I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming or awake when I heard a hushed voice and a couple quick running noises. I had been dreaming about that night in the barn when I felt a quick tap on my shoulder. I sluggishly opened my eyes to see Mike standing in front of me. He looked half excited and half bored, well he always looks like that, doesn’t he?

“What is it Mike?” I questioned angrily, the last thing I wanted to do was wake up and walks, I had “Lazy ass” syndrome at the moment.

“Vespi we found Trixie again, come over here” Mike said, grabbing my hoof and pulling me up. I lumbered a few paces before becoming semi-awake. I finally came to my senses and rushed towards the rustic looing covered wagon being controlled by the pompous light blue unicorn.

“Considering The Great and Magnificent Trixie’s infinite generosity I will drive you to New Marington, but under one condition” I heard, I finally got on the trail (Which was bathed in darkness all but from one luminous light, hanging from Trixie’s wagon) and focused on my surroundings. Everything seemed the same, but there seemed to be a feeling of distress and fear, coming from none other than Trixie.

“The Great and Magnificent Trixie was walking through these woods in order to…relieve herself, when she came upon several hideous monsters. These monsters seemed fearsome but the Great and Magnificent Trixie rushed back to her wagon to defend herself, but in her rush she dropped a very important spell book. Retrieve said book and I will grant you the ride to New Marington…free of charge.” She said, I had a bad feeling about this. She tried to sound strong about it, but behind a semblance of control it was apparent that something had shook her up. I looked at the various facial expressions shown by my friends. Everypony seemed suspicious and unsure as well..

“Well where is this book?” I asked

“I dropped in outside a cave maybe a 10 minutes’ walk from here. Just go down this trail until you see a small lake, the book should be near the lake and cave.”

“Okay” I said “But you better not leave, M- I mean Vinyl Mix stay with her and make sure she doesn’t leave”

Mike gave a wise ass look “Don’t worry”

“Okay we’ll take your offer Trixie” I said

I took off in the direction Trixie gave me and my friends followed.

The walk in the woods seemed more dangerous than in the daylight. At leastly in the day light you could see where your allies were and where other not so friendly things were. In the new moon midnight night that was tonight, I could barely see five feet in front of me. I constantly had to look behind me to make sure my friends where in a ten foot radius. Tyler although was ahead of me.

“What are you doing?” I questioned, I couldn’t see very well as it is and the dark wasn’t helping, but I could hear Tyler rushing into the brush and returning back onto the trail. He came right up to me and showed a rock and a stick.

“Going to make a torch” Tyler said, striking the rock against the stick. There was no fire, Tyler tried again but to no avail.

“Good luck with that” I joked, Tyler should become a professional arsonist when he grows up.

We walked a little bit more, and then I heard a final snap and saw something illuminating behind me. I turned around to see Tyler wielding a torch.

“How’d that work?’ I pondered absent-mindedly; thanks to the torch we weren’t completely in the dark anymore.

We continued to walk nonetheless, I eventually had the feeling that-

“Hey Vespi is that the lake over there?” Nico asked, pointing his hoof into the abyss of the darkness (Torch sure works well…). I took a couple steps closer to see a small line of bright blue water near a couple of desolate looking trees. To the right was a small cave; in the center was the book.

So much for that

“I got it” Conor said, taking off for the book

“Careful Conor” Dan said “There were monsters remember?”

The threat of the monsters didn’t stall Conor for the slightest moment. He began to slow his pace as he grew ever closer to the book that is when I noticed there was something else moving. In the corner of my eye I saw a small brown babble of fur scuttling from the cave.

“Look out Conor!” I shouted, pointing to the intruder.

“Relax Vespi, it’s just a beaver” Conor said in an amused tone. As if Conor had casted a hex 6 or 7 more of the little fur balls appeared form the mouth of the cage and began to walk towards Conor. In the moonlight I swore I saw the half-eaten remains of several ponies, O GOD!

“O my god” I cursed “CONOR THEY ARE AFRICANIZED BEAVERS!” I warned. I had heard about the fearsome Africanized beaver, they were so dangerous they wiped out entire villages in Kenya. A horde of these monsters destroyed Mogadishu and US Rangers were forced in to remove their leader, Beaver Etienne as Firimbi.

“What?” Conor said, grabbing the book and turning his back, worst possible option. I watched in horror as one of the beavers lunged for Conor, grabbing his back hoof. Conor was stunned and almost sprawled out on the ground, fortunately the spasmodic kick of his leg sent the beaver backwards and saved Conor a couple seconds. The 1st beaver’s confederates all began to lunge for Conor who was now scrambling to his hooves to make a dash. A 2nd beaver bit on Conor’s hoof and he howled in pain.

I got out of my daze and rushed out into the dark to assist my friend, from behind I heard the reliving sound of my friend’s charge.

“KILL IT WITH FIRE!” Tyler screamed, batting at a beaver with the torch. The beaver caught alight and ran back into the cave, that couldn’t be too good.

Conor was now laying on his back, blood gushing from several lethal looking wounds from his body. A beaver was hob knocking Conor in the face with his tail when I came into kicking range, I launched my back two legs out (5 years of MMA) and sent the little furry bastard flying like a football. I now realized due to the darkness 6 beavers were an underestimate. There had to be 20 or so of them rushing out of the cave to join the fray, now I knew why Trixie called them “Monsters”,

All the while I couldn’t help but think Mike had it a lot worse, being stuck with the Great and Magnificent Trixie with nothing to do.

***

“Wow that was such a great song! The Great and Magnificent Trixie is impressed by your abilities” Trixie said with an enthusiastic smile “You could be an amazing singer, and I could be your agent!”

Mike couldn’t help but smile at Trixie’s naivety. Sure he sung it well but it wasn’t his song. In fact it was Eminem’s. Mike knew that no matter how hard they tried, copy right could never reach him out here. He was going to be the greatest musical genius of all time! He would be Eminem, Lil Wayne, LMFAO, Lonely Island, Drake (The faggot he is), Kenye West, the Rolling Stones, Eric Clapton, The Numa Numa guy, Atzen, Jimi Hendrix, Akon, and every other successful artist that ever was! He would be Vinyl Mix and live in a kickass mansion! With lots of strippers!

From the distance Mike saw fire brewing

“Is that a forest fire?” Trixie asked

“I don’t think so…” Mike said

***

“BURN YOU LITTLE FURSHIT!” I cursed, burning the beaver alive with the torch. I felt like I was in the middle of a war, a bloody, god forsaken war. Conor was being tended by Nico while I, Dan, and Tyler were fighting for our lives against wave after wave of Africanized beavers.

No matter how many we killed, more and more of the little buggers came and seemed more and more determined to bring their targets down.

The battle ground was now stained with blood and the corpses of fallen beavers littered the area like Chinese people litter China. I was tired, angry, scared, and adrenalized all at the same time. It was the strangest combination of feelings I had ever had, I wanted to live and felt almost super human…or in this case super pony.

“Fall back we got the book!” Tyler shouted from behind me, Nico was carrying Conor in a fire man’s carry and Dan had a small bottle in his hand…now where’d he get that.

“Get dowwwwwwn!” Tyler screamed, I ducked into the nearest ditch and peered up to see the war like Dan waving a Molotov cocktail in one hoof and a lighter in the other.

“EAT FIRE MOTHER FUCKERS!” He screamed, I saw him light the device and toss it into the horde of beavers. Fire turned the battle ground into a Hellish inferno and I had the pleasure to see the Africanized beavers burn alive, unable to breath trapped under there ex-friends.

I scurried out of the ditch and ran with my friends. Dan and I were on the rear guard while Tyler helped carry Conor with Nico. The beavers seemed to be scattered now, some pursuing, some withdrawing, and most dead. The few pursuing beavers though were too weak in numbers and confidence to chase us fortunately. I didn’t have a good look at Conor in the night (Tyler had tossed the torch) but from his wheezing breath I knew it was bad, really bad.

I was relieved to see a faint light coming from the distance. It was Trixie’s wagon! We were safe!

“Don’t worry Conor you’re going to be alright” I shouted with a reassuring voice. Conor was passing out from blood loss, and he looked pale as a ghost. If he didn’t receive medical help quickly I feared he could die.

“Open up Vinyl!” I shouted, ramming into the front door. Nico was close behind with the half dead Conor cradled in his arms.

The door finally opened, Mike must have known about Conor’s condition. If it wasn’t for Conor he would have locked us out.

“What the hell bro!” Mike shouted in anger

“Shut the fuck up, Cinnamon is dying!” I said, Mike was about to shout again but he went blank when he heard Conor’s name.

Nico pushed by me with Conor and seated him down at a nearby side table, barely big enough for him.

“Also hears the book bitch” I said, showing Trixie the blood stained spell book. On the semi-readable title was “Basic Magic Tricks 101” (Some powerful book). The blood was mainly on the cover, which I used to bash beaver skulls in; most of the pages were salvageable.

“Fear not The Great and Magnificent Trixie will save your friend!” Trixie shouted, jumping to the front seat of the wagon.

“Don’t worry Conor you are going to be alright, you are going to be alright” I said, tears forming in my eyes.

“Michael…” Conor said in a hoarse whisper “The beavers…”

“The beavers…”

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