Twilight left the group, and Fluttershy didn’t know what to do. The others started to walk away, and Fluttershy still didn’t know what to do. She approached an information kiosk; maybe they would know what to do. She asked the zebra lady in the kiosk for directions to the hotel. Fluttershy didn’t really want to bother any stallions with her own personal problem, so she thought that it would be best to just go straight to the hotel and wait for the train in the morning.

The lady at the kiosk wasn’t able to hear her properly and understand her question. Maybe it was the thick plexiglass. So Fluttershy spoke louder, but the lady still couldn’t hear. She practically shouted, but even then the zebra lady couldn’t hear. Fluttershy didn’t understand how she could do her job with such a thick, impenetrable sound barrier around her. There was a line forming behind her. Fluttershy felt bad about it, so she got out of line with her questions unanswered.

Fluttershy left the station. She had to stop for a moment and take in the view of the city. It was exciting and new and wonderful and terrifying all at the same time. Fluttershy shivered, overwhelmed. She had to get to the hotel before something bad happened.

She saw a taxi. It was waiting in front of the station. Twilight had said that if there was ever any problem, they could just take a taxi. Maybe the driver would know how to get there. She hustled down the steps and was about to get in when a pony wearing a business suit pushed past her and got in the cab himself. The cab drove away.

“Oh, um, I’m sorry,” Fluttershy apologized. She looked around. There were other ponies hailing cabs. Some were whistling, some were waving, some were just holding up their hooves. Fluttershy could have done that, but she didn’t want to. She didn’t want to bother anybody by making a spectacle of herself.

Fluttershy started walking down the street. “Maybe,” she thought to herself, “if I just keep walking I’ll get to the hotel eventually.” She walked for hours, but never found the hotel. She started wondering if she was still in Manehattan. It didn’t look like the same city as when she had started. The buildings were still big, but almost everything else looked different. All of the signs were in Chinese and there were all sorts of Chinese foodstuffs in the windows of the shops. Even many of the ponies were Chinese. Then she walked through another neighborhood where everything was Italian. Then another neighborhood, but she didn’t even know what ethnicity it was.

There sure were an awful lot of zebras. Not that Fluttershy had a problem with zebras. It was just that it wasn’t long ago that she didn’t even know what a zebra was. The only one she had ever met lived back home in the Everfree Forest. She saw dozens, hundreds of them. Mare zebras, stallion zebras, married zebras with little colt and filly zebras. There were plenty of other species too. She saw mules and donkeys and goats. She saw ungulates that she didn’t even have a name for. There were things like goats, but hairier and with long, curvy horns. There were great big black things, kind of like cows, that had enormous horns that curved down. There was some enormous thing. It was very tall. It was yellowish with brown spots and two stubby little horns on top of its head which was at the end of a very, very, very long neck. Fluttershy would have liked to go up and talk to it, but she was too shy. If only it had been one of her little animal friends.

Before Fluttershy knew it, the sun had started to go down. The buildings casted long, deep shadows. It was growing dark, and she still hadn’t found the hotel. She started to grow nervous. Maybe, she realized, she shouldn’t have sat next to Pinkie Pie on the train. Pinkie had been telling her all sorts of awful, scary stories about Manehattan. About how all the weird ponies come out after dark, and what they might do to lonesome mares that they catch. Sometimes they mug them. Sometimes they do... worse. The thought of that happening continued to plague her mind as the sky grew darker. On one hoof, the reason why she had come here with the other girls was because she wanted it, but she wouldn’t want it if she didn’t want it. It was so confusing. She was feeling like she was being watched. She almost always felt that way, but it was intensified this time. She could have sworn that there was someone behind her, following her, but she was too afraid to look.

Fluttershy wasn’t paying attention, and she bumped into some other pony. “Oh, excuse me,” she said.

“Watch where you’re going!” the pony barked at her.

Fluttershy was startled by his anger, and she backed into someone else. “Outta the way!” the other pony bellowed.

Fluttershy panicked. She screeched and took off down a dark alley, where she would be safe. The strange thing was, once she got down into the alley she didn’t feel safe any more. She could hardly see a thing...and it stunk. There weren’t many directions to run in. Fluttershy turned back to the alley’s entrance.

Her heart jumped into her throat. There was some pony standing there, silhouetted against the light from the street. He was just standing there, staring at her, or at least in her direction. Fluttershy turned around and started to walk away, further down the alleyway. She heard the clopping of hooves on asphalt behind her. He really was following her. She quickened to a trot, but so did he. A canter, a gallop. Still her pursuer kept up the pace. Fluttershy sprinted as fast as she could, tears streaming from her eyes, and a hopeless wail escaped her lips. She turned a corner and screamed. The alley had led her into a dead end. There was a door; the back entrance to some kind of business, but when she tried the knob it was locked.

Her pursuer rounded the corner. He found Fluttershy huddled into a corner of the alleyway.

“Please!” she begged. “I’m sorry! I’ll do whatever you want! Just don’t hurt me!”

“Miss! Miss!” he said. She squealed. “You misunderstand. You are mistaken. I do not want to hurt you.” Fluttershy opened her eyes and looked up. She could see him well in the light from the little bulb above the back door. He was a zebra. A handsome male zebra. He spoke fluent English, but with a thick accent. She had no idea where he was from, but he had a beautiful musical accent. “You misunderstand, miss,” he said, and extended a hoof to her. “I saw that you were frightened. I only want to help you.”

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