Scotch Muffin

by TheFoxern

1: Little Hooves

What's odder than having hooves? Probably nothing. Then again, it's hard to know any different when you've always had hooves. But this was the current distraction that Scotch Muffin had chosen. Why hooves? What exactly did hooves do for you? Sure, they were what you used to walk, but they made holding anything difficult. On that subject, why did everypony always insist on holding things with their hooves? They've no grip strength and to really hold anything properly it has to either be placed on the flat of the hoof, or held with both.

It was easy to distract yourself when walking through the Everfree Forest. Not so scary when you don't think about it. Hooves were a good subject. She just had to keep thinking of other things; like what she brought with her. Hooves were one, and then there was the little pack she had. It had taken her nearly ten minutes to get it on by herself. Suddenly she looked ahead and shuddered. She had thought sen something cross the path ahead. “Jeez this place is creepy...” she mumbled. It was not her first choice for where to run away to, but it was the only one she was sure they wouldn't come after her.

The worst part about distracting yourself so you don't watch where you're going, is that you're not watching where you're going. Which means you get lost. Which she was. She was very lost. But how could you be lost when you had no destination? That thought cheered her up slightly. Only slightly. Was the orphanage really better than this place? She shook off that thought. Any place was better than there. She was certain she could be at the bottom of a hole, with creepy little crawly things and still think it better. Actually that's a decent description of the orphanage, minus everything else bad that happened there.

“No. This is better,” she said, taking a deep breath. Even the air didn't feel good here. A gust of wind made her shiver and she looked back. Several yellow glowing eyes stared back at her. She whimpered softly as she looked back ahead. Distraction. She needed another distraction. What was in her pack again? An apple, some carrots, a rope, a few candles, no matches. She didn't need matches. Her eyes crossed as she tried to look at her horn, of course, she couldn't see it. All it seemed good for was lighting fires. But she had gotten good enough at it to light candles. She could even light two candles at once.

She could do anything she wanted, now that she had escaped. There was no limit to who she could be. She just had to get through the forest... “And who's this little filly?” The voice sent a shiver up and then back down her spine, but she kept walking. “Come here, Little Filly...please come here...”

“Leave me alone.” Even though she tried to sound confident, the terror was evident in her voice. But she had to remember that it only got you if you went to it. She had no idea what it was, but moving away from it had seemed to work every time. The first few times she had ran, but now, she just kept walking.

“Such little hooves you have...Little Filly...” The sound of the voice was etched with fangs; big gnashing fangs. They clicked as it spoke. “Come here little filly...no need to be scared...”

“I'm not afraid of you,” she lied, but it made her feel better to. It had not spoken for an hour, and she was hoping that it had left her alone.

“You're going the wrong way, Little Filly...” the thing said. It sounded amused.

“You don't know where I'm going,” she retorted, taking a deep breath. The more it talked, the less scary it was.

“But I do, Little Filly...I know exactly where you're going...” The worst part was that it sounded like it came from a different direction every time it spoke. Every pause it took, it came up somewhere else.

“Liar.” If she didn't know where she was going, how could it? She stumbled over a rock and kicked it off to the side out of frustration.

“Oh but I do...Little Filly...you're a lost...Little...Filly...”

“You, are a liar.” It was more annoying than frightening now. That was good. Now she was annoyed and not scared. Being annoyed is better than being scared. “I am not lost.”

“You should not lie...not to me...” She almost hesitated when the voice was ahead of her, but she just had to keep walking.

“You're the liar, not me.” She stomped her hooves as she walked, daring the thing to show itself. There was no response. Nor was there a response for several minutes. “Are you still there, liar?” She looked back behind her and slowed to a stop. There weren't any little yellow eyes behind her now, or off to the side. “I must be close to the other side...” She started trotting forward again. “I know they don't like going near the edges.”

But what she found instead, was a ravine. She looked down into it and all she could see was the whiteness of fog. She looked around, spotting a rope bridge a little ways away. She moved towards it and gulped as she prodded it gently with her hoof. She paused, looking at her hoof a moment. Her hooves weren't small, were they? Every filly she knew had hooves this size, but- a twig snapped behind her and she ran. When she stopped, she realized she was on the other side of the bridge, panting and looking back across.

There was nothing there. “Stupid...thing...snapping...twigs...” She kicked at the post of the bridge; it snapped. She froze, watching as the whole bridge fell away. “That could have fallen when I was on it,” she muttered. She looked down into the depths as the bridge disappeared from sight. She waited, and waited, but there was no sound of it hitting any kind of bottom. She gulped again. “Ok...keep it together girl,” she said as she shook herself. “Keep moving...we don't want to go that way anyways...not at all...never.” The area ahead looked just like what had been on the other side of the bridge, but it felt different. She took a deep breath and began walking once again.

A sudden growl made her jump several hooves into the air and run quite a distance before she realized what it had been her own stomach. That made her feel...a bit foolish. She pulled a carrot out of her pack and munched on it. She was holding it in two hooves. Hooves were so useless for holding things. But as she chewed thoughtfully on the carrot, she started to notice things. The trees here looked...nicer. There didn't seem to be anything in any of the bushes nearby and it almost felt safe...

In fact, it did feel safe. Or at least not dangerous. That kind of worried her. “Maybe nothing crosses the ravine?” she said, finishing the carrot and standing back up. There was probably still a long way to go. At least now she felt better about traveling and the creepy voice thing was gone.

A soft clip clop noise echoed around her and she froze a moment, looking around. Then she looked down and sighed. This was a stone street. She nudged some of the cobblestones with her hoof. They felt worn down, yet smooth. “Is this a road?” Her voice echoed in a way that caused her to shiver. It was hard to tell if it was her echo, or something echoing her. “Hello?” she tried. The lack of echo was more frightening than the echo. Echoes don't just not happen. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Hello?” Again there was no echo. A shiver ran down her spine, and she began trotting forward, down the road again. Her hooves echoed. Or...she looked behind her; there was nothing there. It sounded almost like somepony was following her. Ahead, there was nothing but the cobble road, which grew more and more apparent that it had been a road, with even a slight railing raising out of the ground at the sides.

But it was not well used and it was overgrown. She was sure that if she laid flat, she could probably hide behind some of the tufts of grass. The feeling someone was looking at her made her turn around. When she did, she froze. There, a ways away, but nonetheless there, stood herself. It was hard to not recognize yourself. Her amber coat, her purple mane, and those sharp orange eyes. “Hi,” herself said, smiling at her.

“First off...I do not smile like that,” Scotch said, taking a few steps back.

“But I do,” said her double, as it started to approach, matching her step for step. “I have a lot to smile about. Because you're here now.”

Scotch had a feeling she could outrun her, or at least not get caught by her. It depended on how much like her she actually was. Goodness her thoughts were getting confusing. “What's that supposed to mean...”

She tilted her head slightly to the side. “I don't know. But you're the first pony I've ever seen.”

“Never looked in a mirror?” Scotch said, with a satisfying amount of sarcasm. Which seemed to pass right over her head.

“What's a mirror?” she asked, still approaching. “I don't think I've seen one of those either.” There was something off about her voice. Something...wrong.

“It's a thing you use to see yourself in...” She hesitated, she didn't want to back up anymore; she didn't know what was behind her. But when she stopped, so did she. “What are you? You can't be me, because I'm me and I know what a mirror is.”

She hesitated and then sat down. “I don't know. I'm not you, I'm me.”

“Well, you look like me.” Scotch took a step forward and she took a step back.

“Do I? I don't think that's what I usually look like...but...” She blinked several times. “I don't know.”

Scotch sat down, and so did she. She was copying her. It was like staring into a mirror. “Well... Do you think you could try being you and not being me?”

“I...can try,” she said and there was a green flash, revealing somepony much, much taller than Scotch and colored black. Not so much a coat, as a soft shell. Frills instead of a mane, and insect like wings. Two tattered looking ears, and a horn between them. But what Scotch couldn't stop staring at, was the two long fangs and those pale green eyes. Though the holes in it's hooves were quite disturbing as well.

Comments

[Vetnern]

Good story, just need's rewritten so everything is not bunched up

[TheFoxern]

2120361 Bunched up as in how?

[Vetnern]

I quote a comment from one of my own fanfics.

"new speaker, new paragraph. Always."

[TheFoxern]

2120412 o.o Did I not do that? I thought I did that...

[Vetnern]

There are no gaps between paragraphs, unless the computer i'm using is going nuts.

[TheFoxern]

2120432 Oh, I don't put gaps between paragraphs... I should probably do that... I tend to just put a tab space at the beginning of a new one to separate them... I shall do that.

[Vetnern]

2120439 And you keep writing good stories. Don't forget that one!

[TheFoxern]

2120446 Heheh. Thanks. I didn't think that not doing that would make it difficult to read, but I suppose it makes sense. I'll hafta do lotsa editing now.