I woke up in the middle of the night shivering. I had been right about the nighttime temperature drop and I quickly grabbed the blanket I had pulled from the trailer. As I wrapped it around myself, I heard howling sound in the distance. I couldn't quite place it, maybe a wolf, maybe a coyote or possibly something else entirely. My knowledge of desert creatures was fairly limited. What I was sure of is that they tended to be on the smaller side, nothing big enough to break into a car, that much I was pretty sure about. At least that's what I told myself.
Hearing those howls did get me to thinking though. As far as I could tell I only had two options. I could try to get the truck unstuck, which was going to be a lot of hard work, if not impossible. My second choice and the more likely solution, was to walk out of here, wherever that was. I wasn't really afraid of nature, I had done plenty of camping as a kid and never had any issues. But I had no idea where I was and while I figured it was unlikely I'd be running into anything dangerous, the chance existed. It might make sense to dig out one of the guns in case I had to defend myself. The choices of what to do the next day weighed heavily on my mind as I tried to get back asleep.
The sun was barely over the horizon when I woke up. Since it was still fairly cool out, I figured it would be as good as a time as ever to decide exactly what I was going to do. Freeing the truck would be a lot harder work but on the other hand I had no idea where I was, no way of knowing which was the best way to go nor how far the nearest town or even road was.
I divided out my remaining food into a small portion and ate one for breakfast, then climbed out of the truck and headed over to the trailer. It took me a few minutes but I dug out the revolver and its holster, one of the boxes of ammo and the lever action. The revolver was the easiest to carry around, and if I ran into someone, it wouldn't look as strange. Stumbling out of the desert carrying a rifle might scare a potential rescuer off. I attached the holster to my belt, loaded the revolver and put it into the holster. Then I dug around until I found a small bag, loaded it with another twenty rounds and put it in one of my pockets.
Behind the truck and the trailer was the bottom of a fair sized hill that blocked most of the view to the north and east. The vast majority of the west was covered in mountains and to the south and what I could see of the south east was nothing but mostly flat rocky desert. Climbing the hill would hopefully give me a better view and the scope on the rifle was the closest thing I had to binoculars. With any luck I'd find a road on the other side, but if not maybe, I could get some clue as to where I was.
I reached the top of the hill and began to survey the surrounding area. The hill I was standing on was actually part of a series of small hills that ran in a northeast direction, getting taller and taller eastward until they converged with a large mountain range. The mountain range formed a large semicircle around my current position, starting in the east and going up and around until it reached far into the south west. South of my position the land mostly flattened out except for the occasional butte and rocky hill, but even with the scope I could not see an end to the desert. Huge snowy peaks dotted the eastern portion of the range, then the dropped in height to the north before shooting up again as they went west, but they didn't seem nearly as high in the west as they were in the east. However, the western part of the range was far enough away that any an accurate judge of height was beyond my abilities so I couldn't be certain.
"At least this makes for an easy choice," I said to myself.
There was no way I was getting over the eastern peaks, south lead deeper into the desert and west was too far for me to walk, leaving north as my only option. The lowest part of the range I could see was north and slightly to the east so that was the direction I would go. Of course that meant traversing a series of hills and I estimated it would still take me at least three days to reach what I hoped was the edge of the desert, but it was better than sitting here waiting to die. I headed back down, put the rifle back in its case, placed that back in the trailer then locked it up.
The rest of the day I tried to remain as inactive as possible. The shade provided by the hill kept me relatively cool until about midday. At that point it got unbearably hot and I climbed into the truck and idled it while running the AC. Over the course of the day I nibbled my food, saving as much as possible for the trip north. I limited myself to a single can of soda, thinking the water bottles would be far better for when I was hiking through the desert.
Eventually the sun and the temperature started to drop and I prepared myself to leave. Through sheer luck, I found a backpack stuffed under the rear bench. Inside it was a flashlight, a small first aid kit, one of those foil emergency blankets and a folding knife. I put the knife in my pocket, threw a bit more ammo into one of the side pockets of the bag and then put the rest of my supplies in the main compartment.
I took one more look around the truck before heading out. I cringed when looking at the dashboard, still covered in unreadable gibberish. What if this was permanent? Losing the ability to read would be a huge handicap and I didn't know how to deal with it. Would I be able to relearn? What if I couldn't? I had so many questions but none of them would be answered until I got back into civilization. And I was going to do that, no matter how much effort it took. The last thing I did before heading off was grab a number of small rocks and make an arrow pointing in the direction I was heading. I placed the arrow halfway between the truck and the trailer, hoping that if either one was spotted that the arrow would be found as well.
I had been walking for hours, the sun had set long ago and I was now making my way by moonlight. Every once in awhile I could hear the sounds of night creatures roaming the desert but so far I hadn't seen anything. Barely having eaten or drank anything all day, compounded with not being in the best of shape was making the journey far more exhausting than I had hoped. On the plus side all the movement was keeping me warm in the cold night air.
Some of the hills, like the one I was climbing now, had steep cliffs that made my stomach twist in knots while forcing me to zigzag around them rather than move in a straight line. The time I had to spend searching for a traversable path was slowing down my progress even more than my lack of energy, but there was nothing I could do about it but carry on. More than once I had gotten turned while trying to figure out which way to go, one hill looking more or less like another, especially in the dark of night.
Not that it was pitch black out, in fact the night sky was lit up more than I'd ever seen it before. Wherever I was, it was far enough away from civilization that there was zero light pollution. The nearly cloudless sky was awash in starlight and the gentle glow of the moon. Billions of stars were visible, far more than I could have ever hoped to see back in my home town. I reached a stopping point, sat down and caught my breath. While I was resting I downed a soda and tossed the can onto the ground next to me. Normally I would never do such a thing, but any weight I could get rid of was less that I'd have to carry.
After I finished my drink, I decided to take my first good look at the night sky while I had a quick rest. The stars were beautiful, even the small town I lived in had enough ambient light that I never got to see anything like the serene image painted high above me. For a moment I forgot that I was stranded in the middle of nowhere, likely with some form of brain damage and that my chances of making it home alive were slim.
The the whole thing came crashing down when I noticed that I couldn't find any constellations. I wasn't into star gazing or anything but I knew enough to find some of the better known ones. The Big Dipper, part of Ursa Major, had always been pretty easy for me to find and Polaris, the north star, was the end of the handle on the Little Dipper, also known as Ursa Minor. I could not find either one of those no matter where I looked. A chill ran down my spin when I looked at the moon. Even she looked wrong, the craters that normally covered her surface were wiped away leaving a smooth texture that looked strangely alien.
Where the hell am I? I thought to myself. The night sky should look more or less the same anywhere in the northern hemisphere and the moon well, that shouldn't change at all. Could my memory be affected by whatever damage was preventing me from being able to read? That was the most likely cause, the alternatives were too improbable to consider.
Sitting here wasn't going to change anything and I still had a long journey ahead of me so I got back up and started walking. The rest of the night passed with out incident and just as the first light of dawn crept up over the distant mountains I found a rocky outcropping that would provide hours of shade. Taking the backpack off and using it as a makeshift pillow I quickly fell asleep.
The heat during the day was brutal, even hiding in the shade provided little relief; nighttime could not come soon enough. By the end of the day I was completely out of soda and halfway through one of my water bottles, I also had exhausted my food supply, my original intent had been to stretch it out over a few days but the cooler was too large to bring with me and I didn't want it to go bad in the heat so I ended up eating it all. I wasn't too concerned though, as I knew I'd die of thirst long before I died of starvation.
As soon as the temperature had dropped to bearable, I set out once more. A few of hours into the night and I knew I was in trouble; tonight, even more than the previous night I was running into cliffs, narrow trails and other impassible terrain that forced me to go farther and farther off course in attempt to make any headway. I got to the top of a hill and looked around trying to find the best way down to the other side. In front of me was a near vertical drop of about 30 feet and off to my right was looked even worse. I had only two choices, climb back down the way I had come up and try to find a new path, or head to my left which was steep but still doable. Not wanting to lose what little progress I had made in the last hour, I decided head down the left part of the hill.
A little over halfway down, I lost my footing on a loose rock, Only through sheer luck did I manage to fall backwards and land on my butt instead of tumbling down the hillside. As I sat there catching my breath a silvery glint of moonlight, reflecting off something farther down the hill caught my eye. I slid down as best as I could until I got close enough to make out what I was seeing.
"Fuck!" I shouted at the top of my lungs. It was a soda can, one of the several I had disposed of the night before; I had been going in circles. It must have happened as I was trying to get around some of the obstacles I had run into. The damn hills all looked the same at night and the completely alien sky prevented me from using any of the stars as navigational points. This was bad, real bad. I had at most a day, maybe a day and a half's water left and even if I had a straight shot to the north, my original estimate had been at least three days, which in retrospect had been rather optimistic. These damn hills were the problem, if the land was flat like to the west I could make the trip in less than half the time.
I was going to have to travel in the day, it was the only way I could reliably see where I was going. But that meant contending with the day's heat and what remained of my water would be gone before I knew it. The only way I was going to pull this off without ending up dead was to core more distance in less time while simultaneously not getting lost. If I headed to the west until the worst of the hills were behind me, then I could move north much quicker and then head back east when I got near the mountains. I decided to wait till morning, figuring any more attempts at moving at night would only likely make things worst. I found a decent spot and settled down for as good as a rest as I could get.
The next day I discovered I had been right about one thing, the with the sun providing plenty of light it was pretty easy to keep an eye on where I was headed. As for gaining actual speed that was debatable. It had taken me a few hours in the early morning to head west far enough to where the hills died away. Now I was on open desert terrain and while I had been making good time earlier on, the heat was really starting to get to me. The longer I walked the hotter it got and soon I was forced to take so many breaks that any early advantage I had gained was quickly being lost.
I had just sat down on a small boulder, ready to take another break, when the first desert life I had run across jumped out from the other side of the rock. It was a small coyote, and it sounded pissed. At a guess it had been sleeping under the shade of the rock, maybe it had a borrow under there, and my stomping about had woken it up. The thing flew out, howling and yapping like crazy; I reached for my gun, but when it saw me on top of the rock, it paused, then hauled ass as fast as its four legs could carry it in the opposite direction.
I watched as it scrambled away and then something impossible happened. There was a slight rumble and a section of ground near the coyote moved. A fraction of a second later a monstrous form erupted from under the ground, a viscous triangular mouth flew open and a set of tentacles snaked out grabbing the coyote. Before it could even begin to struggle the tentacles retracted and pulled the coyote into range of row after row of sharp teeth. I watched in utter horror as the creature chomped down on the coyote swallowing it in one bite.
Deep down in the back of my head, my brain knew what I should have done but my body wasn't listening. Before I could fully process what I had just watched I was off that boulder and running with a speed that I didn't know I could muster, back towards the hills I had spent last couple of hours trying to get away from. I had a singular purpose, escape and for a few moments it was all I could really think of. I made it a few a hundred feet before the panic subsided enough that I could manage something other than running away. Glancing behind me, I saw the giant worm thing sticking up out of the ground in the distance, looking towards me. A second later it dived back underground, heading in my direction.
This time a small voice in the back of my head, that sounded suspiciously like Burt Gummer, told me to get to a rock. Frantically I looked around before spotting a large one not too far away. I altered course, pouring on yet another burst of speed. I reached the boulder and scrambled up to it's highest point as fast as I could.
A shower of dirt exploded out in all directions as the creature shot upwards, snapping at my feet. I rolled as best as I could, pulling my legs away of its reach. It snapped two more times then opened its mouth wide and let out an ear shattering roar. It turned its head towards me, mouth opened wide. Three tentacles shot out, reaching much farther than I would have believed possible; the first two missed but the third latched onto my leg and began to drag me across the rock. With a scream I raised my other leg and slammed the heel of my boot down on the tentacle as hard as I could. The tentacle let go and the worm let out loud scream, likely unused to its meals fighting back. I scooted back as far as I could but the boulder wasn't very wide and there was nothing preventing the oversized worm from circling to the other side.
The creature swayed back and forth in front of the rock, the rest of its long body still underground, trying to decide the best way to make me its next meal. It stared at me with lifeless black eyes while I popped the snap on the holster and drew my revolver as quickly as I could.
The motion of my arm drawing the gun must have set it off because its mouth flew open again and it hissed loudly, as it prepared to grab me a second time. I quickly aimed at center of the worm's mouth, not knowing where else to shoot. It was large enough that I wasn't going to miss but I didn't know if the bullet would kill the thing or just piss it off. Three times I pulled the trigger, each time having to bring the gun back in line with the monster as the powerful kick of the .44 magnum kicked the barrel upwards. Three red splotches, much smaller than I wished they were, appeared inside the worm's mouth. One of the shots had impacted with a tentacle and it hung limply, dangling out the side of the creature's jaw.
One more shot and the worm's jaw snapped shut, the jagged teeth tore into the injured tentacle, completely severing it. The scream that it made as the tentacle fell down tore into me making my blood run cold. Dark red fluid poured out of from the spaces between its teeth and dribbled down its face. It glared at me with its haunting dead eyes; I aimed my revolver one more time but just as I was about to fire the worm decided it had had enough. It spun around and dived back down into the ground leaving the still twitching snake-like tentacle in the dirt at the base of the rock. Only a minute later when my ears stopped ringing did I realize that I was still screaming as I collapsed against the hard rock.
It was hours before I moved again and even then it was only to get a much needed drink. Struggling to sit up, I pulled off the backpack and took out a drink. After that I opened the revolver and ejected the spent brass. I threw the empties in the backpack, reloaded and then put the gun back in its holster.
Slowly I inched towards the edge and looked down. Red stains on the rock and the ground showed signs of the earlier struggle and the slimy black tentacle still sitting in the dirt offered all the proof I needed to show that I hadn't imagined the impossible encounter. The smell the thing was letting off stung at my nose and almost made me throw up.
"What do I do now? What the fuck do I do now?" I said out loud, as if the expecting an answer from the universe.
Walking across the open desert was completely out of the question. That left traveling up in the hills, they were fairly rocky which is probably why I hadn't run into this thing before. I couldn't in good conscious call it a graboid, as it only bore a passing resemblance to one, looking much more like an oversized snake with a really weird jaw, but if it exclusively traveled underground I supposed it would have a hard time with solid rock. I hoped anyway.
I tried to ignore the voice in the back of my head that told me the whole thing was impossible. Creatures like this just didn't exist, but another look at the slowly rotting tentacle quickly shut that voice up. In the end there was really only one choice. In the open desert I was likely to get eaten alive, and going back to the truck only guaranteed that I'd slowly die of thirst. That left the hills and I'd have to travel during daylight to see where I was going. That was if I didn't get eaten on the way back. With as much speed as I could muster, I headed back into the hills that I had left that morning.
I took my last mouthful of water and tossed the bottle to the ground. I'd be fine, no more impossible creatures and I had made good time yesterday. I was almost there, nothing to worry about.
A ray of sunlight on my eyes forced me awake. I got up and stretched, ignoring the dryness in my throat. I had to set out early before it got too hot.
I shivered in the cold night air, wrapping the emergency blanket as tightly as I could. I had to keep moving, even at night or I wasn't going to make it. One foot stomped slowly in front of the other as a dry cough racked my body.
Everything looked the same, I couldn't...
No this is the right way, keep going!
My foot slipped and I tumbled down a hill. I was confused as to why I hadn't thought of that earlier, it was way faster than walking. My vision turned fuzzy.
Get up! Pick yourself up out of the dirt. I don't care care about the pain, MOVE!
...thirsty...
**********
Golden Dawn landed outside of the Smokey Griddle, her stomach rumbling in hunger. It had been a few weeks since she had eaten out, mostly sticking to dinner at home with cold leftovers for lunch while she worked in her shop. She trotted inside and took a seat at one of the empty tables and started looking through the menu.
"Good morning Golden, I haven't seen you here in what seems like forever."
Golden Dawn looked up smiled, usually the pale goldenrod pegasus liked to sleep in, but a deep need for pancakes had forced her out of bed much earlier than normal, "Hey Morning Glory, yeah I've been really busy working on things, haven't had much free time. How are you doing?"
"I can't complain, it's been pretty slow so far, but I expect the morning rush to start up soon. Do you know what you want to order?" Morning Glory asked as she levitated a small notepad out of her apron pocket.
"Yep, I'll take a full stack of pancakes, oh and a glass of orange juice," Golden replied.
"Sure thing, I'll bring it out shortly."
Golden Dawn watched as Morning Glory headed to the kitchen in the back to pass off the order to Cast Iron. Like Morning Glory had said, the diner was mostly empty, the only other ponies still eating breakfast were Speedy Delivery, the town's mailpony, Justice, the sheriff and an unknown pegasus wearing a mail uniform. Probably one of the flyers who occasionally did priority mail delivery from the much larger Appleloosa to the north when it couldn't wait for the weekly train delivery. With the restaurant so quiet, she couldn't help but overhear their conversation.
"I don't know what it was Speedy, or rather what they were, as there were definitely two separate objects. They both looked like large metal wagons but one was completely covered, that was the silver shiny one. The other was black and had an open back with a small covered section and I think a glass window in front. It was hard to get a good look as I was pretty far away. But one thing I can say for sure, it looked like it was stuck. The black wagon was half way across the gap on one of those old dried up stream beds, I'm guessing somepony tried to jump the gap and didn't quite make it."
"And you saw it where?" Justice asked.
"About 50 miles south from the northern edge of the Badlands, and maybe about ten miles east of that old mining road, it was up in the hills," Pumpernickel said.
"Wow, that's a bit of a trek, I don't have time to go look now, maybe later this evening," Justice said. "What were you doing that far south?"
"You know that old miner, Rusty that lives in a cabin near the old mine?"
Justice and Speedy both nodded.
"He had a priority package."
Golden Dawn's interest was piqued, if only because an all metal wagon sounded interesting and she needed to take a break from working or she was going to go stir crazy.
She trotted over to the group of ponies. "Excuse me but what are you talking about?" Golden Dawn asked, interrupting the talking ponies.
"Pumpernickel here said he saw some sort of contraption crashed down in the Badlands," Speedy Delivery said.
"I'm not positive that it had crashed, like I said I was kinda far away, but yeah it was two big... things on wheels. The first was metal and box shaped, the other was a bit different. I don't know a great way of describing it, maybe like a wagon with an open back and the cab from train stuck onto the front."
"Did you see anypony around it?"
"Nope, but I didn't stop to look inside."
"I've got nothing going on today, I can fly out take a look." Golden Dawn replied.
"Thanks Golden, I appreciate it. Even in my younger days I couldn't cover half the area on hoof that a pegasus can on wing. I really need to get another pegasus deputy to replace Wild Sky." the old sheriff said.
Golden Dawn noticed Morning Glory walking out with her breakfast so she returned to her table. After she finished eating, she paid for her meal and then trotted outside. She headed over to the general store, bought a canteen and filled it with water, then threw it in her saddle bag. A flight to the Badlands wasn't terribly long, but if she did run into somepony that had been stuck out there she wanted some extra water just in case. Finding enough moisture to form a rain cloud that far out in the desert was job better fit for a pegasus who specialized in weather work.
With a flap of her wings, she soared into the air, heading towards the location in the Badlands Pumpernickel had described. She followed the mining road for about half an hour then turned east towards the hills. As she approached the hills she began to circle looking for the stream bed Pumpernickel had talked about. Eventually she spotted a bright light reflecting off the silver surface of the unusual object. She flared her wings to bleed off speed descended down to the ground. Trotting up next to it, she saw some wheel tracks behind the thing running through the dry dirt, but they vanished after a few feet. It was almost as if someone had dropped the metal cart in the middle of the desert. She quickly trotted back to the cart so she could give it a closer look.
Whatever it was, Golden was sure that it had crashed. The silver surface was all banged up and covered with dirt. At the front of it was two metal bars that extended out before meeting up at a single point. That paint on the front was all scratched up and the metal had some dents in it. From the looks of it, she guessed that this was a hookup to attach to the other strange vehicle. She poked a hoof on the big black tires. They appeared to be made of rubber, something she didn't often see outside of bicycles or the rare steam car.
Golden decided to head over to the black wagon and give it a better look. The thing was stuck on two rocks, as if it's driver had tried to jump the stream bed but not quite made it. Other than some scuff marks, it seemed to be in fairly good condition for having crashed. The rubber wheels on this thing were even bigger, the largest she had ever seen. They seemed to have caught on either side of the gap, suspending the thing in the air.
Whatever it was, it was impressively built, a wooden cart would likely have broken something trying to jump that kind of a gap. Judging from the rather sturdy looking construction it must have weighed several tons. That meant it wasn't getting unstuck anytime soon. It would likely take several earth ponies to pull this thing out of it's current position. Or possibly one if they filled in the gap and made a bridge. She began to fly around it trying to get an idea of what would need to be done to move the thing. That's when she noticed that one of the side windows had a red streak on it.
Oh crap! I forgot to check if anypony was inside it! she thought to herself.
She flew right up to the window and looked inside but the cabin was empty. The inside of the cabin was far more luxurious than she expected. There was a comfortable looking bench in the front with a smaller on in the back, but they were oddly shaped. There was a wheel inside, perhaps to steer the thing, again, this reminder her of the few steam cars she had gotten to look at. But this thing didn't appear to have a boiler anywhere unless it was hidden inside somewhere. Behind the wheel was a bunch of dials that had strange writing on them. There were knobs and buttons everywhere. Whatever this thing was, it looked very complicated.
That's when it dawned on her that she forgot to check the other cart. She flew back to it, and headed to the back which had looked like it opened. There was a lock preventing her from opening it, so she decided to knock. She waited for a minute or two but got no response.
Makes sense, if there was somepony in there they'd be locked in! she thought.
"Hello? Is anypony around?" she shouted out, but no reply game.
Golden Dawn wasn't sure what to do next, strange metal carts don't appear out of nowhere, so somepony must have left it here. While not exactly clean it wasn't covered in an amount of dirt that she would expect for something that had been out in the desert for a while. Plus if it had somepony would have noticed it before. Finally she decided to fly around, maybe they had wandered off and she might be able to spot them from the air.
Taking flight she looked towards the black wagon one more time. That's when she noticed the arrow pointing north made of rocks.
"How did I miss that?" she said out loud to nopony.
She quickly gained some altitude and headed north, keeping her speed down so she wouldn't miss anything. 25 miles later she still hadn't found anything of note. All she could think of was that the pony who had made the arrow had gotten out of the Badlands. But if that were the case where did they go? There was a road just near the edge of the badlands. If the pony followed it west, which any pony that knew anything about the local area would do, they would have ended up in town, it was only about 5 miles more. If a strange pony had wandered into town, Justice would have heard about it and not sent her to investigate. She supposed they might have followed it east but that was the much longer road it was at least a two days journey to the east before running into anything of note.
She was quickly approaching the edge of the Badlands when a gleaming light caught her eyes. She circled down to investigate and between two small hills. She wasn't quite sure what to make of what she found. It was a silvery foil mirror, easily the thinnest, lightest piece of metal she'd ever seen, far thinner and more flexible than tin foil.
Golden Dawn picked it up the foil, brushed the dirt off its surface and then folded it up, putting it in her saddle bag. She took off and began to circle the two hills from the air, trying to see if she could find anypony. That's when she spotted a creature lying in the dirt half way down the hill's northern side.
"Hello?" she shouted, galloping towards the thing. It didn't look like anything she had seen before but whatever it was, it wasn't moving. She reached the creature, which looked like it had seen better days.
"Are you alive?" she asked poking it with her hoof but it didn't respond.
The creature was face up in the dirt, eyes closed. The clothes it was wearing were covered in dirt and torn in a few places. The few places where its hairless skin was exposed were red with sunburn. There was a large bump and dried blood on its head. She lowered her ear to its mouth and could just make out a very quiet dry wheezing sound, coupled with the almost imperceptible rise of its chest, it let Golden know that the creature was still breathing.
If she didn't act soon though, it might not be for long. She had no idea what it was but it was a pretty safe bet that it needed water. She grabbed the canteen from her pack and opened the top. Using a wing she lifted the creature into a sitting position, gently opened its mouth and slowly poured some water in.
The creature responded with a series of coughs. She let up on the water until it had stopped coughing and then tilted the canteen back again so the creature could get a second drink. It swallowed the water greedily until the canteen was almost empty, then the creature's arm slowly raised up and weakly pushed the bottle away.
"Are you alright? Do you need more water?" Golden asked still holding the creature up.
"No... thank you," it whispered quietly before coughing again.
"How long have you been out here?" Golden asked.
"Days? I dunno, what day is it?" it answered.
"Sunday, I'm going to bring you to a doctor, is that okay?" Golden asked with a look of concern.
"Yes..." it said, its eyes fluttering open for the first time.
The creature looked at Golden Dawn, she smiled to reassure the creature.
"Everything is going to be okay now," she said.
"Oh," it replied, blinking a few times, eyes scanning back and forth as it looked Golden Dawn over. Then without warning it it collapsed, falling forward, unconscious.
"Are you okay?" Golden Dawn asked, but there was no response.
She tried to wake the creature up again but after several minutes of no success she gave up.
"Looks like I'm going to have to carry you back," she said to the creature.
She wrapped her hooves around its torso and pulled as carefully as possible. The creature ended up not being nearly as heavy as she thought it was going to be, with great care she draped it across her back, careful to not cover her wings. She tried to take off but the creature started to slide off her back, with nothing to hold it in place there was no way for her to fly without dropping it. She placed the creature back down on the ground, this time she she slipped her front hooves under its arms and gently lifted it into the air.
"Ok Golden, you can do this," she said to herself. While the creature wasn't very heavy she had at least a 15 miles flight back to the town and she wasn't going to be able to fly anywhere near top speed. Staying low to the ground just in case she dropped the creature, she started to fly back towards Hoofston.
30 minutes later, and panting heavily, Golden finally reached the outskirts of the town.
"Golden! I haven't seen you in ages. What the hay are you carrying?" she heard from above her. Looking up she saw Blue Skies, one of the town's weather ponies flying down towards her.
"I don't know!" she shouted back. "I found it just inside the Badlands, it's injured, I'm bringing it to Doctor Heart's."
"Do you need help?" Blue Skies asked, flying down to Golden's level.
"Grab it's legs?" Golden asked.
"Sure thing," Blue Skies said, swooping under Golden and latching on.
"Thanks," Golden Dawn said.
"No problem."
Working together, the two pegasus ponies flew across town carrying the creature over to the doctor's house. They set it down as carefully as possible, then Golden cantered over to the door and knocked on it.
"Coming," Golden heard from inside the house. The door creaked open and Golden Dawn saw the familiar face of Dusty Heart, the town's old earth pony doctor.
Golden Dawn explained the situation as quickly as possible, "I found him out in the Badlands when I was checking out something for Sheriff Justice." Dusty Heart looked at the creature, scratching his head with his hoof.
"I've never seen a creature like this before, do you know what it is?"
"Nope, but it can talk, I gave it some water and it woke up just long enough to tell me it had been out there for days before it passed out again."
Dusty Heart galloped inside, returning a moment later with a stretcher. "Let's get it on this, " he said carefully laying the stretcher out.
"Careful now," he said as the three ponies moved the creature as gently as possible.
Slowly they brought the creature inside and set it down on one of the the bed's Dusty had reserved for patients. It was a bit too short for the creature's height and its feet stuck out over the edge, giving Golden a good amount of perspective of how tall this creature actually was. Dusty Heart began to examine the creature, focusing on the obvious head wound first. Golden Dawn and Blue Skies left the room, heading back to the parlor Dusty used as a waiting room so they wouldn't be in Dusty's way. After a few minutes, Blue Skies turned to Golden Dawn.
"I have to get going, I'm on cloud patrol, let me know how everything turns out," she said.
"Will do, thanks for the help," Golden Dawn replied.
Blue Skies left to get to work while Golden Dawn remained, sitting and waiting for Dusty to finish. About an hour later he came out of the back room.
"It's hard to know for sure, since I have no idea what this thing is, but I checked him out as best as I could. This is what I can tell you, it's very likely that you got to him just in time. He's very weak and I'm not sure how much longer he would have lasted without your help. He was severely dehydrated and probably hasn't eaten in awhile either. He's also had some pretty bad exposure to the sun. I'm very proud of you Golden, if it wasn't for your help he'd likely be dead. Apart from exposure and dehydration the only real serious injury I could find was the bump on his head, the rest were just minor cuts and scrapes and of course the sunburn."
There was a thump in the other room and the two ponies turned to look back.
"Maybe he woke up?" Golden Dawn asked.
"Let's go find out," Dusty Heart said in reply and the two ponies headed towards the back room.