NOTHING! It was all I felt for a very long time… I saw nothing, heard nothing, felt nothing, and was alone in darkness… It’s so strange, but the darkness never really bothered me? I guess that’s because peacefulness is kinda hard to be threatening? I don’t know, but I do know that’s all I knew for a very long time after that… Only peace and tranquility… Eventually, my thoughts learned to subside to peaceful bliss deep within my mind as I stayed there and never moved… While I never knew exactly where there was, that didn’t matter… Nothing really did matter anymore… There was only peace and quiet in my sightless, soundless, touchless world…
And then, I saw fuzz… Lots of fuzz and shimmering shapes when I suddenly found myself in my old pony body, standing in a field… There was a gray earth pony standing in front of me underneath a cloudy dim sunless sky… He had a curly purple mane that caressed his shoulders as he stood there and frowned at me while gazing with his distinctly green eyes…
And suddenly, I started talking again, “All I can remember is a lot of pain! I can’t recall much after… After that,” I blink, “other than blackness and void. I remember seeing Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle earlier, but I can’t remember what they were saying? Everything went black and I felt like I was floating… Then, I woke up and I was here! Uh, what is this place?” before nodding.
The ethereal pony looked at me with his long wavy mane and pale body as he frowned back, “This is the Land of the Dead and I am one of many shades that’s forced to aimlessly wander here!”
I frown at the specter as the dark cloudy sky lightly boiled overhead as we stood there in the wide-open grassland. “So wait! Does this mean I’ll be forced to wander here too?”
The phantom widens his gray eyes, “I cannot say!”
I lean towards the other pony in the darkened field and I can feel the big pink bow on the back of my head caressing the top of my neck, “So, can you tell me more about this place? I mean, what do I need to know about it?”
The ghost simply blinks at me as he stares onward, blankly…
“What’s your name?”
The ghost widens his eyes, “I-I don’t know…”
“Where are you from?”
“I don’t know that either… I must be going now…” The phantasm says before he turns his body and begins to trot away from me…
“Hey! I wasn’t done talking to you!” I yell at the ghost while leaning forward as he moves further away… I gulp and look over the wide open field… I can see mountains in the distance and when I look behind me, I see a forest, but at the same time, my mind is unable to focus on much else… I take a deep breath and wonder out loud, “Well, gosh! What am I gonna do now?”
Suddenly, I hear screaming in the distance! “AAAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!”
My eyes widen as I exclaim, “What was that?” before looking left and right, when I suddenly spot a vaguely familiar white unicorn shape in the distance on my slight left! I widen my eyes as I begin to gallop that direction as fast as my hooves will carry me and I behold the white unicorn with her head tilted upward and her wisteria purple and lavender mane, split in the center, right to left, falls down around her shoulders from the horn on her forehead and her cerulean eyes stay poised at the heavily clouded and overcast sky overhead!
I stop running by skidding a foot forward in the dirt, leaving behind a little trail with my forelegs and shout, “Sweetie Belle!” before my body lurches forward so I stand aright.
The unicorn lowers her head back to me and keeps her green eyes wide as she leans forward slightly and exclaims, “Apple Bloom!”
I widen my eyes, “Sweetie Belle!”
The unicorn blinks, “Uh, Apple Bloom!”
“Sweetie Belle!” I retort!
Sweetie frowns and stands motionless before finally asking, “Uh, how long are we gonna keep doing this?”
I nod as a whimsical feeling overtakes my stressed mind for a moment and I grin and say, “As long as it takes! Now you go! It’s your turn!”
Sweetie frowns and squeaks an inquiry, “Uh, how long have you been here, anyway, AB? I just got here!”
I frown back as I reply while laying thick on my Southern Equestrian drawl, “I uh, I’m actually not sure? All I can remember is a lot of pain earlier and then, you and Scoots were in my room, but I can’t remember what y’all were saying?”
Sweetie blinks and leans forward, “You mean, back when we were in your hospital room? Uh, Apple Bloom! That was about sixty years ago!” *
Apple widens her eyes, “S-sixty years?” I open her mouth in shock. “You mean to tell me that I’ve been wandering this field for sixty years now?”
Sweetie enlarges her pupils, “Well, not exactly? I mean, you were a tree for a while too, right? Uh, can you remember that at all?”
I frown, “Well, after all the pain, I was at peace… Yeah, I wasn’t thinking about it earlier, but now that you mention it, I remember just sitting there for a long period of time… Nothing happened and it was just so peaceful…”
Sweetie frowns again, “You were just sitting there? Where is there, exactly?”
Apple blinks, “I uh, I don’t know! I couldn’t see anything and nothing ever made a sound…”
Sweetie tilts her head to the right as life as a tree suddenly must have her interest, “Did you ever feel anything?”
I lower her gaze while suppressing a sigh from my muzzle, “Uh, not really, no… It just felt like I was floating and just sitting there the whole time… Nothing bothered me and I was at peace the whole time…”
Sweetie breaths in and out through her nose, “Well, that doesn’t sound so bad? But uh, I can’t tell for sure! I mean, this must be a dream, right?”
I frown again, “I don’t think so? I just met some kind of ghost pony and he told me we’re in the Land of the Dead now!”
Sweetie widens her eyes, “Land of the Dead? W-what? All I did was go to sleep!”
I raise her view, “I guess you died in your sleep?”
Sweetie stares back blankly as she stammers out slowly in her girly voice, “Well uh, I was eighty-six years old? I guess I just finally died?”*
I widen my eyes and frown as I can only stammer, “I guess so?”
Sweetie looks down at her body and says, “But wait! This body is like the one I had in my twenties! Uh,” she begins to trot in place for a few seconds before stopping. “wow! I’m fit and able to gallop again!”
I smile, “Awesome! And hey! My body is like the one I had before, too!”
Sweetie looks up at the yellow mare and smiles, “Yeah! You can actually move again! Uh, trees can’t do that!”
I grin back and giggle as being able to move like this again after all that stillness sure feels great! “Y-yeah! So uh, being dead doesn’t seem so bad, so far? I mean, at least I got you now and we’re both fit again!”
Sweetie’s smile lowers as she stares wistfully to her right, “Yeah, too bad Scootaloo isn’t also here!”
I widen my eyes to the unicorn again, “Uh, yeah! Hey, do you remember what happened to her?”
Sweetie takes a big sigh, in and out of her snout and stares at me with sincerity in her eyes, “Uh, not really! After you went away, she started drinking a lot of vodka and just shut down! I mean, she wouldn’t talk to anypony! Not me, not her family, or any of her other friends! She just became a ghost...” she blinks her pale green eyes, “Last I heard, she moved to Fillydelphia! I don’t know what happened to her after that?”
Apple Bloom frowns, “Oh, gosh! Um, was my death why she did that?”
Sweetie sighs and nods, “Yup! Fraid so! And she wasn’t the only one, either! A lot of ponies changed when you died earlier…”
I open my mouth in shock as it never really occurred to me that I’m that important and loved? “I uh, didn’t mean to cause such a fuss!”
Sweetie frowns, “Well, it’s not like you got any say in it? I mean, you were turned into a tree! You had no control over that!”
I breath out of my muzzle and frown again, “Well, right! I mean, I never chose how I died!”
Sweetie widens her eyes again, “Most ponies don’t!”
I stare to my right in a dazed contemplation as I suddenly realize there’s a new problem, “Uh, yeah…” before adjusting my gaze back to the unicorn. “So uh, what do we do now?”
Sweetie frowns even deeper and just shrugs, “How should I know? I just got here!”
I scrunch my mouth in silent frustration as my eyes widen, “Well, this is a valley, right? There’s the mountains behind you and a forested area behind me…”
Sweetie scrunches her mouth, “I vote for the forest! That seems like less effort!”
My friend’s logic brings a grin to my face, “Yeah, mountain climbing is a lot of work!”
Sweetie chuckles and grins back, “Yeah! And since as far as we know, one is as good as the other…”
“Take the easier path!” I nod.
Sweetie nods, “Exactly!”
<*****>
We both trot down the dirt trail in a forest of gnarled dead looking brown trees with barely a few twisted branches left underneath the heavily overcast ultra-cloudy sky, dimly lit by what I’m guessing is sunlight above it… I look over at my friend trotting on my left, “So uh, was the rest of your life that great? I mean, what did you do? How did you live?”
Sweetie turns her head towards me and smiles, “Oh, yes! Two years after you turned, I got a record deal and ended up becoming a big name music producer in Manehatten!”
I frown, “Well, that’s good! Uh, any idea what happened to Scootaloo?”
She frowns back, “I already told you, I don’t know what happened to her after she moved to Fillydelphia!”
I adjust my eyes down, “Oh uh, right!”
Suddenly, she stops trotting and I reciprocate before turning my head right to see what she’s staring at, when I notice a familiar looking burnt orange pegasus with a purple Mohawk mane-style and little wings at her side, who stares at me with her violet eyes and asks in an unfamiliar masculine voice, “Greetings!”
Sweetie asks from my left, “Scootaloo! What are you doing here? And why does your voice sound so weird?”
Scootaloo frowns, “Scootaloo? Is that the name of who I am to you?”
I ask in my accent, “Who you are to us? What does that mean?”
She smiles, “Well, you’re in the Forest of the Lost! There is no substance here! Only reflections! You must have this Scootaloo pony on your mind, otherwise I wouldn’t appear to you as her!”
I widen my eyes as I’m still somewhat perplexed and ask, “Okay uh, reflections, you’re saying?”
She nods, “Yes! There is no escape, aside from the path leading to the south behind me. You should follow me to leave now! Trust me, this is no place for wandering ponies!”
Sweetie keeps her eyes wide in shock, “Oh, wow! So uh, you’ll guide us out then?”
She nods again, “Well, that was the plan! You see, my soul is trapped here! I spent too long stumbling and lost inside the woods and so, now I’m forbidden to leave… I help alleviate my sentence and boredom by helping to guide aimless wanderers and new souls to The Collective when they arrive, so they won’t meet the same fate I did…
Sweetie frowns and widens her eyes, “Okay uh, what should we call you?”
She normalizes her mouth and blinks, “I don’t remember my name?”
Sweetie’s eyes recede slightly, “Okay uh, your new name is Zed!”
She blinks again, “Zed? Very well then! While here with me, you may refer to me as Zed!”
I glance at my friend on the left and ask, “Zed?”
She turns her head back to me, “As good a name as any?” she blinks, “I mean, I didn’t wanna just keep calling him nameless pony, you know? So we’re gonna call him Zed, now!”
I blink, “Yeah but uh, “ I shake my head, “never mind!” I turn my head back right to Zed, “Lead on, Zed!”
<*****>
I trot behind Zed with Sweetie still trotting on my left, we reach a fork in the road with three different paths. Zed stops in his body, which still looks like Scootaloo, sniffs the ground, and looks towards the center path and smiles, “We need to go this way! Come!” before he turns his body in that direction and begins trotting…
I follow and hear Sweetie on my left reciprocating as she perks her head up and asks, “So uh, we have to take a specific path through these woods, or we’ll get lost?”
Zed sighs, “Yes! The forest is treacherous, but I learned of her ways and I know how to tell which paths to take!”
Sweetie frowns, “Interesting…” she blinks, “You say you look like Scootaloo because you’re a reflection and that’s what was on our minds?”
Zed nods as he continues to trot through the dead forest down the worn looking trail, “Yes! I am of the forest, now and so, I mimic her ways, including the mirror aspect…”
Sweetie, narrows her eyes in thought as we trot before I notice Zed beginning to glow a bright pastel blue as the glowing ethereal form he turned into changes shape and I see what appears to be Misses Cake there! Only I can’t help but think that her flanks are a bit larger than how I remember them?
I ask Sweetie, “Why Misses Cake?”
Sweetie turns her head to me and says, “Well, I was just thinking about you and remembering all the good times we had back at Sugarcube Corner!”
I gulp as I’m almost afraid to ask this, “Aren’t her flanks kinda big?”
Sweetie smiles and blushes slightly, “Yeah I kinda uh, always thought she was sexy! I mean,“ she blinks at me, “I know she was taken by Mister Cake and I certainly wouldn’t wreck their home, but those massive thunder buns!”
I widen my eyes and blink in shock, “Sweetie! I didn’t know you were a lesbian!”
She smiles ironically, “Yeah! Neither did I until I was thirty-three!”
I frown and narrow my eyes at the unicorn as we continue to trot, slowly and cautiously through the gnarled dead woods, “So uh, seven years after my death!”
She nods, “Yup!”
I widen my eyes, “And you got a thing for big flanks, I take it?”
She blushes slightly and shirks, “Um, yeah…”
I can only blink as I stammer out, “I die, and eventually come here, only to find out that my best friend is a rug munching, chubby chaser!”
She giggles, “Well, I like fit bodies too, sometimes!”
I widen my eyes, “Fit, like mine?”
She frowns and enlarges her pupils, “Well, I didn’t say THAT! But uh, you are kinda cute, now that you mention it!”
Zed stops trotting and we reciprocate before he lowers his snout to the trail at the two-pronged fork we just stopped at and looks up at the wide open sky, brightly open with the lack of branches overhead before back down the right trail and saying, “We should go this way!”
I look forward, eager to change the subject as I exclaim, “Yes, Zed! Lead on!”
He smiles, “Of course! Although you two really should get a room!” before he begins trotting down the road and we both begin to follow him…
I look back left at Sweetie, “Great! Now Zed thinks I’m a lesbian, too!”
She glances over, “Well, most mares in Equestria are bisexual?” she blinks. “Why? Were you suddenly thinking about it?”
I widen my eyes again, “What? No! I would never sleep with YOU, Sweetie Belle! I love you and all, but there are boundaries!”
She smiles at me, “You know, forever is a long time…”
I nod as we continue trotting and a dead branch I didn’t notice before suddenly cracks underneath my right forehoof, “This is true!”
“And the truth is, if you ever can or could sleep with me, you will! Because forever gives that an infinite number of times to come true!” She frowns and blinks her green eyes before widening them with a frown. “You’re gonna sleep with me, sooner or later Apple Bloom! It’s just the Law of Averages!”
I scrunch my mouth while keeping my eyes wide, “No, I’m not! I’m completely straight!”
She raises her left eyebrow, “You sure? You always gave off this bi-curious vibe?”
I open my mouth aghast! “What? Bi-curious vibe? What does that mean?”
She giggles slightly, “Oh, you know? You just seemed like that type of mare, you know? You weren’t sure yet, back when I knew you!”
I sigh, “Oh, Sweetie Belle! I never even once considered sleeping with another mare!”
She frowns and stares back at me, “Even that time when we were teenagers and got all drunk and made out while cuddling under the sheets?”
I blink, “That doesn’t count, Sweetie! We were both intoxicated!”
She blinks back, “I think it says a lot more about you than you wanna admit!”
I frown, “No, it doesn’t!”
She smiles again, “I remember one time, we were playing Hoofball, back when we were teenagers and you crashed into me when trying to catch the ball! Remember that time, Apple Bloom?”
I blink, “That was a very long time ago…”
She nods, “I still remembered what you smelled like down there, even after all this time… You’re intoxicating, you know that?”
My eyes are as big as they can get when I yell back, “Shut up, Sweetie Belle! I’m NOT sleeping with you!”
She giggles, “Well you say that now!”
I grimace when I realize that she’s just messing with me before I stop trotting when I notice that Zed is no longer with us and I turn my head in that direction. “Uh, where did Zed go?”
Suddenly, I hear his distinctly masculine voice resonating around the dimly lit gnarled trees around me underneath the bright overcast sky, “Welcome to your new home, lesbians! Welcome to the Forest of the Lost!”
(To be continued...)