Draconic Awakening

by saber1994

Attack in an Orchard

Elliot slowly returned to the waking world. He looked around to try and find out what it was that had awakened him. Seeing nothing he readied himself to go back to sleep but hushed voices from another room caught his attention. Curious he stood and walked close enough to the door so that he could eavesdrop on the conversation. Elliot looked through the partially open door and saw Twilight and some green and purple lizard talking with one another. He thought that he should alert them to his presence but something was telling him that he shouldn’t do that. Once he decided to wait a moment he started to listen in.

Twilight looked like she could barely hold her excitement and she was talking more loudly than she had intended too. “It really is fascinating Spike. The blood that the human Elliot originally woke up in was dragon’s blood. However there were no signs that a dragon had been there. I didn’t see any claw marks or indentations of when it had taken off, it simply vanished. His blood was still very mysterious, but it had a few similarities to the dragon’s!

“These findings are all so interesting. Hopefully I will be able to run a few more experiments in the near future,” Twilight concluded her enthusiastic recounting of her findings. Elliot however felt nervous considering that it was his blood that she had been examining and the fact that the way she said experiments made him begin to worry for his safety. While the two carried on their conversation Elliot decided that it was in his best interest to sneak out of the library.

He walked over to the door and opened hoping to be as quiet as possible. He slipped through the small opening and pulled the door closed. After he did this he began to worry about what he should do next. Quickly looking around to make sure that there wasn’t anyone who could see him Elliot took to the shadows. Finding his way through this unknown town was going to be difficult, especially with it being a cloudy night.

Elliot didn’t make it too far before his stomach started growling. He knew that he needed to find something to eat so that he could keep his energy levels up. After looking around for a short while, he noticed an apple sitting unwatched. He walked over to it, grabbed a few apples and then ran back to the cover of the shadows. Deciding he would eat some as soon as he was out of the close vicinity of the town, Elliot began to head for the outskirts.

After a short walk Elliot noticed that he was approaching what looked like an orchard of some sorts. Thinking this could be a good place to rest for the night he walked a distance into the trees and found one to sit under. He ate the apples that he had and curled at the base of the tree. All of the sneaking around had worn him out and he knew that he would need most of his energy. With these final thoughts he allowed himself to fall asleep.

Screaming. A high pitched shrill scream pierced through the air. Elliot looked around his bedroom feeling the fear seep in. He had to know what caused the screaming but didn’t want to find out what caused it. Curiosity overcoming fear he climbed out of his bed and walked down the stairs towards the main living room. The first thing that he noticed was the previously white walls now had splashes of deep crimson.

The corpse of a familiar woman lay on the ground. Her body was barely recognizable. There was a six foot tall man holding a bloodied knife standing over the body. His shoulders were heaving up and down as if he were breathing deeply. Elliot could hardly take in the scene and started screaming as loudly as his lungs would allow.

Elliot jerked awake covered in a cold sweat. He was freezing all over, except for his left arm. The slight warmth remaining in the appendage was enough for Elliot to look at it. His fingers and hand were covered in blood. It was then that he noticed that the scream from his nightmare was still piercing through the morning air. He quickly looked around the area and noticed scratch marks covered most of the generally vicinity. It was then that he noticed a small yellow filly lying on the ground with five parallel scratches across her leg.

Elliot walked over to her and asked “Are you alright? What happened?”

All the response that he got was more screaming and the filly trying her best to squirm away from him. Next he heard what sounded like galloping coming directly for him. Elliot looked up and saw a large red stallion charging straight at him. Before he had time to explain the stallions head connected to Elliot’s chest and sent him flying back a few feet.

Elliot held himself up on all fours and began coughing and trying to regain his breath. “This isn’t what it looks like, I promise!” Elliot said as clearly as he could. However his pleas fell on deaf ears as the stallion charged at him again. Elliot stood the best he could and rolled out of the way just as the stallion ran past.

With his arm and leg still injured Elliot knew that he had absolutely no chance in a fight. He tried his best to start running away. His aching leg kept him from doing anything more than a slow jog. However lady luck managed to keep up with him and he was able to run around the trees and avoid the angry red stallion. Eventually Elliot had made his way back to the edge of Ponyville and he ran into the city.

With the red stallion still hot on his heels Elliot knew that he needed to find a safe haven quickly. He looked around and saw numerous and different colored ponies watching the chase occur in their normally peaceful town. It was then that Elliot thought back to the one pony that he felt he could trust and be safe with. Zecora would hopefully take him in and provide him shelter considering she lived on her own.

As he began getting closer to the forest he heard a voice from behind. “What’s going on? You having a race Big Mac?” the voice said. Elliot glanced over his shoulder and he saw a cyan Pegasus with a rainbow mane flying next to the enraged stallion.

“It… attacked… Applebloom…” he said in between gasps of breath. This caused a shocked look to spread across the pegasus’s face. She then turned gaining a determined look and rocketed straight at the back of Elliot’s head. Elliot’s instincts told him to dodge to the left and he did just that. Sadly he wasn’t quick enough and the pegasus crashed right into his right shoulder. Elliot tumbled to the ground and screamed in agony as his right arm caught his fall.

Before the others had time to react Elliot climbed to his feet and let his adrenaline push him the last few yards into the forest. He kept running as quickly as he could. He glanced back and saw that the pegasus had stopped her pursuit and seemed to be having great difficulty in deciding whether to follow or not. Before she could decide, Elliot kept running through the forest and didn’t stop anymore to glance back. After he had made a good distance, he began to look for the landmarks that led to the zebra’s hut. Shortly he saw the familiar building and walked over to it. He limped to the door and knocked before passing out from pain and exhaustion.

Elliot awoke to arguing. He opened his eyes and all that he saw was darkness. The first thing he noticed were voices that seemed to be arguing nearby. Thinking that it was in his best interests to remain unseen he kept still and listened intently.

“Zecora I know that that thing is here. I followed the trail of its blood and it came right to your front door. Why are you trying to hide it?” asked a voice that Elliot associated with the cyan pegasus from earlier.

“He attacked Applebloom. Zecora please if Elliot is dangerous we need to let Celestia know so that she can keep him from leaving the forest,” another voice said that Elliot remembered as Twilight’s.

“At least give him some time to explain, he may not have intended to cause this pain. If what you say is true, then maybe then maybe this day we should make him rue,” Zecora spoke in her usual rhyme.

Elliot had had enough. He didn’t care if these ponies currently thought that he was a danger. He wanted to clear his name. Standing unsteadily to his feet he searched around the room for a door and opened it. As soon as he did the trio turned their heads and looked right at him. The first to respond was the cyan pegasus from before. She quickly shot out of her seat and tackled Elliot to the ground.

With his wounds bombarding his brain with pain signals he managed to say “Please, give me a chance to explain.”

The mare just looked at him and slightly raised herself off of his body allowing him more room to breathe. However she kept her position on top of him to prevent him from trying to run off and escape.

Ignoring the aches of her almost standing on his broken arm Elliot took a deep breath and tried to find the right words for the moment. Saying the wrong thing could cause him to meet unfortunate consequences. “Well last night I overheard Twilight talking about some sort of experiment that involved me. Not wanting to get dissected or anything I ran. Eventually I found an apple orchard and found a tree that I could sleep under. Then I have this terrible nightmare, I still only remember small portions of it, but it was scary. The next thing I know I’m waking up and there are claw marks all around the place I was sleeping and I see an injured little filly and I try to help her. After my attempts were unsuccessful I get attacked by a big red stallion so I ran. Eventually I made it here and I passed out on Zecora’s doorstep.

“This is really all that happened, or at least all that I can remember. However I know for a fact that I wouldn’t have attacked that filly without a good reason, and besides where did those claw marks come from?” Elliot asked at the closing of his story.

The others seemed to think about the story searching for any faults that could show he was lying. Eventually Twilight spoke up, “I think we need to get Applejack here. She is the Element of Honesty and she should be able to tell if he is lying or not. Rainbow could you go and get her while I keep an eye on Elliot here?”

Rainbow Dash nodded and left the house quickly to try and find Applejack. Feeling relief at being able to move again Elliot began to sit up but was quickly forced back down. He began to get really confused before he noticed a purple aura surrounding his body. He then shot a glare at Twilight who simply shook her head.

“Sorry Elliot but I have to make sure that you don’t run away. If you did hurt Applebloom we can’t let you running around being able to hurt others,” she said matter-of-factly.

Elliot just nodded in understanding. It was then that he felt some tears begin to well up behind his eyes. These tears were different than all of the others he had shed recently. These tears were coming from the fear that he felt. Elliot was sure these ponies wouldn’t believe him and that they would put him down like a rabid dog. Closing his eyes and trying to ease his mind Elliot tried to think of any discrepancies in his story. After a while of thought he came to the conclusion that there was nothing to add. This only helped him slip into more despair.

Before he could give the situation much more thought the door burst open. Standing in the doorway was an orange pony who was wearing a cowboy hat. Looking around the room with eyes that burned with a righteous fury she nearly shouted “Where is he? Where is the thing that hurt Applebloom?”

AN: Sorry for the delay on the chapter. Distractions and what not kept me from writing. However it seems that writing at midnight or later seems to help me so I guess I've learned when to start my chapters. I'll try to keep the chapters coming more often.

Comments

[oldtimeydude]

Perhaps you could lengthen the chapters by another thousand words or so? These past four chapters seem like they could be evenly added into only two for all purposes really...

[Lord_Kalbario]

lookin forward to the next chappie

[saber1994]

Sorry guys got a busy weekend ahead of me. Work and my senior prom are gonna be a distraction so the next chapter is gonna be a bit later than hoped, but it will hopefully be up soon. Sorry for the wait