Sharpy didn’t sleep very well that night. And not very long either. He woke up in the middle of the night, unable to go back to sleep. He was still shaking from the nightmares that just woke him up. He had relived the moment his sister died, over and over again. And even now the scene went through his mind. His head was hurting and so he groaned quietly. He tried to hide himself from the outer world by cover himself with his wings, but that wouldn’t help him to hide from his memories. It was during the night or when he was alone it was worst. When there was nothing specific to think of, to do or somepony to talk to. The only thing that remained was his memories. Horrible memories. Sharpy opened his wings and looked into the fire which was still burning strong. It made him feel better. The movements of the flames where hypnotizing. It felt like he could sit there for hours and watch the flames, just as a way to escape his thoughts. He wanted somepony to talk to, but didn’t dare waking any of the others up. He wished Fluttershy was there. She would have given him time to open his heart. But that wasn’t the situation. Fluttershy got afraid to death by just looking at him. He tried to let his thoughts of Fluttershy go and move on, but just like the memories of the death of his sister, it was impossible. But he had to let go sooner or later. From both Fluttershy and Crystal. Things would never work between him and Fluttershy. And Crystal wouldn’t come back to life. But he was afraid that if he would let go of his sorrow, only hate would remain. And even if his hate were directed to Huffy it would surely let his friends suffer from it in some way.

The headache returned again. Sharpy groaned and curled up into a ball. He wouldn’t be able to take this much longer. He had to finish this as soon as possible; otherwise he would lose his sanity. Even for a dragon there was a line for how much its mind could take. And for Sharpy, that line had been crossed.

He gripped his blanket tight. It had almost the same light green color as his fur and it reminded him of Fluttershy’s favorite color. He tried to focus on the short time-period where he and Fluttershy actually got along, but it was hard. The horrible memories tended to come back to him when he least expected it. He curled up even more and gripped the blanket tighter. It was still dark, but the sun would rise any minute now.

Why can’t the others just wake up, already?

The first sign of somepony had woken up were mumbling from inside Pinkies tent.

Finally, Sharpy thought and slowly forced himself up. The sun had been up for a few hours now, but it was still very early in the morning. The Everfree Forest didn’t look quite as scary when the sun was shining upon it. And the field was very beautiful in the morning like this. A perfect moment to share with your loved one. Sharpy sighed sadly as he forced his tired body to wake up and start moving.

When he reached Pinkies tent he carefully approached it. He didn’t want to wake anyone up by being too loud. But before he had the chance to ask Pinkie if he could come in she shouted:

“Come in!” like if she somehow knew he was standing there. Sharpy got surprised and looked from side to side to see if somepony else were there. But then he just shrugged and went inside. Pinkie was still lying under her blanket and looking up in to roof of the tent. She looked very concentrated and was probably thinking of something of great importance. Or so Sharpy thought. He couldn’t hear what she was mumbling about, so he simply asked her.

“I’m trying to figure out our new team name since the last one wasn’t too popular”, Pinkie said. The answer surprised him a little. But he quickly got more surprised that he got surprised in the first place. Pinkie was crazy, no doubts. But she was crazy in a good way. It was next to impossible to foresee what she was about to do or say. One thing was for certain: All of Pinkies positive energy tended to rub off on everypony around. Including Sharpy.

“How about F.O.A?” Pinkie asked with a big smile. It seemed like she was really satisfied with herself, but Sharpy still looked at her with questioning eyes.

“But what does it mean?” Sharpy asked and began to quietly repeat the word to himself until Pinkie answered.

“It stands Friends On Adventures!” When Pinkie said that, Sharpy’s world stopped for a moment. He looked at Pinkie and a smile grew on his face. He, for the first time since the Crystal-accident, got somepony’s honest confirmation that she was his true friend. Shapy had guessed by the girls’ actions that they saw him as a friend, but this really showed him that at least Pinkie saw him as a true friend. I felt kind of weird for Sharpy. That such a little thing, probably unintentional from Pinkies side, could make him feel so happy.

“I love it!” Sharpy said and gave Pinkie a small hug. “Thank you”. Then Sharpy walked out from the tent, leaving Pinkie dumbfounded. She wondered why Sharpy thanked her. But then she shrugged and smiled. She had apparently made Sharpy happy in some way and he liked the new name for their team, so that was good enough for her.

Outside Applejack was waiting by the fire. She was currently looking down in one of the backpacks she’d brought. When Sharpy came closer to her she looked up, gave him a nod and smiled.

“Good mornin’. Ah’ heard you when you went into Pinkie’s tent, so ah’ decided to get up as well”, Applejack said.

“I didn’t wake you up, did I?” Sharpy asked, surprised that somepony had heard him. He’d tried to be as quiet as possible. But Pinkie did talk a bit lauder

“No, no, Sugarcube. Ah’ usually wake up pretty early anyways. So what did you and Pinkie talk about?” Applejack were mildly interested, but thought that she should ask anyway. Showing interest in somepony else were apparently good manners according to Rarity.

“Well she had a new name for our… group. It was…” but Sharpy wasn’t able to continue, because Pinkie, like out of nowhere, jumped in between them and interrupted him.

“It’s F.O.A! It’s F.O.A!” Pinkie jumped up and down, exited to hear what her old friend thought of the name, but at first Pinkie got the same reaction as she got from Sharpy.

“Foa…? What’s that supposed to mean?” Applejack asked, suddenly more interested than before.

“It stands for Friends On Adventures!” Applejack thought of it for a second, but then nodded and said without hesitation:

“Ah’ like it. It really suits us. You know, since we’re all friends and such”. Applejack looked at Sharpy and nodded as a confirmation that he was included. Sharpy smiled back. This made equally as happy as when he got the same confirmation from Pinkie. He hadn’t forgotten about his problems, but right now, they were as good as gone. But he couldn’t help to feel some guilt that he might just use them to get away from his problems, but he quickly shoved that thought away. They were his friends, not some tools used to escape his problems. When all the problems were gone, at least for the moment, he wouldn’t let new negative thoughts destroy the mood.

“So…” Applejack began. “Should we wake everypony up so that we can have some breakfast?”

“I’m already on it!” Pinkie said and dashed into her tent. Applejack looked at Sharpy, who just shrugged. Neither Applejack nor Sharpy knew what Pinkie had planned. But when Pinkie came out of her tent, Applejack and Sharpy burst out laughing. Pinkie was holding a little trumpet in her hoofs.

“I knew I would have some kind of use for this!” she sad and smiled. Then she jumped up on a nearby rock and pressed the trumpet to her muzzle. Applejack proceeded by covering her ears with her hooves. Sharpy noticed that and quickly did the same. He was just in time, because the moment later a loud noise could be heard all over the place. Applejack, Rainbow Dash and Twilight who were still sleeping in their tents all screamed in surprise and Rarity even collapsed her tent. Applejack’s hat flew off due to the pure sound and Rainbow flew out from her tent, ready for action. In the forest you could hear a lot of scared animals running away in fear. And close by Sharpy could hear a very familiar high-pitched scream, but he couldn’t figure out from where he had heard it before, so he chose to ignore it.

When Rainbow figured out that the noise came from Pinkies trumpet, she calmed herself down, realizing there was nothing dangerous. But then she got an angry look on her face. She flew down to Pinkie and glared at her.

“Pinkie… why?” was all that Rainbow was able to say.

“Well, to get you up of course”, Pinkie said with a smile. And as straightforward as she was, she added: “And to try out my new trumpet”. Then their attention turned to Twilight’s tent. She was more or less crawling out from her tent, still very tired, but awake nevertheless.

“What’s going on?” she asked confused, wondering what in Equestria could possibly cause such a noise. Rainbow simply pointed at Pinkie and said:

“Pinkie happened… And her new trumpet”. Twilight looked confused over at Pinkie and saw the little trumpet she was holding. Twilight was quiet for a short while and everypony was waiting for her to say something. The only thing that came out from Twilight was a question that nopony could answer.

“How can such a small trumped cause such a loud noise?” After saying this, she stood up on her legs and walked towards the group. In the meanwhile, Applejack started giggling quietly to herself and Sharpy couldn’t help to burst out laughing. The whole situation was just so funny. When Applejack stopped, she returned to her backpacks and started looking for something they could eat for breakfast. But she quickly got interrupted when an unsatisfied grunt could be heard from behind them. They all looked back and saw the pile of cloth that used to be Rarity’s tent. It was obvious that Rarity was somewhere under there and when Rarity’s voice could be heard from under the pile, it was clear.

“I would really appreciate if you could help me out of this mess”, Rarity said, clearly unsatisfied and she had to try hard not the lose control of her voice. Everypony ran over to help her out. It took some time to get Rarity out of the mess, but when they finally did, she was very upset but remained in control. She demanded an apology from Pinkie and she got one. And while Pinkie was at it, she took the time to apologize to everypony. But it was pretty obvious that she didn’t regret it at all, but there were no damage done so arguing about it would be pointless. They returned to the campfire to get some breakfast so that they would be able to make it the whole day. Or at least until they stopped to eat again. But to Pinkie’s surprise, and everypony else’s relief, her trumpet that she had left back at the fire was gone. Pinkie started checking the area so see if she might have placed it someplace else, but it was completely gone.

“I just don’t get it”, she said. “What ever happened to my new trumpet?”

“You know what, Pinkie…” Rainbow said. “I don’t know and I’m not sure that I want to know either”. Pinkie narrowed her eyes and looked at each of the ponies present.

“Somepony stole it!” she said and out of nowhere she got a magnifier which with she started to investigate the area around the fire. “That’s the only explanation!”

“I would hardly think that one of us would want to steal your trumpet, Pinkie”, Twilight shook her head and sighed. “It was probably some animal who thought it was pretty or so”. Pinkie stopped her investigations and looked at Twilight. She then removed her magnifier and gave Twilight’s words a thought. It was true some animals were attracted to shiny things. And her trumped were all golden, so it was definitely shiny. Pinkie shrugged and gave up. What Twilight said made sense and since everpony was with her to help Rarity, so it couldn’t be one of them. It was just a bit sad that she only got to use her new trumpet only once.

“But ah’ guess that’s for the best, Pinkie”, Applejack said as she moved over her backpacks once again. “But it was pretty funny from our side, wasn’t it, Sharpy?” Sharpy nodded and laughed. He couldn’t deny that. “So… who wants cheese and flowers on their bread?”

During the breakfast they were talking about all sort of things and Sharpy could really feel how they grew closer as friends. They liked him and he liked them. He still had this uncomfortable feeling that came from his memories, but it was a lot better when he had something to do and somepony to talk to. What really made him happy what that everypony accepted Pinkies name without hesitation. They even made comments that made it clear that Sharpy was accepted as one of their friends. As a pony he wouldn’t get too surprised, but now when they knew that he was a dragon and his appearance were there to remind them, he got really happy that they could put that fact away and treat him like an equal.

When everypony was full, had packed all of their stuff and were ready to go, they took the first step into the Everfree Forest. There were a lot of dead trees all over the place and the further into the forest they went, the darker it got. In the outer parts of the forest it was very bright, but the sun couldn’t reach this far. The trees were bigger and created a roof over them. At least they would be safe if it would start raining. It wouldn’t take so long to cross the forest for Rainbow Dash and Sharpy. They could just fly over the trees and be there in no time. But they couldn’t just leave the others, so they walked together. What slowed them down even more was the fact that the small path they were currently walking on were, from time to time, so muddy that it was next to impossible to walk on. Sharpy and Rainbow could just fly over these parts and Twilight used her magic to teleport herself and the others. But constantly teleporting yourself and three other ponies quickly made Twilight very tired, so they had to make their way over themselves. Twilight could still teleport herself without any major problems, but Rarity was not at all so talented with magic. Applejack simply used the environment and her good physics to make her way over. Pinkie simply walked straight trough meter-deep mud without problem. But when it came to Rarity, they had to wait a bit longer. She didn’t want to get dirty at all, so they had to help her through all kinds of obstacles. Sharpy just hoped the environment would be easier to get through after they had made their way through the forest.

But apart from some obstacles it all went well. It felt like they were being followed and watched from all sided, but so far nothing had really happened. Most of the animals kept a safe distance from them. Sharpy was told that the girls had been in this forest before, but then it was apparently much worse. But that was during the threat of Nightmare Moon so they guessed that’s why they had stood before so many dangers. But just after the girls had told their story they heard a load roar. Everypony froze. They were all on full alert, ready for whatever threat there was standing before them. And out from the woods, a manticore jumped out. The manticore roared once again and stared at the six ponies with the intention to kill. The manticore had the head and body of a lion while it had the tail of a scorpion with a poisonous sting. On its back there were two dragon-like wings which reminded a lot of Shapy’s current wings. The manticore was at least four times as bigger than a pony and had to be a lot stronger as well. It was fair to say that he was a dangerous foe. The manticore started circling around the little group, forcing them to move closer to each other and take defensive positions. Sharpy looked over to Twilight.

“Have you ever had to deal with a creature like this?” he asked without losing sight of the manticore. Twilight nodded as a response but continued.

“Yes, but then we had Fluttershy. She’s very good with animals, so she managed to calm it down”. That wasn’t too great news. Nopony had ever really fought against a creature like this, but Sharpy was confident. First of all, they were six against one. Sharpy also knew a lot about fighting different animals. Thanks to the violent life of a dragon, he’d learned a lot of that as a kid. And last, but not least, he was not ready to die just yet.

“Ok, wait for him to attack, then we’ll all dodge his attack at the same time but jumping away in different directions”, Sharpy shouted. “Rainbow, you’re fast so you have to recover fast and distract the manticore while I start attacking him from the front. Applejack! You need to give him a good kick in the back so that he falls over. The rest of you have to stand by and wait. If something goes wrong, you have to join the fight, ok?” All the ponies looked surprised at Sharpy for a second. They were not used to see him like this. But he had a good plan, so they all agreed to do their part. The fact was, when Sharpy ever got into a battle like this, he completely changed. In some way it felt like this it actually felt right, even if he didn’t want to admit it to himself. He was so used to the constant violence he had to live through as a dragon so he’d gotten used to these situations as well and was quick to adapt to new situations.  And as Sharpy predicted, the manticore jumped straight towards the group, ready so slice them all to pieces with a single blow. But in the last second the all jumped away, everyone in a different direction. This made the manticore confused and stunned for a short moment. But it was enough for Rainbow to fly straight towards the manticore. She kicked him to get his attention, which was successful. When the manticore was busy trying to catch Rainbow, Sharpy took the time to fly in full speed straight to the manticore’s face. With his hooves, Sharpy managed to make the manticore completely punch-drunk. The beast was tripping backwards so that it would not lose the little balance it still got left. But before it could recover, Applejack ran forth to kick him in the back. But the manticore were waiving its tail all over the place, so to avoid being stung, Applejack had to stop her assault. This wasn’t good and Sharpy was about to lose his grip of the manticore’s nose. But just before the manticore would be able to throw Sharpy off, Twilight interfered. She shot a beam of lightning on the manticore’s back. This made him completely stunned for a short moment, but it was time enough for Applejack to fulfill her part of the plan. She saluted Twilight and ran towards the manticore once again. Just before the kick she turned to Twilight and said:

“Thanks, partner”. The manticore fell forward by the force of the kick and hit the ground with a loud sound. It wasn’t enough to make him unconscious, but it was definitely enough to make him unable to fight. Sharpy began to walk towards the still lying manticore, showing off his sharp teeth that could easily put an end to the beast’s life if placed correctly. But when he was standing in front of the manticore, ready to make the final blow, Rarity stopped him.

“Wait! Wouldn’t be unnecessary to put an end to his life?” she asked Sharpy. What Rarity said made sense. The manticore was far from able to fight. He couldn’t even stand up. But that didn’t change the fact that he would come after them as soon as he’d recover, so Sharpy simply kicked him hard in the head to make him fully unconscious.

“So, now he won’t be able to follow us”, Sharpy said. He could feel that he had released some of his hate for Huffy on this manticore, which wasn’t what he wanted. He didn’t want to risk losing control of himself. He realized at this moment that his mind was more fragile than ever before. He had to try to stay in control of himself, even if something like this happened. If not, he would sure hurt his friends in some way. Sharpy decided to just leave the unconscious beast by itself and keep on walking. The sooner they got out of this forest the better. The five remaining ponies stood still for a couple of moments, looking at the manticore, before running to Sharpy.

“That was awesome!” Rainbow said excited when she reached Sharpy. “It was like you knew exactly what to do”

“Well, you have to know these things if you want to survive as a dragon”, Sharpy said as a response. And for the first time, the five ponies all got interested in how it was like being a dragon. Especially Twilight, which didn’t surprise Sharpy. Twilight was that type of person who always wanted to learn something new. And she got a baby dragon living with her, almost like her son, so she obviously wanted to know more. Sharpy didn’t stop moving, but he wanted to answer the questions about being a dragon as good as possible so he tried to find the best way to begin. He began by saying that he preferred the kind of life the ponies lived. They were much more civilized than the dragons and they were a lot more peaceful. The dragons sure had some kind of civilization, but only barely. The violence was the biggest minus with the dragon society. Dragon-raids were quite common. A dragon-raid was when a group of dragons attacked animals and terrorizing small towns just for fun. Sharpy admitted that he’d joined a few dragon-raids himself. He didn’t have a problem when you went out hunting to get food, but unnecessary killing wasn’t anything Sharpy was a big fan of. Most dragons didn’t like the raids either, but was enough dragons that did to force you into one. You didn’t want to stand out. It was also quite usual for the younger dragons to cause havoc and therefore minor battles occurred even between groups of dragons. The older dragons usually didn’t care of what the younger ones were doing, but if an older dragon ever got thrown into the fight by all kinds of reasons, it would get brutal. But even if it did, dragons never killed other dragons. That wouldn’t be tolerated and seen as a crime which would be severely punished. Sharpy kept talking about how the dragons lived and the five mares listened with great interest. Sharpy also mentioned that his negative view of the way the dragons lived had only increased after he’d seen the lives of the ponies.

“And that’s why I wanted to stay and live with Fluttershy as a pony”, Sharpy said after he was done explaining the way dragons lived. “And as you have seen… that didn’t turn out so well…” None of the five ponies said anything. There was simply nothing to say. They just nodded and kept walking. Things got awkwardly quiet for the next few minutes. Rarity was the one to break the silence by trying to start a common conversation with Applejack. Rainbow and Pinkie had also some comments about what Rarity said and soon everyone was talking openly. Sharpy liked this much better than total silence. Normally he would feel calm and enjoy the silence, but not now. He was afraid that the horrible scenes would return again. But right now, he was worried that the manticore would return again. When that beast would wake up, he would want to seek revenge, no doubt. He wished that he’d killed it, but at the same time he didn’t. It didn’t deserve to die. Perhaps being a pony changed his way of seeing things, while the part of him that was still dragon had its way of seeing things? He just hoped that they would be as far as possible from the manticore when it awakens. If not, things could get messy. And to Sharpy’s and everypony else’s despair, they heard a loud, angry roar. And it wasn’t very far away. They all stopped and turned around. They were all on full alert and ready for the manticore to come back. They had defeated it once, they could do it again. But this time it would surely be more aggressive. If that would be the case, it would make things very tricky.

They were all waiting and listening for another roar. Then they heard one. If was closer now and you could even hear how branches were being ripped off and bushes being stomped. But then it all got quiet. It was like the rampaging beat suddenly stopped. Then they heard some quiet noises from the manticore. It was very close, but it didn’t sound so angry anymore. And it was walking away! The group stayed their place until they couldn’t hear any suspicious sounds anymore. Then they started backing off slowly.

“Let’s get out of this forest, shall we?” Rarity said. Nopony argued and they all started running in the right direction again, out of the forest and to the mountain landscape where the dragons lived. Rainbow Dash and Sharpy didn’t leave their friends, of course. Even if they could, they stayed with them.

Sharpy decided that he wouldn’t leave his friends, even it that would mean he’d be able to stand against Huffy sooner. He would stay with them and help them whenever they needed. They could have chose to imprison him when they knew he was a dragon, but they saw trough that, and even offered their help to defeat Huffy. But Sharpy had to admit. What he was most thankful for was the simple fact that he could enjoy their company.

Next Chapter: Chapter 13: Behind the Trees Estimated time remaining: 3 Hours, 29 Minutes