//------------------------------//
// Monster 
// Story: Anthology of Dziad 
// by dziadek1990 
//------------------------------//

"Now, unicorn! Put away your horn and walk out of the building with your head up and your hooves down!"

"Uh, Hitch?"

"I mean with your head down and your hooves up! Just look on the ground and follow my voice! Don't you dare look at me, and nopony will be hurt, you got that?"

The girls inside the house were panicking.

Correction: Girl. One of them.

Specifically: Sunny. Izzy was gullibly (and innocently) calm and upbeat.

"This is bad this is bad this is bad This Is Bad THIS IS SO  BAD!"

Sunny was running all around the room, her hooves moving so fast that they almost made the floor-boards smoke.

"Why so scared, ol' buddy ol' chum?" Izzy said with a grin, putting her arm over Sunny's shoulder, stopping her in her tracks.

Sunny pushed her away. "WE JUST MET!"

Izzy shrugged. "Eh, you already talked more to me during those few minutes that I knew you, than my closest unicorn 'friends' talked to me during all the years I knew them. By comparison, to them, we are BFFs!"

Izzy patted Sunny's back. She could feel Sunny's shoulders rapidly rising and falling with her every panicked breath. "So, again my friend: Why So Serious?"

"DON'T YOU KNOW WHAT IS HAPPENING?! HITCH AND SPROUT – THOSE TWO GUYS OUT THERE – THEY THINK THAT YOU HAVE KIDNAPPED ME! DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THEY WILL DO RIGHT NOW, GIVEN WHAT THEY BELIEVE ABOUT YOU?"

"Oh! Oh! Oh! I know! They will play tag and then tie me up like some calf and then they will brand me as the criminal!"
Sunny's teeth were showing. Then she deflated when she heard what her mouth said. "Wait... Don't brands hurt? They're those red-hot metal sticks that put something like burn-scar cutie marks on you, right?"

"No, I mean yes, I mean you are correct, but that is not what Hitch and Sprout will do! They will most likely instead do something else that is just as awful: They will find reinforcements and they will surround the house and–"

Izzy snorted. "Just like they 'surrounded' us right now? With just two ponies? Will they bring another two to make the 'surrounding-ness' complete?"

"No, more than two. A lot more. And I believe siege engines, though not sure..."

"Hah! Then three more ponies instead? HA! They aren't the most sparkly guys in the woods! Their brains lack any light! There is nothing upstairs! I wouldn't worry about them! They are not capable of inventing any sort of plan which threatens us in any way wait what did you say about engines–"

"I am not worried about ME, Izzy! I am worried about YOU!"

"Huh?"

"They do not see you as a person! They were raised to believe that you are a heartless monster! A unicorn!"

"What? But Unicorns are not monsters! We are ponies just like you!"

"Not to THEM! They were conditioned their whole lifes to believe that unicorns are nothing but blood-thirsty beasts!"

Sunny looked seriously Izzy in the eyes. "And they are not dumb, you know... And do you know what Good and Smart ponies like them do to beasts that hurt innocents, right? Beasts who they believe you are a member of? ...do you?"

Izzy gulped.