//------------------------------//
// The Soothsayer 
// Story: The Poncho Chronicles I: The Beans 
// by BRyeMC 
//------------------------------//

	Poncho checked his watch. He was five minutes late of the original meeting time the rest of the group had agreed on earlier. Solicitously, he turned around and tried to get back to the bus stop as fast as possible, hoping that the others would wait for him. He quickly approached the bus stop and realized they hadn't. Frightened, he tried to call his friends with the walkie-talkie. After a few unsuccessful attempts, he looked and saw that he had no batteries. Afraid of being alone, he went back to the center of the creepy, nearly abandoned town. He noticed one store still open and thought he may be able to use their phone, that is, if they had one.
Poncho opened the door to the convenient store, the same one that Rainbow Dash, Tyrone, Spike, and Wahlburn ventured into just thirty minutes before. As the others did, he noticed the strange looking pony behind the counter. The pony was skinny, which was an oddity for one his age. He also had a long dark cloak on, draping over his long back. He felt uncomfortable about talking to him and looked around for any other employees. He searched around quickly but, unfortunately, the only other person in the store was the man behind the counter. Feeling brave, he slowly walked up to the counter.
“Hey, um...” asked Poncho nervously, ”would you happen to have batteries around here?”
Just as the man was about to answer, a masked individual came through the door. His mask was shaped like a bean. Poncho had no time to react when he was hit in the head with the butt of a gun. A burst of light filled his eyes, and then the world turned dark.


*		*		*		*		*


“Hey, hey! Are you alright kid?”  
A voice ringed in Poncho’s head as he slowly regained consciousness. He got up slowly and looked around. The masked individual was gone and the weird man behind the counter was standing over him.”I guess,” said Poncho rubbing his head, “what happened, did you get robbed?” 
“No, no, no,” smiled the man, “you see I had my own gun behind the counter, a Remmington 870.” He looked over at his gun, with a grin of pride. “I thought he would have shot me first but he ran like a bitch. Oh by the way, my name’s Xarlin.”
“My name is Poncho, thanks for saving me.”
“Nice to meet you, and no problem boy,” replied Xarlin, “do you need anything else?”
"Yes actually, there is something,” started Poncho,"would you happen to have a set of batteries? My friends left on a bus without me and I need to see what’s going on.” 
Xarlin looked around suspiciously and looked at Poncho with an awkward, almost haunting stare. “Yeah, I have some behind the counter," he said with a nod of his had. Xarlin then proceeded to the storage room and left Poncho alone.
Poncho got up and limbered over to where the batteries were and plugged them into the back of the device. He couldn’t shake a thought that something bad was going to happen to the rest of the group. He tried to ignore it and held the "Talk" button hoping someone answer back. To his happiness, another one of the friends that went on the trip with them, answered back, the loner Patel. 
Patel was a rather quiet one. Although he had his quiet personality, he was also tech smart. He spent much of his day playing video games or watching videos on the Internet. He stayed within his close knit group of friends and could be very obnoxious with them, but when meeting new people, like the time he first met Clyde and Poncho, he tended to be quite shy. His eyes were of a navy blue,with a light cerulean blue coat color hue. His mane matched the color of his eyes. His mark was of a navy colored lion wielding a staff, in honor of his dedication and love of his favorite Futbol team. “Hey, who is this?”
“Patel! Hey, it’s Poncho, where are you guys at and why did you leave me here?” said Poncho with anger and sorrow in his question due to his friend’s choice of leaving him behind.
“Look, you were ten minutes late and the bus driver wouldn’t wait any longer,” replied Patel, “don’t worry though, we’re only a mile or so down the road because this damn shite bus broke down.”
Relief filled Poncho’s mind. “Are you guys going to be long? I mean, I could just walk down the road and meet you there, at most it would take only about twenty minutes.”
“Yeah, this will probably be a while, but be careful, this area is sketchy as fuck. Get here as soon as possible.” 
“Don’t worry I will be,” Poncho said to calm his friend’s uneasiness, “I’m not feeling so well right now so I might grab something to make me feel better.”
“No need, brother. Wahlburn and this dragon Spike have some weed, they’ll probably let you have some, hell, we all might be able to have some.” said Patel with slight humor.
“Nah bro, I don’t do that stuff,” declined Poncho.
“Alright, whatever, suit yourself more for us then.” Patel chuckled, “Good luck man.” and with that final thought, he cut off the transmission.
Poncho hung up and was still feeling dizzy. He took a seat on the floor and leaned his head back on the wall. He couldn’t stop himself from falling asleep right there.


Poncho woke up and he was back on the bus. Confused, he sat up. He had no idea how he ended up on the bus, but he just figured that the group went back and picked him up. He looked out the window and saw that the sun had just risen. He looked around and noticed that everybody on the bus was asleep, even the bus driver. Poncho ran over to the driver and began to shake him to try to wake him up. As he was shaking him, the driver’s license fell to the floor, revealing his name as Captain Quantico Baxter.      
“Quantico,” yelled Poncho, slapping the driver as well to force him awake, “Wake up!! We are going to crash!!” To his avail, Quantico would not wake up. Shit...shit...shit, thought Poncho as he cursed to himself. There was no way to wake anybody up. Poncho looked up again, but the evident happened.
The bus veered off the highway and slammed into a large tree. The bus was flipped on it’s side and Poncho was flung to the back of the bus, The shockwave woke everyone up. Poncho saw an ember spark in the front of the bus. Soon, the ember grew into a massive fireball. The flames engulfed Quantico, then shot out at Rivs, continuing in a path towards Sticky, Jeb, Wahlburn, Patel, Clyde, and finally Cannon.Tyrone and him were next, but he couldn’t move because a seat was crushing him into the side of the bus. Poncho closed his eyes and prepared for the worst.


Poncho opened his eyes and was back at the convenient store, it was just a bad dream.
“Hey kid, wake up!” said the familiar voice of Xarlin, "you’ve been out again for about ten minutes. I’m about to close the store for the night so you gotta go.”
“Oh, sorry,” said Poncho sadly as he rose from the floor,”I’ll just be going now.” He left the store thanking Xarlin for helping earlier with the masked individual and for allowing him use of the phone. Xarlin gave a feign nod and locked the doors. Down the road, Poncho turned around and saw the store’s lights shutting off, leaving him in darkness. With a nervous shrug he fled the town.
Poncho began his walk down the dark road leading past the outskirts of the town. He felt extremely alone, as no cars seemed to travel this road at night. The wind blew hard, and was cold and eerie. The trees swayed back and forth, almost teasing him. Poncho checked his phone, and saw that he had been walking for fifteen minutes. He confidently thought that the bus should appear from the darkness any minute. He turned his head to the right and noticed something white in the trees. It moved suddenly then disappeared in the shadows. Poncho ran as fast as he could down the road and shortly saw the lights of the bus down the road.