I woke up with the feeling of snow surrounding me. The chill went straight through me and into my bones. As soon as I opened my eyes, I knew that something was way off.

By the looks of things, I was apparently in a forest. The forest was covered in lots of snow; about six inches give or take, with large trees all around. For some reason, the forest gave off an intimidating vibe, like there was this evil presence just watching your every move.

I groaned as I tried to sit myself up. As I did, though, a sharp pain suddenly ignited from my lower abdomen. I moaned in pain as I felt the pain travel from my stomach all the way to my head, making me fall back on my back again. I tried to sit up again, but slower this time, to avoid any unnecessary pain. I looked down upon myself to see what could cause me such agony.

As soon as I looked, I could feel my face pale with shock. Right on the lower left of my stomach, about three inches long, was a deep and ragged cut. Said cut had blood all over it.

Lots of blood.

Panicking slightly, I began to look around for something to help bandage it up. As I was looking, I noticed that there were some leaves nearby that looked promising. Not caring if they were safe to touch at the moment, I immediately tore a few of them off and place them on top of the wound. As soon as they made contact with my wound, a new bout of pain spread across me, making me take a sudden gasp from the shock of it. Quickly covering the wound, I went to work cleaning up the blood around the gaping gash. Thankfully, and surprisingly, the wound had ceased to bleed so much, so I was able to clean it off with ease. Once that was done, I began to take stock of anything that I had on me at the time.

I was wearing a fuzzy red hoodie with a hood that was deep enough for cover my face, at least from what I could tell at the moment. For some reason, I didn’t have anything under it, and my hoodie’s zipper was open. Not only open, but broken, so I couldn’t zip up my hoodie. I was also wearing, for some odd reason, some tan cargo shorts.

‘Why am I wearing shorts in this kind of weather’ I thought to myself. I shook my head, deciding that it was a moot point right now, just happy that at least I was wearing something in this cold weather. Still, the lack of proper clothing was starting to get to me, and I knew that if I didn’t get to proper shelter in time, I would most likely die of hypothermia. As I looked around for a makeshift housing area, I noticed that there were some unusual items near me.

I slowly got up and walked to the items, all the while clutching the wound, making sure that the leaves stayed on it. Once I got to the items, I realized what they were. They were a couple of weapons, which consisted of a large straight stick and a pair of what looked like to be a pair of large trident heads which had short handles instead of long ones. Curious, I bent down a little, wincing at the pain as I did so, and picked them up.

Once in my hand, I began to examine the two objects. The two trident like objects were about one and a half feet in length, and had a slight weight to them, with the middle spike being the longest, and the two side spikes going only a quarter of the length before curving slightly to the sides. At the end of the handle was a solid ball that I assumed could be used for knocking someone out.

Once that was done, I looked for a place to put them, and to my luck, I noticed that I was wearing a belt around my shorts. Giving a silent thank you, I was able to slide the middle spike right under the belt on my right side, allowing the two smaller ones to be placed over the belt, acting a little like a holder. Satisfied, I then placed the other trident-like weapon on my left side before I carefully leaned down and picked up the large stick. It seemed that it was a few inches taller then me, and as I looked at myself, I guessed that I was at least five and a half feet, so I guessed that the wooden weapon was at least five feet and eight, maybe ten inches.

As I finished examining the wooden weapon, I realized an important detail that I missed, one that I thought was more terrifying then the gaping wound, or the fact that I’m in some random forest.

I had no memory about, well…anything.

Now, to be fair, I did know some of the basic things, like my species, gender and things like that. But I didn’t know any of the specifics, such as how I got here, where I am, or what these weapons are called. Hell, I couldn’t even remember where I came from. The thought that I lost all memory from my past to my very identity made me start to panic, but I quickly tried to calm myself down for the sake of my own survival and sanity.

Once I felt calm enough, I gave a quick look around. Not really knowing where to go, I just decided to pick a random direction and to just start walking. Hopefully after a while I would be able to find someplace to stay, maybe find civilization if I’m lucky.

Then again, if I was lucky, I wouldn’t be in this mess to begin with.

---

I have been walking for about thirty minutes now and the forest still doesn’t seem to be letting up right now, making me even more worried. The wound had started to clot a while ago, thankfully, and it didn’t hurt as much as before. The longer I walked, the more certain I felt about that presence watching me. After a few more minutes of mild terror, I finally heard something that caused me to freeze in shock and surprise.

A scream…

The scream was something out of a horror scene. At first, I thought that it was some sort of wild animal, but then I heard a voice. The voice was loud and high pitched, and for some reason, the scream…sounded familiar to me.

Throwing caution to the wind, I ran as fast as I could without reopening my wound, wanting to find the source of the sound. A few seconds later, however, I felt something run into me, causing me to let out a large *OMPH* as I hit the snowy ground. As I tried to regain my senses, I heard someone giving a small groan of pain.

“Ow, my head. That’s going to hurt in-” Said a voice before suddenly stopping. I assumed that it was female by the sound of it, and it seemed to be annoyed more then anything else.

I groaned as I got up, holding my chest and wound a bit. Thankfully the impact didn’t reopen my wound, to which I was grateful. “Geez that hurt.” I opened my eyes, and what I saw was…well…I was surprised, that much I was sure of.

Sitting right in front of me, a hoof holding its head, was an azure horse. Well, maybe horse isn’t the best description of it, since it was a good deal smaller then me, most likely it went up to my chest if it stood up. The…equine, had a silver mane and tail, and it was even wearing a magician’s hat and cape, complete with stars and moons. Out of all of that, however, were the eyes. For some reason, the eyes just stood out more then everything else. It might have to do with the fact that the violet eyes were much bigger then a normal equine, but even so, when I looked into them; I saw intelligence and emotions similar to a human’s.

We stood there for what felt like hours, just staring at each other in complete silence. Once I was able to collect my thoughts, I calmed myself down a bit and began to talk to myself. For some reason, talking to myself was a bit helpful for me

“Ok…so I wake up, find a wound on my stomach, no memory of who I am, and now I come across this…equine with strange coloring and clothing. Well, at least I got a mode of transportation now.” With that, I looked at the equine, and noticed that it was still frozen in the same spot it was when it crashed into me. I gave a small shrug, thinking that it was just still startled, and carefully walked towards it to climb on the equine. However, once I placed a hand on its back to get on, the equine suddenly raised a hoof and swatted my hand away.

“Just what the hay are you doing, trying to touch the Great and Powerful Trixie like that?!” It said, its eyes narrowing in a glare at me. Now I was frozen once again, just staring at it. I thought that it had some intelligence, but I didn’t expect it to be actually sapient.

“Y-you can talk?” I asked a bit embarrassed by my stuttering voice.

“Well, of course Trixie can talk, she has learned to do so ever since she was a filly. Trixie’s more surprised with that fact that she’s never seen anything like you before.” It said, still glaring at me. “And Trixie wants to know what in Equestria you were thinking about doing with her, hmm?”

“Um…w-well, I was going to…uh, ride you, but-”

At this, the creature that I assumed was Trixie stared at me for a few seconds, her eyes now wide open, before she glared at me even more. As she glared, I could have sworn that her cheeks had a slight tinge of red to them. “You WHAT?! How dare you think that the Great and Powerful Trixie would allow a sloppy, disgusting creature to even touch her plot with your horrid appendages!”

Now it was my turn to blush a bit as I now glared at her, a bit upset that she would think I would do something like that. “What? Listen here, ’Trixie’. First of all, I meant ride you on your back, not…that. And second, even if I meant that, why would I ever even think about doing something like that with a…a horse! I mean, it’s…it just doesn’t seem right, even if you are sentient.”

“Wha…how dare you, you…you…hairless freak! Trixie’s not some horse. She’s an unicorn pony, and one of the strongest unicorns in Equestria, and you will treat Trixie as such!”

“Well, sorry, Miss. unicorn, but in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not exactly from around here! I just woke up face up in some snow in the middle of this random forest, not knowing where I am, or even who I am, and now I’m getting a lecture from a random equine? Yea, I so apologize for me not being on my best behavior. And for the record, I’m a human, not a hairless freak…though I guess that could still be accurate.”

Trixie scoffed at this. “A human? Please, don’t make Trixie laugh! There are no such things as humans. They’re a myth, a bed time story told to little fillies and colts, not real beings.”

I opened my mouth to respond, but for some reason, nothing came out. I simply stood there, mouth open, staring at the pony, my anger and frustration just slowly fading away only to be replaced with…emptiness. I could feel my shoulders sag as my strength just left me and closing my mouth, I slowly lowered myself onto the ground, sitting cross legged, still staring at Trixie, no longer glaring at her, but just staring at her in disbelief. For some reason, the thought of me being in a place that has never had humans before…where they were the myth instead of unicorns…it just shocked me so much. “So…y-you’ve never seen a human before? Not a single one?”

Trixie shook her head, seemingly oblivious to what was happening to me. “No, and like Trixie said, they aren’t real, and you are most certainly not one of them.”

I stared at her for a few more minutes, and then I looked down to the snowy ground and at my hands, which were now just resting on my knees in front of me. I remained silent for a while, not saying anything, just trying to absorb the fact that I was in a place where humans don’t exist.

After what felt like hours of sitting, I heard a small shuffle, and looking up, I saw that Trixie had moved a bit closer, her glare completely gone and replaced with a confused look. “Um…are you ok?”

I look at her for a few seconds before I looked back down again. “I…I just…” I then fell silent, too stunned to say anything.

We sat there for a while, neither of us saying anything. I could feel Trixie still staring at me as I kept my gaze to the ground, not caring about anything at the moment. I then heard a small cough, and looking up, I was surprised to see that the pony had a look of concern on her face.

We stared at each other for a while, and then Trixie cleared her throat. “Um…Tri…I mean…I…I think we just got off on the wrong hoof here. If you want, we could…we could start over?”

I was a bit surprised with her sudden change in attitude, but I wasn’t going to complain. “Um…s-sure. I guess…I guess you can go first then.”

She gives a nod, and then she strikes a pose lifting her head up high as she tried to make herself look all grand and such. “Well, I am the GREAT AND POWER…um…” She then fell silent, and her pose changed to a more normal one, just staring at the ground in front of me a little sheepishly. “Trixie. Just…just Trixie. So, may Tri…I mean, may I ask your name?”

I gave a small nod as well. “Well, first off, I am a human, and second, my name is…is…um…it’s…” I then fell silent, placing my fingers to the bridge of my nose as I tried to think, but nothing came to mind. For the life of me, I couldn’t come up with any name at all

Trixie noticed this and tilted her head to the side in slight confusion. “Um…your name is…what?”

I continued to think for a few more moments, and then with a sigh, I just gave up, the only thing that I even got from it was a small headache. “I…I can’t remember. I…I just know that I’m a human, and that the only things that I got are the clothes on my back…” I waved my hands over the clothing that I was wearing. “…And these weapons that I found near me.” I then motioned to the tridents and large stick that I had.

Trixie eyed the things that I had for a few seconds, and then she looked back at me with a raised eyebrow and a small smirk on her face. “Those…are weapons? It looks more like a giant stick and a couple of utensils, not weapons.”

Now it was my turn to raise an eyebrow at her. “Well, they are, and in the right hands they can be very deadly, and thankfully I…” I then paused as I remembered that I had no idea if I could use them. “Um…I actually don’t know if I can even use them.”

Trixie gave a small chuckle. “Well, like I said, they look more like tools then weapons, especially those oversized forks.”

Now that got me a little peeved. I pulled one of the ‘forks’ out as I began to give a little talk about the weapon. “For the record, these are…um…they’re called…well…” I paused for a moment, trying to think of what it was called, and then, to my surprise, the names of both of my weapons came to me. “Sais...yea, that’s it. They’re called Sais, and they are a weapon that was made, to…um, to…” I fell silent for a few seconds trying to collect what I had of my memories, and I was once again able to remember something about them. “To block and disable sword strikes, yea. It’s meant to be a mostly defensive weapon, the prongs on the sides allowing the user to trap an incoming blade, and then with a twist of the wrist they would either break the blade or disarm the attacker. Once the sword was taken care of, the user was able to lean in and…um, you still listening?”

It was at this time that I noticed Trixie wasn’t listening to me anymore, and at first I thought I might have bored her with all of my talking, but I quickly ruled that out when I noticed her eyes were still open, and even wide with some sort of far away look to them, like she was looking behind-

“LOOK OUT!” She shouted before charging into me and knocking me to the ground. I landed on my back with a large *OMPH!* and I felt the azure pony land right on top of me. Before I could even react, the weight was suddenly gone, allowing me to breathe properly again.

I gave a rather loud groan as I got up from the snow for the third time in that day. “The hell, Trixie, why in the world did you do that-” I was saying, before I opened my eyes and the rest of the sentence just died on my lips. What I saw right then made me truly question my sanity…or at least what was left of it.

Just a few feet in front of me, coiled tightly around Trixie, was a very large snake. The serpent seemed to be at least thirty feet long, and it was at least as wide as my torso and then some, with a large head that could probable swallow Trixie whole without even dislocating its jaw. Its head was adorned with random spikes, making it look like it was wearing a crown. Its large, slit yellow eyes seemed to glow even in the falling light (At this point I just realized that it was starting to get dark) the eyes seeming to be staring into my soul.

The giant reptile was looking at me with a bit of confusion, as if it thought I would be the one in there instead of the pony, but then its focus shifted to Trixie who was caught in his coils, a glimmer appearing in his eyes as he stared at the pony. It let out a large hiss, and then its body, which was wrapped around Trixie a few times, started to tighten, causing her to scream. The screaming turned into a sudden pained gasp as a loud snap was heard, indicating that at least one rib was broken.

Hearing her scream and then the snap of bone finally shocked me back to reality. Grabbing the large stick that I placed down when I was sitting, I quickly ran to the beast, worry about reopening my wound forgotten to save Trixie. I yelled at the snake, causing it to turn its head around. As soon as it looked at me, I drew the stick back and then swung it, hitting the side of its head with a resounding crack.

It gave a screeching hiss in pain, but before I could follow up with my attack, the snake uncoiled itself a little from Trixie before lunging at me, knocking my weapon out of my hands. I was so surprised from its move that I didn’t even notice it starting to circle me a little, its eyes still staring at me.

I quickly reached down with my left hand to grab the Sais that where still in my belt, but before I could withdraw it, the reptile brought the rest of itself around my stomach, trapping my hand to my side. I gave a small wince as it began to tighten its hold, its scales rubbing against my wound, the sharp edges ripping the leaves that were there and causing it to reopen. With only one hand free, I began to repeatedly hit the beast with my fist as hard as I could, though to my disappointment, I just ended up hurting myself more then the creature.

The large snake made what seemed like an amused look before it quickly lunged its head at me, its mouth wide open and its teeth glinting in the dim light. I knew that if I didn’t act fast, my head would be in its mouth and most likely the teeth would pierce my neck, before with a tug he would just rip my entire head off. Wanting to keep my head a little longer, I quickly began to struggle, and to my relief, I was able to move just enough so that the strike ended up just grazing my head. However, instead of biting my head off, it sunk its teeth in my left shoulder, the entire thing in his mouth. I saw as well as felt the blood starting to pour in its mouth, quite a bit of it was even escaping the gapping maw and pooling to the ground, melting the snow as soon as it made contact with it.

I let out my own pained scream as I felt the fangs sink in, ripping through my skin and muscles. I began to hit it again with my free hand, this time on its head, which was a worse idea, since it was covered in even sharper scales and spikes. After a few pained hits I noticed my hands where starting to bleed from the repeated hits, and after a few more tries, I just gave up on hitting it and started to try and pry the thing off of me, which was even harder to do, since every time he moved, more pain lanced through me, causing me to gasp every time I felt it.

I was about to try hitting it again when suddenly, with a large flash, what appeared to be a lightening bolt struck the serpent right between the eyes, causing it to reel its head back with a pained cry. However, as it did that, it dragged its teeth in me, ripping skin and muscle as it did so, making me give an even louder cry of pain. Once the pain was a bit more diminished, I glanced over to see how bad the damage was.

To my horror, but not my surprise, it was really bad. It looked like someone took a couple of knives and just shoved them in my shoulder before dragging the blade up a few dozen times. There was a ton of blood pouring out of the lacerations and it was quickly forming a large red pool of liquid underneath me. To my increasing shock, one of its fangs was stuck in my shoulder, a nine-inch blade just jutting from my flesh. As I looked at it, I could have sworn that there was some sort of liquid on its tooth that didn’t look like blood at all.

While I was examining my wound, I felt the snake start to squeeze, and before I could react, I felt something snap inside me, making me wince and squeeze the air out of me. I tried to take a breath to get the air in my lungs, which I immediately regretted, as a sharp pain was shot through my spine.

‘Yea, I think it broke one of my ribs…great’ I then heard a small whimper next to me, and as I turned my head, I noticed that the snake was now staring at Trixie, something inside her hat was glowing a little before it vanished. The whimper was from the beast starting to crush her, causing her to tear up as she stared at her fate.

My mind went into overdrive as I tried to think of something, but what could I do? I only had one arm free, and my other arm was stuck next to me and the shoulder was mangled up, a single fang sticking put of my shoulder…

Wait a sec…

The realization of what I could do came to me just as the snake started to coil up, its sights still on the azure pony. Just as it lunged, I yanked the fang from my shoulder, causing me to wince a little, and then, flipping the fang around to hold it backhanded, I swung it with all my force, hoping that I was quick enough to stop the beast.

(Trixie’s POV)

The Basilisk was staring at me, its cold yellow eyes staring into my very soul, and I knew that the strange creature and I were done for. Not wanting to see it happen, I closed my eyes as it began to coil up for the killing blow, and waited for my life to end.

One second: I was cringing to myself, thinking about all of the things that I did, both good and bad…sadly, the more recent ones were bad.

Two seconds: I thought about the ponies in Ponyville, wondering if they would even care if I died or not. I assumed the latter.

Three seconds: I was thinking over the past few years, and how I was always alone in my cart, wishing for somepony to just be with. It didn’t have to be a stallion, or a lover, I just wished for somepony to talk to.

Four seconds: I was wondering if I was already dead, but when I took a breath, I still felt the sharp pain indicating my broken rib. Wondering how I was still alive, I slowly opened my eyes, and I was met with a sight that surprised me even more then when I saw the Ursa Minor.

The bipedal creature somehow yanked the fang that was stuck in him and shoved it straight to the temple of the Basilisk. By the look of it, it seemed that he was able to strike right into his brain. As I looked back at the beast, I couldn’t see anything in his eyes indicating that it was still alive. Apparently he was able to move fast enough that it killed the snake just before it could kill me.

With the Basilisk dead, its muscles loosened up enough to free us from the snake’s still warm corpse, and once I was free, I tried to take a step, but I collapsed, a searing pain shooting through my right foreleg. I think the Basilisk broke my foreleg as well. I just lay there with my eyes closed, too much pain coursing through my body to do much except whimper every now and then.

I felt something warm carefully picking me up and opening my eyes; I saw that the hairless creature was slowly picking me up with his one good arm, his other one hanging by his side weakly. After a few moments I realized that he was trying to talk to me.

“Trixie damn it, listen. I can’t have you fading on me yet. I need to know where the nearest town is. We need to get ourselves to the hospital, now.

I looked at him weakly, and as I did so, I noticed his eyes. They were full of all sorts of emotions, like there was a storm going on inside of him…an uncontrollable storm of feelings and such with no sense of direction and purpose. When his words registered, I gave a small weak cough.

“It’s…i-it’s that way.” I said, pointing my good hoof towards the nearest town, which happened to be Ponyville. The thing nodded and then began to walk there, picking up his weapons as he did so.

We walked in silence for a few minutes, neither of us saying anything. After a while of silent thinking, I looked up at the being, and placed my good hoof on his chest to get his attention.

“Hey…y-you were right…I guess.”

The being looked at me while at the same time he made sure to keep his eyes on the way ahead of him. “Right about what?”

“You are…you are most likely a human, for only a human would be…that reckless.” With that, I closed my eyes and refused to say anything else, finding the human’s beating heart to be somewhat calming in all of this chaos.

Next Chapter: Chapter 2: Seeking Aid in the Strangest of Places Estimated time remaining: 12 Hours, 24 Minutes