The Pale Bog
In the midst of the pale bog, a mare wandered with her bunny rabbit. Endlessly on and on the bog stretched, bathed in a stagnant mist. Sickly bark obelisks were strewn across the barren expanse. They were dried to near-petrifaction and bent in unnatural directions. Quicksilver puddles dotted the landscape, nearly opaque. A solid slate of untextured grey hung overhead. Neither the light of day nor the dark of night could pierce its veil and touch the face of the land. Shadows sprawled in all directions. The bog seemed as if it were cordoned off into its own dimension, an untouched void lost to time.
The mare’s coat was frosted in the cold like a winter morning’s dew, her hooves caked in — and her legs flecked by — black-grey mud. Hopping next to her was the rabbit. Much of his white coat was hidden with a similarly muddy stain. The sloshing of water and mud as hooves crept ever forward sounded out with a lonesome tone. There was nothing else to be heard. Nothing else to be seen. Life had long abandoned this place, or perhaps had never taken shelter here at all.
Yet, as the mare trudged on, she could feel the sting of eyes on her back.
“Hello?” Her voice quavered and disappeared into the fog without response, not even an echo. She let a wing down, letting her rabbit hop on up to her back. It felt safer, calming, to have him cozy against her. Paranoia was just getting the best of her, she hoped. She must simply keep walking. Walk and soon she’ll find her way out of this place.
“How long do you think we’ve been here?” she asked the rabbit. It was a silly question to ask. She couldn’t even remember how or when she’d entered this dead swamp, as though wandering was all she’d ever known. Her limbs trembled and burned, and her hollow stomach was beginning to devour itself. The last she’d eaten was… She couldn’t remember. To eat seemed almost abstract to her now. Would her friends be angry with her once she returned home? She’d had friends, she believed. At the very least, she had her bunny. Onward still she pressed. Was compelled to press.
A dark shape flittered in the corner of her eyes. She turned.
Nothing there. Nothing but the husks of trees eternally dead. The mare circled one of them. If only something were to grow from these awful things. She eyed its skin. It was cragged and cracked and looked as if it were a stone pantomime of plantlife. Her stomach gurgled with pain. Without even realizing it, the mare found herself tearing at the harsh wood, yanking on it with a manic distress. With a crunch, a piece broke off, sending the mare careening backwards into the muted soup of mud and dirt behind her. She took the bark into her mouth without second thought.
Tears welled in the mare’s eyes as she began to heave dryly, trying to spit the dust from her mouth. It wouldn’t come out. Blood rushed to her head as she strained, coughing a hacking and violent cough. Dust threatened to suffocate her as it lined her throat. Haggard breaths fought to enter her body. The mare crawled to a nearby puddle and began to drink from it, only to cry out as it turned to ash on her tongue. Her limbs gave way. Into the puddle she collapsed, coat soaked with mud as she fell to her side. The coughing would not stop. Her bunny nuzzled against her fervently, trying to help her.
They watched the girl and whispered to one another. She still had the rabbit, they mused to themselves. As the coughing died down, one of the bog’s many residents shambled closer.
Though eyes reddened and lungs burning, the mare picked herself back up, wrapping her bunny in her wings as he hopped beside her. Pangs of hunger stabbed at her core. No good, this place. The mare shivered as she felt the now familiar sensation of eyes crawling across her back. She turned and, in the distance, saw a figure peeking at her from behind a tree. It did not move. Only stared with sunken and dull eyes.
“H-Hello?”
Hello. The voice was not quite that of a pony. Far too hoarse and dry. A high-pitched wisp that could barely wriggle its way into the girl’s ear.
Hesitantly, the girl moved closer. As the thing came further into view, she recoiled. The figure, covered completely with the tar-like mud, seemed to grin. A few thin locks of hair protruded from its head, draping its face in greased strands. It was gaunt, a skull wearing a taut skin mask. The rest of the creature was hidden from view as it huddled behind its tree trunk. A strong and terrible odor wafted from behind the tree.
Oh oh oh. You still have the rabbit, the thing jittered. Unusual.
“Still have the rabbit?”
I don’t like the others, but us, we can be friends. Friends, you and me.
“Do you have a name?”
It cocked its head and laughed. Do you?
Of course she did, but… She couldn’t remember. How strange. Pain flooded out from her core in waves. The girl held a hand to her stomach. She was so…
Hungry? I’d share what I have, but she’s no good anymore. Turning its head, the creature looked off to something behind the tree. The smell was getting worse. Dead meat. It'd be nothing but ashes in your mouth, it said in a playful sing-song. The girl shrieked as the thing lurched out from its cover. Its body was emaciated and desiccated. Reaching out a hoof, it pointed to the girl, as best as it could point. Its limbs were gangrenous sticks covered in torn-at flesh. It giggled, staring into the girl’s eyes. The rabbit’ll do.
The mare sheltered the rabbit behind her.
“No!”
With each backwards step she took, the skeletal creature followed, mouth agape. She could see more of them now, watching with muted stares from behind the trees. Silent. All in various stages of decay. Some of the faces almost seemed to have some semblance of life to them, faces almost like hers.
It continued its slavering advance.
The rabbit. Rabbit rabbit rabbit. Rabbit or you. If you share, we’ll be friends, I promise. The thing smiled. I’m not like the others. We’ll be friends.
As fast as she could muster, the mare turned and ran, rabbit on her back. The creature let out a chilling shriek that tore into her backside. She could hear hoofsteps splashing in the puddles as they chased her. The bog stretched on endlessly. More eyes watched from the trees. They were getting closer, she could feel it. Their chorus of crazed wails deafened her. Through the hunger, through the pain, through everything, she ran.
The mare panted as she collapsed into the mud. There was no sound. None save for her own. Her entire body was paralyzed from exhaustion. Movement was a near impossibility as she felt the energy drain from her body. A hole ate its way through her stomach, waves of pain wracking the whole of her body. She would die if she did not eat. Soon.
Her rabbit looked on her with despair.
If she did not eat, she would die. But she couldn’t… No, it would be too horrible. She couldn’t even have the decency to show her rabbit mercy before… Or he’d become ash. To survive, he’d have to be alive.
She couldn’t.
She would die here in this bog if she did not.
“I… I’m sorry.”
With the last of her strength the mare held the rabbit down and did what had to be done. To live.
How long had she been here? Long long long. So long. The pangs never went away. Never. Never. The others would get her if she let them. No, she was the one to get them. To be less hungry than the others. To continue on. Yes. So long here. So hungry. Sometimes she’d take a little nibble off her foreleg. Not so bad not so bad, no wonder the others wanted to get her. Too bad. She was a buffet of one! Ha ha. And so were they. If you are what you eat, then she was alive. It was a fun thought, ha. More alive than others, she was.
Then she saw her.
In the midst of the pale bog, a mare wandered with her bunny rabbit. She watched the mare stumble around aimlessly. Oh oh oh, rabbit. So long since she’d had rabbit.
“H-Hello?” the mare called out.
Hello.