> Animals or Cannibals? > by Feeling Grand > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Animals Don't Feel The Same As Us > -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The air was so frosty... the night so cold... the mountain so desolate with life and hope. Two pegasai sat shivering in a cave, as the ice had frozen over the entrance way. They had gone on royal duties from Twilight to see the yaks, but because one insisted they fly all the way... they had gotten caught up in a terrible twisted storm. It shook them, and turned them, pulled them this way and that. And damaged the blue one's wings... as the bold rainbow maned pegasus smashed into the cave high up on that cliff, and her dear friend followed. “Rainbow...” Those words whispered into the night, a soft gentle voice comforting an old weakened friend. “We’ll be alright...” “It hurts so much!” Rainbow screamed and screamed, the pain excruciating as she knew a bone in the left wing had snapped. A clean cut is what doctors would call it, for the large appendage of her blue feathery wing just dangled there... hopelessly broken. “It’s okay...” Fluttershy whispered to her... “It’s okay... because, we’ll get help in the morning...” “When will morning come!” Rainbow just yelled in aching tears, so much pain... so much agony. “We’ll just keep close to one another... keep the warmth. That’s what the animals do in the wild.” Fluttershy told her, hugging Rainbow close and trying to sooth her terrible pain. Rainbow Dash pushed her off, and Fluttershy moved back, shivering. “We’re not animals...” Rainbow growled at her. “We’re not critters who can’t think for themselves... we are ponies.” Fluttershy gasped, shocked to hear this and yelped in an angry peep. “That’s not true! Sometimes, I think animals are more than what ponies ever could be!” Rainbow rolled her eyes, ignoring the pain and turned to face her old childhood friend. “Y’know that bear pal of yours...? If you died... he’d eat you.” Fluttershy’s eyes widened in horror and she just yelled. “No!” “Yes...” “He wouldn’t...” “Animals don’t think like us... they’re not sentient in the same way.” “Maybe because they feel more...” Fluttershy only peeped in tears, a hurt of how her friend viewed the creatures she loved so much. Rainbow only crooked her eyebrows up, lost in how else to explain it to the meak yellow pegasus and just rolled her eyes. “You’ll see one day...” she only muttered and turned around on the stone frozen ground, trying to get some warmth but it was not working. She felt herself getting sleepy... but not the same kind of sleepy... more like she was drifting peacefully into the cold and there was no stopping it. Until Fluttershy climbed on top of her and gave her her body warmth. Rainbow accepted it. It wasn’t a romantic gesture or anything, but she knew she needed Fluttershy’s heat to survive... to live. For the cold was bringing them so close to death... To death... To death... ~x~ “Fluttershy...” When she woke the next morning, she felt a frozen body was on top of her. She stayed still. Her eyes filled with tears. “F-Fluttershy...?” She held her close... the body that was so cold while hers was still warm. She looked out the cave, seeing the wind had stopped howling, and began to walk in a limp to the entrance. But as she looked at all the mountains around... she sighed... But the sigh just turned into sobs... Roars of pain.. of pure agony that was not from her wing. But from the pony that had lived. That had saved her... That had died for... her. “FLUTTERSHY!!!” she roared, and ran back to her. She hugged the lifeless body, crying tears that just could not stop and begged the pony to awaken. “PLEASE! WAKE UP! WAKE UP! WAKE UP!!” Her screams were so loud, that she never heard the rumbling of the mountain. And then it came... the clashing, the tumbling of the tonnes... of snow. She blinked her eyes, seeing at first a bit of snow drop just before the cave... before so much more snow came falling down the mountain and as she ran to get out, she only saw it tumble in. And block all light. She was stuck in the cave... stuck with death... and she cried... and cried... For her... for the pegasus that had given her her warmth. She waited three nights to die... hugging the frozen body to her in tears... three nights... as the mountain tops rumbled and made noises of creaking and clinking. She kissed Fluttershy on the forward... the night she knew she would die of hunger... and realized something. She could taste her... And... her friend... she... she tasted... ...good... Oh no! Rainbow kissed Fluttershy’s face again, and again and again... before she took a hard bite... and tasted for the first time... meat. Flesh. Frozen flesh... yet it was still soft. But in her confusion, in her delusion, in her hopeless need to WANT to live... she did it. She did the unthinkable. She tore the fur with her teeth... tore it and got to the meat... the food... It was so disgusting... yet she couldn’t stop, couldn’t stop eating. Until she was full. And on the first night of her first meal in four days... she just sat there with blood on her mouth... looking at the skull she had kissed away... bitten away. She ate her all... the flesh... the blood... grinding the bones, chewing on the muscle... until all that was left was the heart. She looked around, having gone crazy with unnatural food in her gut. “Take it...” She looked back and forth for who said that, looking for Fluttershy and whispered in a heated scared breath. “Fluttershy... I can’t... it’s.... it’s your heart...” “Which I give to you, Rainbow...” She swore she could see Fluttershy standing before her, pushing the heart nearer to her. The heart never moved. “You need to keep your strength up.” “WHY ARE YOU SO KIND!!” Rainbow just screamed, tears pouring down her face. “WHY COULDN’T YOU HAVE LEFT ME TO DIE!! I DIDN’T WANT THIS! I DON’T WANT THIS!!” “Animals need to be fed...” It was when Fluttershy said this that the words came full force back to Rainbow’s memory. “Y’know that bear pal of yours...? If you died... he’d eat you.” Fluttershy’s eyes widened in horror and she just yelled. “No!” “Yes...” “He wouldn’t...” “Animals don’t think like us... they’re not sentient in the same way.” “What am I...?” Rainbow just asked herself, holding the frozen soft heart close to her and feeling the blood touch off her fur... dampening her cheek just the littlest. “What am I now...?” She kissed it. ~x~ There was a rumble... ~x~ Yaks hit the mountain hard with their horns, hitting the snow down and suddenly sunlight blasted into the cave. Rainbow hurried towards it, not giving a damn anymore for the snow and just slid down it, rocks cutting her but she was caught by two woolly yaks. “Yak got message from purple princess of missing ponies.” Rainbow stiffened. She could still taste the blood on her mouth. “Does blue flying pony have friend with her...?” Rainbow swore she heard her stomach grumble... grumble and ache in a soreness... as if... Fluttershy was still speaking to her... But she wasn’t... She was gone. But she was still there. “-NO!” Rainbow suddenly yelled, looking at the two male yaks and seeing their confused thick woolly faces. “Me... and Fluttershy... we split up.” “Oh no...” the main yak said, looking at Rainbow and shaking his head in such sorrow. “This was last cave... last place she could be within miles. You sure you not see her anywhere?” “NO!” Rainbow yelled again, and suddenly the other yak touched her cheek, seeing the dried blood on it... yet Rainbow had no cut. The two yaks were quiet for a moment, before looking at each other, then back at Rainbow. “Yak sorry that your friend... is gone.” Rainbow tried to not cry, but the tears were already coming down her cheeks like a waterfall and the salty water washed away the remaining blood. “Yes...” she whimpered. “Come on... we must go back.” “I don’t think I can go back... I don’t think I can...” “Yak would’ve done it.” She looked at the main yak as he said this quietly, a solemn voice coming from his mouth. “Yak sorry... your friend disappeared.” “No...” Rainbow said, and looked back to the cave... seeing Fluttershy smiling at her, nodding her head. “I’m sorry... I didn’t hug her back...”