The Guardian

by Alexshy

2. Neverfree

An early ray of sunlight sneaked through the arched window into the hall. It jumped from one floor plate to another and soon reached the stepped platform. Soon it climbed the steps, the throne and finally Alex’s nose. When the ray peeked into his eye, Alex tried to move away frowning through sleep and woke up. At first, he yawned quite peacefully, perhaps he thought that all the events prior to this morning were a dream… or better say a nightmare. Not the worst one in his life, but definitely a shiver-worthy. Then Alex rubbed his eyes, shooing the rest of sleep, and… his eyes met the hall, the floor plates, the high windows with sunlight coming through, the… pony armour sets in the arcs and his own self, curling on the throne and wrapping himself in an ancient night-coloured tapestry.

“GASP!!!”

He was still in that nightmare… or the daymare… or whatever mare it was.

‘Oh, no, Alex, you should really hold back from all those horse jokes,’ he said to himself. ‘Right before more of them become real.’

Yes, regardless of his denial or whole impossibility of the surrounding, Alex couldn’t probably imagine any acceptable explanation of the recent events being a joke, prank, any other less mind-wrecking kind of mishap. There could hardly be such a rich and demented fan of the show or even group of them, who could build the castle of Regal Sisters in the middle of nowhere with such care and attention to the tiniest detail. Build and then make it degrade, like if a few hundred years have passed. And the signs of decay were nothing close to artificial, as Alex could remember from the previous night.

So, if it walked like a duck, swam like a duck and quacked like a duck, then it most likely WAS a duck. The only adequate explanation of the events, he faced, was that Alex had somehow got to…

‘How was it called?’ Alex wrinkled his forehead, trying to remember. ‘Equestria. God damn right, Equestria. You are in Equestria, man! Congratulations! TADA!!!’

He then thought, if there were IT specialists needed there, or if the person he was negotiating about his new job looked like a horse… a pony better say.

‘C’mon, Alex, stop it already,’ he laughed aloud. The latter made him cringe again: the feeling of a tight clew of flaming snakes perhaps faded a bit, but it never went away. Then he heard the plaintive singing of his empty stomach.

Alex stood up from the throne and stretched. Surely his sleeping place wasn’t the most comfortable, but he thought he shouldn’t complain, as he got no real choice anyway. Still, it was better than sleeping on the stone floor.

‘Now it’s time to get outside and think, what I have to face and how I can get through all this,’ he jogged to the stairway at the other end of the hall. Despite the slight pain inside, he simply needed to make the blood run faster. Besides, Alex secretly hoped for the outside forest not to become his second-night standing place. All those expectations called for faster moving.

As he thought last night, this wide staircase led him to the hallway on the ground floor of the castle. And the big doors on the other side of the hallway were the entrance. Or in his lucky case – the exit. Alex almost flew there; his feet hardly touched the floor. Fortunately, one leaf was completely missing, while another hung askew on one hinge. If the doors were intact or even locked, he doubted he could open them with bare hands. In that case, jumping out of the window would be the only way out. Despite being on the ground floor, the windows were high enough, which already made any thought of jumping through uneasy for Alex.

He exited the castle and ran down a few more stairs to the ground. Ground, finally, Alex was so happy to see it right under his feet, well, boots thankfully he still had them, that he could probably fall down to his knees and kiss the dust.

The thick wall of the forest closely surrounded the castle. Alex noticed, there were all sorts of trees at once: pines, oaks, willows, elms – the mix we couldn’t normally see in one climatic area, not even in one forest next to each other. While he was able to identify the majority of the trees (some were still new to him, and if he was a botanist he could easily say that there had been none of some on Earth), the whole variety of smaller plants, bushes and flowers were completely new to him. Alex wisely decided to stay away from completely unknown flora unless absolutely necessary. He wasn’t allergic back at home, but… he wasn’t at home anymore. God only knew, where he actually was, and if indeed it was Equestria (some part of Alex’s mind still tried to struggle with that idea), there could be surprises as he remembered.

Indeed, Alex was surprised finding out that he remembered enough details from that long-gone day when he got acquainted with Equestria and its realities! So, now they turned out actually real, and it was good that he could remember at least something.

The first thing he needed was the proper direction. Having the castle strictly behind the back he looked to the sky. The position of morning sun told him he was facing north. As far as he remembered, the nearest town, he knew anything about, was also to the north (and slightly west) from here. So, if he proceeded the way he was facing, he should finally get out of the forest and be able to have a better view of the surroundings. Thus he could correct his path to the town later outside of the woods… unless he could find a high ground to rise above this sea of trees and see another landmark. He preferred to think not, what it could mean to find a HIGH ground. With this in mind, Alex deepened into the forest.

Apparently, it was late spring here too. Lots of flowers filled the air with various unknown delicate scents. Insects were flying everywhere on their daily business, pollinating the flowers. Alex noticed bees, dragonflies, colourful butterflies of unknown species. The trees around him were full of birds’ “chatter” and singing. If he was less focused on his path, he could probably notice some birds practically following him, while chirping in quite noticeable communicating manner. Yet he noticed that the whole life here was innocent, untouched and unharmed by the human. Birds, getting closer to him than anywhere else he was before, were not only more curious up to denying self-preservation, but obviously not familiar with a human, thus harder to startle. Thankfully he had not yet met any of the bigger beasts, which seemed to be common to this forest, judging by how big and wild it was.

Alex was more concerned about his further route through the forest than any sightseeing. He tried hard to remember, which obstacles the main characters of the show met, so he could be at least partially prepared for what he was going to come across. It seemed that his mind finally became capable to operate the events around Alex as parts of reality rather than some bad joke. So he took as the fact that he was in Equestria and needed to follow the path, pony girls from the movie went, to get to the civilized area.

‘If someone told me that I should seriously remember the details of the show as ones of vital importance,’ he thought. ‘I would have told them, they were totally nuts.’

‘So what they were, the obstacles,’ he wrinkled his forehead. ‘As far as I know, there must be a bridge right after the castle, then some shallow river, then some sort of area with dead and spooky trees, then some rocks’, he sighed and shook his head. ‘Always something pleasant, now climbing those rocks. Or were they river, bridge, rocks, then trees? It could be each-way equally possible,” he muttered to himself in a deadpan manner. “Although, I suppose the bridge was right before the castle.”

‘SHIIIIIIIT!!!’ Alex gulped nervously. How could he forget? ‘That bridge is a deadly creepy suspension bridge over a narrow, but somewhat deep canyon. And it must be time-worn… unless some…pony is regularly maintaining it.’

Alex felt that cold sweat started running down his neck and back. There was no possible case, which could force him to consciously cross that bridge. Even a mental image of thin wooden planks, swinging on the ropes above the sharp rocks far-far below in the mist, gave his stomach almost palpable punch, making Alex cringe in a qualm.

‘Damn that, but who could imagine that I ever get in such a situation?!’

He kept walking over fallen trees and bypassing particularly thorny bushes while trying to keep the general direction, his mind spasmodically searched for a less phobia involving solution. The canyon was about 20 feet wide, not a long bridge to cross… for one who wasn’t scared to live higher than on the second floor. And there was no chance one could get over the canyon without the bridge. Of course, Alex’s mind obligingly offered him an image of a fallen tree “bridge”, which he was so “thankful” for. Like if it could be any worse already.

Soon Alex noticed that the forest was slightly thinner here, forming a narrow, but noticeable, long ago abandoned path. Doubtfully there was any other road to the ruined castle, so it was safe to assume that he wouldn’t get lost at least. Reassured by that thought Alex sped up as much as rugged terrain allowed.

Alex covered a few hundred yards when he noticed the unnatural silence around. And he could swear that before he stepped into the thinner vegetation, the forest around was full of sounds: birds singing, insects humming. Now though it seemed that even wind muted itself, hiding in anticipation of something. Whatever it was, Alex didn’t like it at all. He stopped and crouched, making himself less visible from the distance and trying to remember fast, what kind of predators could one naturally expect to meet here. The thought of a dragon (and there were dragons as he could remember, big adult dragons with tons of nasty habits, not only small and adorable ones like Spike… or how this little pony companion name was…) sent a shiver down his spine, but he dropped it as hardly possible. If it was a grown-up dragon, he would have been toasted already from above most likely.

What else?.. Wolves? Wolves were common here, though they were not like our usual wolves. Alex couldn’t remember, what exactly was special about them and scolded himself for that. And there was, of course, that beast, ponies met in the movie – the Manticore. Right when Alex was wishing heartily, it wasn’t a Manticore, moreover a hungry and grumpy one, he heard a distant roar. Not a very loud and angry, but it sounded like one belonging to an animal larger than a simple wolf. It wasn’t distant enough either for the situation to be calming.

‘Predators rely on hearing and smelling more than eyesight!’ Alex tried to breathe less and make his heart beat slower, but obviously failed at that.

The roar sounded once again, closer to where he was. It was still not agitated, but yet very determined. And the strength of the sound, reminding a heavy load truck diesel, was self-explanatory. The beast, whatever it was, most likely smelled Alex’s trail and the mere fact, he wasn’t chasing yet, said only about him being unfamiliar with everything human-related, including smell. Later Alex thought, he was indeed lucky being not seen by the beast, so the latter was unsure till the very last moment if he should deal with the one who left the trail.

‘Merlin’s pants, damn it entirely and every part in particular, I’m out.’ Alex jumped on his feet and stormed along the path as fast as he could, while still avoiding slipping or smashing himself against some tree.

Manticore, and now Alex was absolutely sure it was him, heard the sound of something getting away, roared triumphantly and rushed after.

Fortunately, they were still in the woods and the vegetation, growing and fallen, didn’t allow the clawed menace to gain full speed. Alex thought that in the field he would have had no chances. Surely he was in decent form, but so was Manticore, despite the unhealthy diet. And having four legs, instead of two, was, of course, the unsportsmanlike advantage. The heavy crunch of the large beast wading through the foliage behind his back made Alex pay no attention to the branches lashing him. He tried his best to stay at his feet, hearing that the beast was slowly, but constantly, shortening the distance.

‘Oh, finally, this is it,’ Alex heard some noise ahead. ‘If it is a river then I’m lucky double time. If only I could cross it and hide on the other side. Cats don’t like water, besides it must get the bastard off my trails, if I swim a little down the stream.’

‘Fat chance, but… nope!’ his hope faded when he ran out of the forest into the open area at the edge of the… canyon.

The gap was indeed narrow enough, with its far edge slightly higher. Rocks and old roots were sticking out of the stone wall. The noise Alex heard, was probably wind, whistling in the canyon, or there was some stream at the bottom… That was of no importance now. Alex managed to grasp all that in one wild glance; he still couldn’t force himself to get close to the edge.

The open space was wide, wide and deadly, as Manticore could reach him here in a few good jumps. Alex spotted the bridge to the left from where he exited the forest and stormed towards it at the supersonic speed. Later he thought that he could probably make a Sonic Rainboom if he tried a bit better.

‘This is it,’ he almost slid to the full stop before the bridge. His stomach happily reminded of itself and his heart started beating somewhere in his throat. ‘Final stop. Depot. What are you going to do next?’

He threw a wild look back. The bushes at the end of the forest path let away a creature, which mostly reminded a lion with small rudimental wings (which could look even funny, in slightly different circumstances) and a thick scorpion tail, which was now evilly raised and demonstrating the sting. This “lion” was about the size of a young elephant though, very angry and disappointed by the fact he still wasn’t able to catch his prey. When Manticore saw his aim being much smaller and apparently easy to claw, he let out a loud howl and leapt towards Alex.

‘Run, you idiot!!!’ Alex turned to the bridge. ‘Beefsteaks aren’t acrophobic for sure, but you’d rather not become one!’

God only knew how much did it cost, but Alex managed to cover half of the bridge in some miraculous leap of faith, as he later called it. Then the whole world started spinning around him and he grasped the ropes on the sides, as his legs suddenly turned into jelly. He couldn’t make himself to move any further, even if someone poked him with a candent metal stick in the butt.

Alex closed his eyes and prepared for the worst when he heard a loud crash behind and receding angry roar, which soon mixed with the noise from the bottom of the canyon.

“Squee!” The sound, which came out of his mouth, wasn’t near anything a grown man could make, it resembled one of a rubber toy with squeaker. He cleaned his lungs. “Cough, cough!”

Truth be told that wasn’t because of Manticore, Alex couldn’t give less buck about the beast at that moment. Alex prayed for the only thing – the bridge to stop shaking and not falling apart entirely. Though he wasn’t sure which was the worst: to fall and become a pancake or be stuck at that bridge unable to move.

Risking to get another panic attack, Alex tried to look back carefully. Manticore was too eager to get his annoyingly fast and not giving up prey that he made one big mistake – leapt in the air too early. He landed on the bridge a couple of feet behind Alex and old wooden planks couldn’t hold his weight. There was a several foot gap with the cracked wooden sticks hanging on the suspension. And there was no way back now, not for Alex at least.

He wasn’t sure if there was any way ahead for him either. Perhaps the perspective of meeting the night on that bridge didn’t seem bright enough, or something else… But Alex managed to get control over his quaking legs after a minute. Clenching to the ropes like a paralytic, slowly moving his feet forward, one after another, trying to focus on the aim, but not the bridge doubling itself in his eyes, Alex crossed to the other side.

When he reached the solid ground, Alex collapsed to his knees. A fit of nausea was so strong that he couldn’t avoid vomiting. His stomach was empty for more than 24 hours already and that made the feeling even more tormenting. Flaming snakes inside him, almost forgotten due to the fast pace of later events, awoke and added to his suffering.

“You could have become more civilized after Fluttershy relieved you of the thorn in your damned paw!” Alex gave the finger towards the bridge when he stopped shivering.

He got on his feet and headed to the forest on that side of the canyon. The terrain was gently rising here and the path was more pronounced.

‘Good. That will help me recover after the long run and… stuff,’ Alex twitched, the image of the canyon was still fresh. ‘At least the road is less overgrown with foliage here.’

‘And there must be a river up ahead,’ he remembered, he had no water to drink for ages either. ‘I can take a breath there.’

The returned sound of birds chirping in the trees was the best music to his ears. That meant, there were no threats nearby. Alex thought that perhaps it would be smarter to get something as a weapon, to pick a branch or stone, but soon he dropped that idea. The additional weight could slow him and he didn’t know exactly, how far he was to go to get to the town. Those ponies spent almost a day to cover the whole distance, but again, they travelled on four legs and were most likely familiar with the path in general. Besides he didn’t feel like ready to wave a thick branch. He could easily startle a single wolf away without, but a branch could hardly help against a pack of them or something like Manticore. Alex tried to avoid thinking about facing a dragon, a grown-up one. Speed and reaction were his best weapons at the moment. And the hope of not coming across any more canyons or cliffs.

After an hour of walking, when Alex became slightly worried if he had taken the wrong way, despite apparently there was only one old path here, he started hearing the sound of running water. The air became slightly cooler and tangibly damper. Alex sped up towards the gap between the trees.

The river was not very wide and supposedly not very deep, rocks were sticking here and there from the running water. It was flowing down the hill towards the canyon behind and no doubt fell into it somewhere, forming a waterfall. Despite the hill wasn’t very steep, the flow was fast enough and formed visible swirls in deeper places.

‘Well, at least the water must be clean enough,’ thought Alex. He couldn’t think about anything else now, when he suddenly realized, how thirsty he was.

He made one more pleasant discovery when he reached the bank. A few bushes of hazel (well, they looked like that) with plenty of nuts, evidently suitable enough for a starving adventurer.

‘Now you are an adventurer,’ he smirked to himself. ‘Lara bucking Croft.’

He remembered the castle and the bridge. ‘What will your adventures end with?..’

Alex kneeled at the river bank, the water was indeed crystal clear and he scooped a handful and tasted it. He thought he never tried anything more delicious. Maybe it was thirst or maybe the water was indeed so clear and fine. Anyway, Alex drank enough to flush the sour taste in his mouth and to keep himself going further.

‘Don’t know, when I can find any water, and I don’t have anything to take some with me.’

Alex tried a few nuts to make sure, they were indeed what they looked like, then ate as many, as he thought was possible without making himself uncomfortable with unfamiliar food. He decided to stay for a while and have a rest, but before that, he got to the water once again and washed his face nicely then dipped the whole head into the stream.

‘I can’t afford any sleep now,’ he smoothed wet hair, pressing the water away.

*

The entire morning passed in various cares in and around her cottage. Fluttershy fed and took daily care of her animals, the number of which would probably make any other pony desperately give up. Anypony, but Fluttershy, the Element of Kindness embodied. Besides, while treating her little and not so friends she always showed inscrutable agility and cheer. Everything flew, rolled and sang in her hooves in those moments.

Nevertheless, there was much work to do and time fled insensibly… till it was noon already. And that was considering her having a habit to wake up with the sun.

Fluttershy just finished with the daily medical care of a few sick pets, realizing that she couldn’t delay refilling her potion and herbs reserve anymore. That meant, she needed to visit Zecora and collect some species herself in the Everfree.

Zecora – a strange zebra, tribal traditions keeper and a strong herbalist and magician (practising mostly natural, if not saying elemental magic), lived deep enough in the Everfree forest. She was a rare guest in Ponyville and not everypony knew her well yet or trusted much… for their own loss to be frank. She was actually kind and caring and could help and teach a lot that one, who wasn’t deterred by her strange speech (she rhymed) or rituals. Of course, that one should consider a fine long walk through Everfree to her hut to get the benefits of communicating with Zecora. It happened that Twilight was the first, who doubted reasons for zebra alienation in Ponyville and eventually made good friends with her. And Fluttershy could make friends with practically anypony (or anyzebra in that case) she met. Taking care of animals and thus having a constant need for natural ingredients helped those two get along well.

So Fluttershy was to hurry if she hoped to visit her zebra friend, let alone collect anything herself in the woods. Everfree wasn’t anything to take thoughtlessly; the closer to dusk, the less. She quickly packed a few necessary things, including a couple of carrots for her favourite pet-bunny.

“Angel, Angel, dear, are you going,” Fluttershy slightly raised her voice, as the bunny again was lingering somewhere. She was already going to check upstairs when the white rabbit jumped in front of her and impatiently drummed his hind paw. “Ah, here you are little tod.”

“We need to hurry, Angel,” said Fluttershy with a gentle smile. “So we don’t need to deal with wild and ill-mannered forest inhabitants when the sun sets… I… hope you understand. Ready?”

Instead of any answer, Angel hopped on her back and made himself comfortable, showing with all his posture that he agreed with the plan as long as he didn’t need to walk all the way himself. Somepony knocked at the front door at that moment. Fluttershy blew a thread of pink hair off her face and trotted to answer.

The opened door revealed Twilight, standing on the doormat with an apologetic expression on her face.

“Oh… Hi,” Fluttershy hesitated for a second. “Come on in, Twilight. I-I was going to visit Zecora. I’m out of healing potions and a few rare herbs… if you don’t mind…” She then noticed the concern on Twilight’s face. “But if there is some emergency… I-I’m sure, it can wait. I can go later… So w-what do you need?”

“Hi. What?... Oh, no, no, there is no emergency at all,” Twilight stepped in. “I’m sorry if I mess with your plans. That’s a matter of a few minutes.”

“Look, I’m terribly sorry if I’m asking it back too soon,” she explained. “Remember that book on rare magical plants and their effects I gave you last week. I found out, I need it for my study still. If you could return it just for a couple of days… I then could finish and it would be all yours as long as you need,” finished Twilight, blushing and flattening her ears. Confessing that one of her studies went less than perfectly was always a delicate topic for her.

“Oh, and that’s all,” laughed Fluttershy with relief. “Sure, dear, no worries here. And thank you very much by the way. I’ve found out quite an effective recipe thanks to your book. One of my beavers had his tail constantly scraped and suffered hard to heal cuts, but it’s not a problem anymore with that composition, I managed to find in your book.”

“It means that I’ve done with it and I must say it was an amazing reading. I was going to return it anyway. Here, you can take it,” she pointed her hoof at the small table near the door. “Thank you again.”

“Umm… You’re saving my life, dear,” Twilight levitated the book and put it into her saddle bag. She smiled heartily. “As usual.”

“Being a princess doesn’t mean that I have nothing to learn anymore,” she giggled, wiggling her wings.

“Wait, you weren’t saying that you’re going to Everfree,” Twilight frowned with realization. “Not after the dark. Please tell, you won’t.”

“Well, of course, I won’t… stay there longer than necessary,” replied Fluttershy. “It’s only noon yet. I just get some potions, I’ve run short of, from Zecora and go back home via the different path to collect a few plants on my own… if that’s… okay with you.” She finished with a sheepish smile. “It’s not that I’m going to do something overly daring…”

“Oh, come on, Flutters,” objected Twilight. “They say timberwolves started coming closer to the edge of the Everfree lately… And what if you come across a… c-cockatrice,” she exhaled under her breath.

“I mean just ensure you have enough time to return before dark,” she added quickly heavily blushing. “Not that I don’t realize, who am I talking with about cockatrices, or think you can’t cope with them.”

Now it was Fluttershy’s turn to flush. Twilight remembered that time when she was turned to stone by a cockatrice in an overly stupid incident. She owed her life entirely to Fluttershy, who managed to Stare damned cockatrice to shaking knees state, thus making him revert the curse.

“I-I… umm… errr… okay…” muttered Fluttershy in flaming embarrassment. “Just… L-let’s go… if… you don’t mind.”

“Besides, I’m going to take Harry with me,” she closed the door, when they both exited, Angel bunny still sat on Fluttershy’s back. “He may be not the… fastest bear around… but I doubt, we will have any troubles.”

“Well, that certainly changes things,” said Twilight. “Just be careful anyway. Won’t mind, if I send Spike later tonight… just… to know you’re fine?”

“I won’t, dear,” Fluttershy waved her fore leg when they parted ways and Twilight trotted towards Ponyville. “You are more concerned about my walk in the forest than I should be.”

She then crossed the wooden bridge over a stream and headed to the Everfree.

*

Rare white feathery clouds passed by in the turquoise sky, the sun was almost at the zenith without being overly hot. Laying under the tree on the riverbank Alex almost came to what could be considered peace in his thoughts, despite all the events, all of the uneasy questions… He was that kind of man, who solved the problems in the order they appear, and now the key aim was getting to the town. What he had seen before brought him to the strong conclusion that at least geographically the region was exactly as it was shown in the show, regardless of how crazy it might appear. So at least he knew, where and how he must go to reach the town of Ponyville. Alex remembered that name as well, just like he was now sure the capital of the land was called Canterlot.

Well, it could be better of course – he could never get into such trouble. It could be better, so he never was to desperately look for a way to get back home… and it wasn’t something, what could be done in the middle of the forest for sure. But at least he was alive, still in one piece and kicking. Considering how he got here, it was unimaginable luck to achieve.

‘Don’t worry, Alex,’ he encouraged himself. ‘Let’s get to some civilization first, and there, I hope, are some means to revert you woeful condition. Perhaps princesses have something, as I can safely assume they have magic.’

‘Yeah,’ he muttered sadly. ‘The only thing I can rely now on is magic. And I’d be completely happy if I can get rid of that weird feeling inside, I hope, the lightning didn’t cause some internal injuries. Although, I couldn’t probably make it that far if it did.’

Feeling recharged Alex got up and looked for an easier way to cross the river. The elevated rocks were few, separated and slippery wet. There was no way of getting across without taking a bath. Alex took a look over himself.

‘Not taking off the boots for sure, who knows what the river bottom is like. I need my feet in good shape – there is a long road ahead.’ He then looked on his regal tapestry toga by some mysterious chance he managed yet to tear not. ‘But this will become too heavy getting wet. Besides, it will suck out warmth at light speed, when I cross the river and it starts drying.’

He took it off and folded as compactly as he could. He tore off a long branch and cleaned it of smaller twigs and leaves. Holding the stick in the left hand and folded cloth on his head with the right hand Alex stepped into the water, where it seemed most shallow.

The water was cold enough, not chilling, yet not very pleasant, which might be explained by the relatively strong current, and the riverbed was rocky. Alex was glad, he didn’t take off the boots, he was trying hard to keep balance. If he entered the water barefoot, he would have fallen over already. Probing the riverbed with his stick Alex slowly advanced.

He was almost on the other side when the strong current knocked him off feet. He couldn’t predict everything – it was slightly deeper here and the strong current rolled over a big rock. The stick dropped into a pit and Alex lost his balance. He tried to keep the face above the water and was forced to drop the branch to have at least one free hand. Water formed a small swirl here and it rolled Alex, so he was to keep the direction as well. Right at that moment, a perfidious underwater rock turned up. The current threw Alex on that rock hard enough for him to let out almost all air from his lungs. Sparkles sprinkled from his eyes because of the sudden hit and the swirl was about to give him a good dive when the same current threw his beaten body onto the river bank. Or was it something else?.. For a moment Alex could swear, there was something more solid than water under him, which pushed him towards the ground.

On his three, still holding the folded cloth almost dry, Alex crawled out of the water. He stopped, only when he made it about a dozen feet away. There he sat and regained his breath.

After a few minutes (when he dried a bit) Alex got up and wrapped himself in the tapestry toga again. The sudden memory made him leave the riverside fast enough. There was some kind of water snake or dragon in that river in the show. It wasn’t hostile, according to the show, and evidently, it wasn’t hostile in reality, but…

“Thanks!” Alex said aloud, facing the river. “But I won’t push my luck,” he added under his breath while heading back to the path.

After a couple of hours of walking, the environment changed completely and the changes were of no good. Apparently, Alex stepped onto some sort of equestrian badland. Trees in that area were darker and uglier, with crooked trunks and angular branches, moss hanging from them as a dirty veil, waving at the slightest wind. Many trees had hollows and with those and branches reminding crooked arms with thin clawed palms could surely scare a random traveller shitless during the nights. If someone was mental enough to wander into that part of the forest when Luna’s Moon was high.

When his thoughts touched Luna’s night, Alex looked over himself examining his improvised toga.

‘I hope nobody will object that I’ve borrowed that old forgotten and otherwise unused piece of art,’ He checked if every part of it was still in place. ‘At least I was good up to that moment in keeping it fine.’

Now Alex tried to step carefully, as there was more deadfall here than in the forest before, and the ground was springy under his boots, giving away the proximity of some swamp. Greenish fog covered the ground and raised in the air, becoming thinner at about the waist-high. Dark green bushes grew in thick heaps and made it even harder to see, what was nearby.

The silence around was deafening. Not birds chatter, not small forest critter fuss, nothing broke it. Naturally, Alex thought that no animal in its sane mind would like to make its home here, but yet he learned well, what that silence could mean sometimes. One more thing bothered Alex, it was noticeably darker here.

Of course, it could be dark in thick woods with high and wide-branched trees with tons of leaves even during the daytime, and Alex could say, it was about a couple of hours past noon. But those trees didn’t look exactly like those capable to provide excessive shadow. Neither thick nor healthy and overgrown. Yet there was something like half-light constantly under them. If it was some sort of anomaly or… magic, Alex couldn’t probably tell.

“Now great,” he muttered under his breath. “It’s about time to face another fugly monstrosity of that place! Just when I thought, it was going to be a walk in the park at last.”

As a confirmation of his concerns, Alex heard a muffled rustle in the bushes to his right. He stopped immediately and stared there, ready to flee or kick some ass, depending on who or what was going to appear.

That new whoever-that-could-be didn’t hurry to present itself though, as the rustle moved from one bunch of the bushes to another. When Alex decided that he could have startled a porcupine or some possum or a raccoon, if such animals were common for this place, he noticed that he could hear quiet spiteful croaking coming from the same spots with the rustle. That didn’t make much sense, frankly speaking.

Despite Alex decision to wonder any strangeness not, considering the place he had arrived, a peacock’s head popping out of the thick bush caught him by surprise. Alex froze on the spot, thinking of what a domestic bird forgot in that godforsaken swamp, miles from the nearest dwelling. He also thought that a peacock was the least animal, he expected to see here, when the bird let out another grumpy croak and decided to climb out of the vegetation in entirety.

The point was, it wasn’t a bird. A peacock’s head, a few inches of the feathery body with wings and a couple of otherwise normal bird’s paws were firmly planted on the end of a long slithery snake body. It was unknown if the beast could fly or run on its paws, at the moment it squeezed out of the foliage and slid toward Alex.

‘What the flying buck is that crap?’ thought Alex while regretting his former decision of carrying no stick with him. ‘I surely lack a pair of thick pants or jeans or something alike, as my legs are exposed from knees to ankles.’

Meanwhile, the snake-chimaera approached him, yet stayed at a few foot distance. It wasn’t particularly large or threatening, just utterly strange and, despite the whole situation being least amusing, ridiculous. Apparently, the bird part of the monster was fairly heavy for the snake tail, so it could raise it about Alex’s waist level, while still keeping the balance. There were no poisonous fangs in its beak to Alex’s relief. The beast simply stopped, small evil eyes stared at Alex’s face trying to catch his sight. Alex looked right into the pinprick pupils…

A couple of minutes passed that way. Alex sighed heavily and scratched the back of his head.

“Hey, listen,” he loudly addressed the monster, which was evidently waiting for something and now utterly surprised by not getting that. “If you’re going to play gaze, then it’s not the best time, I have better plans for today. The sun isn’t going to stay up forever, you know…”

Alex took a few steps aside, planning to avoid that serpentine hen-head and continue his hike, but it appeared, the latter had other plans. While looking very puzzled now, the monster slid aside nevertheless, blocking Alex’s path again. It looked quite stupid though, as evidently, something wasn’t working right as it expected, yet it didn’t nest in its tiny bird’s brain and the monster was unable to break its own pattern.

“You!..” Alex grinned unkindly and clenched his fists, popping knuckles.

He aimed carefully, made a couple of quick steps forward. And the monster didn’t have time to react when Alex’s well-placed kick got its beak acquainted with Alex’s heavy boot. The cock-snake let out a muffled croak, when its body flew through the air, while helplessly flapping wings and paws. It then landed right in the middle of the hollow tree and fell through the trunk with unexpected sound of a cue ball falling down the gutter.

That was too much for Alex, even after all those mishaps he had already. The whole situation was so hilarious that he bent in half in a fit of uncontrollable laughter. He simply couldn’t stop himself, remembering the idiotic expression of the monster, if anything could be read on peacock’s “face”, right before the launch.

A few minutes later Alex managed to calm himself just enough to proceed walking. The badland now seemed not so spooky.

The spiteful and now vexed croaking followed Alex for a while, making him giggle like a school girl, but the monster didn’t find guts to make another attempt. Alex marched forward triumphantly and cared now about stumbling not only.

Celestia’s sun started setting already, slowly approaching the west edge of the sky. Shadows became longer and the air – colder, it was only Spring as Alex assumed, so the day didn’t reach its’ maximum length yet. It wasn’t in his plans to stay in the woods that far from any civilization, when the darkness fell, as he knew, there must be wolves or some other similar sort of carnivore, which scoured in the forest at night. And smaller carnivores always came in packs.

The badland ended about half an hour ago and that fact made Alex extremely happy. Surely the cock-snake incident ended hilariously and brightened Alex’s mood for a while, but the whole gloom of that place slowly started getting under his skin. So, he was glad to see normal forest finally, with flowers, birds still singing (though there were less of them now as some started to prepare for the night already) and squirrels jumping in the tree crowns.

‘I need to hurry up,’ he reminded himself. ‘If I’m not mistaken there are some rocks or hills up ahead. So it definitely is going to take more time to pass than the plain ground. At least because I don’t know exactly, what to expect there. I hope nothing has changed, since Twilight’s team (he remembered one more name) passed them last time and there is no avalanche danger there now.’

‘When do you manage to finally overcome your phobia?’ he asked himself almost aloud. ‘You’re now in the place, where acrophobia can be deadly for you. Even not involving manticores.’ He tried to suppress the shiver after fresh memories of the suspension bridge.

Remembering more names and facts from the show… Show? Ha! Here it was history, as real as his own legs carrying him through the forest. Anyway, remembering more brought him to a certain dilemma.

‘If I meet natives… When I meet natives,’ Alex corrected himself as the previous variant sounded bad. ‘Would it be smart to show that I am familiar with parts of their REAL past and present? I mean, if I’m to imagine that some talking pony is found in my backyard and knows me and my family, neighbours, the name of our president, etc, wouldn’t it be utterly strange, if not alarming, for me to communicate with an alien creature, who still knows that much about us?’

‘They will lock me in some stone sack or some mental hospital if they have any of sort… Hey, I wonder what a mad pony looks like,’ Alex smirked, but he was seriously sure that humans were not common to Equestria. ‘They can suspect that I am some spy, evil monstrosity, an alien, I mean extra…equestrian one… or just a bucking rare animal.’ He facepalmed at the realization of the delicacy of the situation, he was going to get into.

‘At least I hope I will have enough time to spend with common natives to prove I’m sentient before officials have a chance to grab me. For what I know, Celestia seems to be not the softest person and I don’t want a vacation on the Moon,’ Alex checked the sun position when he reached another open place. ‘Wonder, if we can understand each other. Evidently, I could read the books from the library, but those were obviously ages old. Who knows, if the language evolved too much.’

Again, he didn’t pay much attention to the fact that he was able to read the books, while naturally he shouldn’t have been by any logical approach. But his mind was distracted by a view of the mountain behind the line of trees. The mountain wasn’t too high or steep, but Alex still cringed.

‘There is no other way,’ he regained his posture. ‘If I try to walk around, I’ll lose too much time. Celestia won’t hold the sun just for me longer than usual. Let’s simply hope there are no vertical cliffs.’ He gulped nervously and decided to run.

Alex passed the last few lines of trees in a few seconds and faced a long yet not very steep dirt slide, which rose to a considerable height and turned into a plain rock “shelf” running around the rest of the mountain. At least one could walk, not climb that slide. Alex was fine with that variant and kept running up, trying to not look behind just in case. The ascent took him about ten minutes of fast running as he didn’t travel the straight line, because of bigger rocks protruding from the slide, and sometimes was to use all four limbs to proceed. He soon reached the top and climbed on the shelf, immediately getting closer to the mountain side and away from the edge. While catching his breath, he could observe the whole sea of trees far below, painted in red and gold by setting sun.

‘I’m out of time,’ Alex continued running along the stone shelf. ‘But no flying way I’m going to repeat that trick in the nearest future. I’ve coped because of one reason most likely if I stopped or failed otherwise, I would have never undertaken a second attempt.’

He proceeded as fast as he could, still being on guard, as he heard wind high up in the rocks and rare stone crackling. Making less noise was the hardest task, as any loud bump could possibly cause a rockfall.

‘Come on, you’re almost there,’ he encouraged himself. ‘There is a descent on the other side of the mountain… Damn! Okay, Alex, calm bucking down. There. Is. A. Descent. And you’re gonna make it. Then a couple of miles more of the same forest. Then you’ll be able to see the town across the hills. Perhaps you can even meet someone at the outskirts of Ponyville. Someone who can help you.’

‘If you want to get home faster, your best chance here is Twilight. She knows magic, and stuff and magic seem to be the force running this world, regardless of how weird it sounds for you.’

‘But Twilight is a direct thread to Celestia,’ Alex frowned. ‘I won’t be surprised if she sends her a letter right after you appear in her sight. Which leaves the question open – is it for good or… not that much.’

‘Remember, you’re still a spy or alien or rare animal, undecided,’ he smiled unhappily while running and trying to keep his breath even.

Seemingly he started to find a strange pleasure in his travel around the mountain. Seeing all the woods below as far as he could observe, setting sun… and having a few foot distance between him and the edge of his improvised road.

Soon his marathon came to an end. Alex stopped and threw a look from under his hand at the wide, but not endless stripe of trees, the green hills behind them and a darker spot with sparkles of glare in the light of setting sun – windows, roofs, whatever there was – there lied the town, his final goal.

The descent here wasn’t a complete nightmare – it was formed by an endless number of platforms chaotically protruding from the side of the mountain, so they practically formed a set of wide but not very high steps. The lower they got the more and bigger plants were growing on them. Few lowest rocks have small trees and thick bushes covering them.

‘Get moving,’ Alex ordered himself. ‘Just a few… Okay, okay, many big steps, thankfully connected by only a few foot high drops, slides, whatever your acrophobic ass is going to deal with. You can easily cope.’

‘I hope…’ added he and started carefully getting down. But before that, he took one more look at the town far ahead to remember the direction. ‘When I’m down, I won’t see any landmark, except probably that mountain. Not even it, when I’m deeper in the forest.’

Surprisingly, descending wasn’t as awful, as Alex was afraid, it was going to be. He just focused not further than next rock platform or even mountain side in front of his nose – he decided to climb down facing the mountain side, not the ground below, that was ten times easier. At least it allowed him to divert his mind from the actual height.

Tired, shaking from the stress, sweaty, but still going down at good pace he was above the last platform when he heard a distant scream from the forest below. Alex strained, the scream was girly, high pitched and undoubtedly one of terror.

Alex quickly jumped to the last platform and crouched behind the bushes. He then crawled flat between the trees to the edge of his watching spot and stopped behind the small log. The cover wasn’t good – the log was probably as thick as his leg and only three-four feet long, but he had no other choice. Right away he heard the rustling below. Carefully he raised his head and waited.

A small yellow pony pegasus jumped out of the bushes to the left of Alex’s hiding spot and stopped almost beneath him. She – and Alex was sure that was a she – turned then, facing the direction, she came from, and stood still, slightly shivering. Fast breath carried whining notes of despair, big turquoise beautiful eyes were wide open, pink mane and tail of impossible length and density now drooped in hopelessness. Alex noticed two saddle bags, a small white rabbit clenching to her back and now trying to hide inside her incredible mane and same marks on both her flanks. Three butterflies!

“I'll be damned!” whispered Alex under his breath. “Fluttershy…” Surely he was ready for something like that, yet when it happened that suddenly and evidently, he was stunned.

‘Why didn’t she fly away?’ he asked himself noticing her wings tightly folded and pressed to her body. ‘Perhaps she feared the rabbit might fall…’

Thankfully the wind was blowing from the forest towards him. The bushes on the edge of the opening parted, letting out three wolves. Very nasty, hungry, determined and… made of wooden debris apparently – branches, smaller twigs, leaves, even a few rocks. Alex’s eyes widened even more. Meanwhile… timberwolves… started slowly cutting the distance between them and their supposed prey. Alex didn’t have time to do anything when he felt that something changed below.

The yellow pegasus straightened and stared right into timberwolves’ eyes. Whining ceased to exist as if it never was there in the first place. Alex was surprised by soft and melodic, yet strong and confident voice.

“So if you are a few big bad wolves, you afford thinking that you can offend somepony smaller and weaker than you!” scolded she and her next phrase rang like a bell. “HOW DARE YOU CHASE ME AND ANGEL?!!”

Alex didn’t listen further, he was simply shocked by that impossible situation. Fluttershy was about his waist-high, her eyes not reaching his chest level. Surely if she stood on her hind legs, she could put her fore legs on his shoulders and look into his face. But timberwolves were giants compared to her, they were at least twice bigger than a grown-up human and could look Alex right in the eyes while standing on all fours.

But… whatever she was doing to them was working. Three wolves crouched with the most guilty look on their muzzles if the timber muzzles could carry such an expression, their ears flat and their broom-like tails between their hind legs. It took them a couple of moments more to lose their determination completely and flee under the trees. It seemed, they had no plans to return at all.

However, Alex noticed one more thing, which avoided the attention of the yellow pegasus. One more timberwolf evidently managed to sneak around the opening and to the right behind the foliage and was now right out of her field of view, getting ready to jump on her back.

‘Even if I shout, she has no time to turn and distract him or do whatever she was doing to the others,’ Alex’s hands found their grip on the log in front of him, as his blood boiled from the anger towards that sneaky beast. ‘I may regret that next moment, but…’

“No! You fucking DON’T…” he landed between Fluttershy, who turned 180 degrees in one jump with a loud frightened squeak, and the remaining timberwolf. Alex raised the log like a baseball bat. Even if the wolf was caught by surprise by that sudden change of the scene, it didn’t show much hesitation and attacked. Alex was ready for that lunge and leaned back letting timberwolf’s head past him and simultaneously getting a wider swing.

He put all his momentum into this one well-aimed hit. With an earsplitting crackling the wooden head left the neck and flew far into the bushes, where it met the tree trunk and crumbled into the small pieces of wooden junk. Timberwolf’s body rolled over with remaining speed and its left paw found Alex’s side in last vile strike.

The beheaded timberwolf dropped to the ground and its entire body turned into the separate branches and pieces of wood.

THUD!

Alex dropped the log and fell on the ground next to his enemy.

All that time Fluttershy stood on the spot as if she was hit by the lightning. The rabbit timorously looked out of her mane and patted her neck with a paw. She woke from her shock and approached the human figure on the ground.

Alex felt heat filling his right side and the nasty trembling in his hands. The fiery snakes inside woke up and jerked, making him let out an unwanted weak moan.

He saw yellow pegasus girl’s face in the reddish veil tinting his eyesight. The pink soft mane covered half of it and left open one lovely turquoise eye, now filled with concern and compassion. Alex reached her mane with his left hand and touched her cheek, feeling the amazing velvet of soft warm coat. To his fading surprise, the feeling was nothing near of a common pony, people are used to – usually more furry and rough; a weak smile touched his lips. Fluttershy’s face then turned into Elen’s in his blurring sight.

A bear muzzle appeared behind. Alex took that with the serenity of the doomed.

“Harry,” exclaimed “Elen” in dismay. “We should take him to my cottage… A-as soon as we can… ummm… please, if that’s OK with you…”

The bear muzzle nodded.

Alex closed his eyes and fell through the darkness…

Comments

[Makill]

I can see twilight already sending letter to Princess

[Alexshy]

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Something like:
“Dear princess Celestia!
Today my friend made a stupid decision to go to the Everfree forest after the noon, risking to linger there after sunset. I failed to convince her against. I could go with her, but I’m afraid of snakes and cockatrices. It seems I failed at studying Friendship. Please don’t send me to the unicorn kindergarten...”

[Makill]

8215368
A bit more explaining about dangerous human but everything else seems right.
Also I didn't expected that quick response

[Alexshy]

8215371
Well, as thy comment was attached to Ch2. Neverfree, I supposed that Twi couldn’t know about the human at that moment The example is what she most likely would start with anyway

The stars befall to arrange tis way

[Draskos]

Don't really like the excessive back and forth 'dear's' being tossed around. The mane six use nicknames or regular names outside of Rarity who says Darling. Dear is usually used by Canterlot Elite or in relationships. Minor issue, but it does disrupt their usual personalities a bit in my opinion.

[JXWheeler]

A part of me feels like English isnt this writer's first language. However, the result is me reading a book that sounds like Old English so I find myself enjoying it even more.