//------------------------------// // Tooth and Claw // Story: An Expedition to the Crystal Forest // by Doubt //------------------------------// An excerpt from The Ultimate Expeditioner's Handbook: Some ponies argue that true success on an expedition isn't achieved by finding that which you had set out to, but by finding that which defies expectation. It is our opinion that this fortune cookie style advice is rubbish. • • ❖ • • Standing before her, with cheeks burning like molten metal and pupils shrunken to pinpricks, was a pegasus Rarity hadn't seen before. Sure, it may have looked like Fluttershy, but the Fluttershy Rarity knew had never been quite as offputting to look at as this Fluttershy was right now. Her eyes were wide and immovably fixed to a slightly downcast angle, and she looked profoundly worried. Clearly something was going on in Fluttershy’s head. That much Rarity knew. And, while she couldn't know for sure exactly what Fluttershy might have been thinking, given recent events, she felt she could make an educated guess. “Fluttershy…?” Rarity’s voice carried a mildly concerned tone. She tilted her head to one side and stepped closer to her friend. “Fluttershy, are you… ehm…” she bumbled, unable to think of anything worth being said. Eventually she settled with just stating the obvious. “You look flustered.” Fluttershy didn’t respond, but not for a lack of effort. She just couldn’t do it. Her mouth cracked open, but, despite repeated efforts, she couldn’t cobble together even the beginnings of a sentence, leaving her to stand there in silence with her mane draped over a large portion of her burning face. The possibility that Fluttershy hadn’t heard her at all was more than just a passing thought in Rarity’s mind as she waited for a response, and with each passing second, she grew more confident that she wasn’t going to get one. The way Fluttershy was staring at nothing, the way she hadn’t moved since Rainbow Dash had fled to who-knew-where, the way her face was painted in a blush so intense it looked like her cheeks were about to combust, Rarity took it all as fairly conclusive evidence that Fluttershy was sojourning in someplace other than reality at present. Though, after a minute, Fluttershy did do something: She fell to her haunches, then continued to stare off at nothing, resuming her empty-headed demeanor from before. Simply mustering the motor skills necessary for sitting down was just about the only physical thing Fluttershy could manage at the moment. But inside her head was a whole different story. Dozens of thoughts warred against each other, and the resulting chaos made it impossible for Fluttershy to make out what each thought was and what they were even fighting for. “Well then,” Rarity began, still at a loss for what to do and uncertain of how to feel about being at least a tiny bit responsible for Fluttershy's current state. “Seeing as your hooves are full at the moment with taking in everything you just heard... um... how about I just go ahead and prepare us a little breakfast?" she said, giving her best attempt at a genuine smile. "Sound good?” In reality Rarity just wanted an excuse to not be around Fluttershy until the pegasus had had enough time to gather her thoughts and could speak again. It wasn't that she didn't want to be there for Fluttershy, she really did, but the situation was an uncomfortable, awkward mess and she needed some time to think things over, just as much as Fluttershy did, lest she say something foolish and make things dramatically worse. Rarity was beyond expecting a response by this point, so without waiting for one, she went on to make breakfast, leaving Fluttershy to her thoughts. • • ❖ • • Rarity clambered through the thick, tangled underbrush, cooking pot within her magical hold, as she her way to the river to collect a potful of water. She mused about what she should do with Fluttershy, and for that matter, Rainbow Dash as she weaved between trees and narrowly avoided tripping over unearthed roots. It wasn’t a long walk from the campsite to the river, but Rarity was finding that the path of least distance between the two locations was by no means the path of least resistance. The path she had chosen was nothing short of untraversable, a wall of grass, bushes and weeds that would have made a suitable defense for a castle. Rarity, however, didn’t plan on turning back just because something like practical decision-making dictated it. No, Rarity wasn’t one to give up, even when it made the most sense. There was seeing her first intuition through to the end that was quite satisfying. As if refusing to give in to the pressure was proof that idea wasn't so bad to begin with. Was it stupid? Maybe, but it would take a lot more than the debatable stupidity of her plan for Rarity to change course now. However, If she wanted to make it to the river without tripping and falling or twisting an ankle, she would need to focus her attention on the present despite her desire to focus it on the more gossipy recent events. Oh, but what a turn of events they were! Rainbow Dash, allegedly having once had a crush on Fluttershy, then Fluttershy finding out about those feelings Rainbow Dash allegedly once had for her, in addition to the many loose ends that needed tying up. She almost felt guilty about the amount of meddling she was planning on doing... Almost. There was one loose end in particular though that captured Rarity’s curiosity more than the rest. Now that she had had a little time to think about each of Rainbow Dash’s responses, one of them really hadn’t made all that much sense… at least, not on its own it didn’t: It was why she had stopped having sleep-overs with Fluttershy. Rainbow Dash had claimed that her reason for stopping was because she had had a crush on Fluttershy, but that didn’t even answer the question. As far as Rarity was concerned, it only raised more. At the time, she had been too caught up in her incredulity at Rainbow Dash’s claim of no longer having a crush on Fluttershy, considering how she had just admitted to snuggling with her for two nights in a row. But that one non-answer Rainbow Dash had given her had really begun to bug her. Her whole conversation had been nothing short of infuriating, with the way Rainbow Dash would only give her half-answers of absolutely no lucidity whatsoever. But Rarity was going to get those answers, it was just a question of when. Not that it would be hard; Rainbow Dash seemed to really open up as soon as she was accused of something untrue. Rarity made a mental note to remember that trick in the future. Rarity hiked her hooves up high with each step to keep them from being ensnared by the mess of long grasses and overgrown weeds as she carried on through the accursed landscape. She was beginning to believe its very existence was solely to serve as a punishment designed specifically for her as a result of some unknown transgression she had committed in a previous life, because nothing so absolutely wicked and unpleasant could have arisen by mere happenstance. Every step was greeted by thorn-bushes scraping at her sides, every hooffall welcomed by more and more burrs clinging to her fur. It was, by every stretch of the imagination, the worst possible thing, but even the worst possible thing wasn’t enough to stop Rarity as she carried on through the thick of it until the plant-life thinned and she could walk comfortably again. Eventually she happened upon a fallen tree lying across her path. She stepped up onto the tree, then back down onto the ground on the other side, hearing a wet squish when she touched down. She looked down in dismay at the sight of one of her legs halfway buried in mud so dark in colour that it almost appeared black. “Ewwww!” A moment later, a pungent stench that smelled like an amalgamation of week-old compost and rotten fish wafted up into Rarity’s nose. “Ewewewewewew!” She attempted to retract her hoof from the stinking mess, but the action only served to create a vacuum in the empty space, the force pulling her leg right back down. Rarity pulled again but was met with the same results. Obviously stuck, she took a moment to evaluate her surroundings and the best course of action to free herself. The muddy terrain Rarity found herself entrapped by extended only a few feet in front of her, but wound off as far as she could see to her left and right. That, and the way the land dipped slightly where the mud began then rose back up where it ended, lead Rarity to believe that the area had once flowed with water, but for whatever reason all that remained of it now was a smelly groove in the earth. These deductions did nothing to put Rarity's mind at as ease. In fact, they did quite the opposite, because she now knew the odor that smelled so strongly of rotting fish almost certainly was rotting fish, and the undertone of compost probably wasn’t too far off from reality either. Rarity grunted from exertion as she pulled again, but, if anything, pulling appeared to just make things worse when her hoof sunk back down to, at the very least, the same depth it was at before. Her shoulder was starting to ache from the unusual position she was forced to assume, and her hind legs weren’t fairing much better. She let out a surly groan. “Lovely…” After hooking the pot she had been levitating on a broken tree limb so she could better focus on her current predicament, Rarity looked around to see if her surroundings could provide her with any aid. Immediately she noticed the fallen tree just behind her. It occurred to her that, if she laid her body across it, the log could act as a fulcrum and provide her with the leverage she needed to extricate her hoof. She stepped her hind legs back over the log, rested her abdomen on the trunk, then leaned back, putting all of her bodily strength into the action. Slowly, she felt her hoof begin to break free. She twisted it in one direction, then the other, speeding up the process of slowly inching her hoof out of its wet, earthen confines. Her joints ached under the strain, and she was finding it increasingly difficult to keep up her strength, but she continued pulling until she felt air rush into the cavity as the airtight seal around her leg broke. Her hoof quickly slipped out of its squishy prison with little resistance, producing a wet slurping sound as it did. With no counter-force pulling back on her anymore, Rarity stumbled backward before capsizing and landing flat on her back. Her head forcefully impacted the forgiving forest floor, leaving a dent in the soil, but her head, thankfully, unscathed. Lying there, unmoving, her mane splayed out every which way, Rarity took a moment to appreciate the fact that she was free. After that moment passed she took several more to despise everything else. • • ❖ • • Time seemed to stand still for Fluttershy as she sat in front of Rarity’s tent, staring off at nothing. Though time could have been doing back-flips for all Fluttershy cared because she was wholly focused on something else at the moment: a thought she repeated in her head over and over, to no forward progress or clarity. Rainbow Dash used to have a crush... on her? The words all made sense on their own. And when put together they formed a meaning that Fluttershy could understand. But when she asked her brain to formulate an opinion on that meaning—to come up with a thought, a feeling, anything at all—it completely and wholeheartedly did nothing, and it did it very well. She had drawn blanks before, but this was a whole new level entirely. Eventually, after several minutes of failing to comprehend what she now knew, Fluttershy gave up on trying to coax an opinion out of herself, and decided instead to manually break down the problem into more manageable pieces, starting with the most basic questions. The first being: Why? That line of thought promptly hit a wall. Granted, the question wasn’t very specific, but nonetheless she moved on, shifting her thoughts to: When? Surely a question as simple as that couldn’t provide her with too much trouble. Fluttershy reasoned that, If anything, she ought to be able to handle a two dimensional time-line. She knew, from what she had overheard, that it must have started some time when they were in flight school together, and lasted until... well that part she didn’t know. Naturally she was inclined to think that it must have ended when her and Rainbow Dash stopped spending time together. But hearing what she just had, it sounded like it was the other way around. Which meant that the reason for Rainbow Dash spending less time with her was because... she had a crush on her? Fluttershy didn’t understand. None of it made any sense to her. Why would...? If Rainbow Dash... Why...? Overwhelmed to the point of feeling like she couldn’t remember her own name if she needed to, Fluttershy wanted nothing more than to lie down in light of current events. So she did. She rolled back on her spine until her head rested on a cushion of grass, her eyes confronted with the expansive sky above her, the vastness of which was reined in only by a frame of trees whose deep teal leaves blotched out the blue, creating a scene that Fluttershy was all too willing to lose herself in. She wished she could push her questions out into that endless sky, let them drift up and away from her so that she could think straight for even just one minute. One minute where she could just stop worrying. The trees all around her never had to worry. They took what the world gave them for better or for worse, because they didn’t have a choice in the matter. Right now they were swaying gently in the wind because that was what the wind wanted and if the trees didn’t like it, then tough. They never had to make choices. Choices were made for them. They never had to think, because what did it matter? Trees didn’t have the perfect lives, but they sure had easy lives. She wished she could be— No. Now she was just being silly. For the moment, she decided, she would just lie there. She wouldn’t think about the trees, or the sky, or the thing she probably shouldn’t even list to make sure she didn’t start thinking about it again. Her subconscious could concern itself with those if it wanted to, but right now, Fluttershy felt, wasn’t a time for thinking. Right now was a time for being, and nothing more. • • ❖ • • Rarity held out her blackened, mud-covered hoof, drawing her head back as far away from it as her body would permit. It stunk of the putrefaction of a thousand fish, hundreds upon hundreds of plants, a dozen or so small mammals, uncountably many insects, a handful of gastropods and other molluscs, most likely a few reptilians, and quite possibly a bird or two. Rarity cringed when the ripe stench settled in the back of her throat, almost gagging when it mixed into her saliva. She took a step back as if attempting to walk away from her own limb. With a deep scowl on her face, she turned her head to the sky, and addressed it. “Nature,” she said with an exasperated sigh, “why do you hate me?” She looked back at the hoof for a moment, huffed indignantly, then dropped it back down to the ground. She allowed herself the few seconds she needed to compose herself, then, without further commotion, picked up the pot hanging patiently on the broken tree limb and continued on toward the river, holding her head up high like the hell of a mare she was, in spite of the displeasure she felt. If nature wanted her to be unhappy—which was what seemed to be the case—then congratulations to it; it had succeeded. But Rarity would be damned if she was going to give it the gratification of seeing her that way. • • ❖ • • Not overly far away, perched near the top of a giant sequoia, Rainbow Dash gnawed on the end of her hoof, a nervous habit of hers she hadn’t realized she still had. “What was I thinking!? Of course talking to Rarity would lead to her screwing everything up!” Rainbow Dash ranted, gritting her teeth and turning to face the trunk of the tree. Her chest felt like it was being pumped full of sweltering hot air as the anger inside her rose. Before long she reached her limit and was forced to let some of that hot air out by throwing a rage-filled punch at the thick trunk of the sequoia. It impacted with a dull crack that sent vibrations all the way up her foreleg and left her with a tingling in her hoof. “It’s all her fault! I know it is!” She held her hoof there as the grimace on her face slowly faded into a frown and the majority of the rage within her dissipated. She hung her head, letting her hoof slide down the trunk and her body droop like a wet piece of paper strewn over a branch. Slowly, she leaned forward until the crown of her head rested against the rough, bark exterior of the tree. “Somehow...” • • ❖ • • Rarity ducked under a branch and emerged out of the brush onto a narrow, sandy shoreline. She trotted into the first few feet of the river where the water was shallow and began washing the mud off of her leg as best she could, frowning at the stained fur it left behind. Then she proceeded to remove the garden she had collected in her mane and tail. Her morning hadn’t been spectacular thus far, but maybe a little breakfast would be just the thing she needed to make it bearable. Rarity had a rule about mornings, heedless of the day or circumstances, that she always upheld if at all possible, and it was to never let anything bad happen before breakfast. It was her opinion that no good day ever started with something bad happening before breakfast. She recognized that this opinion was probably based in superstition and reinforced by cherry-picked evidence, but at the end of the day it was the result she cared about, and living by her breakfast-above-all-else creed resulted in her enjoying far better life than otherwise. Unfortunately, today broke that rule, which meant the best she could hope for was something bearable. Rarity scooped up a potful of water. The thought of warm oatmeal was enough to make her smile, even if just a little bit. Sure, it was too late to save the day from being bad, but at least she had something to look forward to. Perhaps she would even find some wild berries to add to the oatmeal on her way back. She remembered seeing some earlier, but couldn’t quite remember where. Rarity never got the chance to properly call up the memory when, out of the corner of her eye, she caught sight of something moving through the tall bushes on the far side of the river. The figure was large and grey, but she saw little else before it disappeared from view. Whatever it was, it was bigger than a pony and by no small amount either. Rarity kept her attention trained on the area the creature had appeared in, but saw nothing. No shaking branches, no shadows, no anything. And on top of that, it was completely quiet. Much too quiet for her liking. Silence wasn’t something an animal that size did by mistake. It was trying to be quiet. And Rarity had no doubt in her mind about why it would want to do that: It was hunting. The preemptive adrenaline release suggested her body agreed with her assessment, her alertness and reflexes shooting through the roof. The predator remained elusive, but Rarity didn’t need to see it to know it was after her. In fact, she didn’t really want a good look. She had what she’d come for, so all she had to do was simply return to camp, and hope that there truly was safety in numbers. She backed away slowly at first, cautiously watching for movement with a vigilant eye. When no threat presented itself, she turned around to make the jaunt back. To her dismay, turning around put her face-to-face with what she assumed was a friend of grey figure in the bushes, and a good look of it she most certainly got. • • ❖ • • A terror-filled scream ripped through the sky above the trees. Rainbow Dash, slouched near the top of the giant sequoia, jolted up at the sound, her head raising into the air like a meerkat. “Rarity!?” she called out as she frantically darted her eyes across the landscape. She heard another scream followed by her name being called, though it was muffled by the leaves and from the distance it had traveled to get to her. Rainbow Dash launched herself off the tree limb and made in the direction of the screaming Rarity. “I’m coming Rarity!” Even with Rarity’s life presumably in peril—and by Celestia if she was just throwing a fit over stepping in something gross, Rainbow Dash was going to kill—even so Rainbow Dash couldn’t help but spare a few glances at the opening in the trees where they had made camp as she soared overhead. Her last glance was met with what she was really looking for, the sight of Fluttershy, now also responding to the call for help. Rainbow Dash watched as she ran up to the tree line, but stop short of entering, turning in place and looking around worriedly. It crossed Rainbow Dash’s mind that maybe she was looking for her, but right now… she just… couldn’t. She couldn’t go down there, not with everything Fluttershy now knew and especially not now while Rarity was in danger. She had to keep moving, even if that meant leaving Fluttershy in a panic. Rainbow Dash had already passed over the camp by the time she heard Rarity call out her name again. “Hold on!” Rainbow Dash shouted back. • • ❖ • • Rarity ran, darting, leaping, and panting through the trees. Just behind her, thick, black claws ripped up twigs and leaves from the ground and threw them into the air. They belonged to a creature which shared traits with both reptiles and mammals. It had the head, torso, and legs of a wolf, but the heavy, muscular tail of an lizard. The majority of its body was covered in a coat of grey fur, aside from three rows of black, spiny scales which ran the full length of the creature’s back and onto its serpentine tail. From the topside of its wolf-like snout sprouted a streak of hard, armoured, black scales, starting at the end of its nose, and coming to a point between its piercing, snake eyes—A fearsome tatzeldrake, though Rarity had no way of knowing that’s what it was. A grey blur darted through the woods to Rarity's left, and another to her right. They were surrounding her. The only option she had was to to continue forward and hope she could keep up her pace. All around her came hissing and snarling and a strange attempt at barking. Rarity could see the two tatzeldrakes to her sides and knew of the one behind her, but there must have been three or even four more on top of that just from what she could hear. “Help!” she screamed. Why hadn’t Rainbow Dash found her yet? It felt like she had been running for ages, and she wasn’t sure she could keep it up for much longer. Ahead, the ground appeared to drop off into some kind of ravine. As Rarity got closer, the gravelly, boulder-ridden slope of the far side of the ravine came into view. It was no gentle slope by any means, but Rarity hazarded a guess that she could make her way down safely if she had to. Not that she had any other choice. Rarity wasted no time hesitating when she got to the edge. She threw herself over, immediately beginning her descent. She slid and stumbled, but kept her footing the whole way down until she found herself at the bottom. She turned and ran along the length of the ravine, the tatzeldrakes only now making their way down the slope, having briefly stopped to assess the safety of doing so. Rarity's breathing was asthmatically heavy by this point. She took in an especially large breath so she could let out another call for help. “Somepony help!” The ravine petered out into normal, flat, forested ground again, the only difference about this part of the forest being that it was slightly more open, with larger, more spread out trees and sparser underbrush. In no time at all, the tatzeldrakes were right on her tail once again. “Rainbow Dash! Fluttershy! Anypony!” Rarity pleaded. When Rarity spotted a large patch of bushes, she seized the opportunity to use her size to her advantage. She scurried under the low canopy, just high enough for a pony, but too low for her pursuers. She emerged on the other side and kept running until leaping down off a shallow overhang in the earth. She turned around and paused. It was as good a hiding spot as any. Better than most, actually. A short distance off she heard the tatzeldrakes making their way around the patch of bushes, their nonstop growling and hissing giving them away more than anything else. She couldn’t outrun them, that much had been made clear, so it looked like hiding just might be her only shot at survival. She wedged herself under the outcropping of stone and waited. Time would reveal to her soon enough if she had just made a huge mistake. For now, she could only hope she hadn’t. • • ❖ • • Rainbow Dash’s wingtips sliced through the air like a finely honed blade as she diligently scanned the ground for signs of the distressed unicorn. She grunted in agitation. The dense canopy made seeing anything below it a near futile task. "Rarity, where are you!?" No answer came, and Rainbow Dash was beginning to think she was too late. When she passed over the river, she got a fleeting look at something small and black lying on the shore. Rainbow Dash couldn’t place it, but something about it seemed out of place, so she circled around and went in for a landing to investigate. Upon touching down a few feet from the object she saw that it was Fluttershy’s cooking pot. It explained why Rarity had left camp in the first place, but it didn't do much by ways of revealing Rarity's whereabouts. Rainbow Dash kicked it over, hoping for any clue that could help her. Droplets of water clung to the sides of the pot, but other than that it was empty. Except, some of the droplets near the brim were awfully red to be water. Rainbow Dash looked closer and realized that she was definitely right about them being too red to be water. They were clearly blood. “Rarity!” Rainbow Dash called out again, even louder this time. She waited. Nothing. She took off again, letting her instincts guide her, and hoping, for Rarity's sake, that they were right. • • ❖ • • Rarity pushed her back up against the low-hanging stone, regulating her breath. She swore she heard Rainbow Dash calling for her, but now was not a time for shouting. All around her she could hear the tatzeldrakes searching for her. One let out an airy bark, communicating something to the others that Rarity had no chance of understanding, but her guess would have been that it was trying to tell them it had bronchitis. Rarity wasn’t in love with this plan of hiding. In fact, she hated it, but running hadn’t worked. They were faster than her by no small amount, and the only reason Rarity could think of for why they hadn’t made a meal of her yet was because they wanted to tire her out first, reduce the chances of her inflicting any more damage on them. If that really was the case, then they had done an impeccable job. Rarity’s legs felt like they had been run through a taffy machine, and she wasn’t sure how much more abuse they could take. Her only hope was that the veil of shadows the rocky outcropping provided her would be enough to keep her hidden. Just as Rarity's lungs felt like they were going to burst from her effort to breathe as quietly as possible, a long, hideous muzzle lined with an impractically large number of teeth entered the top of her vision. The beast was standing on the edge of the overhang, using it as a vantage point. As it scanned for the marshmallow-coloured mare, with a craving for something equally as delicious, it snapped its lower jaw up repeatedly, audibly clacking its teeth together, half of which looked confused about what it meant to be a tooth from the way they were visibly sticking out at bizarre, crooked angles. Or perhaps those ones were just especially eager to get to their prey. Either way, Rarity wanted no part of them, but moreover, wanted them to have no part of her. She noticed a streak of red, clumpy fur trailing down the tatzeldrake’s neck, leading her to conclude that it was the one she had run into earlier. The one she had introduced the concept of cast-iron cookware to, with the end result being its left eye swollen shut and bleeding profusely. Rarity didn’t like to think of herself as a violent pony, but if these were to be her last moments, if things did turn out for the worse and she ended up as the world’s most fabulous filet mignon, at the very least she could take solace in the knowledge that she’d gotten in a fairly nasty hit on one of them. Eventually, and to the overwhelming relief of Rarity’s lungs, the ugly beast turned around and sauntered away, in tune with the rest of the pack who were doing the same. Finally, Rarity could breath. She drank in the oxygen with a fervor she had never before had for the commodity. Trying, it would seem, to literally get drunk on the stuff, while still being mindful of the volume of her breathing, because it wasn’t likely the pack was too far off just yet. Rarity took a moment to peer over the overhang and get an idea of the course the tatzeldrakes were taking. From what she could see, they were... ... They weren’t scampering off in any one of the multitude of directions that lead away from Rarity to eat some other unfortunate soul. Because, of course, that would have flown right in the face of the day’s current trend for Rarity. Fate had ordained that she suffer. For what reason, Rarity didn’t know, and at the moment she didn’t have time to figure it out because, not even a shouting distance away, the tatzeldrakes were circling back toward her, only now she would be exposed, masked only by her stillness and the slight shade of the overhang. It was only a matter of time before one of the them picked out her white body against the mossy stone backdrop. With each of their steps they drew nearer, making Rarity all the more likely to be spotted. Closer and closer, until Rarity was certain that they were just faking not seeing her. They had to see her. She simply couldn’t accept that they still hadn’t. Yet they continued along their course, apparently oblivious to the fact that, by total coincidence, it would run them right past Rarity’s hiding spot. Part of Rarity was yelling at her to run, to get the hell out of there before they got any closer, to make a break for it, the sooner the better. Then there was the other, larger part of her that told her that making a break for it would be difficult and require courage that she frankly just didn’t have at the moment. It told her how inaction was so much easier, and that tough decisions are, well, tough, and that not making one sounded like the way to go. The anticipation mounted until Rarity’s mind was screaming at her to do something as the pack slowly closed the remaining distance between them. It wasn’t until they were close enough that Rarity could smell them that she took the initiative and leapt out from her cover. She magicked up the largest stone she could find and hurled it at the pack leader. It connected with a clonk against its thick skull and sent the beast reeling back, whimpering in pain as it knocked over one of its comrades. The remaining tatzeldrakes left their incapacitated allies and took chase after Rarity. • • ❖ • • Rainbow Dash continued to fly above the land, intently looking for Rarity, or clues to lead her to her. All she had to go on was the direction she thought Rarity's voice had come from last, but even that she was unsure about. It wasn’t until she heard a high-pitched shriek that she had anything solid to go on. It sounded like a dog getting its tail stepped on. It was out of the ordinary, so that was where she was going. Rainbow Dash banked right toward the sound and doubled her speed. Hopefully it wasn’t nothing. • • ❖ • • Rarity magicked up another large stone as she ran and launched it behind her. The tatzeldrakes, having figured out Rarity's capabilities by this point, dodged the incoming missile with ease. The trees became sparse, then abruptly ended when Rarity broke out into an open meadow full of lovely purple and yellow flowers. With open space for maneuvering now abundant, the tatzeldrakes took the opportunity to again surround Rarity as they pulled up alongside her. Two held their positions at Rarity's sides, while another behind her did the same. One more lunged out in front and cut her off. Rarity's hooves dug into the grass as she slid to a stop. She whipped her head around in frenetic bursts, hoping to spot an opening between two of the predators wide enough for her to make an escape, but no such opening existed. Slowly the beasts began to circle around her, cautious of any attacks she might attempt. Their eyes trained on the unicorn’s form, intent on not letting her get away again. Foamy saliva flowed from the corners of their snarling, copiously-toothed mouths, falling onto the grass and flowers below. It carried a strong, pungent smell that had Rarity holding her breath just to keep the contents of her stomach where they belonged. The one with the bloody gash near its eye passed in front of her, snapping its mouth shut, letting it fall open, then repeating. With each passing second Rarity grew more certain that she wasn’t just food to them, she was their entertainment, a toy, something to be played with until it broke, at which point they would eat her then promptly forget about her. The quick, hard thump of Rarity's heartbeat in her chest served as a reminder that she was still alive, if just for the moment, but she couldn’t help but think of each thump as being part of a dwindling countdown approaching one final beat. Rarity pushed the thought aside. It wasn’t a particularly useful one to focus on at the moment. What she needed was a good idea, some sort of cunning plan to save her skin. As the tatzeldrakes continued to circle around Rarity, they seemed almost eager to let her be the one to make the first move. Not that she was complaining. She was happy they were giving her time to figure out how to best them, though she still didn’t want to try their patience. She just needed to make a quick, rational assessment of her situation so she could weigh all her possible options and come up with a plan of attack. Annoyingly, her quick-thinking kept being interrupted by a distracting multi-hued streak in the periphery of her vision darting about above the horizon. Eventually, (though, in retrospect it took far too long) it dawned on her what exactly that multi-hued streak was. “Rainbow Dash!?” she shouted, dumbfounded at Rainbow Dash’s appearance. She had completely forgotten that she wasn’t alone. Some of the tatzeldrakes perplexedly followed Rarity's gaze which was now cast decidedly above their imposing figures. “Rainbow Dash! Rainbow Dash, down here!” Rarity took it that her voice had been heard when the cyan speck that was Rainbow Dash stopped in her tracks, then began her swift descent toward her location. “I’m comin’ Rarity!” Sensing that the situation was slipping out their favour, the tatzeldrakes scrapped their plan to give Rarity the first move and readied to make their own. Rarity instinctively took a step back, only realizing afterwards that it put her closer to the tatzeldrakes behind her. She wished she had taken the time to learn even a basic combat spell. Telekinesis was all well and good when there were things to throw, but there weren’t now, and she was starting to feel a little bitter about having neglected her gift of being born a unicorn. If she were Twilight, she could have already been on her merry way by now by having fended off the tatzeldrakes with some kind of laser-beam spell. The closest thing she had to that were the light spells she sometimes used when showcasing dresses. The thought of wooing the tatzeldrakes to death with a fancy light show might have made Rarity laugh if not for her current circumstances, but she was hardly in the mood at the moment. Then it dawned on her... perhaps those spells weren’t as useless as she had initially thought. She looked up at Rainbow Dash. The pegasus was more than halfway to her, but the stance the tatzeldrakes were assuming hinted that she didn’t have the precious few seconds she would need. She decided that a last ditch effort was better than no effort at all and began readying a light spell. As quickly as she could, Rarity channeled all of the magic she could harness into her horn, closing her eyes before releasing the energy in a blinding white flash so powerful that it seared the tip of her horn, causing her to yelp in pain. She opened her eyes and started running before she could even register if it had worked, assuming it must have from the immense pain it had caused her. The sight of the tatzeldrakes blinking, trying to regain their vision, confirmed to her it had as she slipped between the first gap she came across in the tatzeldrakes’ formation then bolted for the treeline. It wasn’t long at all before the tatzeldrakes had regained enough of their vision to take chase after her. Rarity sprinted across the meadow at record speeds, but casting such a powerful spell had taken a lot out of her. The combined toll of running, spelling-casting, and to top it all off, pain, caused Rarity's vision to blur as she approached the edge of the meadow. She tried to clear her head with a quick shake, but she knew she had been running on empty since casting the spell. All she could think about was the searing pain creeping down her horn and spreading out across the top of her head. By the time she made it to the outermost tree of the forest, she was stumbling, a few steps further and she collapsed. “Get away from her!” she heard Rainbow Dash say, though her current state made it sound like she was underwater. She didn’t even possess the mental fortitude to notice the whirlwind of pink leaves rising up around her. She took one last glance at the tatzeldrakes through the thickening swirls of brightly-coloured leaves and saw Rainbow Dash keeping three of them busy while a fourth lay on the ground unconscious. Darkness slowly seeped into the edges of her field of vision, making its way to the center. The last thing Rarity remembered after her vision gave out was a pleasant, warm feeling, followed by a pervasive feeling of calmness and serenity.