Grif woke up to the sound of birds chirping happily. He yawned and sat up on the couch, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. Haley looked at him and tilted her head on its side.
"What are you looking at?" Grif asked more gruffly than he meant to.
Haley made a low, whining noise and lowered her head slightly.
"Sorry, you're probably just hungry." Grif said. "How about we go grab a bite to eat?"
Grif was about to head into the kitchen when a sharp pain shot through his leg. He grunted as he fell to the ground. Fluttershy walked into the room to investigate and saw Grif on the ground.
"Are you okay?" Fluttershy asked, running up to Grif.
"Yeah. I just fell over." Fluttershy stared at Grif and looked at his leg, mouth agape. In a moment, she let out a gasp of horror as her shock wore off. "What?" Grif asked.
"Y-your leg..." Fluttershy said quietly.
"What about it?" Grif looked down at his leg, which he noticed was turning green, the veins causing a webbing texture to appear. "What the fuck... What's wrong with it?"
"I-it's gr-green." Fluttershy peeped.
"Yeah, I noticed. But why is it green?" Grif asked.
"I'm not sure." Fluttershy said.
"I thought you fixed it all up." Grif said.
"I thought so too." Fluttershy said.
Grif stared at his wound once again and stepped on his hoof again, just to end up yelping with pain once again.
"Fuck that hurts." Grif muttered, shaking his hoof.
"Stay right here, I need to see something." Fluttershy said.
"I couldn't go anywhere if I wanted to." Grif chuckled, slowly placing his hoof on the ground.
Fluttershy went to check on a small medical book that she kept in her drawer. She opened up the book and flipped to the index and skimmed through it, trying to find any hints as to what could be wrong, or how to help it heal. After a few brief minutes of hastily looking for solutions, she gave up the search. She looked around worriedly and put the book back in it's place and went back to Grif.
"We need to go see Twilight." Fluttershy said.
"Why?" Grif asked. "It's just a small infection."
"You don't know if it is just small." Fluttershy said. "It could be serious."
"I'm sure it will be fine." Grif laughed, walking back to the couch.
Fluttershy stomped in front of him locked his eyes to hers and gave him the stare. Grif retracted slowly and sighed.
"Fine. Let's go." Grif muttered, then smiled. "Nice job being assertive by the way."
Fluttershy smiled and nodded gratefully. She walked next to him and placed his injured leg over her neck to prevent him from standing on his infected hoof. They then made their way to the library to seek Twilight’s aid.
Twilight had just woken up and made her way downstairs to where Church and Spike were rolling around, laughing hysterically.
"What's so funny?" Twilight asked.
"Just Tucker being an idiot." Church said.
"Oh? What did he do?" Twilight asked.
"He had a nightmare." Spike said.
"A nightmare?" Twilight asked. "What was it about?"
"It was about Caboose and Pinkie killing ponies and turning them into cupcakes." Church said.
Twilight stared at Church silently.
"That sounds horrifying." Twilight said.
"Yeah, you should have seen the look on his face when we made fun of him for it." Spike chuckled.
"You guys are terrible." Twilight said.
"Why are we terrible?" Church asked.
"Tucker had a horrifying experience, and you chastised him for it?" Twilight said.
"When you put it that way, I guess it sounds pretty bad." Spike said.
"That's because it is Spike. I thought you knew better than that." Twilight said.
"Sorry Twi, I didn't mean to make you mad at me." Spike said sadly.
"I'm not angry. I'm disappointed." Twilight said. Just then, there was a knock at the door. "If that is Tucker I want you two to apologize to him."
"Fine." Church and Spike said together.
Twilight opened the door to see a worried Fluttershy holding up a weak looking Grif.
"Fluttershy, what's wrong with Grif?" Twilight asked.
"I don't know." Fluttershy said. "I came here because I thought you would be able to help."
Twilight looked at Grif’s leg, which was covered in a strange substance.
"Church, Spike, you two look for my book of ailments and infections." Twilight said. "I'll look his wound over and see what I can find."
Church and Spike set off immediately and started looking for the book. Twilight made room on her table and she motioned Fluttershy to bring him over. Grif slowly climbed onto the table and laid down on it. Twilight gazed curiously at the wound. Upon closer inspection she noticed that this was by no means a regular infection. The green was not that of trapped bacteria, but that of moss.
"Found it." Spike said, grabbing a book off of the shelf.
"Hurry up and give it to me." Twilight said.
Spike hastily handed the book over to Twilight and she started to flip through it. It only took her a few seconds to find the right page, and when she found it she gasped inaudibly.
"What does it say?" Fluttershy said. "Is it bad?"
"It says that timberwolves have a secretion on their teeth. When a timberwolf bites you, the secretion gets into your bloodstream and continuously infects the pony. The infection is a slow and painful process that takes weeks to complete."
Fluttershy looked at Grif’s leg with a troubled expression.
"What else does it say?" Grif asked.
"It says that once the infection makes its way through the bloodstream it starts to take its effect." Twilight said. "It says that once the infection settles, it starts to turn the infected pony into a plant-like form. The pony then becomes tired and suffers through excruciating pain in the infected area as it gets covered in moss or bark. Over the course of a couple weeks, the pony soon loses mobility and the ability to eat, and then the infected pony dies."
Fluttershy started to shake slowly and looked at the book Twilight was holding.
"Fuck." Grif muttered. "I don't like the idea of dying."
"What's the cure?" Fluttershy asked quietly.
"It says that no cure has ever been found." Twilight said sadly.
Fluttershy looked at Grif with a great feeling of regret and she hugged him tightly.
"I'm so sorry Grif. This is all my fault." Fluttershy said, tears welling up in her eyes. "If I hadn't left you alone with the bunnies none of this would have happened." Fluttershy looked at the floor sadly. Grif stared at her finding himself saddened by the sight.
"Hey, don't feel bad Fluttershy." Grif said, putting his hoof on her to comfort her. "It is mostly my fault anyways."
"Why is that?" Twilight asked.
"I did say I wanted to be a tree." Grif said weakly with a humorless chuckle. "Seems like I'm getting that wish granted."