• Published 3rd Dec 2016
  • 611 Views, 5 Comments

Portraits and Chaos - Dragonborne Fox



Two people follow a strange something that manages to ditch them. When they find a suspicious-looking painting, they find themselves in a place that is very unfamiliar to them. And then a chain of events sparks as soon as they arrive...

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Chapter I- Insult to Injury

Browns and greens darted past them in rapid blurs, nicks and cuts and tears in clothing and skin appearing at a hastening rate. Wood and leaves swatted at them as they descended, wind rushing past their ears and through their hair. The two tried controlling the fall, yet their bodies wouldn’t move; all they could do was shriek in unison as the trees battered them on their way down. Bouncing off here, ricocheting off there, Jonathan and Charlotte tumbled on and on with the grace of a piano rolling down a flight of stairs.

All this wound up culminating in one final thrum from a particularly flexible branch that briefly launched them back up again and enabled them to faceplant in the dirt of a clearing. Both cried out as the dirt gave them the most painful "hello" to their faces that they felt yet, but laid still on the ground when they tried to move only to have pain seize their bodies and render them still. The cherry on the proverbial sundae was the book hitting Charlotte squarely on the head with enough force to give her a concussion for a few hours, bouncing off and landing within reach without cracking her skull or even making her bleed in the process.

Silence lingered for a long time, but a rustling and a soft growl broke it at some indeterminate point and left as it had come. Charlotte turned her head and let it rest on the cheek, vision blurred as tears of pain fought in an attempt to get out. “The painting tilted as I cast the spell… that shouldn’t have been possible,” she groaned weakly, shoulders stiffening for a moment before slumping again. A small sense of relief washed over her as she heard something shift, and through her blurred sight she could make out a red form with a blond top not too far away.

“And it took us a ways off the ground, too. I think it hated us,” Jonathan murmured, nodding his head with a slow gait. He turned to face his companion and added, "Sense anything?"

Charlotte stiffened for a second, grunting as that act only caused more pain to flare throughout her nerves. Still, she pushed it aside for the time being, and tried to get a magical feel for… wherever they were at presently. A creeping sense of dread took hold in her as she realized that she could not sense anything at all.

Which meant that they were likely in danger, and worse yet, powerless to stop it in their current state. "N-no," she whimpered in reply.

Jonathan's brow furrowed, but Charlotte couldn't see it as tears welled up in her eyes. "Joy," he scoffed sarcastically. The sod shifted his arms and tried to force himself to sit up, only to howl in pain and have one hand fly towards his groin when he managed to get a few inches out of the ground. “Oh, Christ, I think the flashlight’s glass broke!” he yelled, the pained outcry sending several birds into a flying frenzy overhead.

Charlotte shifted her arms through sheer force of will and scrambled onto her feet, despite the pain flaring throughout her body. She scooped up the book, raced towards her aching companion and wrapped one of his arms around her shoulder with her free hand all before lifting him up into a kneeling stance.

Grappling his other hand and having that hold her book after fighting with it to get it away from his groin, she cautiously helped him stand on his feet. She shot a glance at their surroundings, immediately finding them dismally dark. “Lovely, we’re still out in the night, and now injured. This is gonna be fun,” she hissed, taking a step forward and wincing as Jonathan mimicked her movement and flinched.

“I heard something; sounded like a bush moving,” Jonathan said in a low tone of voice. Instantly, Charlotte stilled, and her heart thundered in her chest as a faint sound hit her ears. He was right; there was a bush somewhere nearby, and it rustled like no tomorrow. Dread crept in again, now a frantic feeling clawing at the back of her mind, which made her head hurt worse.

“Neither of us can fight; your crotch hurts, and somehow, that painting drained me of all my mana,” Charlotte begrudgingly sighed, her tone hushed as a frown graced her features. “Let’s hope that whatever’s nearby ignores us.”

“You heard the screaming from over here, Harry?” a voice asked from somewhere nearby, followed by a growl from some kind of creature. “Two near-hairless monkeys in clothes? Red and blue?” the voice asked again, and once more, another growl came in reply. The wounded duo shared a glance, and Charlotte had a brow quirked while Jonathan boasted a small but tight frown.

Upon glancing forward, the woman groaned and squinted her eyes as a bright light made itself known where there hadn’t been one before. She could barely make out two figures hiding behind the glow of burning yellow; one had been a bear-like creature, and the other she could’ve sworn had wings.

Letting her eyes adjust, she found her brow shooting up again as a small, yellow, flying horse-like creature floated before her and her friend with a lantern around its neck. A pink mane hung past her withers, ending in a small curl, and bright blue-green eyes stared up at her with concern alight, further accentuated by the near-blinding gleam of the lantern.

The creature scanned them head to toe, and front hooves flew to its face as it gaped in horror. “Oh, my, you two are badly hurt!” it exclaimed in a hushed but distinctly feminine tone, irises and pupils shrinking rapidly. Charlotte opened her mouth to speak, but was cut off before she could even begin as the flying thing went on, “You two shouldn’t be out in the Everfree Forest at night! Oh, thank goodness my friend Harry found you!”

“I was about to ask where we were,” Charlotte grunted, letting a reluctant sigh escape her lips. “Listen, miss… pegasus, my friend here suffered a hit to the pelvis and can’t walk very well.” She faltered for a bit when a foot tried to slide out from beneath her, and Jonathan lurched dangerously close to the creature with a grunt as a result. Struggling for another moment, she pulled him back to his feet with all of her might and readjusted her grip on him. “You have anything that can help me lift him?”

“My friend Harry can help with that; don’t worry, he’s a gentle soul,” the pegasus affirmed with a nod. The bear moved forward and scooped Jonathan off his feet with ease whilst separating him and the book from Charlotte, cradling him in one foreleg without breaking a sweat. “Follow me to my cottage; you two look worse for wear,” the creature said, turning around and flying through the bushes cautiously.

Reluctantly, Charlotte stumbled forward, pain continually shooting up her legs and along her spine as she followed the pegasus. The bear followed closely behind her, and soon all four had disappeared into the thicket of wood. It was a long, silent and grueling walk that felt as if it lasted for hours on end, with exhaustion gradually sinking its deadly fangs into the weary woman the whole time. Eventually, she fell on her knees as her legs finally gave out, body aching and trembling as she tried to keep her eyes open.

The bear scooped her up and cradled her with its other foreleg, letting off a soft growl as it followed the pegasus with the wounded people in tow. The last thing Charlotte saw while she had still been conscious was the pegasus turning to her with a small, gentle smile on her face as a bleary building came into view.

~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~-—-~

Charlotte groggily awoke some indeterminate expanse of time later, sitting up and rubbing her eyes with a hand. The sunlight’s rays didn’t hit her face, yet it had still been bright, and she could swear that half of the place she found herself in was much more blurry than the painting that sent her and Jonathan flying.

She glanced around, finding herself in a bed that wasn’t her own, with plush butterfly-patterned quilts and a pillow and two nearby windows, one round in shape and the other ornately decorated. A fireplace was erected nearby, and at the foot of the bed rested a closed chest. A vase stood on a nearby nightstand along with some kind of bleary red object, and there were exposed support beams overhead that sported bird nests and vines.

“Where am I?” Charlotte groaned, blinking dazedly to clear her half-foggy vision before a cold and gentle breeze caressed her body. She looked down when the feeling of wind touching her registered seconds later, and her face broke out in brilliant crimson; half-bloodied bandages covered her breasts and many parts of her arms. The only article of clothing that remained on her body had been the cowl and the red cloth holding it to her frame, and those had somehow escaped the battering of the trees largely unscathed.

Her arms shot to cover her semi-exposed chest, and her blush deepened as she heard a man groan very close to her. Averting her eyes one way, she found Jonathan sitting up right next to her, also covered in bandages and with little more than his red jacket on. The sod glanced this way and that, and his eyes fell on her in the span of a moment. She locked eyes with him for two seconds before jerking her head in the other direction.

“Look down, at your own body,” Charlotte blurted out after spluttering incoherently for another few seconds. Her companion did as she instructed, and his eyes went wide near-instantly.

“Ah, great, we’re both… almost naked,” Jonathan groaned, reaching forward and flinging the quilt off with a hand. More bandages covered their groins and legs, with no visible sign of undergarments anywhere. “Scratch that, we’re completely naked.”

“And there goes our last shred of dignity. At least whoever bandaged us covered our junk up and kept… whatever injuries we have out of the elements. If Stella and Loretta were here right now, I think they’d have a conniption.” Charlotte nodded with a huff. She turned to her companion-turned-bedfellow and asked, “You still have my spellbook, right?”

“No. It’s…” Jonathan paused mid-reply to glance around, and spotted the book on the nightstand with the vase. He gestured to it with a hand and finished his answer, “Right next to you, by the vase.”

Charlotte turned to it and reached out to it. She'd just picked up the crimson leatherbound stack of paper with one hand when she heard the sound of hooves hitting wood. Her head snapped towards the foot of the bed, and coming right up to it was the same pegasus from the night before, though now she had a white box with a red cross tied to her neck instead of a lantern. “Um, are you two alright? You’ve both been passed out for twelve hours,” she spoke.

“Miss, where are we again?” Charlotte asked, using her free hand to gesture around the room. “And did you… strip and bandage us?”

“You’re in my house, and yes. You two had some pretty nasty wounds all over, especially on your… private spots. I couldn’t leave them out in the open and risk infection. I’m washing the rest of your clothes; they got stained in blood,” the pegasus answered, flapping her wings and lifting herself gently into the air. She hovered closer to them and, when she got in range, extended her hoof out to them in a friendly gesture. “I’m Fluttershy, by the way.”

The two people exchanged a glance, before each shook the hoof that’d been offered to them. “So, what happened? How did you two get all those cuts and bruises?” Fluttershy asked, noticing a very hard frown creasing Jonathan’s brow.

“Me and Charlotte chased something; something big and funny-looking... and really fast. It ditched us after a while, and we found an old house with a painting. So we entered the painting, and it decided to prank us by sending us up in the air through the trees into the sky, and we fell back down again face-first in dirt. That’s the whole mess, and we were taught how to fly, long story short,” he answered, sighing afterwards.

“A painting that pranks those who enter it? Oh dear, that’s terrible,” Fluttershy murmured, eyes widening as she lifted her forehooves to the box wrapped to her neck. She took it off, set it on the bed within reach of her guests, and then darted past them and the nightstand and towards the windows. “Stay put; I’m going to get one of my friends. She’ll know what to do about this.” Charlotte opened her mouth to speak, but before she could utter a word, Fluttershy opened a window with her front hooves and raced out into the sky like a bullet.

“That was… interesting,” Jonathan sighed, lowering his head and letting his shoulders slump.

“Indeed,” Charlotte groaned, raising her book and letting the cover collide with her forehead. She lowered said book and laid back down, her head flopping against a pillow. “Do you suppose Fluttershy just meant ‘stay in bed’ or ‘stay in this house,’ Jonathan?”

“Dunno; she didn’t elaborate which we could do other than staying,” Jonathan said as he shrugged, also throwing himself back down onto the bed. “I’m just glad my gonads don’t hurt anymore, or the rest of me, for that matter. I suppose we should just stay in bed for a while; wouldn’t want to give the horse who wrapped us a scare.”

“My mana’s still drained dry, which means I can’t heal anything. Staying in bed sounds like a good idea to me,” Charlotte sighed before going wide-eyed at the implications of her own remark. She sat bolt upright, turned to Jonathan, and waved her hands defensively as she added, “N-not in that way! Th-the church would have my head i-if I lost my virginity!”

Jonathan dryly laughed, turning to Charlotte with nothing short of amusement glimmering in his eyes in spite of the situation. “And besides, our junk’s still wrapped. Even if both of us wanted to do that, I doubt anything good would come out of it. The church won't stick you on a pike. Chill.”

Charlotte sighed, relaxed, and laid back down again. “So...“ she began, turning her head to the side to glance at her companion, “you think we’ll find the creature that gave us the slip in this place?”

“‘This place’ isn’t the least bit of what that damn whackjob of a painting made it out to be; the house isn’t flying, and I can see trees with green leaves instead of purple leaves,” Jonathan retorted, glancing out a window from where he lay. Even with the limited amount of scenery the window provided, the two could see the leaves were indeed green and not purple.

He went on with a snort, “You might as well be asking me to find Eric’s soul and tell him I want to marry both his daughters. Or find Vincent and tell him that I'd like to marry a nun.”

That managed to get a giggle out of Charlotte. “Just be glad Stella wasn’t here to hear you say that; she’d have knocked your head clean off your shoulders,” she replied, a grin breaking out on her face. She frowned, though, as another thought hit her. "I find Fluttershy a bit... strange, as it were. I mean, it wasn't too often we ran into talking creatures that weren't human, and she definitely fits in that category. Now that I dwell on it..." She paused and turned to look at her wrappings. "How'd she even bandage us to begin with? I mean… hooves aren't the most manageable things in the world… certainly not flexible, either..."

"Well, we've definitely ran into weirder things. For us, this isn't a first. At least she didn't outright kill us while we were out cold," Jonathan retorted, firmly and solemnly shaking his head. "I'm starting to wonder if there are other horses that talk... wherever it is that we're at now."

"You're right about that. Did you see those butterflies on her hips as she spread her wings and flew out the window?" Charlotte asked, turning to her friend as he shot a glance at her and nodded.

"I wonder why she had those butterflies on her body. Or why she was pink and yellow," Jonathan sighed, nodding once more.

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“Wait, what?” a purple alicorn asked as she trotted in a street, a brow arched up high.

“Two… bipedal creatures appeared in the Everfree Forest last night, and one of them told me that a painting sent them here,” Fluttershy explained, sighing as she went along. “They’re in my house, and have gotten some nasty injuries. I wrapped them up and told them to stay put.”

The alicorn’s horn lit up, and she stopped in her tracks. Fluttershy stopped next to her, concern alight in her eyes. “I’ll teleport us to your house and ask them a few questions. Is there anything you found odd about the creatures, aside from the fact one of them brought up a mysterious painting?” she asked, frowning.

“No, unless you count a book with a red cover one of them had on their person, Twilight. As I trotted up the stairs, I heard one of them call it a spellbook,” Fluttershy answered, shaking her head.

Twilight nodded. "And what do they look like?" she warily queried.

"One has blond hair, and the other has brown hair. They seemed friendly though, if… cautious," Fluttershy replied. Twilight nodded again, and in a flash of violet light, they were gone from the streets.