Chapter 5:
I was lying in my bed, sleeping quite fitfully when the bells awakened me.
One minute, I was floating in a haze of darkness and peace, and the next, I was conscious of the firm mattress and pillow pushing up against my body, the coolness and darkness of the room, and the distant, haunting chime of bells. I stared at a spot on my pillow for a minute, and then rolled over and pushed myself up into a sitting position on the side of the bed, rubbing my face into my hands and really wishing I could just ignore it.
‘Bells’ I thought warily to myself. To this day, I can still recall the sensation of fear, suspicion and panic all rolled into one that at that very moment, striking my heart and spreading out from deep in my chest out to the rest of my body, as I tried with growing awareness to recall the meaning of it. ‘There are different sounds set for different alarms… I had a system… there was a list… but what are the bells for…?’
And then it came to me. People. The bells were positioned in such a way that only humans, in their body structure and just general ignorance of movement in the woods could have set them off. But why? How? Who the bloody hell was marching around the forest at night, in the winter, tens of kilometers from the nearest town? It didn’t make any sense.
I got out of bed as fast as my stiff, tired limbs would allow, and grabbing my rifle off of a small desk in the corner of my room, dashed down the ladder to the main floor. There were no windows where I slept, so the first thing I did was look though crooked window cut into the wall of the main room. ‘Brilliant strategy’, I think now, for it was far too dark to see anything that was going on outside. After hastily slipping on a pair of boots, my coat, gloves, and grabbing a cheap battery operated flashlight from a kitchen drawer, hoping all the while I could find whoever was out there before they disappeared, I left the safety of my wood-scented cabin and ventured out into the cold dark night.
The bells had long since stopped ringing, but that didn’t change much, only that whoever was out there could now have fled and I might not be able to see them. I double-timed it across the clear area in the front of my cabin towards the edge of the trees, and after climbing to the top of a viewing platform that I had skillfully constructed in a particularly large one, I saw immediately where I was going. Out near the nearer bank of the river which wound its way across the landscape, I saw a small yellow light sweeping the snow in a peculiar fashion. The distance was too great and the night too dark for me to make out how many were there, but it appeared that there was only one person. I made a mental note of in which direction they were headed, and ducked my body back out of the numbing wind.
Descending crude rectangular wooden rungs from my perch, I jumped when I was near enough to the ground, and landed with a soft Thud into the snow. I recovered quickly began to run with speed, but cautiously down the side of the mountain. With my right hand I gripped the flashlight, but left the rifle strung across my back. The small beam of light that stretched out in front of me cast eerie shadows across the forest floor onto the powdery snow, and the cold night air that was whipping across my body, combined with the small crystals of ice that were being picked up off the ground, soon left my face and neck raw and in pain. And it wasn’t that kind of pain you get when you push your hand into snow either; this was the deep, aching pain that clutches your throat and jaw and makes you wonder if your frozen flesh will make it through the experience. But I didn’t care. Something was wrong, and I needed to find out what…
Soon, the ground leveled out and I found that I’d reached a spot near to the edge of where the forest ended and frozen river began, and I was able to catch small flashes of light from between the trees. Turning off my flashlight and carefully stowing it away into an oversized pocket, I unslung the rifle from my back, and began to creep forward as silently as I could, hunched over and ready to run or hit the ground in an instant. I tried to remember my training, how to move without being seen by the enemy, but this was different, this was real. Each soft sound that my footfalls made in the snow were like earthquakes to my ears, but I kept going. After about a dozen steps, I reached the edge of the trees, and I saw her.
About 10 feet away from the edge of the trees on the ice, she walked slowly and deliberately forward, continually glancing off into the woods as if expecting to see something there. She stood about five and a half feet tall, and walked in a strange, wobbling way, as though she’d spent the last half an hour spinning around on the ice. In one of her hands she held a lamp, or a lantern of some kind, that projected the light out in a beam in front of her. And the most outstanding characteristic, which I could make out at that point anyway, was that everything she wore was the same shade of purple. An almost plum colour, but lighter.
I waited until she was around 7 meters from me, close enough for me to make the first move while still not risking her not seeing me at first in the dark, and then stepped out into the clear and leveled the gun, in one, swift motion.
The movement caught her eye; she looked up and froze immediately on the spot. For a few moments which felt like minutes, we stood there, in a silent staring stand-off. I was somewhat tired and was breathing heavily from my run, but I inched my finger up a few centimeters and removed the safety from my weapon. Something about this was very wrong.
Finally, after a minute or so, I decided to speak first; « Qui es-tu? Qu’est qui se passé! » I demanded. After waiting a few moments, I had no response. Nothing at all. I took a few menacing steps closer, still aiming the rifle, and tried again; « Comment tu-es allé ici, et pourquoi? Parler! ». Still, nothing. But then, she took a step forward and said, in an uncertain voice, “Oh, um, I’m sorry, I don’t really speak that language. Can you understand what I’m saying right now?”.
“Who the fuck are you, and just what do you think you’re doing; strolling around the forest in the middle of the night?!” I shouted at her, as I was beginning to lose patience.
“Oh yes, of course, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Twilight Sparkle, and, you see, I came here through a magic portal in the Palace of the Crystal Empire. I was looking for that big hill over there” she gestured towards my mountain. “There’s something about it that I need to find out while I’m here, something important, but I don’t know what. Do you think you could help me?”.
I did not lower my weapon. Not one inch.
We stood there for several moments, this girl, this, Twilight, looking at me expectantly, as though she actually thought I would believe her insane little backstory. After a few long moments, she tried again at a response;
“And what’s your name?”
Poised and very still, the metal sight still pressed against my cheek with utmost confusion rolling around in my head, I announced my clearest, most intimidating voice; “I am sergeant Mahoney of the Queen’s Own Rifles regiment of the Canadian forces, currently off military duty. Now I’m going to ask you again, and I want you to tell me very clearly and logically how you got here. You’re obviously lying, and so I have good reason to suspect illegal activity”.
“But I told you the truth; I came through a magical portal from a place called Equestria, I’m sure you’ve heard of it”
“You came from the back of a horse?” I asked. Her stories was very creative, I gave her that, but, as she recounted it she didn’t seem nervous, or have that nervous stalling between words like when people are lying. It was as if she believed it herself.
“Alright then, if you’re not going to tell me the truth then I guess I’ll have to use my ERS to call in the authorities.”
“But I am telling you the truth. Why don’t you believe me?”.
“Oh yeah, the truth eh? Prove it then. Where is this ‘magic portal’; can you show it to me?”.
“Actually I can. It’s just back here; follow me and I’ll show you” and without further hesitation, Twilight turned and began walking back the way she had just come. It took a moment for me to comprehend this; I didn’t expect her to actually have proof, but I soon snapped out of my surprise and followed her as she led me back about 30 meters or so back to her alleged portal. Upon our arrival at the spot, nothing particularly strange popped out at me, other than an ovular, rather shiny and reflective area on the ice completely clear of snow.
“There it is” Twilight said, pointing at the clear spot with a gloved finger.
“This is your portal?” I asked, beginning to wonder how hard this girl had hit her head.
“Yes, that’s it” she replied, looking over at me as though she expected some kind of understanding to click in on my behalf, but I was utterly confused.
“And how, exactly, did you get through it?”.
“Princesses Luna and Princess Celestia cast a spell that opened it for me. Hmm, but it was a very strange one, they said they’ve got no doubt that I’ll do my best to learn what I’m meant to here, and that, I’ll know when the time is right to return, whatever that’s supposed to mean.” At that point I suddenly realized what I then thought was going on. This girl had obviously come into the forest to get sinfully high, forgotten what the hell had happened to her, made up this story to satisfy her subconscious need for reason as the drugs began to wear off, saw my cabin before the sun set, walked here looking for help, and set off my alarm. Now that made sense.
“Ah, I know what’s happened here” I said, with the tone of someone who had just figured out some small personal mystery, which, I had.
“You do?” Twilight said, the energy in her voice back, and a look of mild relief spreading across her face.
“Yeah don’t worry about it; lots of guys in my company had substance problems before they joined the service. It’s no big deal, as long as you can get a hold of your life again; I really wouldn’t want to see someone like you, with so much potential, go to waste. It’s fine. Anyway, I’m not about to let an innocent girl die out in the forest. You can crash at my cabin for tonight only, if you really need it.”
“Oh, thank you very much!” expressed Twilight, taking a step towards me and smiling contently. I couldn’t quite place it at the time, but there was something about her voice that seemed almost… scripted. As though she had memorized her words beforehand and was simply recalling them at my cue.
“Bah, no problem. Now let’s get going, I don’t want to stay out here any longer than I have to.” and with that, I turned and led the way, much more slowly this time, back up the side of the mountain. It wasn’t too hard to do, as I had made several trapping paths that crisscrossed around its slopes, and after we’d found one it was merely a matter of following it back up. One thing that did slow us down was that the girl seemed unable to keep her balance while walking, and to make everything just wonderfully annoying, she lacked any proper winter clothing. Although she did have a jacket and boots they were much too thin, and I could tell that this amount of climbing combined with the cold was trying for her.
Throughout the course of the trip, she continued asking occasional questions such as “Wow, why is it that everything is so detailed and finely coloured around here?” and then they were something like “Is that your house up there? Oh, is that because your ruler banished you?” and then eventually they moved to something along the lines of “I was relocated once to Ponyville. Have you heard of that place? I wonder how far it is from here” and so on and so forth. They weren’t jumbled and blurred as one might suspect from someone who’s stoned, as a matter of fact they seemed very logical, and I tried to be patient with answering them, although the amount of her confusion with reality was much more complicated than I first suspected, and eventually I just gave up; on being legitimate anyway.
Once we arrived at the cabin, I demonstrated to Twilight how to turn the downstairs couch into a simple bed, and where the blankets were. Once that was done it wasn’t long before she’d lain down and fallen soundly asleep, as she’d obviously been very tired. From the front door, you turned right to go into the kitchen, and left from there into the living room, if you could call it that, where I’d set Twilight up.
I stood there watching her for a few minutes, leaning against the doorframe in the opening to go into the kitchen. It was rectangular, long ways reaching out behind me, and the living room was a squashed square, long ways perpendicular to that of the kitchen. One thing I noticed now that I hadn’t before was that her hair too, was purple, but streaked with pink; apparently this was a popular colour. As I watched her on the couch, I found myself wondering where she had really come from. Mont-Laurier was too far, as was Maniwaki. Grand-Remous was closer, but there was the Baskatong Reservoir to get over, so that was off, but there just weren’t any other towns closer than that. I remembered her saying something about a Ponyville, so maybe that was the name of a ranch or something out in the wilderness. Possible, but still unlikely. I furrowed my brows and moved my tongue thoughtfully over the inside of my teeth. Something still wasn’t right; the same subtle suspicion and feeling of danger that had clambered into my chest and neck and shoulders two hours or so earlier was beginning to re-awaken within me.
I shook my head dismissively and turned around, heading back through the kitchen to the main hallway. Whatever had happened to her I’d be able to discover in the morning, provided the lasting drug effects had fully worn off. I just hoped I’d be able to get her back to where she’d come from. There was enough gear for maybe half-a-dozen other people and a lot more food than I needed, but I still didn’t want some naïve little teenage girl hanging out with me for the next two weeks.
I stepped sideways and grabbed a poker from beside the fireplace in the kitchen to push some ash overtop of the coals in the grate to keep them hot for the morning, before heading into the hallway and pulling down the trapdoor with the ladder, leading back up to my room. Once I was there, I stowed the rifle in its corner, and walked over to my bed, flopping down tiredly into it.
My father had always told me when I was young ‘don’t trust anyone you find on the street; chances are they’re there for a reason’.
‘Well dad’ I thought back to his words, ‘I’m not about to let an innocent person freeze, no matter how much they might’ve messed up. Everyone deserves a second chance’.
And then, as sleep began to overtake me once again, I had another vision. It was cartooned like the own from my dreams before, but this time I was seeing the forms of six brightly-coloured ponies. They didn’t look anything like real ponies, but for some reason I didn’t have any doubt that that’s what they were. They were talking and laughing, walking through the streets of what I assumed was the same town as before, but it was hard to tell, the edges were all fuzzy. And one of them looked very familiar, one with a horn on its head that was totally purple, with black hair. I wouldn’t remember it afterwards, but just before darkness consumed me that night I realized who I was looking at.
It was Twilight.