After an hour of pacing around the library, Twilight Sparkle's relief was found in the form of a scroll with the Royal seal. Upon reading it, the purple mare found that these strange cells were recovered north of Fillydelphia in the Celestial sea. The princess did not actually state her theories on where they came from, only setting out Twilight's task.
She was to record the changes to the miniature ecosystem day by day, as well as nurturing the dominant species even further, prompting the possibility of new growth and an expanded insight into evolution.
After careful calculation into the temperature and humidity at which these things could survive at, Twilight successfully transported all life from a cramped container into a proper habitat, where the beings could thrive and grow in a proper monitored containment.
She was just finishing off some of her calculations when Twilight heard a sort of- dragging sound. She spun around, ears perked up warily. A murky green blob that Twilight recognized as the dominant species was thrashing in the artificial shallows she had built. However, instead of trying to get back into the cool water, the thing was trying to drag it’s boneless body up the sand with great heaves, being propelled by… it’s leg?
Well, that’s new.” Twilight thought, strangely unbothered about this particular happening.
The dragging was quickly replaced by the ear-twisting sound of bones cracking and reforming, flesh tearing and a sickening ‘pop’ as a mound of tissue grew longer, and the end split into two. It now had two legs, which it used to resume the dragging sound, only with twice the amount of efficiency.
Twilight turned away and rubbed her eyes as it topped into a makeshift tree line off the beach, followed by faint annoyed chirping. Twilight looked into the observation hole, and saw the creature staring at her carefully; almost if it had developed intelligence in the hours she had taken to prepare the sanctuary. But that was impossible, right?
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Fluttershy’s mind was cloudy as she rested in her bed, nursing a light headache. Something about the way Mr. Bear had, well, died just wouldn’t stop bugging her and kept making her relieve the moment when she found Mr. Bear lying face down in the dirt. Not even some of that expensive herbal tea that Rarity had imported from Saddle Arabia could quiet her worried thoughts.
The marks on the body reminded her of Mr. Bear himself, when she found him he was scared and lashed out at the wild animals that lived in the forest. With some gentle persuasion however, the Pegasus mare convinced him to calm down and let her dress his bandages. Fluttershy smiled at the memory, and then it hit her.
Who’s to say that the animal that killed Mr. Bear wasn’t also scared, alone and hurt? What if they were suffering right now, while she was lying here in her soft bed? Oh, how selfish it was of her to be relaxing in comfort while the poor thing was probably dying out there?
With a slightly harder resolve, the mare clipped a lantern to her saddlebag and took a deep breath before walking into the forest that bordered her house, ignoring how the rays of the dying sun cast crimson beams of light into the shadowy depths, shining a few meters into the forest before being swallowed by the darkness.
White-tail woods were surprisingly dark for this time of the evening, and the first stars were hard to make out underneath the birch branches. The wind had dropped so you could hear every hoofstep making the leaves crackle underneath. The trees seemed to stretch out forever, and the light of the sun had long since left her behind to wander.
Utter silence unnerved Fluttershy as much as deafening noise did. It made the fur on her body stick up, and her ears had unwillingly flattened against her head, while her wings were in fight or flight mode, either stretching out to make themselves look more threatening, or curling in on themselves.
The light from her lantern barely broke the blackness, and once or twice she stumbled over a twisted root or a stray branch, the noise echoing throughout the emptiness. Fluttershy sighed. This expedition was turning out to be a lot harder than she thought. While she didn’t expect to find the creature right away, she expected to find some kind of life within the usually teeming forest. It was like the entire place had been robbed of its spirit, its life. With that unsettling thought, Fluttershy quickened her pace and resolved to find this creature as fast as possible.
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Tf'kt's nostril's flared as she picked up a new, unfamiliar scent. The scent of living things was good, after some overly enthusiastic hatchlings set off on their first hunting party. Although the heavy hunks of meat hanging from their mandibles would feed the pack for a while, the meat was gathering flies, even in the deepest corner of the food hole. She was the only one awake, keeping watch over the young and old of the pack.
Although Tf'kt was not meant to leave watch, the enticing scent of unfamiliar genetics called her away, promising power for the pack. With a flutter of undeveloped wings, she hopped from tree to tree, easily seeing though the forest with special eyes taken from a type of flying food. Tf'kt quickly honed down on the scent, and found it in the form of a strange creature radiating light like the sun. It had four legs and pink growths coming out from it's backside and head. There were also a pair of large flying food wings pearched on it's back, though Tf'kt wondered if they could even fly at all with the size.
There was something... different however, about this creature. There seemed to be a well of power resting deep within itself, something Tf'kt and most likely the rest of her species had never even seen before. The feeling of it was overwhelming and intoxicating for the inexperienced creature, and she found herself lusting for the power that rested deep within that creatures soul. This went far beyond genetics, she realised. This could make her the most powerful in the pack.
And with that, she lunged.
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The creature and Twilight held a staring contest for a very long time. A tendril waved uncertainly while Twilight's eye merely twitched. She was sure of it now, sure of the fact that within this ridiculously short time span, this anomaly had gained intelligence. It was simply taking her brain a while to filter through this new knowledge into something that might make sense.She turned away. She looked back. The creature was still lying there, shyly waving a tendril.
Her eye twitched again. The creature chirped happily.