Ponyville's new neighbour

by Tecuro

Chapter 9

Once again Twilight found herself awake much earlier than she planned, this time however there was no beautiful bird song or stunning sunrise instead there was a starry night and a frantic beating on her front door.

“Who in Equestria could be awake this late?” she groaned to herself, and started heading downstairs past a snoring Spike, who mumbled something about Rarity and an ice-cream mansion until a thunderous roar shook through the entire library.

“Ahhh!” Spike screamed as he leapt into the air and landed squarely on Twilight’s back holding onto her tightly “What was that? Are we under attack?” he asked looking around for signs of invaders.

“I don’t know but we need to find out,” Twilight replied as she galloped to the front door and upon opening it discovered a frantic Steed blocking her way.

“Steed?!? What are you doing here? What’s going on?” Twilight demanded of him.

“Well, do you remember the disgruntled manticore I mentioned?” he said, looking guilty, “It’s possible that he may have followed me here” - another loud roar rang through the town - “just maybe.”

Before Twilight could scold Steed a very disgruntled manticore with a nasty looking black-eye sprang from behind a nearby house (the residents of which were peering from their windows in fear and disbelief) and upon spotting Steed charged straight towards him.
In an act of stupidity, only once seen before, Steed also charged head first towards the beast and would have been done for had Twilight not teleported a large fruit cart in between the two of them, causing Steed to skid to a halt – the Manticore however was not so agile and careened head first into it, smashing it to pieces but also dazing the beast.

“Run!” Twilight yelled, then quickly turned-tail and sprinted as far from the manticore as she could get, with Steed hot on her heels (as well as Spike hanging desperately to her neck), and eventually found a place to hide at the back of the school house.

“I think we lost him,” Steed panted while scanning the horizon, “So, what’s the-” he was cut off by yet another roar.

“What did you do to this manticore anyway?” Twilight questioned, giving Steed an angry glare.

“Well while I was in the Everfree Forest-”

Spike then spoke up, “Hold on! What were you doing in the Everfree Forest? Or better yet who are you?”

“To answer your first question, I was lost, and to answer your second question, I’m Steed,” Steed explained, with an irritated expression.

“Fair enough,” Spike remarked.

“As I was saying, I came across his den while in the forest so he tried to fend me off and I tried to get past him, there was a bit of a tussle between us and I maybe, possibly, might have dropped a boulder on his head,” Steed finished his explanation with an regretful grin.

“Well maybe you should apologise to him,” Twilight advised, sternly

“As soon as I get the chance I will, but so far any time I get close to him he tries to inflict as much harm upon me as possible. I think he’s gone from disgruntled to revenge-fuelled-rage.”

Spike suddenly light up with a bright idea, “Where’s Fluttershy? She’ll be able to sort this out!”

“Back at the cottage trying to keep order, I assume,” Steed said to him, “the manticore must have caught my scent because he made a bee-line from the forest right to the cottage and virtually broke down the door. I ran to lead him away from Fluttershy, but not before big-mean-and-scary back there caused something of a ruckus.”

“So what are our options?” Spike asked, dumbfounded

“I could run away again,” Steed suggested, “or we could find another boulder; that worked well the last time but this one needs to be bigger!”

“Or we could try to resolve this peacefully,” Twilight interjected.

“Or we could try that…” Steed agreed looking at his hooves.

“Err… Guys… You might want to turn around…” Spike hesitantly said. With a feeling of impending dread, Twilight looked behind her and came face to face with the creature from which they were hiding.

Steed quickly stood between Twilight and the manticore, “Hello Mr. um… manticore… I’m sorry for dropping that boulder on you the other day… I uh…” before he could continue the manticore took a swipe at him that he just managed to dodge, “Hey! I’m trying to apologise here! The least you could do is not take my head off until I finish!” he yelled, irately at the manticore as it raised its paw for another attack, fortunately for Steed however Arrow swooped in out of nowhere and started to peck and claw wildly at the creature’s face

Twilight saw the opportunity to escape and was about to take it when the thrashing manticore spun blindly and hit her with its tail with enough force to send her straight into the school through a, thankfully, open window, but also knocking her out cold.

For the second time that night Twilight awoke, this time thanks to Spike. “Come on, Twilight! Wake up!” he shouted at her, while shaking her vigorously.

“I’m awake! I’m awake!” she answered, brushing Spike of her chest “Where’s Steed?”

“He and Arrow ran towards the Everfree Forest and the manticore went after him.” At that point Applejack and Big Mac both appeared in the door.

“Twilight? What’s goin’ on out here?” Applejack asked, looking concerned and confused “We heard some sort of commotion and came to see if we could help, right, Big Mac?”

“Eeyup,” Big Mac confirmed, while looking out for signs of trouble.

“Steed is being attacked by a manticore, they’re somewhere in the Everfree Forest, and he needs our help!” Twilight quickly explained.

“Eeyup” Big Mac agreed and then led the group to the forest.

The group was able to follow Steed and his attacker easy enough -with the amount of carnage the manticore made it was almost impossible not to know where it went- and they quickly found Steed and Arrow trading blows with the disgruntled Manticore near the outskirts of the forest (though Twilight supposed the manticore was more than disgruntled at this point). Big Mac wasted no time and rushed straight into the fray, Applejack however was a bit more cautious.

“Well, this is ah mighty fine pickle,” She mused wincing as Steed was launched into a nearby tree before regaining his sense and charging back in with gusto, “any thoughts?” she asked to Twilight and Spike

“They look like they can take care of this, we should just leave them to it,” Spike readily suggested, looking hopeful

“We can’t abandon them, Spike!” Twilight countered, glaring at the baby dragon, “we have to get them to stop fighting… somehow…”

“That may be easier said than done, Big Mac’s got that look in his eye again,” Applejack stated looking uncertain as Big Mac sent a powerful kick into the manticore’s chest.

“Well if we don’t stop this soon somepony’s going to get really hurt!” All of a sudden a loud crashing sound came from deeper in the forest.

“What was that?!?” a now terrified Spike asked but before he could get an answer the sound was heard again, this time loud enough to make everypony and the manticore look around in fear. For a moment there was silence, and Twilight thought that whatever was out there must have left but that thought was quickly refuted as a much louder crash sounded through the forest and then, erupting through the undergrowth came the source of the noise; a much larger and much angrier manticore this one however was female and surprisingly accompanied by a very stern looking Fluttershy.

“Fluttershy!?! What are you doing? Get away from that thing!” Steed yelled at her.

“Her name is Mrs Minnie Manticora, and she’s here to pick up her son,” Fluttershy said calmly.

In disbelief, Steed looked to the manticore he was just locked in mortal combat with and saw it back away from its mother looking at its paws. “Her… son...” he repeated slowly

“And speaking of which you’d better get over here, young man,” Fluttershy then turned her frown to the manticore, who from the look on his face knew he was in a lot of trouble and slowly made his way towards his mother, that is until she let out a deep growl upon which he quickened his pace.

“Now, before you go,” Fluttershy said to the manticore family, “Steed, come here please.” Still dumbfounded Steed made his way to Fluttershy, but still kept his eyes on the manticore son. “Now, Steed, I think you owe someone an apology,” she said to him.

That broke Steed out of his stupor, “What?!? I already apologised! It’s not my fault that he tried to knock my lights out before I could finish!” he complained, ironically, looking disgruntled.

“Steed.” Fluttershy cautioned

“Fine. I’m sorry.”

“And you as well, mister,” Fluttershy then said to the very rueful looking Manticore who let out a long low grumble, “he says he’s sorry,” Fluttershy explained to Steed.

“So… We cool?” Steed asked to the beast, which smiled and gave Steed a playful nudge that still toppled him.

“Much better,” Fluttershy breathed looking content, “now we should all get back to bed.” She then turned to the manticore, “I expect to see you tomorrow to help clean up the mess you made,” she told him with a firm look. The manticore nodded heartily and then followed his mother back into the forest.

“Come on, everypony.” Twilight said to the group, “let’s go home.”