A Snowy Day

by The Ancestor

Awakening

Darkness.

Darkness was the only thing Lyra saw. Cold was the only thing she felt. Silence was the only thing she heard. She tried to look around, but found she was unable to move her head, she tried to flail her hooves around, but found she couldn't. A frightening realisation dawned on her as the situation sinked in. She had no had or hooves. She had no ears. All she had, was awareness.

Was she dead? No, she couldn't possibly be! Death couldn't be so... empty. Where was the greenest pastures? The bright blue skies? Where were her ancestors? Was it all a lie?

If she still had eyes, she would've cried.

Despair began to take hold, when a faint humming reached her non-existent ears, piercing the utter silence of her not-death. Swirling her non-existent ears around, she found that the sound was actually directional. She turned her non-existent body towards the source of the sound, and began swimming towards it. She couldn't say how long she was swimming for, but at some point the sound got louder and clearer, and she was able to discern some words.

Bayu-bayushki-bayu~

Ne lozhisya na krayu~

Granted, she didn't know what the words meant, but she could hear them. As she got closer to the source, a bright light began to shine in the all-encompassing dark, soon filling all of her vision.

---

Lyra felt a deep ache throughout her body as she opened her drowsy eyes, trying to blink away the cobwebs that plagued her mind. She felt very warm, and soon found out that a blanket was covering from tail to neck, her head laying on something soft. The sound of a familiar lullaby reached her ears, and in her now coherent state she could discern that the voice was that of a stallion.

Pridet seren'kiy volchok,

I ukhvatit za bochok.

She didn't mind it, not really, the voice was firm yet gentle, like that of a father putting his foal to sleep. Lyra relaxed as something scratched behind her ear, sending waves of pleasure throughout her body. Whoever that stallion was, he sure knows how to treat a mare. She looked around without moving her head, finding herself in some kind of log house, the crisp crackling of fire giving the cabin a sort of homey atmosphere. A few benches stood at the opposite side of a table, standing in the middle of the room, a two-story bunk bed standing not too far from it. A tall cabinet stood beside the bed, rows upon rows of books lining the shelves.

Another hoof began brushing through her mane, massaging the scalp underneath and prompting her to lean into the touch. Seconds passed in utter bliss as the mare turned into a warm pile of putty, until something odd grabbed her attention. Instead of feeling one hard furry appendage going through her mane, she felt five small, soft, smooth ones with hard tips pushing into her skin.

She gasped as understanding dawned on her. Could it be? Could she've found the human she was looking for? Whoever was holding her seemingly noticed her disturbance, slowing his petting, and halting his lullaby.

"Ch ch ch, krepko spi loshatka, teb'ya sil'no potr'epalo." He cooed, much like one would do when speaking to a particularly cute puppy, stroking her mane. She slowly tilted her head to look at the creature that was holding her, hoping against hope that he'd be what she though he was.

Small chestnut eyes filled with worry met her own, awing as they found a spark of intelligence in them. A brown stubble of hair resided on the creature's chin, mirroring the color of his short hair. It's snout was a lot shorter than that of a ponies, looking rather flat, nevertheless retaining an exotic kind of beauty. Small red lips were curved into a smile as the creature- No, not a creature. A human looked down onto the pony.

"Uzhe prosnulas'? A t'y crepch'e ch'em ya dumal." The human asked in that same tone, the meaning of his words still lost to Lyra. Moments passed as the petite unicorn was at a loss for words as the object of her searches sat right in front of her.

"Y-you're a human!" She all but squeed in excitement, prompting the man to freeze. "A real, bona-fide human! I've been looking so long-"

"Yo'bany v rot!" The human emitted a high pitched scream, jumping to his feet and backpedalling from the small pony until he had his back to the wall. Lyra looked at the man in concern, noticing fear in his eyes.

"H-hey, I didn't mean to scare you." She said in a soft tone, much like she did before. Her words, however seemed to have an opposite effect, as the man's eyes went wide.

"Ch'to za nahuy?! Izydi d'yemon, izydi!" He put his left hand over the left side of his chest, shallow rapid breaths escaping his mouth, all the while his right hand seemed to be going through strange cross-like motions. Lyra's ears fell flat at his reaction, nevertheless she tried once more, laying flat on her stomach and wincing a little at the jolt of pain that shot through her underbelly.

"Please, I mean you no harm." She pleaded, giving him her best puppy-eyes. "I-i just want to talk..." Tears gathered in the corners of her eyes as she looked down on the floor, unable to withstand the man's horrified expression. She felt the human approach her, dropping into a squat in front of her. She dared not look at his face.

"Y-you can talk?" His voice was careful and uncertain, speaking with a familiar accent she couldn't put her hoof on. Her gaze traveled upwards, landing on his exotic features, the expression on his face a mix of worry and surprise.

"Y-yeah, of course I can." She said with a small smile, fidgeting under his studying gaze and wincing at the pain in her belly. A frown graced the human's face.

"You shouldn't be doing that, little green hair." He said, grabbing her and putting her to lay on her side. Lyra yelped at the sudden contact, but didn't protest otherwise. A small blush crept onto her face as the human pointed at a bandage wrapped part of her body, just below the ribcage. "Wood wolf cut you bad, had to stitch close." Her breath hitched as the recent events flooded her mind, her ears pinning to her head, her breath quickening.

"I-I could've died..." She murmured, unable to quell the lump in her throat. "I-I could've died!" She yelled, forgetting for a moment that she wasn't alone in the cabin.

The human picked her up like a cat, placing her in his lap, slowly rocking her back and forth. "Ch, ch, ch, little loshatka, you're okay now, that's all that matters." He started scratching behind her ear absentmindedly, lulling the mare into a sense of comfort. Minutes passed as she layed in his grasp, sniffling, trying to get her tears under control. Finally, when she wiped the last tears out of her eyes he put her down, the mare wobbling a little as she stood straight.

"Feeling better?" He asked, crouching beside her so they could both look eachother in the eyes.

"Y-yeah, thank you." Lyra said, giving him a small smile. "I could never repay you for what you did."

"Pff-" The man waved his hand at her dismissively. "Don't mention it, I just helped you calm down a little, no need to be so dramatic." He finished, oblivious to the meaning behind her words.

"That's not what I meant!" Lyra exclaimed, rolling her eyes and earning a quizzal look from the human. "You saved me from that timberwolf, didn't you?" A look of understanding dawned on him as he nodded.

"That mutt? Da, I blasted it back to whatever hole it crawled from." He said nonchalantly. "Still, it's nothing to write home about. What was I supposed to do? Leave you to the wolves?"

"N-no, of course not." Lyra rubbed her chin before realizing something. "You've saved my life, but I still don't know your name."

"Oleg." The man said, extending an open palm towards her. Lyra looked quizzaly at his hand. "You're supposed to shake it." He clarified.

"Oh, of course." The unicorn mare corrected her mistake, laying her hoof in his open palm. "Name's Lyra, Lyra Heartstrings!" He grasped her hoof gently with her fingers, slowly shaking it.

"Nice to meet you, Lyra Heartstrings." He said with a small smile.

"Likewise!" She replied, ending their handshake, wincing from pain as she shifted her weight on her left hoof. "Ow!"

"Careful, Lyra, when that wolf attacked, you seemed to have sprained your... hoof?" He shook his head, rubbing his chin in thought. "N'yet, ne hoof... blin, what was it called again?"

"You mean my fetlock?" Lyra offered.

"Da! That's it, fetlock!" He grinned, ruffling Lyra's mane. "Thanks, loshatka, you're one smart cookie!"

"Aw, don't mention it!" Lyra beamed and the praise. Her smile fell a little when she remembered the situation she was in.

"Hey, I've been meaning to ask... You're a human, right?"

"Yes, last time I checked, amyways."

"So... how did you get here then? Humans aren't native to Equestria." Her question earned her a puzzled glare from the human.

"I've been meaning to ask you the same question, Lyra. Horses-"

"Ponies." Lyra corrected, earning a light chuckle.

"Ah, konech'no, ponies aren't that colorful, or talkative for that matter, back where I come from."

"Is that why you were so scared?" She asked, earning a sheepish smile in return.

"To be honest I still feel a little uneasy, but..." He trailed off shaking his head. "Where are my manners! How about we talk this over a nice mug of tea?" Although his question came out of left field, Lyra couldn't help but agree.

"That'd be love-" A loud rumbling sounded like thunder in the otherwise quet cabin, causing the mare to blush slightly. "-ly. Sorry, I didn't mean-"

"Nonsense!" Oleg said, raising his hand in protest. "I'll see what I can find for you to eat." He said, approaching the stove and putting the kettle on. Gesturing the mare to seat on one of the benches beside the table, he bueried himself in te old white fridge, looking for something edible inside.

"So what do you eat? I've got some veggies, a couple of apples, sour cream, milk, canned tuna..."

"Anything that's not meat or fish will do." Lyra said, approaching said bench and standing on her hind legs, leaning on said bench with her front hooves.

"Yeah, sounds about right. Hey, I've got some mashed potatos from yeaterday." He sniffed the bowl with the aformentioned food, and smiled when he found it was still fresh. "It's downright deliscious with some mushrooms and beans, will that be okay?" He asked grabbing the glass jar containing a mix of the last two ingridients.

"That huff sound huff tasty, Oleg." The noises of excertion the mare was making promted the man to turn, and bear witness to a strangest scene.

Lyra was trying to climb onto the bench, using only her right hoof as help, her left one hanging limply beside her. She'd jump a little, trying to climb onto her seat, but without her left hoof she lacked the strength required to do so.

"Uh, Lyra? Why are you dry-humping the bench?" He asked with unconcealed amusement.

"I- what?" A hint of red appeared on Lyra's cheeks as she began to pout. "I was just trying to get on the stupid bench, no need to be so mean!" The man shook his head and sighed.

"Alright, come here you silly pony."

"I'm not sill-" Before the mare could protest, the man grabbed her under the armpits and raised her above the ground, gently putting her onto the bench.

"Don't be shy to ask for my help if you need something, you're a guest, after all." He said, petting her on the head and moving back to the fridge, but not before recieving a bump to his leg from the flustered unicorn.

"Quit marehandling me, I could've done it myself!" Lyra pouted, furrowing her brows.

"Marehandling? Oh Bozhe, ya ne mogu!" The man roared with laughter, his bout of mirth subsiding when he noticed the unicorn's miffed expression. "Ladno, ladno, I'll ask before picking you up next time, horosho?" He wiped a tear out of the corner of his eye, putting one plate of food into a microwave.

"You better!" Lyra pouted, getting a better look at the human while he was busy. He wore a green knitted sweater that had a noticable red stain in the middle of his chest, but was otherwise pretty clean. Trousers that were of a darker shade of green adorned the lower part of the body, his feet being warmed by a pair of light green socks with little pine trees printed on them.

Looking around she wasn't surprised to see pure white on the other side of the window, seeing as the storm was scheduled to last for entire two weeks. "Two weeks is a long time." Lyra thought to herself, her great mood taking a nosedive at the thought. "Bonnie's probably worried sick right now! I've got to ask Oleg to come with me, or at least let me go back to Ponyville and explain myself." She winced at the thought of meeting another timberwolf. "I'll definently ask him to come with me, Everfree just isn't safe, not for me and not for him."

A sudden clink of ceramics against wood snapped her out of her thoughts, and she looked up to see Oleg sit down opposite of her with a small smile.

"Kushat' podano! Oleg said, pushing the plate of steaming food towards Lyra, who gave him a raised eyebrow.

"I don't really know what you said, but I get the idea." She sniffed the food, an enticing smell of beans and mushrooms mixed with something else entered her nostrils. She levitated a spoonful of food to her mouth, tasing the dish. "Mhm! That's good, my compliments to the cheif!" She turned to Oleg, only to see him gawking at her with a thoroughly bewildered expression, his spoon clattering to the wooden table.

He slowly raised his hand, his finger pointing at the spoon, hovering in her magic grasp. "H-how are you doing that?

"This?" Lyra pointed a hoof at the spoon, and the man nodded. "A simple telekenisis spell, most unicorn learn it when they're foals." That statement made the man's widen.

"You can do magic? Real magic, no smoke and mirrors?" He asked, transfixed by the golden glow that enveloped the floating spoon.

"Yeah, I just concentrate on what I want to do, channel it through my horn and boom! Magic happens." She said before stuffing her mouth full of food, scarfing down almost half the plate in record time.

"Boje moi..." He propped his head with his right hand, wearing a shocked expression. "You can do anything with this magic of yours?"

"No, not anything, things harder than telekenisis require remembering and reciting a magical matrix when casting, and the more complex the matrix is, the more it takes out of the caster to, well, cast the spell!" She finished her sentence and her meal, sitting on the bench with a satisfied expression.

The conversation died down as the man started eating his own meal, until Lyra noticed a weird taste floating in the air.

"Why does it smell so... metally in here?" She blurted out, distracting the man from his meal. She looked at her, then at himself. Finally, he stretched the dirty part of his sweater and sniffed it.

"That's me, I'm afraid." He paused and Lyra could hear gears turning in his head. "Actually, It's you."

"Me?" Lyra asked, dumbfounded. "Why do you think it's me all of a sudden?"

"Because you-" He said, dragging his finger from pointing at her, to pointing at his sweater. "-bled all over my best sweater."

"Oh." Lyra's face turned a shade paler, and she felt her lunch coming back up. "I-i know I'm asking a lot, but can you please take it off? I don't like blood." She said, pinching her nose.

"Sure." Oleg said with a shrug. "Time was coming to wash that thing anyway." He took the green sweater off and threw it in the general direction of a small box, full of other clothes. Under the sweater was, lo and behold... a green t-shirt with a birch tree print.

Silence once again filled the room as the man finished his own meal, taking both of the plates and putting them in the sink before returning to his seat with two steaming mugs. He gave one to Lyra, who was happy to find a full mug of green tea. An aroma of black coffee was coming from his own mug, but Lyra thought it best not to question it.

While she was thinking on how to best begin the conversation, Oleg spoke first. "So, where are you from?" He asked bluntly. "Can't say I've seen... pones like you before."

Lyra took a sip of her tea, wishing there was more sugar in it. "I'm from Equestria, you've never heard of it?" It was a pointless question, of course, since no humans were ever seen in Equestria, but she asked it nonetheless.

"Nope, never heard of it." He gulped down some of his coffee, a wave of warmth spreading from his stomach outwards, to the rest of his body. "You're far from home then, I reckon." He said with a certain amount of sadness, making Lyra wince inwardly.

"Where do you think are we, right now." She began gently, her hoof tracing circles on the table's wooden surface.

"We're at Taganay National Park, of course." He scratched his stubble, sipping his coffee. "Kialimsky cordon, to be exact."

"Uh-huh. And you are..."

"A woodsman, I watch over this here cabin, as well as a couple of others. I meet the tourists and see to it that they're not up to something nasty." He explained, rapping his fingers on the table. "There's not many of them in the winter, but someone has to keep the place running, right?"

Alright, this didn't look good. He still believed he was somewhere back home, and Lyra didn't know how to break the bad news to him.

"O-okay, what's the first thing you did this morning?" Lyra asked, deciding to start from afar. Oleg raised an eyebrow at the strange question, but answered it nonetheless.

"Well, I woke up at around... five, I think, from a very loud sound." His rapping became more frequent as he recounted his tale. "Then everything started shaking violently, I first thought it was a rockslide, but after a couple of seconds things settled down, and seeing as I was still alive I wrote it off as nothing serious."

"Really? Your whole cabin started shaking, and you thought nothing of it?" Lyra asked in disbelief.

"Nothing was broken, and I was still alive, so It was good enough for me." He said with a shrug. "Still, I decided to investigate and left my cabin, trying to see what the ruckus was about." A small smile graced his face as he gestured at the unicorn with his mug. "And then I heard you."

"Really?"

"It was hard not to, mind you. You were wailing like a bloody banshee!" He said with a chuckle, earning a light hit to the shoulder from Lyra. "So yeah, I saw you getting mauled by that weird wooden wolf, blasted it and carried you to this here cabin. Patching you up took some time, and I was worried you wouldn't wake up at all, but thankfully, it all turned out well in the end." He gave her a smile, finishing his coffee.

"Really? Why'd you think I wouldn't wake up?" Lyra said, purplexed.

"Well, you slept for, what? Fifteen hours? That's usually a bad sign." Lyra's eyes widened as she did the math.

"It's eight in evening already? Why didn't you wake me earlier?!"

"Well, usually animals don't like being disturbed in their sleep, so I just made sure you were breathing and sort of... waited for you to wake up." He froze up for a second, understanding what he just said. "Not that I think so now! I just-"

"Thought so at the time." Lyra finish for him, waving a hoof. "Don't worry about it, you didn't know at the time." Lyra thought about something, and couldn't help but ask.

"Is that why you were... petting me?" She said with a small blush.

"Y-yeah, I thought It'd calm you down, or something." He said awkwardly, scratching the back of his neck. "I won't do it again if you don't like it!"

"Oh, no, I don't mind it... Just ask before you do it next time, alright?" Lyra assured him with a smile. "I think we got sidetracked, was the forest... different than you remember it?"

"It was, I almost couldn't find my way back to the cabin." He mused aloud.

"And you said you've never seen a timberwolf before?"

"No, I have never-" He paused suddenly, squinting at Lyra suspisciously. "Wait, what are you getting at?" A tinge of alarm was evident in his voice.

"Well, just this morning I went to investigate a weird magic spike in the forest near my town." She said in a careful tone.

"So, what you're saying is..."

"You're not in Taganay, Oleg. You're in Equestria." She finished, silence descending onto the room.

Oleg grabbed his head in his hands, a panicked expression on his face. "Nyet, nyet, nyet, ne mozhet takogo byit'..." He mumbled quickly to himselft, and although Lyra didn't understand what he was saying, she clearly heard the desperation in his voice. "Da kak zhe eto tak?" He said to himself in a crestfallen tone of voice. Suddenly, he slumped in his seat, a miserable expression on his face.

"Pizdetc." She didn't need to know the meaning when she heard the pain in his voice.

He stood up shakily, making his way to the bunk beds, his shoulders slumped. Lyra hastily jumped to the floor, not caring about the pain in her hoof, and trotted up to the man.

"H-hey, are you-" She began, stretching her hoof towards him, but went silent as he turned his head towards her, his eyes glazed over.

"Alright?" He chuckled mirthlessly. "I think I'll hit the sack, it's been one hell of a day." He climbed onto the second story of the bunk bed, not caring to disrobe. "You can take the other bed, I won't mind." Lyra definently didn't like the lack of emotions in his voice.

"Oleg, please, let's talk. I promise you'll feel better after."

"I'll sleep on it." Lyra sighed, getting into her own bed, snuggling under the covers of a thick wool blanket.

"Good Night, Oleg." She said sincerely, in a last ditch attempt of cheering him up.

"Good Night, Lyra." He replied bitterly.

Author's Note:

It's 13.05.2022 where I'm from, so it counts.

Comments

[FanOfSun]

Bayu-bayushki-bayu~

This lullaby makes me laugh in any situations...This one was not an exception

[FanOfSun]

" Yo'bany v rot! " The human emitted a high pitched scream, jumping to his feet and backpedalling from the small pony until he had his back to the wall. Lyra looked at the man in concern, noticing fear in his eyes.

BAHAHAHA

This one got me!