It wasn’t an everyday occurance for Zecora to leave the Forest. It always seemed that she preferred the wild places, the quiet places. It was said that she only truly left in cases of emergency, whether by chance or some kind of voodoo. And yet here she was, knocking on Fluttershy’s door with an urgency seldom seen. So of course Fluttershy opened it right away, dropping her bag of birdseed and leaving a messy pile of sunflower and carroway on her nice green carpet.
As soon as the door opened, Zecora began. “Fluttershy, I do implore, I need your help with a manticore. Her term is up, the time is right, but of her cub many will desire a bite. So please, my friend, I beg - make haste, for we cannot another young one waste.”
Fluttershy took half a minute to decipher the rhyming verse into normal terms. Then she grabbed her emergency bags, slung them across her back, and asked Angel to tell Pinkie what was going on. Pinkie was a master of charades and would get the message. After all, it wasn’t every day that a manticore gave birth. Zecora was right; this was important. Manticores were an endangered species, the 50th listing down on the registry. Inhumane hunting practices, though outlawed decades ago, had thinned their numbers to a dangerous low. Birthings were difficult, and oftentimes the mother would be too exhausted to guard her cub afterwards.
Many common misconceptions about manticores persisted as fact, especially near the Everfree. One of the most common was the idea that manticores were the top of the food chain. Sure, a full-grown manticore had no real enemies. Nothing would dare go after it once its stinger came in. But until that segment of growth, at an average of two years old, manticore young were everything’s prey. Timberwolves, Celestial animals, bears, cockatrices; really anything with an appetite for magic-enhanced meat would take them out.
Zecora led her through the twisting undergrowth at a fast clip, winding and turning at odd intervals. Fluttershy stayed close, cringing at menacing shadows and claw-like branches. She knew she’d be safe with Zecora, but something about the forest never quite sat right with her. Fluttershy hated how she was scared right now, when a creature needed her so. Soon enough, she could hear the cries of the mother in labor. She galloped on ahead, heedless of the thorns and vines that scratched at her legs and caught in her mane.
It wasn’t pretty. The cub was trying to come out sideways, and the mother was roaring out in agony, thrashing around. Three large oak trees lay in pieces around the bloodstained clearing. Fluttershy did what she could to calm her down, speaking as soothingly as she could while still shouting over the manticore’s guttural wails.
“I’m here to help you,” she all but screamed. “This might hurt a lot, but I promise it’ll make everything easier!” The manticore met her eyes with fear and pain and hope, and she set her jaw. Then she set her back legs into the ground, forced her forehooves into the birth canal, and turned the cub around. The manitcore shrieked, louder than anything yet. Her barbed tail lashed around, barely missing Fluttershy’s head. But it was done. Hours, maybe, later,he cub’s head poked through, and with some steady pulls, Fluttershy helped the mother bring her little one out into the world.
It was a miracle, really. Looking down at the cub’s closed eyes as it rested in its mother’s arms. A cracked branch got Fluttershy’s attention, and she whirled around.
“Pinkie? What are you doing out here?” She stared at her friend, at the basket held between Pinkie’s jaws.
PInkie set it down, and some balloons popped out. “Happy birthday, Flutters,” she whispered after a look at the sleeping cub. “I talked to the girls, and we can have a real party tomorrow, ‘kay?”
Fluttershy threw herself at the other mare and caught her in a tight hug, not particularly caring that she had blood and celestia-knew-what else in her fur and mane. “Thank you, I knew you’d understand,” she whispered. “You always do.”
Kinda rough around the edges, but I do very much like this brave, hooves-on Fluttershy. The image of her sitting there covered in blood and pulling out a manticore cub is powerful indeed, and it contrasts charmingly with her enthusiastic response to Pinkie.
Also, one quibble:
Etymologically, "inhumane" is derived from "human," so it doesn't really fit. It's one of those nuisance words that's hard to ponify.
2317961 yeah... Inhumane is a problem. I was rushing for deadline on this one, and it definitely shows. I was using it mostly to start getting a better handle on Fluttershy for a longer story I have in the works right now, and it definitely suffers from having no real plot. So it goes.
Ooh! I love it when you update these.
Waiting: Mmh, it's always jarring to see AJ, the strong bulwark, laid low by something in any fic. And guilt, you really hit the nail on the head there-- Of course AJ will forgive her sister, but forgiving herself, that's the hard bit. Jeez, I'm amazed at how you can write this stuff (mostly) in thirty minutes. Amazed and maybe just a bit jealous. This is yet another one I hanker to see fleshed out, but I confess I love Apple family stuff.. Even when your insomnia dooms them, dooms them all.
Miracles: The opening reminded me how much Zecora is used as a plot device more often than she's treated like a real character. Of course, maybe that's because rhymes are so damn hard to write, heh. Actually, come to think of it, I'd love to see a backstory for the Everfree, too. Wild magic, weather, monsters.. Why? Maybe there's something like that out there and I just haven't come across it, yet. Oh, but that ending-- D'awwww! Once again you make Pinkie an epic character instead of one-dimensional slapstick.
J'adore, as always!
2322155 Zecora's rhymes are actually fairly easy for me to come up with... I think they were easily the quickest part of 'Miracles' to write down, probably due to my time spent with song lyrics. My problem here was that I didn't really know what she would do after alerting Fluttershy to the situation, since Fluttershy sorta took over the whole operation.
As for how I write these in nearly thirty minutes...
-- I type fast, especially when inspired.
-- I drink too much coffee. WAY too much coffee.
-- I start each story with a little nugget of truth. That way, I can relate enough to the situation that it all flows fairly naturally.
-- I tend to think through and plan out the general mood and arc of each piece before I actually sit down to write it. My brain spits out little fragments as I mull over possibilities and images while I work on other things, so by the time I actually sit down it's just a matter of putting the pieces in the right order.
I'm glad you're enjoying my dribbles of words, and thanks, as always, for your great feedback.
2322198 Well, Fluttershy may take over, but Zecora's into herbalism, yes? Maybe she's, ah, on-hand with life saving potions in case of hemmoraging or such. Either that or rhyming pep talk (You must push, and breathe very deep. Watching childbirth is giving me the creeps.)
Ah, good tips, though! My new years resolutions were to try writing (and posting, since I tend to panic at people seeing my work) a fic, and to becoming less of a lurker and more involved in the community. So far, I have yet to be able to force myself into the writing bit, but at least I've been proofreading and trying to comment more often, which is something!
2322436 Herr Burr Durrrr!... My brain forgot about herbalism in the midst of all the everything else, it would seem. And shamaness cheerleading would have been amusing to say the least.
Proofreading and commenting is definitely the way to start easing into the writing process. It helped me with finding exactly what I liked and didn't like as far as writing was concerned, before I actually made myself sit down and write something. It also may have helped that I did some stuff early on for the Collab Cage, which helped me get my gears turning.
I definitely look forward to anything you feel up to posting in the future, and if you need a second set of eyes feel free to poke me.
You know, I have liked Zecora since her first episode. And yet, I never think of ideas on how to use her. I will have to correct this in the near future.
I'm always amazed by all the situations Fluttershy finds herself in. For a shy pony, she has some balls. I can't see somepony like Dash being able to handle the extreme nature of childbirth...but it doesn't even phase FS. While I know she has wrestled bears and shouted at dragons...sometimes you forget. Especially when you usually see her being so gentle and timid.
But I digress.
It was also nice to see another Pinkie pop up. But I could be biased. Maybe. Probably.
2399045 I love Zecora and actively squeal whenever she gets screentime, and yet in all my stories I have only shoehorned her in once, to my great shame. Beyond any Everfree disasters, potential shipping with Twilight, AJ or Gilda (), or a dreary, iambic origin story I just can't think of ways to flesh her out into a more full character... *le sigh*
And I can never get enough Pinkie either, which is why she made a cute cameo in this. But this is basically what I'd see her doing in this situation, in the end... enough to let Fluttershy know that she hadn't forgotten the birthday, but also keeping it quiet enough that she wouldn't wake the baby or mama manticore.