Spike and Chester wandered mindlessly around the city. They both thought it was strange that there were no guards at the front gate, so they just walked in. Chester lost Wilson's scent and now they were just keeping an eye out for him. The two even asked around for him and they got some pretty good leads, surprisingly. A bishop said he went towards the castle, but another said he saw him going inside of "Build n' Repair".
"We should check out "Build n' Repair" first Chester, it's close by" Spike suggested. Chester nodded and waited for Spike to lead the way. Looking back and forth, the dragon chuckled. He just chose a random direction and hoped his luck was good today. It took quite a while for them to actually find the darn place, but they got to have small talk which was nice. Even though Spike couldn't understand what Chester said, he nodded in agreement to every sound he made.
"Alright, here it is, lets go" Spike said. He opened the door for Chester and bounced on in. His face instantly got stuck in some yellow caution tape. Spike did the same, not realizing it was there. Chester emitted a high pitched cry in dismay, not liking the feeling of the tape.
"What is this here for!?" Spike shouted. He struggled to pull the tape off of him, was it supposed to be super sticky?
"Hey! You cannot be here, this is off limits!" A knight said. He was wearing a blue vest that had a golden badge on it. A baton was strapped onto his waist and he was a but bulkier than the other knights outside. The knight came to help Spike and Chester get the tape off of them.
"Thank you, sir. But, why can we not go in?" Spike asked, rubbing his chin. The knight raised one metallic eyebrow for a split second, before sighing.
"Well, the owner of this shop has gone missing, and we may have a potential culprit. Right when he came into town someone goes missing, coincidence? I think not! Anyways, you two run along now, this is adult business."
Spike frowned and turned around to open the door. Chester leaped out and waited for Spike. The dragon's eyes went wide.
"Wait! Can you tell us if you see a friend of ours, he came here maybe a few hours ago. He's tall, has spiky hair, and has two arms on his sides, like me! We are already hot on his trail, but just in case you see him, tell us. Okay? Thanks!"
The knight looked almost excited for some reason. He told spike to wait there. He walked over to two rooks that had golden armor and spikes on their horns.
"Did you hear what that dragon just said?" The knight asked.
"Yes we did, he described the man we told you about earlier. No doubt that he did this." The left rook replied.
"If we follow him, he'll take us right to him! Then we can catch him and lock him away."
"Sounds like a perfect plan. Not to mention we was pretty suspicious first time he came."
"How so?" The knight said, raising one eyebrow again.
"Well he wanted the Metal Potato. So if we get him now he can't get close to it."
"Wow, lets get going!"
Spike saw the knight approaching with two large rooks, he got nervous. They didn't say anything but they just walked out the door.
"Spike! Lead the way to your friend!" The knight said, smiling at him.
"O-oh! You're coming with us? Cool, more help!"
The group walked towards the castle, like that bishop told them. They each looked around as well for good measure, chances are he wasn't even in the castle. He had to have been nearby, Chester got the scent back. He hopped faster ahead of the group, he took a right down a dark alley. Everyone exchanged glances before continuing, not trusting dark alleyways.
----
"WILSON! WILSOOOON! WAKE UP SOMETHING IS APPROACHING US!" The potato warned, shaking Wilson's mind out of a dream. He blinked his eyes a few times then rubbed them. Wilson yawned loudly and scratched his back.
"Someone's here? Well who?" Wilson asked, squinting his eyes at the small outline. As it got closer he figured out who it was.
"Chester? Chester!! Come here boy!" Wilson held his arms out wide. Chester jumped into Wilson's chest and they embraced in a tight hug. "How did you find me, Chester? It's quite a long way from Ponyville!" He said, squeezing Chester's furry cheeks. Spike ran up to Wilson.
"Wilson! Why are you all the way out here? Y'know Chester dragged me all the way out here to find you! Now that we have can we go back to the library? I'm hungry!" Spike bombarded Wilson with words.
"I don't think he'll be going back anytime soon, boy" The knight said. He stared at Wilson, who became nervous.
"And who are you?" Wilson asked, pointing weakly. The knight chuckled.
"I am Detective Bernard W. Hunter, or, Your Worst Nightmare" He emphasized that last part. The two rooks from behind him stepped forward, revealing themselves. Wilson's eyes widened and slowly reached for Spike and Chester. The two groups stared into each others eyes intensely.
"Now, Detective, as much as I'd like to stay to listen to your ar-" Wilson quickly stood up and placed Spike and Chester in the cart full of junk. He grabbed the handle and sprinted the other direction and out of the alley.
"Dammit! Get him!!" The detective shouted, he grabbed his baton with his mouth. The rooks charged after Wilson, steam coming out of their horns. Wilson didn't look back, he ran as fast as he could towards the exit. The ground was becoming sloped, and soon enough the cart was almost dragging him since it gained so much speed. Wilson heard the sound of large footsteps getting closer and closer.
"W-w-wilson!!! Run faster!!" Spike yelled. The rooks were right on their tail, Wilson had an idea. He quickly jumped inside of the cart, looking back at the rooks. The three were going faster because they were still going downhill. b
"DON'T LEAVE, JUST LET ME FIGHT THEM! IF YOU LEAVE HE WON'T GET THE POTATO!!!"
"Not happening! We will come back! Trust me!" Wilson said back. He could make out the voice in his head mumbling something, he waved it off. The rooks seemed to pick up their pace. Soon enough they would catch the group, luckily the exit was close. Nothing could ever go the way they wanted it too. The heavy metal gates began to close!
"Shoot shoot shoot!!!" Wilson panicked. He thought quickly for a moment and pick up Spike and Chester again.
"Woah! warn me before you do that!" Spike yelled over the loud stomping of the rooks. Wilson nodded apologetically and took aim. He hoped his aim was on point because he couldn't settle for a miss. Before Spike realized what Wilson was doing he had already been thrown into the air. The small dragon flew towards the closing gate, Chester followed behind. Not only did this ensure that they'd get away, but it relieved some weight off of the cart. Wilson's speed boosted tremendously and he smiled. The rooks were slowly inching farther away from him, rather than closer. The gate was almost closed!
"No! No! Go!" Wilson screamed. The gate was too low for him to go through while he was on the cart. Last minute he jumped forward and landed UNDER the gate. Chester and Spike ran fast to pull on his shirt to get him out of the way.
SLAM!!
The gates finished closing, it made a huge sand cloud from the impact. Spike and Chester began to cough. Waving his claw to clear the dirt, Spike looked around for Wilson. He let out a huge sigh of relief when he saw the man laying on the ground. His feet were pressed up against the gate.
"Phew. Close call there" Spike said.
"Tell me about it" Wilson said in between breaths. Chester scooted next to Wilson and licked him across the face, twice. This got a reaction out of him but he didn't say anything. The three just sat down in front of the gate, Spike and Wilson leaned their heads against it. After a few silent moments, Wilson saw his cart still going. It went right into the forest, he chuckled a bit and stood up.
"We should get going, you two. Twilight's probably turning the town upside down looking for us." Wilson said. He popped his shoulder and sighed.
"Haha, yeah she's probably going crazy right now. You know? This was pretty fun, dangerous, but....fun" Spike said, smiling at Wilson. He returned the smile.
----
The walk back was uncomfortably peaceful, when has the Everfree Forest been peaceful? Spike and Chester said extra close to Wilson during the walk, it may have been peaceful but it was really dark. The largely spanned trees blocked the sun's light out completely, giving predators an edge when hunting. Wilson swore he could see large, green eyes looking at him through the bushes. It made him paranoid, it made him think of the invasive white eyes that haunted, stalked, and scared Wilson while he was on the island. He never really figured out what they were, they only appeared in the dark, when he was going insane. Which, for him, was a pretty common thing. He couldn't shake the feeling of them being here with him, but the color of the eyes had changed. Just like everything else that came here as well. Wilson reached inside the cart and grabbed a spear. Without a word he stopped moving.
"Wilson what ar-"
"SHHHH" Wilson snapped, interrupting Spike. Spike lowered his head and stayed quite. They stood like that for at least five minutes, Chester or Spike were not brave enough to make a sound.
"THEY'RE COMING FOR YOU" The voice taunted, chuckling.
"Shut up"
"YOU KNOW IT'S TRUE. YOU THOUGHT LEAVING THE ISLAND WILL LET YOU ESCAPE YOUR FEARS?"
"I said shut up!"
"YOU DON'T HAVE TO LIVE IN DENIAL, WILSON. FACE YOUR FEARS AND THE FEARS WON'T FACE YOU, EVER AGAIN"
"I SAID SHUT UP ALREADY!!!" Wilson shouted. He charged into a nearby bush and swung violently, the leaves scattering about. He would hit something hard every so often and when he did he hears a cry of pain. It didn't faze him, he was a mindless animal by now. He screamed as he swung, showing no mercy to his victim. Spike and Chester sat there, waiting for Wilson to calm down. When he did, he saw what he was hitting. Laying before him was some kind of wooden dog, it was still alive! It's body was torn apart by Wilson' savagery.
"Oh no, what have I done" He whispered. Wilson knelt down on one knee to comfort the creature. It growled ferociously at him, snapping at his hand. It kept growling until it eventually died, it's cold body lay limp in the even colder dirt. Wilson just stared at it.
"I killed it." He said. His tone, dark and gloomy.
"YOU DID GOOD, WILSON. YOU FACED YOUR FEARS."
"That wasn't even my fear! Why do you keep-" Wilson was cut off by growling. He looked down at the wooden dog, it wasn't even alive. Standing up, Wilson held on tight to his spear. He looked over at the cart, then at Spike and Chester. Where was that growling coming from? He searched the area around him briefly.
"Uhh, Wilson?" Spike said. Fear evident in his voice.
"Yeah, Spike?"
"B-behind you..." Spike whispered. Slowly, Wilson turned around. There they were, six Timberwolves beginning to surround him. He didn't know what to do, he just waited. One moved an inch closer and Wilson pointed his spear at it, another did the same.
"They're going to kill me" Wilson said to himself.
"NONSENSE, THESE ARE WEAK CREATURES. WEAKER THAN THAT STORE OWNER, HAHAHAHHA!!!"
"Not helping"
A timberwolf leaped at insane speeds at Wilson. He held up his spear and got ready for a battle. It was an extremely unfair fight, be he'd do all he could.
"TEAR THEM APART!!!!!"