The Other Side of the Horizon

by Rambling Writer

7 - Snakebite

Applejack scrambled backward, her eyes wide as she stared at the nyokakubwa charging their boat. It was big. It was big big big big big. And if it-

An arrow longer than Applejack stabbed into the nyokakubwa’s face, fired from the other boat’s ballista. It, too, was making for shore, but the zebras on board were yelling and screaming, trying to get the nyokakubwa’s attention.

It didn’t work. The nyokakubwa hit the boat and hit it hard. The entire back end of the boat caved in, and the boat tilted back under the nyokakubwa’s weight. Applejack slid down and grabbed at the railing. The boat leveled out again as the nyokakubwa raised its head up and roared again.

The roars turned to pained screams as something sliced across its face. A zebra near the back was standing on her rear legs and swinging something that resembled a sword on an elastic cord. On one end was a blade about two feet long; the other was attached to the zebra’s hoof. She was swinging it around like she’d done it every day of her life, frequently wrapping it around one of her legs to shorten the cord. She was yelling like a loon. Her aim was clear: distraction.

The nyokakubwa turned on her, but another ballista bolt from the other boat hit it in the neck. It switched its attention to the other boat, at which point the swordszebra sliced up its face again. The nyokakubwa whirled on her, but this time, it stayed focused even as it got hit again with a ballista bolt.

Still swinging her sword, the zebra began to back up. But her bipedal stance was awkward, and she slipped on the wet decks and fell. She tried to get up, but the nyokakubwa bore down on her.

Applejack reacted the only way she knew how. She jumped forward, standing over the zebra, and bucked out with her hind legs. She hit the nyokakubwa hard and square on the nose; it froze in place, as if shocked that something had actually hit it. It croaked and drew back, shaking its head.

The zebra blinked at the dazed nyokakubwa sliding back into the water, then at Applejack. “Thanks!” she gasped as she gathered her hooves under her.

Before Applejack could respond, something wrapped around one of her legs, and next thing she knew, she was being dragged across the deck. She scrabbled at the wood, trying to find something, anything to grab onto. But there was nothing.

Bhiza yelled and came charging after her, screaming bloody murder. Applejack tried to reach out, but she was too far away.

Then she went over the railing and into the river.

The chill of the water hit her a like lightning bolt; it was all she could do to keep from gasping and swallowing water. The visual world was a confused, shadowy blur of black and dark green, with nothing coherent that she could see. She heard nothing but waves and boat engines, both muffled as it they were miles away. She flailed her legs around. She felt nothing but water, the tug of the current, and the tendril around her leg.

The river was deep, and the nyokakubwa kept dragging her down. Applejack started kicking at the tentacle wrapped around her leg. Maybe she could dislodge it. But it was no good; the tentacle had too firm a grip and she was in no position for her kicks to do any damage.

She kept kicking. Her lungs began to burn. She kept kicking.

She felt a disturbance in the water next to her. The tentacle shuddered and loosened a little. More disturbances. More loosening, and then the tentacle let go completely. Kicking with all her might, her lungs screaming for air, Applejack swam for the surface.

It was hot and muggy, but the air Applejack inhaled had never tasted sweeter. She took deep breaths when she could and life flowed back into her limbs. As she reoriented herself, Bhiza broke through the water next to her, her sword gauntlets deployed. Water was already washing them clean, but they looked slightly bloodstained.

“Thanks!” yelled Applejack.

“Pwani!” yelled Bhiza. “Sasa!” She began swimming away.

Following her, Applejack finally saw the shore. Both boats had been beached on it, although there wasn’t much left of hers. Zebras were scattered about; some of them were bleeding, but it was hard to tell if there was anyone missing. Idube was yelling, directing zebras on jobs Applejack didn’t know. The moment Bhiza was out of the water, Idube pointed her towards the intact boat for something.

Idube noticed Applejack and said, “You! Stay back! I do not want to have to explain to your princess that her assistant was killed because she did not know to stay away from monsters!”

“But I can help! I-”

“Stay! Back!” Idube’s tone of voice said, If you insist on arguing, I will dropkick you away from the river myself.

Applejack huffed. Fine. She’d stay back. But she needed to find- “Zecora!” Applejack yelled to no one in particular. “Where’s Zecora?” If she was gone-

“Do not fear!” a familiar voice called out. “I am here!”

“Zecora!” Applejack yelled again, running over to her. “Are y’all alright?”

“I am fine; at least, this time,” said Zecora. Indeed, she’d escaped almost completely unscathed, with the only injury Applejack could see being a small splinter sticking out of her ear. She was digging through one of her saddlebags and her apothecaric ingredients were laid out around her in something vaguely resembling order. An empty bottle, a mortar and pestle, and some herbs were arranged out neatly off to one side.

“Lookin’ for something?”

Zecora snorted. “I am missing ingredients, I fear.” She looked over her shoulder and grinned. “But they are easy to find out here.” And before Applejack could say anything, she’d vanished into the jungle.

Don’t panic, Applejack told herself. Don’t panic don’t panic don’t panic. Zecora knew what she was doing. Right? She wouldn’t just run off into the jungle like that if she didn’t think she could take it. Right?

Trying to calm herself, Applejack turned back to the crowd on the shore. The zebras were mostly concerned with moving the injured away from the water. She didn’t know if anyone was missing, but she couldn’t see anybody that was dead. The boat she’d been in had been smashed almost to pieces, but the other one looked mostly intact, if beached from the speed at which it’d headed for shore. The nyokakuwba itself was nowhere to be seen, but the river was rippling in a way Applejack didn’t like.

Idube was still directing zebras around, yelling and pointing. Cautiously, Applejack trotted up to her. “How’re we doin’?” She decided not to mention Zecora taking off.

“No deaths,” muttered Idube. “Several injured, but no deaths. That is something, at least. One boat down, obviously, but the other one should be useable once we get it back in the river. I do not know if the nyokakubwa will return. But as long as we have this moment of quiet, we will gather supplies.” She barked at a zebra and pointed at the ballista on the broken boat. The zebra nodded, clambered onto the boat, and began digging around at the ballista. Applejack guessed she was scavenging the extra bolts.

The lack of any big movement, with no nyokakubwa around, was somehow unsettling. Applejack lightly pawed at the lasso around her leg, then slowly unravelled it. It was something to do. She looked up at the zebra. Something w-

The nyokakubwa exploded out of the water again, roaring with such intensity that everyone jumped and the trees shook; several zebras clapped their hooves to their ears. Purely on reflex, Applejack began twirling the lasso. The nyokakubwa’s tentacle had had its end severed and it was gushing blood.

The zebra on the boat ducked beneath the railing, but the nyokakubwa spotted the movement and lunged for her. For half an instant, Applejack was terrified, ready to see the zebra get devoured before her eyes.

Then she remembered she was swinging the lasso. And she saw the opening.

Applejack threw the lasso and, with unerring precision, it looped neatly around one of the nyokakubwa’s tusks. She bit down on the cord, dug her hooves in, and yanked with all her might. Given that she was an earth pony who’d done manual labor pretty much all her life, she had an awful lot of might.

The nyokakubwa was yanked to one side, missing the zebra completely and smashing its head into the ground. It pulled back and tried to go for the zebra again, but Applejack pulled again and it missed again. It roared in frustration and tugged on the lasso. Applejack slid a few feet, but no more. She had a grip, and she was not going to let go.

She felt another tug on the lasso — from behind. She chanced a look back; a zebra had taken up some of the extra line and was helping her pull. Applejack gave her a quick nod and redoubled her efforts. With the assistance of the zebra, she not only held her ground, she started pulling the nyokakubwa out of the water.

The nyokakubwa shrieked and tugged as hard as it could. Applejack and the zebra started sliding forward again, but then another zebra bit on the cord and added his own strength. The nyokakubwa was losing again, no matter how much it struggled.

Then it realized that while pulling back was useless, those puny equines could do nothing to stop it from pulling up. It raised itself out of the water as much as it could. The hooves of Applejack and the front zebra left the ground. With most resistance gone, the nyokakubwa started moving backwards into the river.

Bhiza charged the nyokakubwa, jumped, and grabbed onto its chin tendril. Still sensitive from when she’d severed the end, the nyokakubwa instinctively lowered its head to reduce pressure on it. But that only put Applejack and the zebra back on the ground. They pulled on the tusk, Bhiza pulled on the tendril, and the nyokakubwa started coming out of the river again.

Behind them, Zecora yelled something. Bhiza let go of the tendril and rolled away. A bottle trailing green smoke soared through the air and shattered on the nyokakubwa’s nose in a greenish haze. The nyokakubwa stiffened and stopped struggling, although it was still visibly and audibly breathing.

Zecora yelled something else and after a brief pause, Bhiza and another zebra darted to the nyokakubwa’s neck, their sword gauntlets deployed. They began hacking at either side. Blood started spraying them. The nyokakubwa moaned, but didn’t move.

The blood flow got greater and greater. Sickened, Applejack dropped the lasso, took a step back and shielded her eyes with a foreleg. There was just so much of it, enough that a metallic stench began to fill the air. Every now and then she’d lower her leg for a brief glimpse, only to put it back up when she saw that, yep, there was more blood. Bhiza and the other zebra were slowly working their way up the nyokakubwa’s neck.

Suddenly, Applejack was nearly knocked off her hooves by a massive cheer from the zebras. She cautiously lowered her leg; Bhiza and the other zebra were both coated in blood (Applejack gagged), but they were grinning broadly, almost smugly. The head was completely on the ground, tilted at an unusual angle. It took Applejack a few moments to realize what that meant: the zebras’ hacking at the neck had been them slowly decapitating it.

The nyokakubwa was dead.

The zebras were ecstatic, cheering like nothing Applejack had ever seen before. Some of them were dancing. Some were even hugging each other. You’d’ve thought they’d just won every single medal at the Equestrian games. Not just the gold, but the silver and bronze, too. Of course, just surviving that would be cause for celebration, much less actually killing that monster. But it still seemed a bit over-the-top to Applejack.

Bhiza came bounding up to Applejack, half her face taken up by a smile and coated head to hoof, nose to tail in a dripping layer of nyokakubwa blood. It made her look more than a little crazy. “Applejack! We-”

“Y-y’all’re covered in blood!” stammered Applejack. “A-any chance you c-can clean yourself up a tad? Please?” She tried to smile.

Bhiza tilted her head and looked down at herself. After a second, she shrugged. “Yes. Wait, please.” With a swing in her step, she strode into the river and began washing the blood off.

Applejack picked up the lasso and began walking away. But she was stopped halfway; the loop was still around the nyokakubwa’s tusk. The lasso itself was still good, though. (Zebras must have been really good at making strong ropes.) To get it off, all she had to do was go up to the nyokakubwa’s head, loosen the loop, and take the lasso right off the tusk. Easy, right?

All she had to do was go right up close to the hideous severed head of the giant, decapitated monster whose body was still pumping blood by the gallon onto the ground.

Yeah, no. “Uh, hey! Bhiza!”

Bhiza popped out of the water in a manner bizarrely reminiscent of Pinkie Pie. “Yes?”

“Any chance y’all can…” Applejack swallowed. This was silly, asking Bhiza to do something so simple. “…can get the lasso off the nyokakubwa for me?”

Bhiza laughed. “Yes.” She dove back under the water.

Well, that was that. Applejack just collapsed onto the ground. She wasn’t exactly tired, not really, but her heart was pounding in her ears from the exertion, and it felt good to just be able to lie down. On good, solid earth, no less; Applejack was sure that when the diplomatic mission was over, she’d have had enough traveling on ships and boats and all the other kinds of watercraft to last a lifetime, and then some.

Bhiza, soaking wet but nice and clean and devoid of blood, walked up to Applejack, the loop of the lasso in her teeth. “Here.” She dropped it next to Applejack and lay down on the ground beside her, contentment plastered all over her face.

“Thanks.” Applejack rolled onto her hooves and began looping the lasso around her leg again. “You’re lookin’ happy.”

“We killed nyokakubwa,” said Bhiza. “Thing good. Thing good very.”

“What normally happens when that thin’ attacks?”

“Boats gone. Sometimes, zebras die. We make it leave.” Bhiza smiled at Applejack. “Never kill it. This part of river? It is safe now. Good very.” She lightly nudged Applejack. “And you helped us much. You crossed ocean; I knew you were pony brave. But not that brave.”

“Shucks, it was nothin’,” said Applejack. “I couldn’t just sit by and let it attack y’all.”

“You could. But you did not. Are all ponies so brave?”

“No. But Apples’re stronger’n most.”

“Apples?”

“That’s my family name.”

“Ah. Family brave.”

“Yes indeed.” Applejack ran a hoof through her mane and stiffened. In the chaos, she’d lost her hat. Her hat was missing. It may have been just a hat, but it had been her hat. She’d liked that hat. She sighed and put her hoof down.

Bhiza noticed. “Missing hat?”

“Yeah,” said Applejack. “It ain’t much, but-”

“That hat?” Bhiza pointed out into the river, near the wreckage of Applejack’s old boat.

Applejack followed Bhiza’s hoof and almost whooped with joy. There, in the debris floating in the river, she noticed not only her hat, but also a few familiar somethings from one of the destroyed crates. “My apples!” Some of them, anyway. She waded out a ways and, once she’d reacquired her hat, gathered a legful of apples. It was just water, they’d be okay to eat. Assuming they weren’t bruised or anything.

Applejack pushed her pile of apples onto the shore and bit into one. It was still good, and wow this year’s harvest had been tasty. She took another bite. Yeah, now that everything had cooled off, that really hit the spot.

She caught Bhiza staring at her. “It’s called an apple,” Applejack said, holding it up. “Try one, they’re real good.” She plucked another one from her pile and offered it to Bhiza.

After maybe half a second’s hesitation, Bhiza took the apple and cautiously bit into it. She chewed for a little, then took another, much larger bite. “Goo’,” she said around the apple in her mouth. “Goo’ vewwy.”

“Glad you like it.”

Bhiza swallowed and chomped into the apple again. “Your name family is Apple… and these are apples?”

Applejack shrugged. “Growin’ ‘em’s a family business. Been that way for… I dunno how long. Centuries.”

Chewing at the apple, Bhiza cocked her head and made a hmm? sound through her full mouth.

“Hundreds of years.”

Bhiza nodded and swallowed. “Time long. But if you like it, good.”

“Like it? I love it.”

Bhiza flicked her ears, cocked her head, and snickered slightly.

Applejack suddenly remembered “love” was a bit of a slang term, wondered what connections Bhiza had made, and felt her cheeks growing very, very warm. “I mean I like it a lot. I, I don’t mean I… actually love it.”

Bhiza was still giggling as she said, “Good.”

They sat in silence for several moments, munching on apples, before Zecora walked up. “You just put up quite a fight,” she said. “Are you hurt? Are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” said Applejack. “Didn’t get hit at all.”

Zecora nodded and glanced at Bhiza. They exchanged a few words in Zebran. Bhiza pointed at one of her front ankles, then shrugged. Applejack guessed she was feeling fine.

Idube yelled out to all the zebras assembled, relief in her voice. “She says we can take a rest,” Zecora translated, “so when we leave, we’re not so stressed. And if you don’t mind, I’d like to tend to the wounded and help them mend.”

Applejack shrugged. “Ain’t like you got anythin’ better to do. Go ahead, I’ll be fine.”

Zecora bowed slightly and began walking away.

But then one last thought jumped into Applejack’s head. “H-hey! Zecora!”

Zecora stopped walking and looked over her shoulder.

“While we were fightin’ the nyokakubwa… did you seriously run into the jungle, find the right plants for your paralytic or whatever, come back out, and brew it in barely a few minutes?”

Zecora grinned a grin Applejack had never seen on her before: a smug one. Zecora was never smug. “Not to brag,” she said, “but that is true.” Somehow, she managed to get even more smug. “I’m very good at what I do.” She flicked her head and strode over to Idube.

Applejack dropped back to the ground. With a few minutes to spare before they had to get going, she had nothing to do. So she would do that nothing to the absolute best of her ability. It wasn’t something she’d want to do on the boat, but right now, on the ground, that felt good.

Bhiza spoke up. “Applejack?”

“Yeah?”

“Before we leave again, can you teach I how to use lasso?”

“It ain’t somethin’ you can learn in a few minutes, but we sure as hay can start.” Applejack draped the lasso over her leg and held it up for Bhiza to see. “First, you gotta l- You have to know how to spin it so the loop stays open…”

---

Once their break was over, they spent a while scavenging in the debris of the wrecked boat, trying to recover what they could. A lot of the diplomatic gifts were ruined, but they weren’t that big a loss (at least, not to Applejack), and they’d been evenly split between the boats. After that, a bit of effort had been required to get the beached boat back into the river. It floated like a charm once it was in the water, though. With all the zebras jammed onto one boat, plus the extra cargo, it was a lot more crowded, but nothing Applejack couldn’t handle.

The rest of the day seemed to pass a lot more quickly for Applejack. Maybe it was the atmosphere; the zebras were jovial, talking and laughing a lot more than they had before the attack. Several of them occasionally came up and patted Applejack on the back. Maybe it was the company; she could talk with Bhiza without Zecora, and now Zecora was actually on the same boat as her. Maybe it was the activity from the fight; she’d spent so much of the past two weeks not doing all that much, but now she’d just helped beat up a giant snake monster. Maybe the boat was just going faster. Whatever the cause, Applejack was surprised when she realized the sun had gone down.

The trees were thinning when they stopped at a sort of way station. It had docks to take multiple boats, but theirs was the only one around at the moment. The station itself was essentially a tavern, with good food and lots of beds for their company. Bhiza explained that, given the size of the jungle, these sorts of stops were almost necessary for zebras traveling to and from Bandari Mji and other such towns. In keeping with the lack of boats, the inn had no other guests.

Applejack may not have understood Zebran, but when one zebra starting talking loudly to the staff, making grand gestures, and everyone listening was gasping, it didn’t take much of a guess to know what she was talking about. We just killed a snake thiiiiiiiis big!

Dinner was… Well, there wasn’t really a dinner. Idube forked over a lot of coins, there was a lot of food laid out for the travellers, and everyone helped themselves whenever they felt like it. Most of the zebras had cleared out a large section of the room and were engaging in an impromptu celebration for their victory that day.

There was music, and lots of it. Mostly drums, but there was also this weird cross between a piano, a violin, and a dance floor. It was spread out flat on the ground and tiled; you jumped on the tiles to play notes. Applejack assumed beginners would stand on it and just hit the notes, but skilled players, like the one currently on it, literally danced out the music. They were playing a tune that seemed to be going nowhere in particular, but was having an awfully fun time getting there.

Most of the zebras were circled around two others, pounding their hooves to the beat of the music. The two zebras in the center seemed to have a back-and-forth type of song going on; one would sing a verse, then the other, then the first, and so on. It was actually kind of appealing, but Applejack didn’t know any Zebran, so she couldn’t understand anything. Every now and then, they’d stumble over a word or two, but they never stopped singing. Were they improvising all that? Wow.

For her part, Applejack sat in the corner, slowly sipping at some beverage she couldn’t remember the name of. It was strong, but deliciously fruity. She wanted to join in, but she still felt out-of-place. Like she’d be interrupting something. The zebras were welcoming enough; it was all in her head.

Zecora sidled over from the bar, a cup balanced on her nose. “You look down,” she said, dropping the cup on the tabletop. “Why the frown?” She took a seat next to Applejack.

This wasn’t the kind of thing Zecora needed get involved in. Applejack wanted to say, “Nothin’.” But she couldn’t. “Y’ever feel like you don’t belong?” she mumbled. “Like y- Wait. ‘Course you do. I did it to you, once.” She sighed. What a great way to start this particular conversation. “I just feel like the zebras… like they don’t like me, ‘cause I’m the puny pony who can’t even get through the jungle without help.”

Zecora took a massive gulp from her cup, downing half of it in one go. “Care not about what others say,” she said, wiping her mouth off. “You proved yourself to them today. You helped them get out of that mess; they know now that you’re not helpless. I beg you, don’t make such a fuss. The jungle takes the best of us.”

“Maybe,” said Applejack. She batted at the straw in her drink. “Don’t stop me from thinkin’ that, though.”

With another huge gulp, Zecora chugged the rest of her drink and hiccuped. “You should at least give them a chance, so come on. You can try to dance.” Patting Applejack on the shoulder, she left her cup on the table and weaved her way into the dance crowd.

Applejack watched her go, thinking. Dancing wasn’t a bad idea, in and of itself, but she’d have to find the right way to get into the c-

Bhiza bounded out of the dance crowd. “Applejack!” she said happily (and maybe slightly tipsily). “Dance!” Even outside of the dancers, she kept bobbing her head and shuffling her hooves in time with the music.

“I’d like to,” said Applejack, “but I ain’t that great at dancin’.”

Bhiza giggled. “That is good! I am not, too! Come!” She held out a hoof.

Oh, why not? It can’t be that bad. Applejack stood up and took Bhiza’s hoof. Before she knew it, Bhiza had whirled her into the crowd, and she was surrounded by dancers, twisting and turning and flailing. It was infectious, and soon she pulling out her own (kind of terrible) dance moves.

And after a few moments, for the first time that day, Applejack no longer felt like an outsider.

They weren’t zebras and a pony in that room. They were travellers. Nothing more, nothing less. They were celebrating a phenomenally successful journey thus far. It was a distinctly zebran way of celebrating, maybe, but Applejack was enjoying it. None of the zebras cared about her orange coat. A few even twirled her in brief, one-off pair dances.

Applejack might not’ve been a zebra. But that didn’t matter anymore.

She kept dancing as the night went on.

Comments

[Mother3Forever]

Nice. Chekhov's Gun? Or AJ's Lasso?

[PonyDragon]

She hit the nyokakubwa hard and square on the nose; it froze in place, as if shocked that something had actually hit it.

So, she technically booped its nose?

---

Nice chapter!
Let's hope Twilight's mission goes better (with less things trying to kill her).

[NobodieZ]

Great wprl/

[grogar]

Nice stuff! love the characterization between zecora and applejack and the fight scene was good too. (Is it wrong i kinda want to see those two paired together?) btw have you ever heard of the Kishi ( two-faced demon in Angola. According to legend, a kishi has an attractive human man's (Or in this case zebra) face on the front of its body and a hyena's face on the back. would be a interesting monster for Twilight group to face.

[QueenMoriarty]

it got hit again with a ballista bolt

Should be a period at the end of that sentence.

shattered on the nyokakubwa’s nose in a greenish.

A greenish what?

[PFisken]

Really liked that Applejack got a chance to shine!