“The Other Side” Chapter 2- Running Like Hell.

Shards of falling glass shone in the afternoon sun, spinning in graceful arcs. The man's fall was less than graceful; after leaping feet first out a window 20 feet off of the ground, he twisted awkwardly in the air, trying to shield his face from falling glass. He plummeted to the ground within seconds, missing the metal gurney by half a foot. The bushes he had aimed for acted as a natural cushion, softening a bone-breaking fall into simply a bruising one. That did not mean that it was painless. It was far from it. He landed directly on the stinger-wound to his abdomen. In his own words, mentally of course, as the time for verbalization was long gone: Fuck! Scrotum-faced, shit-stained cockmonkey in a pile of bloody assrags!

As is evident, he had quite a vocabulary, particularly for curses. Keep running! Don't stop! a voice in his head spoke, but he assumed it was just his mind urging him forward. After all, who didn't get a little crazy in stressful situations? He bolted out of the shrubbery, arms pumping wildly as he made his way towards the town at breakneck speed. The curtains wrapping his feet and hands protected him from the jagged glass littering the ground. It would have been a hilarious sight if the man hadn't been running for his life. The sight in question was a hairy, naked, pale young man in bandages running from a group of talking equines, all the while having a cool breeze blowing in his direction. He felt cold, and it showed... awkwardly... but he ran nonetheless. He would've probably had an easier time escaping, had the rainbow-maned pegasus close behind him lost her wings. Unfortunately, or fortunately- whichever you prefer- she had not, and dove out of the window a few seconds later. He was about halfway over a waist-high stone wall when she caught up to him.

"C'mere you... thing! You're not getting away that easi-!" She was in mid-sentence when she received a healthy, delicious and nutritious knuckle sandwich.

"Cud!" she spat, holding her snout as he jumped the wall and began sprinting again. The pleasant sunny afternoon was a perfect day for a stroll, but in the young man's brain, it went more like this: Talking fucking midget horses are trying to kill me, I'm naked, everything burns, it's fucking cold outside, I don't know what damn universe I'm in, I'm so hungry I could (Ironically) eat a horse, I need to piss, I'm probably going to die today, and I just pissed the- damn it, need to go even worse now- shit outta that thing I just punched. Oh, and I'm going insane!

"And your thingy is showing!" said the energetic voice from before, out of nowhere. The young man's mind responded in the most rational way possible: THE FUCK?!

He didn't stop to think about the statement, instead, he ran even faster towards apparent safety.

The townsponies were going about their business for the day, when suddenly, they heard a voice yelling in the distance.
"Help! I'm being attacked by mutant horses! Help me! Help me! Get away from me you abomination!" looking up from their work, ponies on the street turned towards the sound, quizzical looks etched on their faces. The source of the yelling became immediately obvious when a naked, six-foot, crazed and extremely loud human male came into view. On his heels were a rainbow-maned pegasus, a pink earth pony with wildly fluffy hair, and five others, who were struggling to keep up. The man didn't pay any attention to what was going on in front of him, as he was busy waving his arms in the air and screaming pleas of assistance. A large number of the ponies on the street gasped, their jaws dropping wide open. One large red work horse with an orangish-red mane simply nodded.

"Eeeyup."

By this time, the man had arrived on the street and continued to yell.

"Help! Get these things away from me!" The man yelled at the top of his lungs. A young filly screamed, then blurted out,

"What the hay is that!?" The young redhead looked down at where the voice had come from, then immediately let loose an even louder cry of terror. "Aaah! Holy flippin' asscrackers!"

Seeing that the entire street was filled with talking ponies, he darted down an alley, continuing to run like a madman. Surprisingly, the alley was very clean and virtually devoid of trash. He was a city dweller, and lived in a rather dirty one at that, so the sight of clean back alleys unnerved him. The slapping sound of his feet slapping cobblestone, his ragged breathing and the clipping of hooves on stone were all he heard as he ran, his mind focused on three little words. Run like hell.

"Gotcha!" that was what the rainbow maned pegasus grunted as she tackled him from behind.

Blue eyes - that's what we'll call him until we find something more suitable- had played football as a linebacker for a season, and most six and a half foot, 250 pound meatheads didn't hit that hard. He exhaled sharply as the air was forced instantly from his lungs. She had rammed into him directly between the shoulder-blades. This caused him to stumble forwards and lose his footing. He fell and landed face first, getting a good taste of the slightly dusty ground. He also tasted the metallic flavor of blood as he bit his tongue. They rolled over each other in a flurry of limbs, each trying to wrestle for control. She ended up getting her rear legs around his chest and grinned with triumph. She
swung a cyan-colored hoof at his face, which sent his vision spinning as the blow connected. On instinct, he began to jostle around underneath his equine attacker, causing her to frown in confusion.

His strategy was apparent when he rolled his shoulders, along with his lower body, so that his legs stuck upwards into the air. He pulled his legs towards his chest, wrapping them around the head of the still-confused pegasus before she could punch him again. He pushed his legs back down, prying her off of him. As soon as Blue Eyes escaped the hold of his opponent, he rolled backwards and turned sideways, stumbling up into a rather angry looking orange mare in a cowboy hat. He was greeted by a swift kick to the jewels. If you're not a male, you do NOT know the feeling. In excruciating pain, he fell drunkenly against the wall of the alley, holding his newest injury with one hand and groaning uncontrollably. His groans were from a dry, hoarse throat, exhausted from screaming.

"Sorry sugar, had to be done. We can't have ya' causin' any more trouble." she drawled.

"F-fuck... just be glad you're not male, or I'd be sending yours straight to the top of your skull right now."

"Don't you be threatenin' me, I don't like makin' this any harder than it is!"

"Yeah? My ass! That coming from the crazy goddamn mutant horse trying to put me down!"

"Hay, we're ponies, you get it right before I feed you some more hooves!" said the feisty pegasus.

"You try it and you'll be picking up teeth, ya' frickin' hippie!"

"Hippie! Grr, lemme' at him!"

"Calm down RD, he's okay now. Now what the buck is this talk bout' bein' 'put down'?"

"I heard you all talkin’ about it in the hospital, 'End his suffering' 'the tension's killing me' 'stop the pain' and all that! Don't fucking lie ta' me!"

"I hate lyin', trust me Tatercakes. We weren't tryin' to hurt ya."

"'Tatercakes'? When the frick has anyone from the south called someone else 'Tatercakes'?!"

"'The south'? South of what?" 'RD' chimed in.

"No time fer' that, sugarcube. Just calm down, hon'."

"Fine, I'm calm." he growled the words but truthfully meant them nonetheless.

"What's yer' name?"

Blue Eyes leaned against the wall a little less, standing straighter and looking down from underneath his eyebrows.

"My name's-" he cleared his throat and held a hand to his gut as the pain from his stinger wound resurfaced. He shook his head in defiance of the pain, and then grunted out "Dylan... My name is Dylan MacLauchlan... and yours?"

"I'm Applejack, and my slightly angry friend over there-" Applejack motioned with a hoof to the pegasus "- Is Rainbow Dash, Ponyville's fastest flyer."

"Darn straight!" Rainbow Dash puffed out her chest, stretching her wings boastingly.

"So, I guess this means you're not trying to kill me? I don't know about this yet, give me a few minut-" Dylan was interrupted by a once-timid yellow pegasus with a pink mane, who had just arrived in the alleyway. Needless to say, she was not timid at the moment.

"You've been a bad, bad thing! Now sit still so we can have a nice lunch!" The yellow pegasus stared right into Dylan's eyes with such force that she could have used her gaze as a battering ram. Dylan sat frozen in her gaze for a few moments. Applejack and Rainbow Dash looked relieved, looking from the newly arrived pegasus to Dylan.

"Phew, good. Nopony can resist one of Fluttershy's stares." Rainbow Dash commented, shuddering as she remembered a time when she too had been stared down by Fluttershy. Suddenly, all hell broke loose, Dylan's look of horror returning with a vengeance as he screamed and ran down the alley shouting

"She's gonna eat me! She's gonna EAT MEEEE!!!!!"

All three of the ponies' jaws dropped, their eyebrows shooting upwards at the same time.

"I love The Lion King!" the energetic pink pony shouted as she bounced into the alley.

"The what now? Never mind, Pinkie Pie..." said the lavender colored unicorn following closely behind Pinkie Pie.

"What?! You don't have cable, Twilight? That's too bad. Oink, oink!"

Pinkie Pie had now put on a red warthog mask, and was continuing to bounce. A white unicorn with a clean and brushed indigo mane trotted up behind Twilight.

"Don't think too much about it, Twilight, we've got to hurry up and catch him. I'm completely covered in sweat! My mane is going to frizz up!"

"Um... I-I-I'm sorry everypony, b-but I think I...-" Fluttershy's voice lowered to a whisper, "-s-scared him off... I thought the Stare would work..." She pawed at the ground with one hoof, looking sheepish and blushing deep red.

"It's okay, honeydew; we all thought it would work. But please think of some different words to say before you try that again."

"Uh, yeah, what AJ said." said Rainbow dash, chuckling to herself. "Grr! Ponies, Equestria's most vicious carnivores!" they all giggled at that, but Pinkie Pie almost doubled over in laughter, which would have made for unpleasant landing, as she was currently in midair.

A pony in a doctor's coat panted and wheezed as he stumbled into the alley. "Sorry... but girls, aren't you...forgetting somepony? He's... getting away again."

After several minutes of chasing, everypony- including Dylan, but excluding Pinkie Pie -collapsed, exhaustion present on everyone's faces except for the inexhaustible Pinkie Pie, who was ecstatic.

"Guh... S-so... you're not trying to eat and/or kill me?"

"Ponies are vegetarians. Duh!" Pinkie Pie said matter-of-factly. "I'vegotapresentforyouanditssoawesomethatIcan'tholditinanylonger! I've just got to-" she took in a deep breath, her chest and cheeks expanding to an impossible size to take in the massive gulp of air.

"Oh no! Everypony cover your ears!" Twilight said quickly.

"Why?" Dylan said, scratching his head quizzically. Everyone else had covered their ears.

"SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAM!!!" Pinkie's scream was deafening.

"Fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckgoosefuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfiretruckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckcanteloupesfuckfuckfuck! Ow, that hurt..." A messily wrapped pink box with a red bow landed squarely in Dylan's lap. Dylan's ears were ringing so hard he almost vomited. He held up a hand to one of his bleeding eardrums. "This is for me?" Dylan groaned. Pinkie Pie nodded in assent, her smile widening until it stretched from ear to ear. Dylan slowly unwrapped the box, tenderly massaging his ear while he pulled the ribbons off. Inside was a large chocolate cake with white icing. There was a sentence written on it in blue and red icing: Thank you for saving Fluttershy! "You're... giving me this after I demolished a hospital room, ran halfway across town naked, and punched one of your friends in the face... Who the hell are you people?" Dylan scratched the side of his head, perplexed at their kindness.

"Well, you saved Fluttershy's life, and she sort of returned the favor..." Twilight Sparkle said. At this, Fluttershy's cheeks burned an even deeper shade of red. Dylan reddened slightly himself, tilting his head as his curiosity was piqued.

"How'd she do that?"

Fluttershy had now turned as red as she could possibly go, and crossed her forelegs. "Um, I... well I just... uhm..." the yellow pegasus looked as if her head was about to explode. Twilight Sparkle spoke up after Fluttershy's failed attempt at speech.

"What she was going to tell you was that she carried you all the way back to her house on the edge of the forest, which was at least three miles away... on a broken leg. When she got to her house, she almost bucking killed herself trying to stop the manticore's poison. She never left your side, even when we got Big Macintosh to pull you in a cart up to the hospital. She was frantic, especially when the doctor gave his prognosis." After this, the doctor piped up.

"By all rights, the amount of punishment you took should have killed you five times over, especially the poison; the manticore's venom can take down a fully grown grizzly bear within seconds."

Dylan's complexion took on an almost porcelain hue as he soaked in this information. Beads of sweat were falling off of him every second, splitting into shimmering droplets of moisture when they touched the ground. He shook violently; he jerked and twitched, sickly groans coming from deep in his throat.

"T-then... how am I... still... alive..." With this last word, Dylan breathed deeply, fell backwards and was sent hurtling into unconsciousness once more.

AUTHOR'S NOTE
I would really appreciate it if you guys DIDN'T GET ANY LESS AWESOME! Keep sending in comments, ratings, and if you feel like it, SPREAD THA WORD MAH BRETHREN! Next chappie's gonna have a drrrrream sequence! See you guys later. *Activating Sunglasses at Night*