Rarity had to have slept better than ever before after the previous night. She felt so comfortable that she almost didn’t want to get up. She couldn’t quite put her hoof on it, but there was something about having a foal look up to you the way Timber seemed to do with her, that made her feel that she was truly doing something worthwhile. Sure, being overall generous to somepony always gave her a very good feeling, but this felt especially refreshing. She was basically attempting to teach a pony to…well…be a pony, and that felt fantastic.
Or perhaps it was the fact that Timber had adorably cuddled up to her all night like a foal would with its mother. That wasn’t entirely out of the realm of possibility.
No matter how comfortable she felt right now though, she had to get up sometime today, so it may as well be now.
Rarity stretched out her hooves and shook her head to get out of her dazed, sleepy state, and pulled her pink sleep-mask off of her face.
“Mmmm! Good morning Tim-HUH?!” Rarity looked down next to her, expecting to still find the colt laying next to her like he had the night before, but was nowhere to be found.
Rarity’s mind went into an almost immediate panic and a few beads of sweat began to form on her head. Where did he go?! Why did he get out of bed?! What if some vile creature stole him from her in the middle of the night and she hadn’t even noticed?!
In her panic, Rarity quickly got to her hooves and ran through the flap of her tent and galloped in front of Critter and Fluttershy’s tents, screaming for them to get up.
“Professor! Fluttershy! Get up, quickly!” Rarity screamed.
Both ponies very slowly emerged from their respective tents, Fluttershy rubbing the sleep out of her eyes with a dazed expression on her face, and Professor Critter looking a little irritated with bags under his eyes and having a serious case of bed-head.
“Ugh. You couldn’t wait till the afternoon to have one of your fits? Seriously Rarity, it’s way too early for this.” He grumbled.
“Rarity…what’s the matter?” Fluttershy asked sleepily, her voice laced with a bit of concern.
“Oh it’s absolutely terrible! I woke up this morning and found that Timber has disappeared!” Rarity yelled, pointing to her empty tent. Fluttershy and Critter seemed to perk their heads up and snap out of their morning drowsiness at the thought of the foal going missing.
“W-What?!” Fluttershy stuttered.
“Alright Rarity, just calm down-“ Critter’s attempts at calming the alabaster mare where in vain, as they were interrupted by the mare in question started to frantically shake Critter by the shoulders.
“CALM DOWN?! HOW CAN YOU EXPECT ME TO CALM DOWN WHEN MY FOAL IS OUT IN THE JUNGLE ALONE?!?!” Rarity screamed at the top of her lungs. Rarity let go of Critter’s shoulders, only to hold onto her own and begin to shake.
Critter and Fluttershy to exchange some rather confused glances. Did they just hear that last part right?
“Umm…did you just refer to Timber as ‘your foal?’” Fluttershy asked.
Rarity stopped shaking at the sudden realization at what she had just let escape her mouth and tried to regain her composure, standing back up and taking some deep breaths.
“Erm…did I say that?...” Rarity said before shaking her head. “…No need to worry about it darling. Just a mere slip of the tongue in my panic is all.” Rarity said, trying to reassure her friend she had simply made a mistake.
“…You know it’s alright if you care enough for Timber to think of him as your own. There isn’t any shame in it.” Fluttershy said.
Rarity was beginning to see that her effort had been in vain and let out a big sigh.
“…I won’t deny that I do care for Timber’s well being…I may be becoming a little attached.” Rarity sighed.
“Awww. It’s so sweet that you care for that pony so much Rarity…but…why do you feel so worried about it?” Fluttershy asked.
Rarity visibly deflated, looking not at all like she wanted to answer.
“I-I just...keep thinking…of taking him back home with us…he’s lived here for so long, and he probably has so many friends here…what if he doesn’t want to go with me?” Rarity’s eyes looked like they were starting to fill up with tears and her bottom lip started trembling. “I do want him to come back to Ponyville with me, but I also want him to be happy…I-I don’t know what to do” Rarity stuttered.
“Oh Rarity…” Fluttershy said with her ears folded to her head and a sad look on her face.
Professor Critter had to be in one of the most awkward positions he’s been in for a while. Most of the time, he was used to being smart and sarcastic. This was really not the time for that though. There was a crying mare and her friend that didn’t seem to know how to console her on such a serious matter.
“Ms. Rarity…I can see why you’re worried. Timber may not be ready to leave his home yet, but then again, that colt adores you. I wouldn’t be surprised if he did decide to leave and attempt to be with his own kind. Timber had the guts to save you from a manticore for crying out loud! If that isn’t admiration, I don’t know what is.” Critter said.
Rarity wiped some tears from her face with a hoof and mustered a grateful smile.
“…Thank you Professor. I do feel a little better…is…is my makeup running?” Rarity asked.
Critter looked at the black marks running down Rarity’s face due to her tears and nodded.
“Oh dear. Just give me a moment to take care of this, and we’ll go and look for Timber.” Rarity said, trotting to her tent to fix her makeup, but stopped at the entrance when she noticed something. There were a few indentions in the dirt in front of her tent in two different shapes. One was hoof-shaped, and the others were just simple dots.
“Professor. Fluttershy. Come here. I think I may have found something.” Rarity said, waving a hoof toward her, prompting Critter and Fluttershy to surround the set of hoofprints in the dirt.
“These hoofprints look to be about Timber’s size, but…what are those?” Rarity asked, pointing to the dotted prints. Fluttershy and Critter leaned in to get a better look at the tracks.
“Hmmm…Fluttershy, are you getting the same feeling off of these things?” Critter asked.
Fluttershy nodded.
“I am. These look a lot like Spider-Monkey tracks.” Fluttershy said.
Rarity questionably raised an eyebrow.
“I beg your pardon you two, but these tracks don’t have toes. How can it be a spider monkey?” Rarity asked. Critter trotted over to a desk next to his tent, picked up his field guide in his hoof, and started to turn the pages.
“Not the same species you’re thinking of Rarity. These things are literally Spider-Monkeys. Big, arachnid-like abdomen, eight legs, and a monkey head…and did I mention that these things are enormous? Like…can get to be the size of a pretty able-bodied stallion enormous?” Critter said, making it to a page in his field guide and showing it to Rarity. Inside the book was a black-and-white sketch of a large, vicious, bug-like creature with the head of a monkey that appeared to be in the middle of a loud shriek, baring its fangs.
Just the sketch alone made Rarity feel like she was going to faint.
“A-Are you telling me that one of those monsters actually came into my tent and stole Timber right out from under me?!” Rarity yelled, horrified at the thought of one of those things being anywhere near her.
“But, Spider-Monkeys are usually such docile animals. And when they need food, they usually have a web set up somewhere and wait for food to come to them. They never go out and ambush other animals. This doesn’t make any sense.” Fluttershy said, looking at the picture of the Spider-Monkey in the field guide. She thought that whoever wrote this book was inaccurately depicting these creatures as monstrous, when in reality, that couldn’t be any farther from the truth.
“Look, all we know is that one was here and Timber’s gone. I’m pretty sure he can handle himself, but we’d better follow these things to make sure…Rarity, if you want to sit this one out, I understand.” Critter said, remembering how Rarity reacted to a normal spider earlier the previous day.
Despite Rarity’s disgust at these creatures, Rarity shook her head and put a determined look on her face.
“No! I am going to find Timber if it’s the last thing I do! And so help me Celestia, if one hair is missing off of his cute little head, I will SKIN THOSE MONSTERS ALIVE!” Rarity yelled, already hurriedly trotting past Critter and Fluttershy into the jungle, following the tracks made by the Spider-Monkey.
“Wait Rarity! Wait for us!” Fluttershy shouted after her as she trotted ahead as well.
Critter shook his head and let out a deep sigh.
“Again with this.” Critter sighed as he trotted in the mare’s direction.
The ponies had been trotting through the jungle for about an hour now. They were still following the tracks, and had yet to see any other signs of the Spider-Monkey that took Timber. Rarity was the one in the front of the group this time, determined to find the foal that had gone missing in the middle of the night.
“How dare those monsters take my Timber! They had better not hurt him or they will most certainly regret it!” Rarity had been yelling things of that nature for the past hour as they searched for the colt.
“Rarity, we don’t know for sure if that’s what happened.” Fluttershy mumbled with her ears still folded back.
“Fluttershy, I know it isn’t in a Spider-Monkey’s instincts to just go out and hunt down their prey, but the evidence is stacked pretty good against them.” Professor said, putting a hoof around Fluttershy’s shoulder.
“But Professor…weren’t you the one that told me not to expect the worst out of everything?” Fluttershy asked with a face that appeared to be a mixture of confusion and concern.
Critter took his hoof off of Fluttershy with a very awkward expression on his face. Who would’ve guessed his own advice would come back to bite him in the hindquarters? He started to rub the back of his neck.
“Erm…I guess I did say that.” He mumbled nervously.
“Professor, these Spider-Monkeys…are you absolutely certain they are as docile as you and Fluttershy say?” Rarity asked, still quite worried about how Timber was faring. If these things actually turned out to be as aggressive as that manticore…it was best to find out.
Critter shook his head to recover from Fluttershy sending his own advice right back at him, and took a moment to process Rarity’s question.
“…Not unless they’re provoked. Unless Timber somehow pissed em’ off, he should be okay. I just hope for their sake, they don’t get on his ne-“ Critter stopped midsentence when he looked ahead of the two mares. Acting on his instincts alone, he grabbed both of them by the shoulders and pulled them back toward him.
“Professor what are you-“ Fluttershy was silenced by one of Critter’s hoofs being pressed to her mouth and the sight that he pointed to ahead of them. Where Fluttershy fell silent though, Rarity gasped in fright.
Before them was quite a disturbing sight. In the clearing they had entered, there was a large group of the very same creatures they had been looking for this entire time, the Spider-Monkeys. However, unlike how the field guide depicted them, they looked absolutely terrified and fragile, their spider-like legs shaking and their monkey-like faces having looks that were nothing less of horrified.
And for good reason. In front of them was a beaten and battered Spider-Monkey, huge claw-marks emblazoned on its chest, and a few of its many legs were bending at angles that shouldn’t have been possible. Not far from him was Timber with a few cuts and bruises littering his body, snorting large amounts of air and steam from his flared nostrils with a furious look on his face.
The object of his rage however, was very familiar to them. The very same manticore Timber had fought yesterday was glaring him down once again, appearing to still be ready for a fight. The ponies could tell it was the same manticore from the bandage on its nose that Fluttershy had put there to heal the cut there.
To say the least, Rarity was shocked that Timber was going to have to fight this same monster again in the span of two days.
“Why is Timber fighting that beast again? He wouldn’t just get up in the middle of the night to go and pick fights like this.” Rarity said, trying to figure this out. She started to survey the situation more closely, and judging from the scared faces of the Spider-Monkeys as well as the injured one, she could factor a guess as to what this was all about.
For whatever reason, the manticore was trying to attack the Spider-Monkeys, Timber was trying to keep it away and one of the animals must have been injured in the struggle.
From the looks of things though, Timber had been fighting this thing for hours, and it didn’t look like the manticore was any closer to tiring out. Timber wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead and continued to bare his teeth and snarl at the gigantic feline.
The manticore must have taken whatever Timber said to him as a taunting and lunged toward the colt. Timber slid right out from under the manticore, just barely missing the monster’s claws. Timber came out behind him and was prepared to strike him again, but was halted by the feeling of the manticore’s tail slamming into his pelvis and throwing him across the clearing and right into the trunk of a nearby tree. Rarity swore she could hear the sickening CRUNCH of one of Timber’s wings as it impacted the tree.
“ARRRGH!” Timber roared in pain at the feeling of his wing being crushed between the tree trunk and his own body. The colt fell back to the ground on his knees, holding a hoof onto his broken wing with a hoof. The manticore seemed quite unapologetic for injuring the colt and prepared to strike him again, crouching low to the ground and walking toward him with his huge, bat-like wings flared and teeth prepared to bite.
Timber got back to his hooves and got back into fighting position, fully prepared to continue fighting this monster, even with the condition his wing was in. Even if it meant certain death, he refused to show any sign of weakness, and wasn’t going to let this manticore hurt these Spider-Monkeys again.
Neither party got the chance to attack though, as something else did it for them.
A blast of blue energy struck the manticore in the side, throwing him to the ground, leaving a huge burn mark in his fur where he had been hit, and himself roaring in pain.
“RAAAAAAARGH!” it roared.
Timber looked back to the source of the blast with a dumbfounded and confused look on his face. What creature would dare to interrupt a battle this dangerous? Not even the Spider-Monkeys, who could easily kill whatever they needed to if it was absolutely necessary, didn’t dare to get in the middle of it.
Once he laid eyes upon it though, it made a little more sense.
At the entrance to the clearing was none other than Rarity, her horn glowing its signature light-blue color, with a face that looked almost unrecognizable on such an elegant face. She didn’t look all too different from Timber mid-battle; nostrils flared, teeth bared, and her pupils shrunk down to pinpricks.
“DON’T. YOU. TOUCH. HIM!” Rarity yelled.