Sweet Dreams, LLP

by AnchorsAway

This Tastes Like Bleach: Part 1

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It is hard to run away from timberwolves.

Strange words for an introduction, I know, but a valuable piece of information nevertheless, I feel I should divulge. It might just save your life one day.

You see, this is not some unguided opinion about a timberwolf’s insatiable ability to chase you down and gobble you up, but scientific fact. So here it is again for you ponies that are little daft in the head or if you happen to be a slightly narcissistic baby dragon: timberwolves are very hard to run away from. If you find yourself stumbling upon one in the wilderness, it is this author’s opinion that you are much better off curling up on the ground and awaiting the inevitable. If you run, you’ll only die tired.

If you—whoever has the misfortune of stumbling upon this tale—should know anything at all about timberwolves, it should be that a fully-grown timberwolf can sprint up to twenty-two miles per hour. If you’re still doing the mental math, let me just say that it is much faster than anypony can run. And unless you’re a pegasus, there is little hope to evade a pursuing timberwolf at such speeds.

However, dear reader, there is one trick this author has learned to always, nearly one hundred percent of the time, successfully out-pace a timberwolf, which I will now give to you free of charge.

—You only have to be faster than the pony that you are with.

Really, it’s that simple. And it is a very versatile concept, too; just about anything can fit into the ‘slower pony’ category. These can include, but are not limited to: a colt-scout troop camping nearby, naturists, your local ranger, whoever those yuppies are that go “glamping”, or even your piece of shit neighbor, Doug, who you knowingly convinced to go hiking in timberwolf territory because he keeps leaving his garbage cans out past trash day. You hate Doug.

You might be thinking at this point, unfortunate reader, that this story is only about timberwolves.

You would be wrong.

This story is about many things—dreams, inner workplace conflicts, highly illegal and unsanctioned therapeutic treatments, nightmares, and the brave ponies that fight them. It’s about the subconscious and its most profound desires, secretly guiding our waking world with its unseen hooves from deep inside each of us. It’s a story of many characters and creatures, but if this author had to choose one in particular, he would say it mostly revolves around Bright Shine.

So this is Bright Shine’s story, an unalluring ramble if there ever was one. It is a tale of anxiety, night terrors, uncovered medical expenses, and the overwhelming thought of sleep.

And also timberwolves.

You see, unfortunately for Bright Shine, he was very alone with nary a chubby companion nor a colt-scout troop in sight to aid in his escape from the pair of hungry timberwolves hot in pursuit.

“No, no, no!” Bright Shine puffed, gasping for breath as he weaved through the treacherous, dark forest, narrowly dodging trees and leaping over puddles of sucking mud. “This can’t be happening. I can’t get mauled, not here,” he cried. “I can’t afford to be mauled. My rent is due!”

The pair of lumbering wolves, however, paid no attention to the terrified wails of economic strife spouted by the sweaty pony fleeing their snapping jaws. Because a timberwolf has no concept of rent or Equestria’s woefully unbalanced healthcare system.

“I’ve got to get out of this forest,” Bright Shine said with a whimper, his hooves sliding in the muck as he rounded a stump. The wolves were only inches behind him. He could smell their fetid breath, hot and moist, washing over the nape of his neck. “Where even am I?” he wondered, trying to grasp his bearings as he pushed his legs harder, willing them to put more distance between him and the splintered jaws closing around him. Everything felt misplaced, and he had no recollections of his surroundings, the brooding forest with its impenetrable canopy. His head was spinning, his thoughts roiling in confusion. “How did I even get here?”

“Can’t quite remember how this started, can you, Bright Shine?” the voice leapt out at him.

“AHH!” Bright Shine fell to the ground in a balletic tumble of flying hooves, his face carving a clean rut through the dirt. He narrowly missed the tall, blue figure blocking his path.

He shook his head, spitting dirt and pebbles from his mouth, his eyes following the elegantly shod hooves before him upward.

“Ohh, that looked like it hurt,” the mysterious blue mare cooed, staring down at him struggling to his hooves. “Having a little trouble finding your bearings tonight, are we? Well, I wouldn’t take too long though,” she said, turning toward from where he had come. “They’re catching up,” she remarked, calmly watching the ravenous wolves bounding towards them. “Huh, timberwolves,” she said as if commenting on a turn of the weather. “Haven’t seen that one in a while.”

“Who? What?” Bright Shine muttered through the pounding in his head. But there was no time for questions. “Hey, HEY!” he cried, drunkenly stumbling backward. “You have to run! T-timberwolves!”

“Hehe, I know, right,” the mare chuckled, oblivious to the twin beasts barreling toward them. “It’s funny, right, normally everypony who has timberwolves has been mauled by this point. But you—you’ve managed to last this long. Usually I end up popping in during mid-mauling.”

She seemed to pause at this, lifting a shod hoof to scratch her delicate chin in some deep contemplation. “Always hard to get a word in over the screams, though.”

But he was already gone, Bright Shine taking off through the dark forest, leaving the crazy mare to her fate. He wasn’t about to sit around to be eaten. If anything, he hoped the timberwolves would partake of the stranger instead of him. Why would such a mare be all the way out here anyway? he wondered. And why did he have the uneasy feeling he recognized the blue mare from somewhere?

“Just focus,” he told himself, shaking away any thought of the peculiar stranger. Snagging vines tore at his every step, the brambles scratching his coat and clawing at his flank. “There has to be a way out of here.”

If he had lost the wolves, he couldn’t be sure. He wasn’t about to stop to be check if they were still on his trail. “If only I knew how I got here?” he puffed, sucking in great gulps of air. But his memory kept coming up blank. Had he been out drinking? he asked himself. “It’s almost like a bad dream.”

“Now we’re getting somewhere, Bright Shine,” the familiar voice leapt out, directly in his path.

Though Bright Shine’s mouth had opened to let out another startled scream, that scream found its exit blocked by a mouthful of sod as the unfortunate slate-colored earth pony was sent for a momentous tumble.

He hadn’t seen the ravine.

Over and over he rolled, choking and gagging with each breath that was knocked out of him, his hooves flailing as he fell down the embankment. Bright Shine landed with a heavy thud at the bottom of the steep ravine, his fall thankfully cushioned by his spine on a very sharp and very hard boulder sticking out of the ground.

“Owww.”

The words slipped through his slit and bruised lips, eliciting a deep howl in response from the top of the ravine. The timberwolves had picked up the trail.

Bright Shine landed in a heap as he slid from the boulder. Scrambling as fast as he could, he pressed himself against the rock as he heard the sound of claws sliding down the ravine.

They were close, and he was stuck with nowhere to go. His cover was yards away from the tree line, smack in the center of a small clearing. The wolves would be on him like a fat colt on cake the instant he made a break for the trees.

As slowly as he could, Bright Shine peeked a wide, bleary eye around the boulder. The timberwolves were closing in, the pair sniffing the ground as they picked up his scent. He only hoped they weren’t very hungry. Maybe they had eaten the blue mare; perhaps they would be too full to maul him.

“You know it’s only a matter of time before they find you.”

Bright Shine stifled another scream, practically leaping out of his skin.

“What, it’s true,” the blue mare who had inexplicably appeared behind him said, shrugging her wings. “Maybe if you didn’t sweat so much they wouldn’t be able to track you. Jeez, you’re a greasy fellow,” she sneered, her eyes wandering over his sweat-soaked coat. “Is it a glandular condition or something?”

“Sh-sh-sh!” he pleaded, the comment slipping by him. “Be quiet, they’ll hear you.” This mare was going to get them both killed.

“Fascinating,” she beamed, grabbing his aching head with her cold hooves, twisting it back and forth as she probed over his bruised melon. “You’ve sustained so much trauma and you still haven’t woken up. You’d be a perfect candidate!” she exclaimed, her horn and eyes alighting with eagerness.

“Ca-candidate? Woken up?” Bright Shine swiveled his eyes, his head still locked in the stranger’s iron grip.

“The words are on the tip of your tongue, aren’t they? Come on, Bright Shine. Use your words,” she encouraged,as if talking to a foal.

“Dream? I’m dreaming?” The words were unsure, a weight that rolled off the end of his tongue.

“Finally. Very good!” the cobalt mare shouted with glee, grabbing his shoulders. “It took you long enough. Here, take my card,” she offered, pressing a small piece of paper into his hooves. “Come by our office as soon as you’re available, which gauging from what is happening outside, I don’t expect will be very long. Tough luck with the job by the way,” she added. “I hope the severance package is good.”

Bright Shine looked over the card in his hooves. It was about the size of a business card.

Sweet Dreams, LLP

“Hey, what is this?” he asked, his mind still reeling from the strange mare’s revelation. Dreaming? This was all a dream? “There isn’t even an address or contact here,” he said, flipping it over. “And why do I have the feeling I’ve seen you before?”

When he looked up, the mysterious mare was gone, vanished into thin air. Instead, in her place, two hungry timberwolves licked their oaken chops eagerly on either side of him. Their chase had worked up quite an appetite. Bright Shine could feel their rancid breath washing over his face, their green eyes lighting him in their glow.

“Now would be a really good time to wake up,” Bright Shine chuckled nervously. “She said this was all a dream, right. And I can’t get hurt in a dream,” he reminded himself assuredly.

One wolf replied with a deep growl, the rumble resonating from its gaping maw that stretched before him, beckoning of what was to come.

“You’re just a dream,” he told the wolf, taking another step back. “Any minute now, I’ll wake up.” Bright Shine gulped. “Any minute.”

Luckily for Bright Shine, it was only three minutes into the mauling when the blue mare returned.

“Sorry, sorry, sorry,” she apologized profusely as she popped back into the dream in a flurry of fiery particles. “Almost forgot the timberwolves—the mauling and whatnot,” she said, her words drowned out by Bright Shine’s screams as the first wolf had a second go at tossing him like a ragdoll in its jaws.

“Wake me up!” Bright Shine screamed over the mauling. “Sweet fires of Tartarus, wake me up! They won’t stop!”

“Hold still, just hold still!” the mare shouted, aiming her horn at him. She danced restlessly on her hooves. “You must be a very heavy sleeper.”

“How can I hold still? They’re using me as a freaking chew toy!”

“Just try not to move. If you do this will hurt—a lot,” she warned, tracking Bright Shine in the wolf’s mouth with her horn.

“Wait, what?! What are you doing?”

“Waking you up.”

BLAM!

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“Bright Shine!”

“Huh? What!” The stallion bolted up at his desk, a thin sliver of drool trailing down over piles of unsorted mail, mail he still hadn’t sorted since the goggley-eyed mail pony had dropped it off that morning. “B-boss,” Bright Shine gurgled sleepily as he rubbed his dark-rimmed eyes to the dimly lit mailroom of Fetlock Financial. “I was just about to—”

The pony in bright red suspenders shook his head, his thinning mane whipping in the humid air of the mailroom. “Save it, Bright Shine. This is the fourth time this week,” he sighed. “And the last time for that matter.”

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Comments

[link4]

LOL...

[Prismfire Productions]

That disclaimer... Goddamn Luna, that is harsh as hell

[revilO]

Hey im with Rini, loved reading a bit of the story. You have amazing writing skills and witty humor to match!!