//------------------------------//
// Chapter Four: Saving a Chicken 
// Story: The Element of Willpower 
// by Redwolf15 
//------------------------------//


Chapter Four
Saving a Chicken





Its been two days since I left Flora's, she said it was a two day flight, so I predict that I would reach a settlement in another day or so. She said that ponies walk along this path frequently, but so far I've met nopony. The last two nights have seemed a little lonely. But that doesn't mean I've been alone. If you think Equestria is a safe place where beasts now their place inthe animal kingdom, you are surely wrong. I'm constantly being attacked every few hours by night, most of these attacks have just been from hungry creatures looking for a snack. Most of them are farely cowardly though, I just have to grit my 'teeth' and make a menacing growl. I never want to kill them, just chase them away. They run off scared and know not to tangle with me ever again. 

Of course there are the few who are brave enough to call my bluff, or too stupid to run away. So seeing as though they don't back down, I finish things quickly. I doubt that they ever realize that they've been killed.

My sword, Silver Fang, is extremely sharp and my arm is fast. I've tested it out on several things, starting with twigs and working my up to bundles of sticks, branches, and entire trees. No matter how much it slices in half, it doesn't lose its edge, it stays incredibly sharp no matter what I've cut through, even stone.

It was probably just me losing track of time, but night seemed to have come earlier today. Maybe Luna jumped the gun this time. I head off the path to look for firewood and something to kill. Okay, I may have said I didn't want to kill anything unless it attacked me first, but come on, I need meat. 

I don't stray too far from the path incase I get lost. Think about, 'Boy goes into dangerous woods alone. Never seen again.'

*snap*

I turn my head in the direction of the noise, my hand resting on my blade. I stare into a pile of bushes for a good ten seconds, I couldn't see anything, but I knew that while I was staring into the bushes, the bushes stared back. Finally there was movement. I see a brown paw step out first, followed by nose, rows of teeth, and two yellow eyes. Slowly the rest of it appear, another three paws, a body and lastly a tail. 

Now, from my short time here I have learnt that Equestria's native creatures are a wide variety ranging anywhere from the normal earth dog to the mythical dragon and everything in between. But this was one of the strangest oddities. On first glance you would expect it to seem like a normal wolf. But take a second glance and you could see that it didn't have fur. No, instead it had tree bark, and it didn't have meat under that bark, because there was wood. I've seen these once before in an episode before. A timberwolf.

The timberwolf glared at me, teeth showing, and giving a low growl. I doubted that intimidating it would work. I get ready for it to attack me; waiting for the right moment to strike. 

Suddenly there is a howl in the distance, sounded like another timberwolf. The one in front of me stands straight up, cocks its head back, and lets out a similar howl in response. Multiple more howls sing through the woods from the direction of the first, could be its pack. The timberwolf turns around towards the howls and runs towards their direction.

At this point I would have been grateful for whatever it was that got the first timberwolf's attention away from me. I started picking more sticks and logs for my fire, but something was nagging at me that something was wrong. My curiosity finally got the better of me. I dropped the sticks and ran in the same direction as the first timberwolf, towards where there was probably an entire pack of them. 

As I get close enough to my estimated destination I begin to hear snarls an growling. I get on my hands and knees and start crawling over a hill. I peek my head over to see what's on the other side. I count there to be about twenty or so timberwolves surrounding a tree. Each one looks tougher and uglier than the next with hunger in their solid yellow eyes, all of which didn't help the fact that I was still hanging around at this point. 

As they slowly crept closer to the tree keeping a tight circle, I look more closely and saw something at the base of the tree. There's something small and pink at the bottom against the trunk cowering. It looked like the ugliest chicken I've ever seen in my entire life. 

So an entire pack of timberwolves cornered a butt ugly chicken and will soon eat it, so what? That's the order of nature, eat or be eaten, it's not my place to decide who lives and who dies. I began to crawl back, it seemed harsh but it was law of the jungle, survive. Don't do anything that could break that single law. As I slowly crept away something kept nagging me to stop this. I don't know what it was, but something told me to help that chicken.

The wolves were closing in slowly, it was just one chicken but they never rushed it, like they were nervous, hesitant even, to kill it. Finally one found its bearings and attacked. In that exact moment, I reached for my knife and threw it at the attacking wolf without blink an eye. Before the wolf could bring its jaws around its prey, my knife struck it under its shoulder blade. It let out a quick howl of pain and missed its meal. The rest of the pack turned to hill where I threw my knife, except I wasn't on the hill, I was in front of them. I drew Silver Fang with lightning quick reflexes and cut through the closest wolf's jaw, severing brain connection from the rest of its body. I didn't stop there, instantly after cutting the first, I kicked the next one in the face and rushed past them. None of the wolves realized what happened until I was in the center scooping the chicken in my arms and bolting away.

I don't know what it was that came over me, but from the time I threw my knife I wasn't me. Instead, I was a robot, acting without hesitation or fear or emotion or regret, I just acted on impulse, without thinking. Mechanically and lifeless. It's only until I brake out of their circle with the ugly chicken do I realize what I'm doing. 

I look over my shoulder still running. "Crapcrapcrapcrapcrap!" The entire pack is far behind me but catching up quick. I look down to see how my passanger is doing. Whatever this is, I was pretty sure it wasn't a chicken... I think. But one thing was certain about it, it was ugly, but stangely familiar; and it was warm, very warm. The ugly chicken thing has pinkish feathers that look too small for it to be able to fly, a long neck, a huge beak, and some pretty derped out eyes. It lets out a dry cough, the poor thing's feathers are so frail that some of them fell off from something so small as that one cough. This poor thing wasn't just helpless or sick, it was dying. 

One timber wolf finally caught up to our right side and jumps towards us, mouth gapping wide. Unlike earlier I have regained my senses, so I don't kill the wolf even though it attacksed me. I wack it with the end of my hilt disorientating it and don't stop running. But it's just in the worst of times that you realize something important, and I realized that I have no idea where I am or where I'm running to. I don't know where the path is. 

Dammit!

As I continue to run for our lives I hear something ahead of us, something rushing and fimiliar. My train of thought is cut short as another timberwolf tries tackling me to the ground. I dodge left before the wolf is able to pin me to the ground. I kick the S.O.B hard in its jaw. It lets out a small whine as it falls to the ground stunned. 

The rest of the wolves are still behind me but catching up quick. As I run from my pursuers the sound of rushing gets louder and louder. The trees begin to thin out as I continue on. I break through the boundary of trees and come into a clearing, as the sun hits my face I skid to an immediate stop. 

"Again?" I yell out loud. "How the hell does this happen twice?" I end up on another cliff, this is deja-vu. Beside me is a flowing river, explaining the rushing sound. The water goes over the cliff into a small canyon. "Someone, somewhere, is playing a cruel joke on me, aren't they?" The only reply is from the chicken giving out another feeble cough. 

I judge the distance between here to the water. It's about a 100 foot drop to the bottom, the lake looks deep enough so I won't crack my head on impact. I weigh my options, jump to possible safety and figure out how to get out of the forest later, or run in a different direction while a pack of timberwolfves chase me. I turned around to see how far the wolves are from me. My eyes go wide as I see rows of teeth come straight at me. The sudden surprise forces me to back away as fast as I can. Turns out the decision was made for me, I stumble over the cliff and plunge into the water. The sudden impact on my back forces me to exhale, losing all of my air. I swim upwards as fast as I can, when I brake through the surface I gasp for as much oxygen that I can take in.

The chicken looked like it was having as much trouble as me, it was flailing around frantically trying to stay afloat. I swim over and keep it above the water. I swim us to the shore, it's made up of mainly a bunch of rocks, two trees, one of which has fallen over, and more rocks. I hear a howl back up the cliff, all the timberwolves are snarling at me, they look pissed. I flip them the bird and stick out my tongue in a mocking gesture. "HA! Suck it wolves!" Humans: 1, Timberwolves: 0. I was pretty sure that they didn't know what I said or what my rude gestures were, but I didn't care.

They look off into the distance and ran along the cliff. They just won't give up will they? I watch the last of them run off. I turn around and try to plan my next step. Then I feel something, something powerful and ominous. I slowly turn around, I didn't want to know what was behind me, but I had to know what it was. One timberwolf stayed, but it was different from the rest. It was bigger then the other wolves, the bark was well trimmed and a darker colour. But that wasn't what made me nervous about it, there was something scary about it, it seemed bold, brutal, strong, fast, smart, and deadly all at the same time; a born killer. It just stared at me with calm yellow eyes, and I stared at it, speechless. It turned away and followed the rest of its pack. Even when it was long gone, I kept staring at the spot where it was, like it was still there.

I finally came out of my trance, and I got this sudden feeling of doom. I knew that those wolves weren't going to give up. They were coming after us. I made use of what little daylight was left. I studied our surroundings so I could use the terrain to our advantage. Turns out that luck was in our favour, there was the small but deep lake to one side of us and a huge wall going all around us into a circle with two parts disconnectingt leaving an exit, or in this case an entrance. I go through the open door, it is half as long as my body if I stretch out my arms and three meters long. 

Perfect, there seems to be only one way for them to get in here, and its only wide enough for one of them at a time. They wouldn't be able to surround or gang up on me, their only hope is to tire me out before I hack threw them all one at a time

I walk back to the see how the chicken is doing. It feels hotter than before, whatever this fever is, it's getting worse. I begin to strip down and wring out my clothes, rather not face my possibly-imminent demise in soaking wet clothing. 

"So let's see here. I was just out minding my own buisness, when suddenly a timberwolf appears and then just leaves in the same instant. Instead of just leaving things alone, I had to follow it. Next thing I know, I'm rescuing their dinner that will probably not see tommorrow either way you look at things, only now to make their Shit-list. And now I'm in a gultch waiting for those wolves to come. And for what? That?" I look at the chicken, it just hurts to look at it. "And lets not forget that I left my bag on the road and lost my knife, so now all I have is some damp clothes and my sword." I mutter. 

The chicken looks down, like it's blaming itself for this. I just grunt and hack at the one of the two trees to make a camp fire. It would be a bad idea to make a fire just before night with some P.O.ed wolves after you, but I won't be able to fight if I can't see, plus they already know where we are, so I guess there's no sense in trying to hide.