Pain.
Her throbbing head was all Trixie could think about. She slowly opened her eyes to see only blurs. She rubbed her eyes with her hooves hoping to clear her sight. The first thing she saw was the ceiling over her bed, unmistakable because of the replica of her cutie mark that she painted above it, a blanket covering her form. Odd, last thing she remembered was that she was pulling her cart like any normal day, running into a little rabbit, then...
"The human!" Trixie shouted, bolting upright. Her left foreleg gave a twinge of pain, but she ignored it.
Why did the human save me? Where's the manticore? Why didn't the human just leave me? Trixie just kept thinking of questions but not answers. She then rolled out of her bed, determined to get answers from the human. Opening the door she found the human silhouetted in front of a beautiful sunset in its final minutes of the day. Trixie's eyes widened and her jaw dropped at the sight, her heart giving a strange flutter.
The human straightened turning to face her. "Ah, you're awake." he said in a slightly cheery voice and had that half smirk from before on his face, "Good to see you can walk around with out a limp." Trixie was about to question him when she realized her front left leg was in a makeshift splint made up of sticks and a blanket. "I was able to heal it enough to make it only a minor fracture, but I couldn't heal it any more than that."
"Why?" Trixie mumbled.
"Excuse me?" He asked. "Can you repeat that?"
"Why?" She asked a little more clearly.
"One more time?"
"Why!?" She shouted, "Why let Trixie go, than save Trixie's sorry flank from a manticore when you could have gotten injured? It would have been so easy for you to do, just watch as Trixie gets torn to shreds and eaten! Or is it because you wanted to hurt Trixie instead, not wanting the manticore to have the fun of it?!" The human was silent, not backing down, flinching or even giving an expression to Trixie as she accused him of multiple atrocious acts. Eventually Trixie stopped, resorting to glaring at her might-be captor. "Well?!"
He closed his bright eyes and slowed his breathing further than before. After what felt like an eternity he opened his eyes and spoke "You're wrong again Trixie." He sighed. "How about I answer your question with one of my own? If I got a sick pleasure from watching others suffer, then why would I heal most of your broken foreleg and help ease a majority of the pain from your concussion?"
Trixie was speechless. He was right, he had helped her out of a sticky situation and even began nursing her back to heath, making her assumptions of him completely baseless and made her feel like she was a little filly calling out an old, wise mare. "I don't know," she finally admitted "But, really why? Also how do you know Trixie's name?"
A smile. The human actually gave her a genuine facial expression! "Because my personal motto is 'help those in need and maybe they can help you.' Since I helped you with that manticore, I expected that you would be able to help me figure out how I got here and if I could possibly get back to where I'm from. As for your name," he shrugged "You've said it at least twenty times since we meet and it's also written on the wall of your mobile home. One doesn't need much more than that to figure it out."
Trixie's face burned ever so slightly from a light blush at the obvious answer to her second question. "So is that the only reason you saved Trixie for?" She asked, "Or is there another?"
The human's smile disappeared and he glanced just to the right of Trixie as he responded "I do have another reason, but that will have to wait for some time to be said, if ever."
Trixie opened her mouth to ask why he was dodging her question but closed it when she saw his, barely visible, serene expression, as if just living was giving him joy to last him an eternity. She let the matter drop, aggravated at how thick-skulled this human was.
"Name." She stated.
"Excuse me?" He asked.
"Your name, tell it to Trixie."
The human arched his eyebrow the slightest bit, "My name is Joseph Green."
"That is a strange name." Trixie said
"And Trixie Wand isn't a strange name?" Joseph asked.
Trixie reeled back when she heard her last name, "How do you know Trixie's last name!? Trixie never told you, nor anypony else!"
Joseph's eyes widened the slightest bit but the rest of his face remained in the same stoic position. "If I told you now, you would never believe me."
"And why is that?!" She shouted.
"Would you believe me if I said I could make absolutely anything I want happen with a mere thought? Would you believe I could fly without wings or magic? Or anything else along those lines?" He asked.
"No, because what your saying is impossible!"
He sighed, "Not quite," he said, "But at the moment, yes, those things are impossible. But imagine something at least three times as impossible as those examples and hopefully you can understand why I know you wouldn't believe me."
Trixie stopped. If what Joseph said is true, she understood why he was reluctant to elaborate. "Fine, Trixie won't question you on this subject for now." She scowled, "But she will again, eventually!"
"Eventually?" Joseph asked, "As in you expect me to stick around and be available for conversation at a later date?"
Trixie nodded and looked around, she and Joseph were both in a small, plain area with a small tent, a fire and two overturned halves of a freshly cut tree trunk acting as makeshift seats and just south of the small camp were the fringes of the Everfree.
Trixie shuddered, not from the memories of her escape from death at the edge of the ancient and foreboding forest, but instead from the cold wind that froze her as if her fur coat was nonexistent.
Joseph, who was tending to the fire looked up to see Trixie shivering, his eyes widening the slightest amount. He rose to his full height and, Trixie noted he was much taller than her, even though Trixie was an average four and a half hooves tall, he seemed to be at least six hooves tall.
"Are you cold?'' he asked.
Another blast of cold air made Trixie shiver harder "A-a l-l-little." She stuttered through her clacking teeth, "T-Trixie will just g-go inside." Trixie had only managed to turn around before she was stopped by something that had her tail, and she had an idea who it was.
"Wait just a second." He said, dragging her by her tail, using his magic, she was moved closer to one of the makeshift benches, "Just give me a moment." The glow around his hand got brighter slightly and the chilling wind died and the force holding her tail dissipated.
"How did you do that?" Trixie asked curious, sitting down on the, rather warm, log.
Joseph just shrugged and lowered his appendage down to his side, "Weather Manipulation spell?"
Trixie was very impressed, Weather Manipulation spells were rather difficult to cast and it was as if Joseph could cast them with little to no problem.
The sun had finally completed its decent and the darkness surrounded them, the light from their fire the only thing keeping the darkness at bay. Even though Joseph was not saying a thing Trixie could see something was on his mind from his body movement. The slight amount of fidgeting, how he was looking at everything besides her, and other subtle giveaways. To be nice Trixie started a conversation to get his mind of whatever it was that he was thinking.
"So, uh, what is it that you remember? How you got here Trixie means." She started.
Joseph paused, then said, "Not much, I was having fun at a party that was thrown in my honor for my latest discovery in my field of science, I got a little tipsy and, after that, nothing."
"Nothing?"
He nodded "Next thing I knew, I was in the middle of some freaky, dark forest with strange creatures and even stranger plants."
Trixie didn't know what to say, if he was telling the truth then he had not the slightest idea of how he got here and woke up in the Everfree! "You're very lucky," She said "From what you said you landed in the Everfree forest, a place of dark magic and ancient creatures from a nearly forgotten age."
Joseph's eyebrows shot up for roughly three seconds before returning to their usual position "Did I really?" he asked in an amused tone. "Seems my bad luck did not carry over to this different land." He chuckled and looked into the fire, "Huh, looks like we need more wood for the fire, if you'll excuse me for a moment." Joseph then got up from his log and made his way to the side of Trixie's cart where a decent sized wood pile lay. Bending over he grabbed several full sized logs with those odd appendages he had.
"What are those?" Trixie asked pointing with her hoof at Joseph's appendages after he set down the logs.
"You mean my hands?" He asked wiggling the smaller parts on one, "They're what I use to pick things up with and," His face darkened, "When necessary, fight with." His expression went back to normal, "But anyways it's just a part of the human anatomy."
"What are the littler things on your hand called?"
"Fingers, humans have ten, five on each hand," he explained holding up one to Trixie so she could study it while telling her exactly what a few parts of his hand were called. While Trixie was studying Joseph's hand he was busy chopping wood, not using a tool or magic, mind you, but using his hand to cut the thick logs into narrow quarters. After finishing Joseph put four log quarters into the fire and sat back down, giving a content sigh.
"Joseph?" Trixie asked.
"Yes?"
Trixie bit her bottom lip a bit, "What did you do before you ended up here?"
If Trixie was intruding in Joseph's personal life he didn't seem to mind, if anything Trixie swore that she saw his eyes get a twinkle in them, "Well, you see Trixie, what I am is a physicist and engineer, I have found ways to bend a few of the laws of physics through my extensive research and even grant myself the greatest thing the world has ever seen," He lifted his hand, his palm facing upwards where a ball of white fire burst into existence, "Magical abilities, allowing me to further reshape the laws of physics."
Trixie stared at the enticing white flames that where now in Joseph's hand and she continued to watch until he decided to let the miniature fire burn itself out, curling into the air and disappearing. All Trixie could think of was how amazing he was, changing the laws of physics? There was only one being that Trixie knew of that could do that, but the pink earth pony was the exception of almost every rule or known fact there is, but that's besides the point.
A comfortable silence took the place of conversation, human and pony alike staring into the ever moving flames. After what felt like several hours of relaxing Trixie began to feel drowsy and her foreleg was beginning to ache.
"Trixie thinks that she will go to sleep now," she said. "Trixie shall see you in the morning Joseph."
Joseph smiled, and for the second time that day Trixie's heart felt as if it was filled with butterflies, and he said, "Good night, Trixie, and please, call me Joe."
Trixie nodded her head and left the light of the fire for her dark cart, but instead of fearing who was outside, knowing Joe was just outside left her dreaming peacefully, for most of the night anyway...