//------------------------------// // Chapter 2: Timberwolves are Howling // Story: Zaps Apple // by Electuroo //------------------------------// Zaps Apple Chapter 2: Timberwolves are Howling Darkness why always the darkness chasing me in my dreams now... I finally escape them and now they hunt me in my sleep, I do not know how I know what I am dreaming but I was frightened of it... petrified of it... I just fled from it but then a strange feeling came over me something was a head it was the same sparkling light that I saw before I ran to it and then... I found myself standing in the middle of an orchard full of those colorful apples the place was peaceful it was wonderful and somehow it felt at home but it didn't feel it either... I never dreamed of this or didn't remember but what I saw a small town as I slowly walked through it, it was quiet but the town was built around a fountain with about twenty or so buildings max. I looked around it felt some how I knew it but I couldn't place it in my mind... I look to the ropes across above me attached from building to building all the way to the top of the fountain where a flag of the rainbow apples. I was rather confused then I saw something ghostly images of ponies harvesting the rainbow apples bucking them down one of them I saw it was... “Me!?” I saw myself with a red large stallion with a short black mane and tail he smiled to the colt beside him showing him how to buck the tree. “Alright, kid you got it?” “Yeah big bro I got it!” the colt bucks the tree but nothing seem to happen and then one of the ponies hiding in a tree a pegasus knocks it down landing on the colt's head. “Ow...” “See you did it!” the red stallion beamed “Yeah, I did didn't I big brother!” “Don't...” the young colt already eating the apple “What?” he said with a full mouth of apple. “Sometimes I don't know what worse, you eating them as they are or you being a big pain of a little brother” he grabs the colt and starts to tickle him with his hooves. “Uncle! UNCLE!” he cried out laughing uncontrollable. “That my brave little brother” he chuckled rubbing the colt head “Now why don't we finish the harvest?” “Sure bro!” the colt jump up on his hind legs and resting the front legs on the large creatures that were at least a head higher than the colt when standing on all fours. I saw a flash of lightning and snap my eyes open looking around seeing I was still inside the tree what a strange dream... it felt right but did it? I wasn't sure if that was home or I was creating something in my own mind... a world out of the darkness but the lightning and thunder caught my attention I peered out of the hollow tree seeing the trees just a few meters away sparkling like the ones before and I saw the grey colour apples again. “The rainbow apples!” I beamed in delight I had food as I saw them appear one by one in a beam of rainbow light it was the most delightful thing I saw. I walked up to it ignoring the pain in my hind leg still causing me to limp a little. I saw my goal a few apples low enough for me to grab them with my front hooves or my mouth. I pulled a few down right away and started to eat them one after another, they was as tasty as the one I ate when I first awoke with those being my only memoirs of the past few days... the dream must have been something created in my mind when the surge of energy came from the apples, I some how felt it as if I was connected to the ground. It was wonderful since I was snaking away. “That better...” I sighed feeling full from eating about four of those apples, I had about four left looking around for something to put it in I saw a odd looking saddle bag lying there “This look like it been lying around longer for quite some time... well it look like it still usable” I opened it up to see it was empty but smelt really disgusting “Urg that is gross...” I was about to toss it when I saw something in it that I missed. “I thought it was empty...” I looked inside to find a photo of a few ponies “Wow I wonder who they are...” I smelt the bag again and put a hoof to my nose “No way I am carrying that thing... but how am I going...” then I saw it another bag that look recently dropped it had a red coloured apple on the side of it 'I thought apples are suppose to be rainbow' and when I opened it up it had a book, empty sheets of paper and a set of quills. 'Strange... how did I know they were quills, paper, and a book?' I placed the four apples in there with the photo I found then went back to the log I was hiding in and sat there in my hiding spot pulling out the book with my mouth carefully and place it in front of me reading the rough written words 'Cutie Mark Crusaders Diary' when I saw those words I was a little confused I understood it, I never saw them yet I somehow knew it. “What a diary... but what are Cutie Mark Crusaders? And why can I read this?” I asked myself with wonder “I don't remember learning to read...” I using my hooves pull the cover over to see a long list of different activities most of them crossed out so much I barely could read them. One I did saw said 'Zip Lining' and I looked at it with wonder “What zip lining?” then saw a drawing of a set of symbols on a few pages on “Whoa so that a cutie mark huh? Those symbols on the flanks... wait my dream...” I closed my eyes picturing it in my mind and saw the red stallion cutie mark was of a partly cute rainbow apple with a purple star behind it and a shield behind that with the core of the apple seen in the symbol. “Wow... could that pony be real? Or was I making things up in my head... urge...” I groan trying to remember anything before the darkness but nothing came up it was just giving me a headache then I hit my right hind hoof against the wood with a buck in annoyance. I blinked there was no pain, I slowly look back and the bruise was gone “Wh-what!?” I screeched in shock “My bruise it all gone! B-but how...” I was a little spooked by that and hope this wasn't a dream so I hit my head with my hoof a little harder then usual and felt the pain “Ouch that hurt... no dream...” I rubbing my head a little then look to the book flipping over the pages to the last one to get a idea what this book really about. I read it out loud to myself whispering it so nothing heard me “Today we going to the Everfree Forest with my brother and sister with my best friends to do our assignment for Miss Cheerilee on the Zap Apple Tree origins and hoping we get our cutie marks too, It really annoying that most of the class has their cutie marks and we still haven't. But today we hoping that doing something about my family will earn us the cutie marks. Me, Scootaloo and Sweetie Belle. Still I have high hopes for it this time with my brother and sister tagging alongside us and keeping us safe from all the dangerous critters there is in the Everfree Forest, I know that we shouldn't write out our thoughts in this book but I just know we going to get it today! I know we will! So I write this like every other time in hope we will get it” then I looked at the last part “Well that it for now, Cutie Mark Crusaders assignment completers! YAY! Applebloom” I blinked as I said 'yay' loud as it was written in the book “Where there others here? Bu-but if so wh-where are they?” I gulped with fear realising I just shouted out that word and heard howling in the distance “Oh no...” I whispered with ears flat against my head I realised my yelling caught their attention. I quickly put the book back in the bag and push my head under the straps and let the saddle bag settle on my back. I step out of the log looking around for them, I couldn't see them but I could sure hear them, I look around for a way to go and saw what look like hoof prints in the mud leading away “That way!” I spoke out and ran in that direction of the hoof prints lead, they vanished into the leaves and grass but I didn't care I had to run and that I did. I suddenly heard the sound of the Timberwolves howling and turn my head for a second to see them charging right at me, I was so frighten I just picked up the paste and ran with all my little legs could carry me, I could hear the sounds of their wooden feet closing in on me, I didn't look back I just kept running. I ran into bushes pushing through them hard as I could hear the branches swing back and smack the Timberwolves with them, I grinned seeing that my quick idea worked and glad I was so small to get through them, I burst out of the thick brush tumbling around a little and quickly got up to see a house and a barn. I quickly looking for a place to hide I ran for the barn through the field seeing the moon high in the sky I guess it was night, not sure how much time past but I was glad to run into the barn and hid behind some big stacks of hay. I was breathing hard and my heart racing slowly I peered around the hay to see the Timberwolves coming out of the brush and charging right towards me I gulped and was frozen in place I had nowhere to go and they were going to get me... then it came... “The Timberwolves are a-howlin'! The Timberwolves are a-howlin'!” I heard a odd cracky voice then saw a green odd mare running back and forwards with what look like a pair saucepans and a pair cooking pots banging together this seem to cause the three Timberwolves that was growling to back off slowly, I was wondering again how I knew something that I just saw but my thoughts was broken by her screaming out again. “The zap apples are comin'! The zap apples are comin'!” I couldn't believe my eyes the wolves scared of an odd pony and they were... they fled back into the forest and all I could do was sigh in relief and place the bag beside me... I sat there against the hay bay wondering what to do, I was on somepony's land and felt rather scared if they found me, so I decided to just to stay where I am and try to sneak out by morning, I had no idea what they would do to me... I shivered at the thought of the darkness “Th-they might throw me into the darkness... or back into that scary forest...” I whispered with a deep gulp and lay there looking to the bag I had and then back to the entrance of the barn I could see that old pony still yelling away. 'If she can scare off those things no telling what she could do to me... she might look odd but she scary...' I thought to myself and lay there rubbing my hooves in the dirt not sure what to do now... I was stuck inside a barn, finally out of the forest now stuck in an unknown place and fearing the worst, since that all I could do... finally I let out a yawn and sat on the hay bay side and let my tiredness get the better of me... I closed my eyes and glad that the wolves won't get me and let myself fall asleep...