When I opened my eyes, I saw Wild Wind laying across from me. It looks like we accidentally split ourselves when we fell.
I picked up the cloth that we wore earlier and wrapped it around my waist, as I sat up and rubbed the top of Wild’s head.
“Wild? Are you ok?” I asked.
Wild then grumbled and slowly opened her eyes, as she sat up.
“Yeah, don’t worry about it,” she said slowly.
She was silent for a few seconds as she looked at the floor.
“I can’t believe Fuzzy Fun just sacrificed herself like that…”
I looked at Berry Blast, who was fastened tightly in her seat, with her face buried in her hooves.
“Listen everypony, I know how you feel. It always hurts when we lose people,” Spitfire said suddenly from the front of the plane. “But we have to live on and keep fighting, for their sake.”
Spitfire looked back at me and Wild for a second.
“And you two should probably get into your seats and put on your seatbelts, we might hit some rough wind, or maybe a-“
I then heard the sound of glass breaking at the front of the plane.
I quickly looked at the front and saw that a Severed pegasus had crashed through the front windshield, and was biting Spitfire in the chest.
Spitfire yelped in pain, and I quickly jumped up on my feet, but instantly fell to the floor. The rush of being fully human again was just too much, and I couldn’t focus the nerves of my normal legs.
“SPITFIRE!!” I yelled, as Ruby Gleam dashed into the cockpit, just as the Severed bit Spitfire in the neck and ripped her throat out.
When Spitfire was dead, her body fell on the steering wheel, which caused the plane to begin flying straight up, and start tilting.
Ruby was holding the Severed back, as she stabbed it in the chest with a spear that was in the cockpit.
The plane was too slanted for me to make it to the cockpit myself, as I slid to the back of the plane.
I desperately looked to the unicorns who were strapped in their seats, as they looked confused as what to do, before they looked at me determinedly.
The four unicorns we had on our team then combined their magic strength to surround me with a magic aura and quickly lift me to the cockpit, as I grabbed my knife which they levitated with me.
I then held my knife tightly in my hand as I floated upward, into the cockpit, and jabbed it into the skull of the Severed before it bit Ruby, which got black goop all over my face and hands.
Ruby then quickly pulled the Severed out of the pilot seat and grabbed the steering wheel, as she set the emergency auto pilot to take us back to our outpost in the Hollow Shades.
The plane straightened itself out, but at that moment two more Severed pegasi flew through the open windshield.
One of them bit Ruby in the face, which caused her to freak out and accidentally hit the plane’s back hatch controls.
The other one tackled me and knocked me out of the cockpit, in front of everypony else.
The Severed that was on top of me almost bit me in the throat, and surely it would’ve, had Wild not regained her senses and tackled the Severed to the floor, smashing it’s head in repeatedly with her hooves.
I got up so I could close the hatch in the front controls, but the hatch was already halfway open, and the rush of wind swept me off my feet and was pulling me to the back of the plane.
I quickly jabbed my knife into the floor as hard as I could, and held onto it tightly.
I looked to my pocket knife and saw that my grip was slipping because I had that black goop all over my body and hands.
I looked at Wild Wind, who was holding onto the wall of the plane, as she looked back at me worriedly.
“WILD!” I yelled quickly. “PARACHUTE!!”
Wild looked around her quickly and threw Ruby’s parachute to me.
I caught it in my right hand just as my left hand completely lost its grip on my knife, which caused me to fly out the back hatch of the plane.
I briefly heard Wild yell my name, just before I flew out of the plane.
Our plane wasn’t flying very high above the ground, so I quickly equipped the parachute and pulled the mechanism, and I was caught safely in the air.
I wiped the black mess off my hands as I looked back up at the plane, which was flying away quickly.
Before it left my view, I saw that somepony had shut the back hatch, which was a good sign. It meant that somepony had taken care of the Severed that bit Ruby in the cockpit, and fixed the controls, and that Wild was safe. I only hoped that they wouldn’t run into any more severed on the way back to the outpost.
I knew that they would keep the auto pilot going, though. Spitfire and Ruby were our only pilots, and even if Ruby was still alive, she would only have a little under thirty minutes before the Severing spell, transferred from the bite, would corrupt her completely.
It was a little over a three hour’s flight back to base, so I knew they would have to keep auto pilot on to make it all the way back. This meant I would have to find my own way back to base.
I looked around at my surroundings, and mostly saw sand and mountains, but I also saw what looked like a farm past the desert, which could’ve had inhabitants.
I memorized the direction I would need to travel on foot, but I couldn’t really control my parachute, so I sort of just had to wait as I floated down to the ground.
I whistled to myself for a bit of time, before I landed on the sandy hills on the outskirts of the San Palomino Desert. I then trudged my way through the sand, towards the farm.
I was only wearing the cloth around my waist, so I wasn’t too worried about heat, but I wasn’t wearing shoes, so my poor feet were burning with every step I took.
After what felt like an hour of hellish walking, I finally made it to the outer fence of the… rock farm?
The fence had a barbed wire, which seemed to loop all around the farm. It looked like this place was decently fortified, which seemed to be a good sign.
I didn’t have many options, so I decided to just introduce myself and hope the inhabitants didn’t think I was hostile.
Severed weren’t the only bad thing in both worlds nowadays. Bandits and looters have become much more common ever since our worlds fell apart.
I walked to the front gate, which was unlocked, surprisingly, and slowly pushed it open.
Right when I was about to enter the farm, I heard a twig snap right behind me, which was followed by what sounded like a loaded shotgun, planted directly behind my head.
It sounded like it was being carried by a magic aura, based on the slight twinkling sounds I could hear.
“Don’t move,” an unknown, feminine voice said. “If you know what goods for you.”
I did what she said, and stood completely still, raising my hands in the air, as her hooves searched around my waist for any weapons.
I especially didn’t like it when she used her magenta colored magic to pull my cloth off of me, to search thoroughly.
I shuddered uncomfortably when she did this, but luckily she just did a quick scan of my body, before using her magic to wrap the cloth back around my waist.
“Are you alone?” She asked. “What’s your name? I need to know if you’re a friend or an enemy.”
I looked at the floor.
“My name is Dan, I’m just trying to get back to my friends,” I said. “There was an accident, and we were separated.”
“So, you’re alone then?” The pony asked, keeping the shotgun pinned again my head.
I nodded slowly.
There was silence for a moment, as if she was thinking.
“Perhaps I should introduce myself, you seem harmless after all,” she said politely.
“I’m Twilight Sparkle,” she said. “Nice to meet you.”
She then walked in front of me, so I could look at her directly, as she lowered the shotgun, levitating it into her saddlebag.
Her eyes looked tired.
“I’ve heard of you,” I said. “Don’t you know how worried General Celestia has been about you? She sent out search parties for months when she realized you’d vanished.”
Twilight’s eyes widened slightly when I said that.
“Why didn’t you try to find her?” I asked curiously.
Twilight tilted her head, giving me a stern look.
“…I don’t WANT her to find me,” she said, looking at me determinedly.
“…What?” I asked.
Twilight then sighed deeply and looked up at the sky, as it was beginning to get dark.
“About a week before the invasion, me and my family were on a trip to Canterlot, to reminisce the old days, and maybe visit the princess of the sun,” she said slowly.
She looked up at me.
“But when the invasion started, my parents were bitten, and I lost track of my brother… and Spike…. but it wasn’t that that made me hate her. It was the fact that she’d taken in so many random ponies off of the streets, but she completely forgot about me and my family,” she said bitterly.
I was silent for a moment as I took in what she said.
“I’m sorry, Twilight. I lost my family, too.” I said.
Twilight’s anger then dissipated a little bit, as she looked at me curiously.
“When the invasion started on Earth and I lost my family, I decided to join the military,” I said, as I looked at the floor shamefully.
“I thought I would have what it took to protect those who I cared about, but I was wrong. My little sister was taken by the severed because of me, and I don’t even know where my parents are.”
By now my eyes were getting watery. When I noticed Twilight’s look of concern, I wiped my eyes with my hands, despite how dirty they most likely were, as I took a deep breath.
“But… it’s not worth dwelling on,” I said quickly. “We just need to focus on the loved ones we still have with us now, and do whatever it takes to help THEM, even if we have to make the hard calls.”
I looked up at the darkening sky, as Twilight did the same.
Twilight then looked back at me, and looked down at my fusion bracelet, which was glowing orange in the darkness of the night, before she snapped her eyes back to look me in the face.
“Hmm. Come on, you can spend the night in the barn, then we can figure out what we’ll do with you.”
“Sure,” I said slowly, as I followed her along the gravel path of the farm.