//------------------------------// // OCE: Into the Everfree // Story: Manticores, Crushes, and Alcohol // by Hidden Brony //------------------------------// “Private,” Shield said, “we’ve got your first assignment. We’re heading into the Everfree Forest to look for a missing filly.” Streak saluted his sergeant, snapping a hoof crisply up to his open-faced helmet. They were both suited up in the standard-issue gleaming golden armor of the Day guard, so as to be ready for any threats or dangers that needed to be confronted. “When are we moving out, sir?” he asked. “Now,” the senior guard replied. "I'll fill you in as we walk." The blank dropped his hoof and fell into step beside his superior. His hoof-falls rang out more than usual due to his metal covers. Unlike normal covers, these had three sharp steel blades attached to each, front hooves and back, to simulate the claws of predators such as timberwolves and manticores. Streak had found he had an aptitude to them, which was strange, especially since Shield told him they were alien to most ponies. Apparently he was the only pony that Shield had met that was a natural with them. “Okay, so we’re looking for a young filly, named Mite. Her parents are visiting relatives in the city, and she ran off into the forest not knowing how dangerous it is,” Shield said. “I don’t have to tell you how important it is to find this filly as fast as we can, especially since she isn’t familiar with the territory. “No, sir,” Streak said. “What am I looking for?” “She might be difficult to find, due to her coloration and the general air of the Everfree. She has a black coat and a bright blue mane, and her eyes match her mane,” the senior guard said. “Sky blue bright?” Streak asked for clarification. “Just so,” Shield replied. “Now keep in mind that this is the Everfree. She could be injured, she could be dead. Most likely, she’s just dirty. Even so, brace yourself. Most guards aren’t prepared to see a dead body.” “Sir,” Streak said, forgoing the traditional salute due to the walking pace set by his superior. After a few minutes, the duo reached the borders of the Everfree Forest. Not even pausing, they plunged straight into the heart of the most dangerous place in Equestria. Within seconds, everything got dark as night. The branches of the trees around them twisted and interlocked above their heads, and glowing eyes attached to small, dark shapes peeked from their protected perches at the ones that didn’t belong. Streak made eye contact with one pair of luminous eyes that was peeking out through the foliage at ground level. They conveyed a feeling of general malevolence, as if it didn’t care if he belonged or not, it was going to hurt him. He felt a shiver run down his spine as he forced himself to tear his vision away from those eyes. Right into four more pairs, just as malicious as the first. He stopped in his tracks, a faltering brought about by cautious prudence. “Sir, I think we have an issue,” he called out softly. “Timberwolves,” Shield responded from his position immobile next to the younger stallion. “Looks like a whole pack, too.” As if spurred by the guards’ words, the creatures emerged. The first thing visible—save for their baleful eyes—were their muzzles. Slightly parted in anticipation, these twisted wooden protrusions held sharp, thorn-like fangs by the dozen. As the rest of their heads pushed into the clearing, Streak felt primal fear that only prey facing a predator feels. The wooden wolves growled as they slid slowly out of their element. They were in control of the moment, and they knew it. A louder growl sounded off from right behind the guards. Streak risked a glance behind himself and had to work to not groan. Standing at the rear of the guards was a timberwolf easily twice the size of the ones in front of them. “I’ll take the large one,” Streak said as he cautiously turned around. “Are you kidding me?” Shield asked, not risking taking his eye off of the four in front of him. “I’ll take the large one. I’m better at fighting than you are.” “That’s why you’re fighting four at a time,” Streak mentioned. There was a short pause. “So I am. You take the large one.” Streak stared into the hostile eyes of the belligerent timberwolf. His attention—but not his eyes—roamed across the body of the beast. It was made of thick logs and branches pulled together and interwoven with thick vines to hold it together.Thorns stuck out seemingly at random from its body, leading Streak to believe it was literally cobbled together from whatever was available. It growled at him, glaring from under the leafy protrusions over its eyes. The standoff was broken as Shield charged at the four smaller wolves. With the enchantment gone, the alpha charged. Streak dove under the beast as it swiped at not only where he was standing, but everywhere to his left and right. Using his momentum and that of the beast, he threw his hoof up. His steel claws gouged a trio of scars into the wooden underside of the beast, causing a watery sap to start leaking slowly from the wounds. He quickly rolled and stood up, whirling around to face the creature again. It glared at him with hate-filled eyes. Before it was hungry, now it was personal. It howled, an eerie, echoing sound, before charging again. Knowing that trick wouldn’t work again, Streak decided to go up. As the beast lowered its head to cut off his opening to its belly, he jumped. Sensing its mistake fractions of a second too late, the alpha tried to swing its head up into his way. This served only to propel his jump a few feet farther and spin him slightly, placing him transversely on its back. Not wasting a second of the time he didn’t have, the blank guard whipped his left forehoof out and dug his claws into the neck of the beast. As he was swinging his other forehoof around, the timberwolf shook in an attempt to dislodge its unwanted hitchhiker. As he flopped from side to side, he jabbed his free forehoof straight down. When that strike proved to be a glancing one, he tried again. This strike bounced off as well. He cried out as his weight continued to pull on a single hoof, stretching the socket unnaturally. He twisted his left forehoof, popping his claws free from the wolf’s neck. He cried out as he bounced off a nearby tree, spinning in the air before hitting the ground. With a grunt, Streak stood up and braced himself to fight with the timberwolf alpha. A fight that never came. The beast just stared at him while he stood up. Confused, Streak relaxed his defensive stance the slightest bit, hoping to draw it in on the offensive. There was a snorting sound, and Streak felt a blast of hot air on his plot. Glancing behind him, he saw three more regular timberwolves behind him with wolfish grins. “Bit of an issue here!” he called out. Shield flashed into his peripheral vision, tackling him out of the lunge of two of the normal timberwolves. When they stopped rolling, the senior guard pulled up his subordinate. “Run!” he yelled, turning and running through the forest. Streak didn’t even pause, following directly behind him. The wolves nipped at their heels as they ran, toying with them. More than once, the duo had to juke to the side to avoid a wolf that had materialized in front of them. Right as Streak was about to give up on escaping, a roaring sound was heard. This time, though, it wasn’t a waterfall. A beast crashed through the trees like they didn’t exist, slamming into the wolves behind them. It started snarling as the wolves—at this point they numbered over a dozen—launched themselves at it, forgetting their earlier prey. The duo kept running, but Shield took the energy to comment, “I don’t think I’ve ever been happy to see a manticore before!” “Me either!” Streak shouted back. They kept looking around themselves as they ran, looking for something that broke the monotony of the forest, be it clearing, cave, or mountain. The farther they ran, the less tangled the branches above them became, and the easier it became to see. After a few minutes, Shield exclaimed, “Cave! Two o’clock!” They barreled through the wide opening and Streak collapsed out of exhaustion. “You okay, kid?” “Yeah, just tired,” Streak panted. “Excuse me,” a small voice peeped. “Are you two guards?” Streak turned his head to look at the new converser. There was a small filly—she couldn’t have been much older than Ruby—sitting in the small, dead-end cave they had just entered. He looked at his superior. “What are the chances we happened across the one cave in the Everfree we were looking for in a blind run?” “Almost zero,” his superior replied. Shield turned to the filly. “Yes, we are. Your parents contacted us when you went missing.” “I was just going to play in the woods,” she said innocently. “This is the Everfree, Mite,” Streak said. “It is the most dangerous place in Equestria.” “Oh,” she said quietly. “Streak,” Shield said, shooting Streak a look. “You go watch the entrance. I’ll talk to the young filly.” “Sir,” Streak saluted, dragging himself off the ground. He forced himself to walk to the front of the cave to provide overwatch for the two further inside. He tried not to listen to the two as they talked, but he caught some of their hushed whispers, due to the size and shape of the cave. “—in the middle of this insect ridden dump,” he heard from the filly. “—not much choice, not if we—” Shield replied. “What about him?—could be—won’t be happy with you if—” “I know, I know,” Shield replied. “We just have to be—” “Or we could—” she replied calmly. “No,” Shield said quietly but firmly. Then louder, “Let’s get you back to your parents, alright?” The filly was immediately back into her shy mode she was in earlier. “O–okay.” Streak cocked an eyebrow but didn’t comment. As the little earth pony filly walked past him, he made eye contact. Her eyes flashed momentarily and he felt a slight pressure on his mind. Afterwards, she walked right next to Shield as if nothing happened. Streak fell in behind the duo, casting a glance back at the cave. With the size and shape of that thing, you’d think I would have heard at least something of what they were saying, he mused. The trio walked through the woods for a half hour before the branches started to gnarl. “Uh, sir?” “You don’t have to get permission to speak, Streak,” Shield said. “Spit it out.” “I think we shouldn’t keep going this way,” the rookie guard said. “And why not?” his superior asked. “Because this was the area the timberwolves prowled,” he reasoned. “And I think it’s safe to assume that the same thing will happen again, and we won’t have a manticore to drive them off this time.” “Complaint logged,” Shield said, “and dismissed. This is the fastest way through the Everfree Forest. Any other way we’d have to deal with a delay of hours, potentially a day.” “This way we have to deal with a delay of death,” Streak said. “Private, keep your comments to yourself,” Shield snapped. The junior guard ground his teeth. “Sir, yes sir.” As they were walking, Streak saw a moving patch of darkness out of the corner of his eye. “Sir, I caught movement.” “It’s probably a squirrel or rabbit,” Shield dismissed him. “Sir, I think we—” Streak started. “And I already said no,” his superior said. “We keep moving. I know what I’m doing, rookie.” Streak sighed, but didn’t get to deliver his rebuttal. He was thrown off the trail by a large mass of wood. He screamed as shards of wood dug into his stomach and torso—one particularly long shard stabbed into the ground behind him—and strong jaws clamped around his his right foreleg. He swung his other foreleg up to attack his assailant, scoring a glancing blow on the beast, having his claw bounce harmlessly off of a bloody block of wood. “Streak!” Shield exclaimed, jumping towards the guardspony and his alpha timberwolf combattant, only to be blocked by a small black filly. “What are you doing? He’s going to die!” he exclaimed. A small black hoof pointed to the other side of the road, where nearly a dozen bundles of logs and branches were twitching and jumping together around the bloody corpse of a manticore. “The rest of the pack are about to reform. We need to go, now.” Streak’s second swing was just as effective at dislodging the alpha from his leg. “Get. Off!” Streak yelled, emphasizing each word with a useless swing of his claws. He was at just the wrong angle to properly hit it. It growled in response, shaking its head. He screamed in agony as it tore at his flesh and yanked at his socket. “That will be us in only a few minutes if we stay,” Mite said. “It’s him or us.” Shield was conflicted. He looked at Streak, then to the reforming timberwolves, then back. The beast gave one last yank, and with a revolting sound of tearing, separated Streak’s leg from the rest of his body. Anguish he had never felt before flooded into Streak’s mind. “Shield!” he shouted. “Oh, Celestia, Shield! Help me!” Shield took a step towards the combat, before faltering. Mite scoffed. “I’m leaving now, with or without you.” She turned around and started walking. “Shield!” Streak screamed, tears falling down his face as the timberwolf started to gnaw on his other right leg. “Shield! Please! Help me! By Celestia, help me!” Shield lifted a hoof as if to take a step forward, before placing it right back on the ground. “I’m sorry, Streak,” he said. “Shield!” the maimed guard screamed at the retreating form of his superior and friend. “Shield, you bastard! Help me! Shield!” The other stallion didn’t even turn around as he abandoned his friend to a gruesome and slow death. “Shield!” He kept yelling for Shield until his voice gave out five minutes later. By that time, the timberwolf had graduated to mauling his stomach and chest, and the others started to wait around in a perimeter, waiting for their share of the prey. Right before the pain and blood loss caused him to pass out, there was a flash of heat. A flaming and yelping timberwolf dislodged itself from his body and started running away, causing the rest of the pack to follow its alpha. Streak saw a pony stand over his head, and caught the barest flash of a horn. He tried to speak, bit it came out in a raspy groan, “H–help. . . me. . .“ His savior’s eyes widened. “By all thirteen Gods, you’re still alive.” Her head whipped behind her. “Moth! We got a living one, here!” She looked back down at him. “It’s worse than it looks. You’ll be okay.” Streak nodded weakly, eyes drooping. “No, stay awake!” Her head whipped around again. “Moth! Hurry up!” Another voice called out from somewhere Streak couldn’t see. “Not all of us are as young as you, Aphid. What is the—by the thirteen Gods. He’s alive?” “Not for long if you sit with your jaw on the ground,” Aphid snapped. “Now help him!” His body was surrounded by a green glow as his eyes closed.