayor looked like he was seeing a ghost, which was really close to the truth but not close enough. I saw the Mayor freeze up, similar to what I did when I first saw it in the caves so I could have relate to what was happening to him now. I saw him trying to fight the effects of the thing that held him up and for the briefest of seconds I saw his horn flicker up in a red-ish aura, the sign of him trying to use his magic, but it was futile since it went away as soon as it appeared. The terror in his eyes was something that i shall never forget as by this time Slender was so close to him that I could see ‘myself’ in his glasses.

The next thing I know was that Slender had a tentacle wrap itself around the throat of the unfortunate pony, so that he wouldn’t scream and took him away from his office to the Hal room, where I found all the bodies. Arriving there Slender turned to its captive and started to tighten the tentacle around his neck while raising the poor sap. From the widening of his eyes I could tell that whatever was happening couldn’t be worse and my fears came true when I saw even more tentacles descending upon his body rapidly. However when I wanted to close my eyes I just couldn’t do it for some reason and had to watch as the black appendages went closer and closer until...

THUD

THUD

THUD

*CRACK*

Real world:

I shot up from the nightmare with a scream, sweat and tear freely flowing from me as I tried to catch my breath, with little success. “What was that.... Could it be that these were It’s memories? But if yes...then why show them to me?” However no answer came to my mental question as only the silence greeted me in the night. But whatever that was, one thing was for sure...

A/N: Sorry for the long wait, school started plus a very mild case of writer's block.

Also, I'm in need for an editor, so if anyone would liek to be my editor then please PM me and we can talk about it.

Travels of a Hunter

by Reaper1543

Man's best friend?