Dashed Hopes and Reformed Dreams

by ChaoticHarmony

Stones and Ointment

Chapter 9: Stones and Ointment

The cold night air brushed against his body as he flew after Rainbow Dash. His mane flapped behind him as he flapped his powerful wings, trying to catch the distraught pegasus. Pain gripped at his chest, but he gritted his teeth and flew on after the speeding cyan pegasus. He watched as the air itself seemed to bend around her, warping and distorting how he saw her. A loud booming noise, followed by a splash if color and a rush of wind, signlaed her going supersonic. Wind tried to follow her, but her rainbow trail soon dissapated without the light to maintain it. Without a guide, he flew blindly on for a few minutes, trying in vain to find the rainbow-maned pony that was his friend.

Pain flashed red-hot in the muscles of his wings, and he began to plummit to the ground, his futile efforts at stabilizing doing nothing to slow the fall. Branches slapped at him, sending stabbing pain through his body when he landed on one of the thicker branches. If those ribs weren't broken, they sure are now. The branches began to slow him more and more and he watched the ground approach. He positioned himself to land, and fell onto all four hooves. Looking back on this descision later, he cursed his stupidity for trying to look cool landing. For now, he contented himself to screaming in pain as his legs were pushed close to their breaking point. He stumbled backward into a tree, disoriented by the signals of pain that were being sent to his brain from all parts of his body. He walked forward, but he ended up moving towards the side drunkenly and smacked face first into a bush.

A growl was emitted from the depths of the bush, and Wind moved part of the leaves aside. Yellow eyes, cold and intelligent, started back at him from inside the bush. He backpedaled away from the bush, fear gripping his mind and making his movements erratic. His eyes kept trying to look at the advancing figure, but what was left of his rationality forced his head to look at the ground. He collided with a wall of bark and jumped away from the rough touch of the trees. His hoof found a stone in the earth, and he tumbled to the ground, getting a mouthful of tasteless dirt. He coughed as the fine particles made their way into his throat, and a pair of chicken legs walked up to him. He noticed with shock that there was a lizard tail in-between the legs where the feathers should be.

The creature's strange legs and body enticed him to look upward, but he fought against the pull. A claw reached under his chin, pulling his face upward, the beast the claw belonged to crooning at him. As hard as he tried, he made contact with the yellow eyes. They seemed to grow, two orbs of glistening gold that gazed into his soul. Numbness gripped his legs, the pain seeming to seep out of them. He gazed into the orbs, content to let them take away his pain that he felt. The numbness crept up his chest, scouring away the pain and leaving nothing in it's place. It was only after the numbness reached his face that he realized something was wrong, and his rational thought returned. Oh no oh no not good not good! He tried to draw away from the petrifying gaze, but he was stuck in place. He started shouting, but after the first shout the stone closed over his nose and started on its way to his eyes. He looked skyward as he thought his last thought. I.....never........even....got to.....take her....on a date....... His vision was filled with grey, and he thought no more.

000

Oh! I hope I'm not too late! Fluttershy flew over the forest, urging her wings to take her faster over the trees. Nopony told them that there is a cockatrice out in the forest tonight! In fact, nopony knew but her. She remembered seeing small stone animals on the way to Sweet Apple Acres, but she told herself that she would get the mean ol' cockatrice to fix them later. Oh and now Rainbow and Wind out out there in the dark and scary woods. All alone!

Suddenly, a resounding boom and a flash of color cut through the night and quickly faded away in the darkness. She found herself watching the sky wrapped around a tree branch.Oh! Goodness that must have been Rainbow! But....what about Wind? She scanned the sky for any sign of him, and she spotted a small dark speck falling out of the sky. She winced as she watched him crash into the trees. A small shock coursed through er body. Oh no! That's where all those stone animals were! She took off from the tree, willing her wings to flap faster as she shot towards the place where Wind had landed.

When she passed over the clearing, she sighed with relief. Wind was looking up at her from the center of the clearing, watching her fly past. She dropped down to land and trotted over to him. "Oh Wind, you have no idea how worried I was about you two!" He didn't reply to her, and she stepped a little closer. "I mean, Rainbow or you could have run into the cockatrice! It's a good thing I found you before he did." Something was strange with Wind. He was still staring at the night sky, unmoving. Almost as if he's a stone.... She giggled nerviously and walked over to nudged Wind. His body was ice cold. A shadow loomed over her. Almost as if....he's a.....stone....

Steeling herself, she took a deep breath and turned to confront her attacker.

000

Small webs of dim-white spiderwebbed across the grey mask over his eyes. Small peices began to fall away from his face, allowing the moonlight to shine inside his stone prison. Feeling returned slowly as larger flakes of his stone skin broke away, slowly at first, but then increasing in intensity. After a few moments that seemed to drag on for ages, he was free of his cage. He took a deep breath and looked over to see a yellow pony glaring off into the bushes. Is that..... Fluttershy?. He took a step forward and promptly fell onto the ground. Yum, dirt. He spit out another mouthful of the brown clods of earth. Second bucking time today.... I wonder if I can get a third in before sunrise.

Suddenly the pink-maned pegasus was atanding over him, looking him over as he struggled to stand. She placed a hoof on him, whispering in a soft voice. "Stay still, the petrifying spell will fade in a moment." She began prodding gently at him with her hooves, feeling his body for other injuries. "I didn't get a chance to look at your injuries at the farm." He gritted his teeth as she poked at each of his wounds and murmered to herself. "Most of these are shallow, and that's good, but some of them are pretty deep. We need to get some healing balm on these cuts." When he started to complain, she stuck her hoof over his mouth. "None of that. I brought it with me. Besides," she giggled softly as he tried and failed to stand up again. "it isn't like you can go anywhere right now anyways."

She pulled a small glass vial of paste out of her saddlebags and walked back over to where he lay. He watched her approach warily. If I could only fly away... Oh well, I know what Fluttershy is like when you don't listen to her. He shuddered a little at the memory of "the stare". She set down the vial in the grass and left to rummage in her bag again. When she returned, she was carrying a wad of bandages in her mouth. She spit out the bandages and picked up the vial again to pull out the stopper. He watched as she poured a bit of the balm on her hoof and walked over to him with a reassuring smile on her face. He tried to move away, but the spell's lingering effect stopped his efforts cold. She lay down in the grass beside him, rubbing her two front hooves together to spread the balm on them both. She reached towards a particurarily painful cut on his side and he pressed his eyes shut, fearing the worst of pains to slash across his side, adding to the pain that the cut already burned with.

Her hooves touched him, and he felt himself instantly relax as the hooves worked the medicine in small circles. Coolness spread and smothered the fire that burned from the cut. He sighed in dissapointment as she pulled her hooves away, only to feel his spirits lift when her hooves came back onto another inflamed cut, snuffing out the fire and leaving the same soothing coolness. She smiled and she worked, rubbing away all of his pains. Well, she is the Element of Kindness after all. I can see why that is. He lifted his head a little to look at her better. "Mmmmm Fluttershy?" His voice sounded groggy, even to his ears.

She didn't look up from her work. "Yes?"

He lay his head back down on the grass. "Thanks for helping me." She only spared enough time to look at him and smile before returning to her task, an intent look on her face as she slowly probed around one of the cuts on his side. She kept murming to herself as she poked and prodded at his coat. Pain flashed red in his vision, and he shot up into a standing position. She looked concerned as she reached out a hoof to force him gently back down. He yielded to her gentle pressure, settling his body gently back onto the grass. "I think...uh...a few ribs are broken, nothing serious though."

She looked at him as if he were crazy. "Nothing serious? You have at least 6 broken ribs!". She fluttered over to her bag and searched franticallu through it. She pulled out a sprig of bright purple berries. She shoved them in his face, looking intensely into his eyes. "Eat these!" When he started to protest again, she turned up her stare from commanding to dominating. Her bright eyes seemed to dominate his vision as she stared into his very soul. He leaned forward and nipped every berry from the branch, chewing slowly and swallowing the bitter paste. She leaned back, smiling reassuringly at him. "Now let's fix those ribs."

He could feel nothing as a numb haze gripped his mind. He watched as the clearing grew further away as she carried him away from it, struggling with his weight. I was....supposed....to....find.....Dash.... Oh well.....Buck it....... He drifted off into a dreamless sleep.

Comments

[SuperPinkBrony12]

Well looks like Wind has hit a set back.

[Rocket0007]

Dem berries...
I'm surprised that the cockatrice came back for this round 2