An Unstoppable Force

by Iliketoreadandstuff

A Peaceful Morning

It was yet another morning in the Everfree. The bright, blue sky was spotted with clouds of various shapes and sizes, and the trees provided plentiful shade for the creatures that resided there. Creatures like the wise zebra, Zecora. The Everfree was her home and a place that most accommodated her for years prior, and she felt comfortable in this strange, dangerous area.

She stepped out into the forest, taking a deep breath. She could smell the forest's age and could hear its history in the rustles of the leaves and the howls of the wind. Though, as she took in this peaceful environment, she could just barely feel a breeze too cold. A sunray too dim. A smell too rancid. Her hairs stiffened just a bit, and a chill coursed down her spine. A cold morning, indeed, she thought to herself. It was the middle of summer, so the cold was indeed a foreign temperature, yet there were many things in the Everfree that weren't as one might expect. Many little treasures and colonies that seem too rich or too small to hold any sort of value. Now, to remind myself of what it is I need. She took out a list of ingredients she needed to pick up. Just a few petals and pieces of bark, as well as the mucus from a knot-dwelling creature. With these ingredients, a potion may be formed that can bring courage and strength to those who ingest it. She traveled along, keeping out a keen eye for the things she needed, and again felt that cold breeze. The breeze that filled her lungs with the aroma of...well, she wasn't sure what it was. Something felt off, she could tell. It was the smell of the air, the chill in her spine, and the pit in her gut. She could feel that the aura of the world was just off. Not much, but enough to be noticed. She observed her surroundings, noting the clouds in the sky were much bigger than before. The blue of the sky wasn't nearly as bright. And the smell. The smell became stronger than ever before. She carried on, her limbs feeling weaker than before. It wasn't often that Zecora felt fear. She had always lived in a perfect chaos; a world she could observe and learn from. A world that stayed the same, only bringing new secrets and mysteries. She neared a tree with a rather large knothole, and the smell was almost too strong. She took out some herbs, tapping the powder out on her hoof and rubbing it under her nostrils. It nullified the smell just enough so that it wasn't obnoxious, but it was still a raw and heavy scent. Mucus from a knot-dwelling creature, that's all she was here for. She peered into the hole, seeing nothing more than an oppressive pool of darkness within. The smell was able to overpower the herbs at this proximity. She reached a hoof in, feeling something small and furry. Pulling it out, she froze as she saw it. It was the creature she needed, there was no doubt, but it was much too limp. Too calm. Too quiet. It was almost as though... Zecora's eyes widened, and she dropped the critter on the ground. It didn't move, instead bouncing and splaying itself out. Its eyes never blinked. Its nose never twitched. Zecora, disgusted and horrified, rushed back to her hut. Once inside, she slammed the door behind her, leaning on it and panting. "That poor little creature with its motionless eyes! What a shame that it met such a cruel demise!" Zecora said, calming down a bit. She had seen animals that shuffled off of their mortal coil before, but they were always few and out of the way most of the time. It was the size of a youngling, so it couldn't have been an age-based death. There were no scratches or blood, so it couldn't have been attacked. Perhaps it was a disease? A plague? As she considered this, Zecora dipped her hooves into a small pool of a cleansing potion. She calmed herself down, writing it off as just that: a disease. The Everfree wasn't exactly the cleanest place in Equestria, so it would make quite a bit of sense. Zecora looked out into the forest, still a bit shaken. The light from the sun was very dim and the only glimpses of the sky came from tiny cracks in the clouds above. Even though the smell was explained, there was still that cold breeze. That chilled spine. That feeling in her gut. It was the feeling she got before a storm.