The trip back to the castle turned out to be a long and quiet one. The flapping of the pegasi’s wings as they pulled the royal chariot as well as the whipping of the wind comprised most of the sounds that the two sisters heard. Luna, for her part, tried several times to strike up a conversation to diminish the boredom and keep her mind from trying to form long chains of barely connected thoughts to keep her sane. Or worse yet, having a single thought that would last the whole ride back, comprising figuring out every iteration of that thought and just why she cared.

Unfortunately for her, every time she would try to start the conversation, her sister didn’t seem to be willing to continue it. Whenever she tried to get an answer to what her sister thought of this new creature that had been found, she would simply receive some derivative of ‘I have no idea what to think’. Luna tried to ask questions about other topics, like the Zebra Nations pastries, or the interesting dreams she had seen as of late, but none of them could elicit more than a sentence from Celestia.

About ten minutes after Luna asked her last question, resigning herself to several hours of mind-numbing silence, Celestia decided to tell her sister why she was being so curt.

“I’m sorry for not being too talkative. I know I’m being rude. I just can’t seem to shake the feeling that this ‘human’ is not something we, nor anypony, is equipped to deal with. I feel we may have made a mistake in not just sending a letter to the Zebra Nations.”

“I do not blame you sister for thinking that a grave mistake was made in not being prepared for the arrival of a new species in Equestria. I do, however, believe that your reaction might be greater than is deserved. You read the letters yourself, besides their first meeting with the creature, it has not indicated any ill will towards the six of them. And if you think on how Rainbow acted towards it, I do not feel that the human’s actions were entirely unjustified.”

After that short exchange, the trip resumed the silence that Luna had been trying to avoid. Worse yet, the fact that the hunter had been brought up was reminding her of something that wasn’t sitting right for her, and worse yet, was probably why Celestia was so on edge. Twilight said that when Rainbow Dash had flown towards him he responded by grabbing her by the throat and slamming her onto her back with enough force that they could all feel the impact through their hoofs. While an impact like that was not exactly new for Rainbow Dash, discounting the fact that her head had been used to bring her to a stop, the human would not have known this.

When she thought about what the human had done, she couldn’t shake the notion that the human had more than likely intended to kill the pony that meant to attack him. While she couldn't blame him for his actions, it sounded like he had indeed been threatened, but the fact he had instantly resorted to murder was beyond disquieting. The human had not tried to talk the problem out like a pony, he had not subdued her in a way where she could not fight him, nor did it seem that he had simply meant to incapacitate her by rendering her unconscious; he seemed to have been attempting to kill her.

She knew there was no evidence for such an accusation. The human did describe himself as a hunter before revealing that he was human, so the possibility did exist that he had deduced how durable she was just from looking at her and by grabbed her. However, she highly doubted that that was the case. Every time she tried to reason through his actions and come up with an alternative, her thoughts always lead back to him wanting to kill Rainbow Dash.

So that's how she spent the remainder of her silent trip, trying her best to convince herself that she was over-thinking things, and she was failing miserably at it. Not even the changing of day to night was enough to shift her thoughts to a different topic.

Fortunately for her, the trip was short enough that she was prevented from finish her thoughts on just how little regard the human had for the lives of others when the chariot landed in the castle courtyard. The courtyard was in motion with the strange waltz that night brought about. While the day held the hurried bustling that would not look out of place in an ant hive, the nightly activity was much lighter, and looked to all flow together in a strangely purposeful rhythm. The moving and shifting lights of Canterlot and the castle, so peaceful at night, tempting the princess away from her dark thoughts on the human and onto her responsibility of helping the dreaming ponies of Equestria. The problem was that this duty had recently become tainted with thoughts just as, if not darker than, those she had on the human.

Last night had been odd for her. She had been unable to sense the dreams of those that resided in Ponyville. When she looked at the area where those dreams usually resided, she discovered the area shrouded in darkness. Worse yet, this strange darkness had clouded the dreams, rendering them impossible to view from the outside. She had visited several of these dreams, but all of them had been the pleasant dreams she strived to see in her subjects. She figured that the darkness was the result of her distance from the town, being in the Zebra Nations after all. Two things about that though didn't seem to make sense. For one, Ponyville was the only town that was experiencing this darkening of the dreams. While it would make sense if multiple towns and cities had been shrouded in darkness, she tended not to travel outside the boundaries of Equestria, so such an occurrence, while new, would not be all too surprising, the fact only Ponyville was being affected was worrisome. However, the more concerning thing was that the darkening of these dreams somehow felt familiar.

She knew in her heart that this couldn't be true, there was no way that she would be able to forget such a bizarre, and quite frankly unsettling occurrence. Yet, there was just something about it that felt familiar, like she had seen this before, and knew exactly what it was, but just couldn't conjure up the memory. What scared her even more though, was that this feeling of familiarity brought with it the feeling of dread. A part of her brain was telling her that she both knew exactly what was causing the darkened dreams and that it was something she was hopelessly unable to deal with.

“Thank you all for helping to transport me and my sister to and from the Zebra Nations. I do believe the three of you have earned some rest. If you wouldn’t mind, could the three of you fetch the night guards responsible for pulling Luna’s chariot, I feel the two of us have some business that needs to be taken care of before the night is over.”

The sound of her sister’s voice brought Luna back from her thoughts. Luna was able to turn towards her sister addressing the day guard pegasi right before the three of them headed towards the western wing, the area that the bat ponies of the night guard called their homes. It was always funny to watch the flummoxed looks of the day guard ponies when they were dismissed by Celestia when the duty of princess shifted to her. The day guard had seemingly grown so accustomed to extending their hours into the night in the millennia she had been absent that even now the guard were still trying to acclimate.

While Luna would have loved to quietly follow the three pegasi and listen to their thoughts on being dismissed, she was more concerned with what Celestia had said to them.

“Sister.” Celestia turned to acknowledge her younger sister, possessing the reserved face Luna knew she only held when she was trying to bring a situation under control. She knew that Celestia would never hold that face around her unless a situation was incredibly dire. “I know that you wish to meet with the human, but I believe that it is something that we should wait till tomorrow to accomplish. Let us rest, and when we finally meet with him, we might have cooler heads.”

The face that Celestia made in response to Luna's suggestion was one of utter shock. “Luna, you can't honestly be suggesting what I think you're suggesting.” The disbelief that emanated from Celestia's voice was only matched by how wide her eyes had become.

“I know you have your reservations on leaving the human in Ponyville for longer, I share your thoughts on the matter.” Celestia looked like she was about to interject, asking her sister why she was suggesting it then. Only to stopped as Luna resumed her appeal, “However, we have not been sent any letters telling us that the human has brought harm to our subjects. Nor have our royal advisors sent any messages that would even suggest that the human was not peacefully residing in Ponyville. I would suggest we wait to hear from your advisor, Daily Planner, before we take action.”

Celestia was both proud at how mature Luna sounded, and disappointed in herself for how she was behaving. She was the older sister, and had spent the last thousand years without her ruling the country. In all those years she should have become less paranoid about new creatures and more accepting. It almost brought a smile to her muzzle to know that her sister was taking the lessons that she and Twilight had been trying to instill in her since her reformation as Nightmare Night to heart. She resolved that from this point on she would look past what she had initially seen this human as and view the human as she would any other sentient creature on Equis.

While Celestia was berating herself for her actions over the last two days, the previously mentioned pony came through a doorway not too far from where the three pegasi guards had gone. It was almost as if Luna simply saying her name had called her forth from the castle. When Daily Planner reached the two princesses the grin on her khaki snout was one of immense relief, something that Celestia felt either meant that either a significant amount of vacation time, or a generous bonus, was in order.

“Thank goodness the two of you have returned,” the earth pony began, pulling a large purple binder from her saddle bag with her muzzle before laying it down on the ground and proceeding to open it with her hooves, “While most of the basic operations regarding maintenance of the castle occurred without issue, the lack of the two of you for the day and night courts have created an issue within the more affluent members of Canterlot. I was able to filter out the more ludicrous complaints like those of Tweed Suit, and have scheduled private meetings with many of the ponies later in the week for the two of you to go over exactly what it is that needed your attention.”

While the fact that Daily Planner had not only managed to keep everything in order in their absence, but had even been able to prevent them from having to deal with the more benign and absurd requests was a feat Celestia had decided had earned the mare the next two weeks off.

“That is excellent to hear. I was wondering, have there been any more letters from Ponyville while we were gone?” Celestia was doing her best to maintain a regal appearance, hiding her desperation to know everything that was happening around the human.

“There was one we received almost an hour ago, but it wasn’t meant for you. It came with a note saying that it should be delivered to a pony by the name of Forrester at the Saddle Pine University of Ecology as soon as possible.” Daily Planner began to turn pages in the binder to find something she had included that could help with the explanation.

The words were both scaring, and confusing her. Why would Twilight need a message to be delivered so quickly to an ecologist, let alone one so accomplished that they had attained a position at one of Equestrians premier universities? Twilight knew that humans were not a species native to Equestria, nor were there records on them in the written works of other species. Before she could delve too deeply into trying to figure out what had happened and why, Daily Planner had found what she had been looking for. She held up a small stack of papers that had been clipped together, her long maroon hair coming to rest on the papers before a quick exhalation through her nose blew her hair off of them.

Celestia took the papers from her assistant with her magic and began to look over them. The front page had the full body picture of a pegasus with a walnut coat that began to fade as it approached the hooves, and a copper mane and tail with streaks of mahogany in a barely maintained state. On his haunch, Celestia could make out his cutie mark, what appeared to be a timberwolf positioned in the shape of an ouroboros. Celestia figured that the pony in the picture was Forrester and the papers where what Daily Planner was able to find out about him.

“Forrester is the most respected timberwolf expert in Equestria. He has almost two decades of experience dealing with the creatures and has published extensively while working for the university,” Daily Planner continued after she saw Celestia looking over the report.

“Has Forrester been involved in any research aside from those involving timberwolves, perhaps something to do with minotaurs or other bipeds?” Celestia inquired, moving the papers over to Luna so she could read them.

“No. Forrester appears to only be interested in studying timberwolves. I think the best pony to ask about minotaurs would be Linear Mapper, and for bipeds in general Profound Endurance would seem to be a good choice.”

It appears that the letter she had received from Twilight was correct and that there was no cause for concern about the human, the misgivings about what he was simply attributable to paranoia. She remembered one of the letters Twilight had sent mentioned that Fluttershy had taken in an injured timberwolf. In all likelihood, Twilight had allowed Fluttershy to use the magical letter system to get the message to Forrester as soon as possible.

Just then, four ponies silently arrived, dropping to the ground after presumably having flown here from the night guard barracks rather than spending the time walking through the castle. All of them were bat ponies, however, two of them were currently utilizing enchanted armor to appear to be normal pegasi. The use of such magical items was something Celestia was saddened by. Many bat ponies faced some kind of discrimination from the general populace for their appearance, so many of them chose to hide their differences behind illusion magic from enchanted items. While both she and Luna permitted no discriminatory practices to occur within the guard, many bat ponies still chose to utilize magic to hide their true forms. A practice that ground on Luna’s soul.

The four newly arrived ponies began to stand at attention, awaiting orders from the princesses. Celestia looked over to Luna and was met with a look she knew all too well. Luna had been right, the human did not appear to be a danger to the citizens of Ponyville, and her insistence on summoning the night guard responsible for pulling the royal carriage was ill-founded. Celestia simply turned back to Daily Planner and thanked her for what she had done before silently looked to Luna with an even face.

The silence from her sister was all the answer Luna needed. “Thank you for coming, I wish to be escorted back to my chambers so I can begin preparations for handling tonight's dream excursions.”

The ponies looked perplexed by the order they had been given, why would the princess ask for the four of them specifically, the chariot guard, simply to walk her to her chambers? Despite their confusion, they did not voice their questions and simply began to walk with Luna as she headed to her night post.

Celestia released a sigh. If she wasn't going to be traveling to Ponyville tonight, the least she could do was send a letter to Twilight informing her of the change of plans. She had told her ex-student that she would be returning as soon as possible, so it was only right to inform her that the plan had changed.

The sounds of papers being crumpled and being disposed of had been occurring for some time in the second-floor workshop of the Carousel Boutique. It had been several hours since Draxton had left the boutique and she still couldn't figure out an outfit that would fit him.

She had first designed a light blue formal suit inspired by traditional equestrian clothing from when the Grand Galloping Gala first began, but it just didn't fit. She had tried revising the style, trying to modernize the outfit, but each iteration just looked wrong. She tried shifting the colors to pastels, brights, warms, and muted colors, each iteration never feeling just right. And she had a sinking feeling she knew why.

She was loath to admit it, but the first outfit she had seen on Draxton seemed to fit who he was exactly. From her experiences with him, he had been very dark and forward, with a distinct demeanor or knowledgeability that was reminiscent of Celestia herself. She hated to admit it but she had been trying to dress Draxton as she felt he needed to be, rather than how he should be.

Rarity grabbed her pencil and marker set and redrew the shape of Draxton that she had grown so familiar with. This time, she was not going to try to start this design from scratch, she was going to draw inspiration from that terrible, yet gorgeous crow outfit she had seen him wear.

The first thing she wanted to do was try to layer the design. While Twilight had told her that she had wanted Draxton to have some clothing that was more casual, she couldn't help but think Draxton would need some formal clothes as well. She could think of no better way than to make an outfit that could serve both goals. The challenge though would be making sure the layers could work without each other, a challenge she believed she was more than capable of handling.

While Draxton seemed to prefer things to be simple Rarity knew there was something more to him. She had seen him go from murderous to calm almost instantly in his workshop. When he wasn't actively threatening something, he seemed to act quite courteous, despite his laconic disposition.

For the first layer of clothing, she felt a nice, deep purple, button-up shirt would be a good start. She remembered that the first outfit he wore had been an almost black purple, and she felt it would be nice to use a similar color, although slightly less dark. In the end, a darkened eggplant seemed to be the proper color. To go with it, a crimson tie would serve as a nice contrast to the dark purple of the shirt.

Over the shirt and tie, an onyx black vest seemed appropriate. While she disliked using too many dark colors, especially black, in her designs, this was a special case. Even then, she planned to utilize vermilion red threads to embroider some designs into the vest to break up the color, and really make the outfit aesthetically pleasing.

Finally, for the uppermost piece of clothing, she was going to have it be a jet black leather frock coat, similar to the one she had seen him wearing today. Besides the color and materials, the coat would be mostly the same as the coat he had been wearing. The design differences being the collar lapel, while extending the same distance down the front of the coat, would also permit the front to be closed. She was also going to have the tail of the coat curve as it traveled to the front, rather than have that square look of his other coat. She additionally wouldn't create a divide between the left and right sides with a cut like the other one had.

For the pants, she could simply use a light but durable charcoal grey fabric. It probably wouldn't hurt to also try to make a replacement hat for Draxton with the same material as well, so he wouldn’t keep using that thin cloth to hide that horrid wound. Just the memory of that injury made her shudder.

When she looked down at the finished designs, she couldn’t be happier at how it had tuned out. Well, she would have been happier if Draxton would have looked right in brighter colors, but in the end, this outfit perfectly fit the human. Now she just needed to bring the piece before her into the real world.

Pinkie had followed the human's aerosolized grump back to Twilight's castle. She found a nice hiding bush to lay down in so she could see when the human came out. Unfortunately, it seemed he was done going outside for today. That was fine though, she just needed to go inside and meet him.

Pinkie got up and happily trotted towards Twilight's front door. As she was heading there, she could make out the faint sound of a door being opened really loudly. She couldn't tell exactly where the sound had come from but she was going to find out, and she was going to be S.Ne.A.K.Y about it.

Fortunately, she always had her Super Necessary Anonymity Kirtle Yeoman hidden everywhere, for just such an occasion. She reached into a nearby bush and pulled out what most ponies would assume was just a manikin from Rarity’s shop wearing a rustic dress. Pinkie quickly took the dress off her trusty yeoman and placed him back in the bush.

Pinkie quietly made her way along the wall towards where she thought she had heard the sound come from as fast as she could. When she reached the part of the castle that she remembered lead to the library two things became apparent to her. For one, she could make out the sound of Twilight's voice coming from the other side of the wall, meaning she was in the library talking to herself, Spike, or the human. The second thing she could notice was that the concentration of grump had gotten super high. The human was definitely with Twilight in the library.

Now that she knew where the two of them were, she just needed to walk back to twilight's front door and head to the library. She couldn't climb in a window like she would have wanted to since Twilight's library only had windows above her super high shelves. As she was about to head back through a really good idea suddenly came to her. Why not climb the walls and enter the windows to surprise the two of them, they would never see it coming?

Pinkie had just what she needed too. She always carried some super-suctiony suction cups with her for just such an occasion. She reached into a pocket in her kirtle and pulled out four large suction cups. She attached a suction cup to each hoof and began her ascent up the wall. As she was climbing, she could hear Twilight and Mr. Grumpy still talking. Unfortunately, the conversation quickly ended as she heard the human say one last thing before there was the sound of a door closing. The good news though was the not so fun feeling the human gave off hadn’t gone down, meaning he was still in the room.

When Pinkie finally reached one of the windows to the library, she began searching the room for the source of the grump. The room was dim, with the only lights coming from magically imbued gems in desk lamps and sconces that filled the room. Despite this, Pinkie knew she should have been able to make out the human, he was so different looking there was no way she could miss him. He must be right below her, in the natural blind spot she had from the window. She did her best to look beneath her by trying to get higher.

She plastered her face to the top of the window as high as she could get, straining to see anything below her. She could just make out what looked like the human's hat but she couldn't be sure. She was pushing her face as hard as she could against the glass, attempting to make out just what was beneath her.

She could almost see more of him, she was almost there, she just needed to…

A soft pop came from the window.

Pinkie had all of half a second to remember that Twilight preferred to not lock the library windows, and said windows were the circular ones that pivoted around the center before she was sent head first into the library. The window rotating from top to bottom, catching the pink mares clothing before flinging her towards the human she had been trying to see.

Draxton had been surprised to find that every book the strange unicorn that was housing him had was in New Delistaris. There wasn't a single book written using the runes of Old Velathrian, the language he had grown up with. He had tried to reason this away by telling himself that this was a different world and they had developed differently than how his world had. The only problem with this was that all the ponies as they called themselves -a stupid name seeing as all member were called as such despite ponies referring to immature horses- spoke his language and wrote a language from his world.

He had learned a great deal last night when he had discovered this library after having retrieved his things. He found a book titled Pony Anatomy: The Ins and Outs of Our Bodies and decided to read it. Apparently, these ponies were very similar to the equines of his home, the exception being unicorns and pegasi. The book had also stated that each pony had a latent network of structures throughout their bodies that allowed them to harness some kind of magic. But he highly doubted the claims.

With what he knew, he had no doubt that these creatures had come in contact with a great one that had bestowed them their powers. He had seen what the amygdala could do, and had been to that damnable fishing hamlet. Everything he had seen up to now that could be called “magic” was simply attributable to the cosmic powers of great ones.

He was searching the historical records contained in the books here for anything that would tell him just what great ones these equines had come in contact with. So far, the only records of a great one were of an entity they called Discord. According to their records, this being could warp the world around itself, seemingly breaking all known laws of physics. This, however, meant nothing, as the records of this being came after records of magic being used in the world.

He had a feeling that either the records had been purged- as they should be- to prevent the populace from going mad from the eldritch truth, or were never there to begin with. If the second was true it would mean that this world, despite being influenced by the same beings that he had so recently come to know, was wholly ignorant of the truth that surrounds them.

He was about to read a section of the book he had just picked up when a sudden high-pitched shriek filled the room, along with the sound of something falling from above. The muscles of his body moved before he even had to think, a reaction he had learned during his night in Yharnam. He had learned rather quickly how to respond to something that came at you from above.

He dropped the book he had been reading in front of him and deftly rolled away from his chair. He had his back to the chair when he heard the sound of something landing in the seat. Draxton immediately grabbed the blades of mercy he had on his hip, he wouldn't have time to split the blades now, but after his first attack, he would. He rounded on the creature that had landed on the chair, fully intent on slicing whatever had dared to attack him, only to be met by one of the normal horses he had seen in his workshop.

When the horse finally opened its eyes it was met with the sight of his blades inches from its flesh. He could see the horse visibly pale, a sight that should have been impossible to do, given it had fur. He calmly placed the blades back onto his hip and went to pick up the book he had dropped so he could put it back where he had found it.

“If I had less control you’d be dead.”

The pink horse for her part seemed to calm down once she saw that he did not intend to end her life just yet. She slowly lowered herself from the chair and turned to face him. When he turned back around he saw an unnaturally wide smile had come to dominate her face. Of all the horrors that he had witnessed in Yharnam, nothing compared to the fright that this smile was giving him. Back then, anything this unnerving had the decency to want to kill him, so he at least knew how to deal with it. This smile was too wide, it was the smile one would expect from someone that had found pure joy. It was a smile that couldn't be worn by anything not deranged or dead.

“Thanks for not hurting me Mr., I knew you couldn't be all bad.”

He just scoffed. He had learned well the lessons of Yharnam, the only thing that ever mattered was that you survived. He almost felt sorry for this pink ponies ignorant notion of good and bad. He began to make his way towards the door before the pink horse stopped him.

“Wait. Don't go yet. We haven't even properly met. My name is Pinkamina Diane Pie, but everyone just calls me Pinkie Pie or just Pinkie for short. What's your name?” Pinkie said as cheerily as could be. He couldn't fully trust something this happy, it wasn't right. He could at least be courteous and give her his name.

“Draxton Vanright Valdane,” he replied over his shoulder before resuming his walk back to the door.

Pinkie couldn't let Draxton get away she needed to throw him a “Welcome to Ponyville Party” and she did not need a repeat of Twilight or Cranky at ANOTHER of her welcome parties.

“Hey, before you go, I'm planning a super special ultra ‘Welcome to Ponyville But Also Equestria And Also Thanks For Saving Us From A Big Mean Kitty From The Everfree And Also Sorry For Going To Your Home Uninvited And Attacking You’ party and wanted to know if you wanted anything at the party?”

After she had finished her request, she could see the human looking over his shoulder at her. His single red eye feeling like it was looking into her soul. The uncomfortable silence that filled the room seemed to stretch on for a solid minute to Pinkie.

She could feel her mane deflating as time passed. What if he didn't want a party? What if he didn't like parties, and she had offended him by wanting to throw a party for him?

“Quiet.”

Her mane instantly regained its poofyness. Draxton hadn't refused to let her throw the party for him, she knew he had some goodness buried under his gruff, silent, miserable exterior. If she could just play her cards right, she could crack that exterior and make it so he wasn't always giving off that aura of grump.

“Okie dokie lokie.”

Pinkie happily started her bouncing out of the library and to the front door, passing by Draxton on her way. When she arrived at the door, she reached up to reopen it only for Draxton to stop her this time.

“Are those wooden wolves a common pet?”

Pinkie looked back at Draxton confused, what made him think timberwolves were pets. Unless he really liked them and wanted one for a pet. She could probably try to get him a pet timberwolf, but Twilight probably wouldn't want him to have one. Oh, maybe she could have a timberwolf theme to the party.

“You mean the timberwolves? I don't think anyone has one of those as a pet.”

“Then what’s your friend Fluttershy doing with one?”

“Oh, she looks out for all kinds of animals, it's her special talent. She’s taking care of that poor timberwolf since he got really hurt. I feel really bad for him too.” Pinkie looked down, her voice conveying the pain she felt for the condition of the Everfree predator.

Out of the corner of her eye, she could make out that Draxton had subtly changed his posture after hearing what she said. She couldn't make out what had specifically changed in his posture or what it meant, but she wanted to believe he felt bad for what he did and wanted to make up for it.

The dinners were almost prepared for all the animals she cared for. Fluttershy liked the consistency that feeding the animals that lived with her brought. Regardless of how bad her day had been, she could always count on the dinner preparations to remain consistent. It also didn’t hurt that caring for animals never failed to brighten her mood. The evening sun shining through her kitchen window mirroring her mood. She was just fixing dinner for the songbirds and wood mouse family which lived near her fireplace. They tended to be one of the last groups she fixed dinner for, mostly due to how simple it was, nuts and berries for the songbirds, and seeds and apple slices for the mice family. She was about to bring out the food for everyone when she remembered that she needed to prepare dinner for the timberwolf.

If she instead happened to be housing a normal timberwolf, she didn’t expect it would be much of an issue, but the one fact she knew was that this timberwolf was not normal. Typically, she gave the timberwolves sticks from the forest border but judging by the lack of interest it had shown over the sticks it had been given this morning, she doubted it would go over well. When she checked the wood she had left behind in her room, she found none of the softwoods had been interacted with, and most of the tougher woods only had light teeth marks. She asked if it wanted her to keep any of it around, but it told her none of it interested him. The timberwolf seemed perfectly content to not eat and instead just drink from the bowl of water she kept filled for him. Even when she discovered that the wood it had eaten this morning came from one of the oak trees near her garden when she found the leftover pieces while cleaning up, it had eaten none of the other sticks and branches from those trees. If there was a way to figure out what she needed to feed it from just this it was beyond her.

Fluttershy carefully took the small bowl of food for the songbirds in her mouth, and the plate for the mice family in her right hoof. When she arrived back in the living room, she found everyone was eating their dinner. Well not everyone, she only allowed the herbivores and insects to eat in the cottage. She had learned when she first started to take care of animals that having the carnivores eating with the non-carnivores lead to less than comfortable situations, so the predators tended to eat outside, they didn’t seem to mind though. Angel, who had already finished his dinner, was currently glaring at her from his spot on her loveseat. He was angry with her due to not being able to go into her room, not from her keeping him out, but because he didn’t want to share a room with a timberwolf. After she set down the last two meals, which they were immensely grateful of due having to wait, she headed upstairs to ask what the timberwolf would like to eat.

When she arrived in her room she was greeted by the timberwolf quickly wagging its tail across the floor with its head up as far is it could get it without instinctively wanting to sit up. She couldn’t help but give him some scratches behind the ears, because despite how different he was from her perspective, she couldn’t help but look at him as another dog, especially with how he treated her. The timberwolf gratefully took the pets, even closing his eye and tilting his head to get her to scratch what he wanted. The petting would have gone on for some time, but the rumble that came from Fluttershy’s stomach reminded her she still needed to eat and why she came up here.

“I’m so happy you’re doing better. Everyone else is having dinner, and I was wondering if you want something,” Fluttershy squeaked out, “I know you didn’t want any more of the sticks I brought earlier, so if you would like something I’m sure I can get it for you; if you want that is.”

“If I could have some meat that would be nice,” the timberwolf responded in soft growls and barks.

The response sent Fluttershy’s head reeling. This was the first time she had heard of a timberwolf eating another animal. As far as she had known, timberwolves only ate plants. However, when she thought about it, she had never housed a timberwolf longer than it needed to heal, and the stories she knew of them always involved the ponies staying as far from them as they could. On top of that, when she considered how this timberwolf had what were essentially the teeth of a predator, and how the other timberwolves around here had stakes for teeth, it shouldn’t be a surprise that they ate meat.

“Ok, I’ll see what I can do,” Fluttershy responded in the cheerful tone she tended to have around the animals she cared for.

As Fluttershy proceeded out of her room and down the stairs, she couldn’t help but feel like this was going to be an uncomfortable experience. Not because she was caring for an animal that ate meat, she knew better than most ponies the needs of animals, she took care of mink siblings that lived under her bridge, and one of her best friends was even a bear. It wasn’t even that she was probably going to need to handle the meat with her mouth, she disliked the taste, but that was a small price to pay to make sure another creature was happy. No, what was going to make this an unpleasant experience was that she was going to be bringing the meat past the animals in the house.

When she had first begun caring for animals in her cottage, she had originally fed everyone in the house. It didn’t take long to figure out that doing so was not the best of ideas. Because she allowed the animals to eat where they felt most comfortable, more than once an owl would be eating its rat dinner in front of a family if mice, or a snake would be given an egg while there were birds in the room. While every animal knew they were safe while she was caring for them, and none of them were deluded as to the needs of the other animals, it still wasn’t best to have the animals see something they could relate to getting eaten.

She had promised to have the predators eat their meals outside, and only let them back when they had finished. Everyone seemed to be fine with the arrangements, the predators could still live in the cottage, and the non-predators could eat without being horrified. Most of the predators had gone back to hunting for themselves too, which made things easier. Even though she knew the animals she was caring for would understand completely why she was doing it, it still felt like she was breaking her promise. She knew they would tell her it was fine, that the timberwolf needed her to be close, and that even if he did want to hurt them, his condition made everywhere but right in front of him safe, it still didn’t feel right though.

As she was about to exit her cottage, she remembered to grab her saddlebags from next to the door. If she was going to be feeding the timberwolf, she doubted he would only need to eat the small amount of food she could normally carry, especially when she considered how little he had eaten today. Now that she considered it, she hadn’t decided who she would ask to help the timberwolf by donating some of their food. While she was caring for a lynx at the moment, and she tended to have more hunts than she needed, Fluttershy knew that the extra food tended to get split up among the serpopard cubs that tended to follow the lynx. The serpopard cubs had a mother that cared for the three of them, but they seemed to prefer to hang around the lynx whenever they could for some inexplicable reason. The next best option would be asking Harry if he would help, but she preferred to ask him last as he seemed to be cut from the same cloth she was. She remembered times he had gave away all the food he had to help other predators. If she did ask him she needed to make sure that he had already eaten, she didn’t want to tell him he needed to look after himself first. Unable to think of another predator that would be able to help her, she made the decision to ask Harry.

Harry was currently in the animal sanctuary helping to make sure that everything was in order while she was gone. When she arrived at the sanctuary, she saw Harry giving some fish to a badger. As she was flying over Harry saw her and began running over. When he was close enough, he swept her into one of his wonderful hugs. He told her he was glad she was dropping by and that everything was still going just fine.

“That so nice to hear Harry. I was just coming by to ask you some questions; if you have time.”

“Of course, I always have time for you,” Harry replied, hugging her closer to emphasize his point.

“Well first off, are you making sure you are eating enough,” Fluttershy pointedly questioned, staring him straight in the eyes.

“Don’t worry, I didn’t forget what you told me.”

“That’s good,” Fluttershy said, her tone having returned to her usual pitch, “I also wanted to ask if you have any meat you could spare. There’s a timberwolf that’s not doing too well, he hasn’t eaten all day and said he would like some meat.”

“Certainly. How much do you need?”

She hadn’t thought about it. Usually, she had some kind of reference when she was fixing up a meal. She hated that she didn’t have more experience with this to make a good call. “I think he is about half your size, so a bit less than what you eat.”

Harry nodded, put her down, and walked over to the spot he had claimed for himself in the sanctuary. When he came back, he was carrying a small cloth wrapped item in his right paw while across both his paws was what appeared to be one of the back legs of a very large deer. When he got closer the size and structure of the leg suggested that it had come from a moose and not a deer. The leg coming from a moose made more sense than a deer since deer were a sentient species like ponies, and she couldn’t see Harry doing that after all his time around her and her friends.

When Harry finished walking back to her, he asked her if she thought it would be enough. She responded that it was probably more than what she needed, but he simply told her if he didn’t eat it all tonight she could just give the rest of it to him tomorrow. She thanked him for his generosity, but only after she made him promise that he still had enough food for himself, and began preparing to head back to her cottage. When she asked what was in the cloth Harry told her it was some fish he had caught. He preferred to have some variety in his meals and thought the timberwolf would feel the same. Fluttershy thanked Harry for being so thoughtful.

She didn’t need to worry about carrying the fish, as she could simply do so with her mouth, but the moose leg wasn’t so easy. While she could carry it in her hoofs, the weight of it was enough that she would need to make some stops to put it down and rest her muscles. She and Harry decided to use her saddlebag to hold the leg, but due to the leg being longer than she was, it only went in about half way up the thigh and tended to fall to that side. Harry was finally able to get the leg situated properly by turning and bending the leg to go into the other side of the bag, creating a furry triangle behind Fluttershy’s head.

Fluttershy bid her friend farewell and started her flight back. To an outside observer, her trip back would have looked quite absurd. The sight of a pegasus carrying what looked like a picnic lunch in her mouth while a moose leg jutted out of her bags, constantly threatening to fall to her side if she didn’t fly the right way was quite the sight. The situation would have brought a smile to her face if she stopped to reflect on what she was doing.

When Fluttershy had finally returned, the last of the sun's light peeking over the horizon, she quickly landed and dropped the fish-filled cloth. The scent of dead fish was starting to get to her and turn her stomach. She proceeded to drop her front while keeping her back up to slide her saddlebags off. When she stood back up and took her first look at the way that the leg had been situated she couldn’t help but blush a little when she thought about how ridiculous she had probably looked.

Looking over what she had been given, she tried to decide what she should give the timberwolf. The small amount of fish was most likely going to be less than he would need, so if she decided to give him fish she would need to find something else to give him. The moose leg on the other hoof had the opposite problem, definitively being more than enough. If she would have thought ahead, she would have asked Harry to break the leg into pieces to make it more manageable. Since the leg was practically the size of a pony and she DEFINITELY didn’t want one of the more sensitive animals to come across it before she gave it to the timberwolf, the decision seemed to have been made for her. She just needed to mentally prepare for having a half eaten leg in her room overnight if the timberwolf couldn’t eat all of it. Now she needed to figure out how she was going to get it to the timberwolf.

She couldn’t just carry the leg in for the same reasons she was going to feed it to the timberwolf now. The first thought was to fly it up to her room and go in through one of her windows, regrettably, none of her windows were currently unlocked, so that plan wouldn’t work. The only option was to bring it in the front door, either fast enough so no one would be able to make out the animal leg or to cover the leg. Because Rainbow Dash was the only pegasus she knew that could fly that fast she needed to find a way to cover it.

Fortunately, she kept a blanket in a box near the chicken coop for when cold nights were eminent and she wanted to make sure the chickens stayed warm. She retrieved the blanket from the box and decided to roll the leg in the blanket. When she had finished wrapping the leg the end result looked like somepony was trying to pass off a very wide blanket as one of those throw rugs one sees rolled up in stores. It was going to be awkward trying to carry the blanketed leg, but it was something she believed she needed to do.

Fluttershy grabbed the cloth of fish in her mouth and placed it in the box she had taken the blanket from. While the smell would likely be worse by tomorrow morning, it was better than taking it inside to try to refrigerate it, both due to not wanting to bring meat into the house again, and because if she did there was no way the refrigerator would ever not smell like the fish.

She made her way into her cottage, trying to balance the wrapped leg on her back. When she entered, she noticed several of the animals in the living room turn to watch her come in, many of them cocking their heads in confusion as to why she was carrying the chicken blanket on her back, and why it was rolled instead of folded. Fluttershy seeing this, quickly closed her door and trotted towards the stairs, telling the animals that she just needed to go out to retrieve some food for the timberwolf while not actually turning to properly address them. Her thoughts going up the stairs were of how she was going to make it up to them for being so impolite.

When she opened her bedroom door a wall of stench slammed into her nostrils like it just couldn’t wait to escape. She couldn’t help but try to cover her muzzle to avoid the horrid scent. When she looked at where the timberwolf had been she was met with a large “present” and a significant amount of liquid surrounding it. The puddle seemed to trail over to a large wooden mass in the corner of the room, the timberwolf was trying to wedge itself as far as it could into the corner and do its best to go unnoticed. Fluttershy dropped the leg to her left and flew over to where the timberwolf had crammed itself.

When she landed next to the timberwolf she was assailed with the timberwolf’s whimpers of apology. He told her he tried his best to hold it in but he so rarely did that he couldn’t control himself long enough. The timberwolf obviously felt immensely guilty for what he had done, he probably thought she was cross with him and would reprimand him for what he had done.

Fluttershy simply nuzzled him.

“I’m not mad at you. I should have known you would need to relieve yourself eventually. I didn’t think to take you outside earlier when we had your pictures taken. If anything it's my fault, I should have thought to take you outside when Spike and Featherweight were here. From now on just tell me when you need to go and I’ll help you outside. Don’t worry, I’ll get something to help clean up the accident.”

Fluttershy left the room and headed downstairs to her broom closet to grab the cleaning supplies. She needed some paper towels to deal with the poop, and to absorb what she could of the urine. She also grabbed a spray bottle of vinegar water and a box of baking soda to make sure none of it soaked into the floors. She had experience in with dealing with animals that couldn’t always hold it in so she was prepared. Her front hoof was on the first stair when she realized that she was forgetting to bring a bag to put the waste in, she quickly grabbed a bag from the kitchen and proceeded upstairs, many of the animals nodding in understanding as they saw what she was carrying under her wings.

As Fluttershy was cleaning up the accident she couldn’t help but notice the timberwolf still huddled in the corner she had found it in. While it was no longer trying to become a solid lump of wood, it still looked at her and what she was doing with what she could only describe as shame and remorse. She felt really bad for him, she needed to do something to try to get his mind off what had happened. When she had needed to get her mind off something she liked to soak in a warm bath, the heat relaxing her muscles and helping her forget her troubles.

That was it!

She was going to give the timberwolf a bath. He had never had one and after what had happened today he probably needed it too. After how long he had probably spent in the woods, he would likely feel so much better not being so dirty. She just needed to grab a brush and some light soap and she could put her plan into action.

The timberwolf was wondering if the creature that was taking care of him had lied to him. She said she was not angry with him but then she had assaulted him with foul smelling water and three hairy pieces of tree after her and a snake cat carried him into a raised, white, stone pit.

The first piece of tree with a clump of hair on it wasn’t so bad. The hair was like this creatures hair, soft and bending, making him feel funny every time it was rubbed on him. The other two hairy trees were less enjoyable. After she had rubbed his back with that first weird tree she switched to the smaller hairy tree piece, rubbing the larger one over his body while the smaller one was rubbed in between the pieces of his outer coat. He wished that he had more control over the pieces of his outer coat, because of every time the hair on the stick went between two pieces it scratched him and made him itch as nothing else could. The hairy stick scratching the outside of his coat wasn’t too pleasant, but he had become accustomed to scratching on the outside of his coat.

However, the worst thing to happen was when she started to use the foul smelling water she had used to clean up his mess to clean his back half. It smelled similar to fruits around the forest that he had learned from experience were not meant to be eaten. It made his outer coat tingle. The worst part wasn’t the smell of the water, or that it felt weird on him, but that she was using it to clean his broken leg and where his missing leg should be. While she had gone back to using the first hairy tree, whenever it came in contact with the exposed wood it would send bites of pain up through his body. She seemed sorry for causing him pain but kept insisting she needed to do it to try to keep his injury clean. She didn’t seem to be lying to him, and really seemed to be sorry for causing him pain, he tried his best to keep his sounds of pain to cries and whimpers instead of howls.

She finished off what she wanted by taking a soft wet leaf and rubbing him down. After that, she placed the same white powder she had placed on the area she had cleaned up his mess on his coat where she had used that awful water and wrapped it in a long white leaf. When she was done with whatever she wanted with him, she called the snake cat back in to help carry him back to the area he had been staying. He was placed back in the spot he had been when he had first been taken here.

Now that he was back and was no longer being prodded and scraped he could think about how his outer coat felt. He appreciated that his caretaker hadn’t used much water as he knew that his body would take it in and swell, making moving irritating and impractical. He also came to feel that his outer coat had become a great deal more comfortable. He turned as far as he could and looked at his coat, seeing that it was not as dull as he was used to it being this long after he replaced the pieces. It almost looked like it had just been replaced. When he licked at it he found that it was mostly smooth too, he couldn’t feel the usual scrapes he had gained in the last few months.

He had been wrong to assume that she had been punishing him for what he had done. Rather, it seemed that she was doing her best to make him as comfortable as she could. He would have to find a way that he could thank her for everything she was doing for him.

After the cat snake had left the room, following his caretaker telling it they could do so, the loud rumble of an empty stomach filled the room. It had been his caretaker.

The caretaker’s face seemed to change color when she realized what had happened, something he had not seen happens before in any other animal, least of all his own pack members. She apologized to him, saying she forgot about his dinner when she saw what had happened. She quickly went back to the door she had come in through and brought back something strange and dropped it in front of him with a firm thud. When he smelled it, he could pick up the scent of food, but with how weak the scent was, he knew whatever this was had only come in contact with the food he wanted and wasn’t the food itself. Not wanting to insult her, he began to bite the strange item and rewarded with a not too pleasant taste. It was stringy and soft, reminding him of the time he had run into a spider web with his mouth open, the taste of this thing seemed to come close to the spiderweb too.

His caretaker smiled at him as he tried to lick the air to get the feeling and taste of that thing out of his mouth. She told him that his food was covered by the strange object as she proceeded to grab onto a protruding portion of it and pull, causing the thing to roll in place and eventually deposit an item that made his mouth water and his own stomach to attempt to recreate the sound his caretaker’s had made.

Fluttershy was to no small degree regretting what she had done to the timberwolf. While his body language told her that he enjoyed the outcome, what it took to get there had made him miserable. When she started to brush him down with the body brush it just wouldn’t clean him. The bristles were too soft and couldn’t remove the chipped wood and anything that had embedded itself in his coat. Fluttershy figured she was going to be unable to clean the timberwolf until she saw her hoof brushes sitting in a cup near the timberwolf. The bristles were extremely stiff, made to clean hooves by scraping away at them. It didn’t seem right to use them on the timberwolf, but she couldn’t see another way to try to clean him off.

She had covered his back half with baking soda and then wrapped it in gauze to try to keep the powder to the timberwolf’s body to try to neutralize the vinegar water she had used and help the timberwolf smell nice. He looked a bit ridiculous though, almost like she had given him a diaper. It had pained her when she had cleaned back there. Every time she would brush the vinegar water on his leg wound or the broken leg, she could see the pain it caused him. But she needed to try to clean those areas as best she could; if the timberwolf’s urine could cause some medical problem by being in the wounds, she needed to act. It was better to be cautious when caring for something she was unfamiliar with.

After she had thanked the serpopard and told her she could handle the rest herself her stomach had rumbled, reminding her that she still needed to eat, meaning that the timberwolf also had yet to eat. She quickly flew over to where she had left to leg after having blushed of embarrassment.

When she set down the leg in the blanket, the timberwolf sniffed at it and tried to take a bite before she had a chance to unwrap it. She couldn’t help but giggle a little at the timberwolf trying to get the taste of cloth out of his mouth.

“That’s not your dinner silly. It's what's inside.” She grabbed ahold of the end of the blanket with her mouth and pulled up, the leg eventually cascading out of the blanket and rolling towards the timberwolf who looked at it like a child would their favorite meal.

“Is this really all for me?” His voice conveying his uncertainty as to the situation he had been presented with while looking up at her with wide eyes. “My dad and older brother were always the ones who got the hind legs.”

Fluttershy simply nodded to him and pushed the leg towards him with her foreleg. He graciously grabbed it in his mouth and ravenously tore into the haunch, placing his left foreleg over the thigh to keep it from moving too much. While it wasn’t the most pleasant thing to watch, Fluttershy was glad she had done well to make the timberwolf happy. If she had known how much the timberwolf enjoyed meat, or that he needed meat in his diet, she would have asked Harry yesterday if he had anything to spare.

With the timberwolf’s dinner taken care of, and the remaining animals having been fed, all that was left was for her to feed herself. As if the very mention of food in her thoughts was its invocation, her stomach growled, reminding her that she had indeed foregone her evening meal. Hopefully, she still had some daisy sandwiches left from earlier this week in her refrigerator. If not, she always had fresh vegetables in the kitchen she could use to make a nice salad.

The hospital was somehow worse than she remembered it. All day she had to deal with nurses and doctors coming in and out of her room, asking her really easy questions and writing down what she said. If it hadn't been for Twilight and Spike dropping by, she was sure that she would have had at least one more of those stupid tests. Worse yet, the library didn't have any Daring Do books. She had read each of the books at least a dozen times, so much so that she could explain precisely what had happened at any part of the book at the drop of a hat, so reading them was simply her way to kill time.

She had settled for reading a book from a series Daring Do had recommended, Dark Secrets: The Temple of Time by Starry Arora. Daring told her that while Starry was an unremitting racist, if you looked past that, his writing was quite good. The problem she was having was that the book had been written more for eggheads than for ponies like her. She wasn't saying she was stupid, it was just that the pacing and bleakness of the first few chapters, combined with the numerous word she had never seen before lead to her eyes glazing over at an accelerated rate. Seriously, how did this series have such high praise and a cult following when it seemed to be so antithetical to what common knowledge would say would be successful?

Rainbow Dash’s boredom eventually got the better of her as she relented and decided to pick up the book again and try to make it through the second chapter.

Rainbow Dash had to put down the book again. Not only was the writing unbearably wordy, but happiness and hope seemed to be foreign concepts to this writer. Compared to the Daring Do books which positively radiated with a desire to win and push forth, this book seemed to wallow in hopelessness, and do it's best to convince the reader there would be no happy end. Her thoughts were broken however by the sound of a bird’s cry from outside the window, a cry that sent shivers down her spine.

When she turned to see what bird it was that had sent the chill of dread down her back she was met with the sight of an old crow, perched on the window sill of the hospital, framed by the light of an almost full moon. The sight of that black feathered form brought forth the most horrible visions. When she looked at the crow, staring at her through the window, she did not see a harmless black bird as she usually did, but a hateful omen, foretelling her misery and death.

Every fiber in her being felt like it had been pulled taut, rendering her immobile. In front of her was a creature that wanted to hurt her. A part of her was telling her that a small crow was not strong enough to hurt her, but a louder, more desperate voice inside her head was screaming that a crow was what had put her here. A crow had flown towards her and had smashed her skull while she was flying. It must have returned to finish the job.

What had she ever done to the crow that would warrant it coming after her? Then she remembered. She remembered feeling sad, somepony she had recently met had been hurt. She remembered they had told her it was a crow that had done it. She found the crow not too long after that and decided she was going to give it a piece of her mind, only to wake up here in the hospital.

As she was trying to remember what the crow looked like, her mind flashed an image of a tall crow with a single blood-red eye. The crow was far bigger than she was, making her feel like a filly before it.

No, this crow wasn't the one who had done this. It was simply a messenger, it had been sent here by the crow that had done this to her to remind her of what it had done. The spiteful way its eye stared at her through the window was a testament to the severity of the message it carried. The other crow was taunting her, it wanted her to know that it knew where she was. The other crow would wait for her to exit, and before she could make it too far, it would strike.

*tap*

*tap*

*tap*

The crow had slowly tapped upon her window three times. Why would it have done so? It must have known she saw it. It must know that she understood its foul message. Was it telling her to open the window? There was no reason she would have to open the window, not after the threat she had received.

*tap*

*tap*

*tap*

How could she be so stupid? The crow wasn't delivering a message, he was here to point the crow that had hurt her to the room she was in. The crow wasn't going to wait for her to get better, it was personally coming to finish the job, here and now.

She had to move. Every instinct she had was telling her to hide. But how could she hide? It knew where she was. Was it right behind the crow at her window? Was it already inside the hospital? Every horrible thought on how it would come for her flooded her mind all at once. One thought stood out and was the reason for her next action.

I need to defend myself.

The thought was the desperate vocalization of her desire to survive.

Rainbow Dash jumped out of her bed. Ignoring the doctor's orders to not move too much for risk of making her situation worse. But that wouldn't matter if she was dead. With all her strength she forced the bed along with the frame up onto its hoofboard. She then pushed it as hard as she could against the window.

It wasn't enough.

She knew that the crow was stronger than her. She knew it could kill her easily. A bed wasn't enough. She looked around the room. A large cabinet was standing to the right of the door. It looked heavy.

She went to the side of the cabinet closest to the door and pushed. It was too heavy. She couldn't push it.

No.

She needed to stop it from getting to her. She pushed with all he might. She was flapping her wings to help her. She could feel her muscles begin to tear. The pain was immense. But she couldn't stop. With all her strength she shoved the cabinet into the bed.

The two impacted with a satisfying thud, bending the bed. It would have to do. Her muscles were begging her to stop. They felt like they were on fire.

She couldn't stop now.

Not while the door was still unblocked.

The door was flung open by a group of one doctor pony and several nurses. They were here to help the crow.

She was about to defend herself but her muscles disobeyed her. Before she could properly react she was tackled to the ground.

“You’re working with him aren't you! You want to feed me to him, don't you!” Rainbows voice was manic, her eyes had shrunken down significantly despite the darkness of the room. “I won't let you! I’ll fight all of you! I’ll…

Rainbow was unable to finish that last sentence. Not after a nurse pony had come around the corner with a needle filled with sedatives and jabbed it into her neck.

Everypony looked at each other. Why had Rainbow Dash gone off? She had been fine all day, Twilight and Spike visiting had done wonders for her psyche as she had been mostly upbeat, all things considered. However, the biggest question on the ponies minds was why she had been freaking out. Why she was both violently afraid of whatever it was and why she thought it was going to kill her.

When the nurses and doctors assessed the damage they discovered just why Rainbow had been unable to move following what she had done with the cabinet. The supply cabinet she had been able to toss at the bed covering the window had contained several hundred pounds of both bedding supplies and other materials for the room. It was a feat in and of itself to even move something like that herself. What really scared the medical staff though was that the cabinet had been bolted in place to prevent it from falling. In her panic, she had been able to tear the legs from the cabinet and rip the bolt that secured the cabinet to the wall from its stud.

The only thing that the ponies could find that could explain what had caused this was a single black feather on the window sill.

Mr. Black loved Fluttershy, so when he had heard what had happened to one of her friends, he felt sorry for the mare that took care of him. Worse yet, because she needed to help a timberwolf recover, she couldn't go see her friend. Mr. Black figured that it would be a simple way to repay the kindness she had shown him by checking up on the injured mare and reporting back what he saw. He now knew that had been a terrible idea.

After Fluttershy had given him his food, he ate it as fast as he could. He knew she disapproved of animals devouring their food so fast but he had a job, and some minor stomach pain was worth the joy he would bring to his caretaker. After all of it had been consumed, he took flight in the direction of the town hospital.

When he had arrived at the hospital, he decided that he should check each of the windows to see if Fluttershy's friend could be seen through any of them. If not, he could always return home and simply say he had taken a flight to get some fresh air if Fluttershy decided to ask. It didn't take long to find Fluttershy's friend though. She was on the second-floor on the eastern side of the building.

He could recognize her from that awful hair on her head. He had seen her several times around Fluttershy’s cottage as he could not forget that colorful atrocity that was her hair. He didn't know if it was natural but if it was, he felt sorry for her. Every other pony he had seen had hair that matched their body or at least had colors that worked well together, she did not.

He saw her reading a book with a fairly interesting cover. It was dark and seemed to depict a unicorn fleeing in terror from a large stone structure with a clock in the background. She suddenly dropped the book into her lap and pointed her head at the ceiling. He had a feeling the book was not something she was enjoying.

Since she didn't seem to be presently engaged he let out a single caw to announce his presence. Hopefully, she would be willing to let him in, it was starting to get cold out here. He could see her instantly tensed up at the sound of his call and slowly turn to face him.

He did not claim to be an expert on how ponies tended to act, but he was fairly certain that an unmoving, unblinking mare was not a good sign. It unnerved him how she was staying stock still for so long. He needed to try to get her to stop what she was doing before she gave him nightmares.

He slowly tapped the window three times to try to wake her from her no movement thing. She didn't seem to respond at first, he waited to see if she was simply having a delayed response. When nothing changed he tried knocking again.

After the second knocking things quickly escalated. When he finished tapping the glass, he could see her eyes shrink significantly before she leapt off the bed. Had he scared her? He hadn't meant to. Before he could try to figure out what went wrong, he was greeted to the sight of the mare pushing the bed she had just been lying on onto its hoofboard and tossing it in his direction.

He didn't need to be told twice that he was unwanted. As soon as the bed came crashing into the wall housing the window he had taken flight, beating his wings as fast as he could so he wouldn't be harmed by this crazy mare.

Twilight was just about to turn in for the night. While she still couldn't get the thought of Draxton being able to smell everypony’s blood out of her head, she knew she still needed to sleep. She had returned to the kitchen to see Spike and see if she could help him in any way only to see he had left. She had sighed and simply fixed herself a warm cup of tea to help her get to sleep.

On her way to her room, she was meet with the sight of Pinkie Pie bouncing out of her house. Before she could summon her question as to how and why she had entered her house, Draxton rounded the corner and proceeded towards the stairs to his room. Her mouth was frozen in disbelief. Draxton, the single most joyless and serious entity she had probably ever met had possibly just interacted with the element of laughter, and neither party looked worse for wear. Before she could ask what had just happened Pinkie told her goodbye and left through the front door.

As Draxton walked past her a question formed in her head that she just had to have answered.

“Wait, weren't you just reading a book? Don't tell me you can read one that fast.”

“I haven't properly slept in forty-eight hours. I need to rest.”

How in Tartarus had he not slept in two days? He seemed perfectly awake all day. Did humans just not show signs of exhaustion? She would need to add several more questions to her “stuff Draxton needs to tell me soon before I go crazy” list.

She had made it to her room and was greeted to the sight of Spike sleeping in his bed. She was about to do the same before she heard the telltale belch and magical sparkling signifying that she had gotten a letter. When she turned around, she noticed Spike was still asleep, but a letter had materialized and rolled over to her dresser. She grabbed the letter with her magic and unfurled it so she could see just what had been sent.

Dear Twilight,

Sincerely, Princess Celestia

Twilight was unsure if this was great news or not. With the princesses coming tomorrow it would mean she would not need to house the human in her castle past tonight. This meant she didn't have to put up with Draxton violating every little etiquette she knew. Additionally, it meant she didn't have to wake up to burned coffee every morning. It would also mean he wouldn't be around to tell her all the horrifying facts about himself before she went to bed with nightmares.

On the other hoof, him not being around meant she couldn't have her questions answered concerning what he was, even the horrifying things. And despite his love of the single worst method to create coffee, the fact that he had thought to make coffee for the both of them and not just himself spoke to his true character.

Twilight released a frustrated groan and face planted into her bed. She didn't need to be thinking about this sort of thing right now. She just needed to clear her mind and have a nice restful sleep to make up for what she had lost the previous night. She quickly levitated over her half-filled teacup and poured the contents into her mouth before crawling under the covers and wishing to be given a more enjoyable dream tonight.

The sensation of the cool night air felt good against her coat. Luna was standing on the balcony she used to compose herself in preparation to enter the dream realm. The quiet of night, accompanied by the beauty of the stars and moon, was always helpful in clearing her mind to better attune herself to the oscillation of the dream realm. Many thought that for her to enter the dream realm she simply needed to cast a spell and it would be done, but the process was much more complex. If she truly wished to walk the dreams of others she needed to feel out the way the realm ebbed and flowed and match it. It was a difficult process that required her mind to be on nothing else.

She had sent the four guards away once she reached her destination. They understood she needed to be alone to properly join the dream realm and left without protest, but being summoned just to escort her was somewhat off-putting. She had looked over the two disguised bat ponies with the same look she and her sister had been given by their mother when they had something to tell her but didn't want to. While she and her sister did everything in their powers to try to make them feel welcome, there was nothing she was unwilling to try to finally have every bat pony accept who they were and cease their use of disguise magic.

Luna began her slow methodical breathing, clearing her mind of the last few hours and every thought she had had during that time. As she lit up her horn for the required magic, she could sense the realm of dreams before her; a malleable and thick wall of the most ancient of magics. The texture was not unlike that of sky jellyfish, able to bend and contort to a pressure, never seeming to be able to give way and split open. This was what made entering the dream realm so difficult when doing what she did. If she tried to enter without a clear mind, the realm would admit her, but within her own little dream, meaning that she would have to try again to enter the realm the way she needed to.

The solution to entering the dream realm as she did was to listen to the way that the realm fluctuated, and surround herself in a magic that resonated with the realm. By doing so, the realm would see her as a part of itself and allow her to move unhindered. She felt the way that the realm was shifting tonight, notes of hope surrounding notions of love chased by desires of accomplishment. She began her spell that would coat her in the proper frequency to enter. When she was finished, she walked forward and pushed at the border of the dream realm. The border easily moved at her touch, showing that her spell had worked. She walked forward until she had created a deep enough cavity her entire body was definitively inside. She could sense the realm collapsing the entrance and moving its way back towards her.

Luna knew what was going to happen next and shut her eyes, she knew how chaotic and colorful the realm was on the inside and preferred to not go from nothing to that without first preparing herself. She felt the walls of the crevice she had made begin to push on the sides of her barrel. The walls would not crush her but the pressure they had was nothing if not uncomfortable. The pressure increased steadily, coming to a point that was almost enough to prevent her breathing before it completely disappeared. She had made it.

She opened her eyes to the chaotic colorfulness of the dream realm. The peace and happiness she saw in ponies dreams was always a pleasant way to spend her nights. Her first priority was to sense any disturbances in the realm signaling the presence of a bad dream. Her horn lit up, and she listened to the currents of the dreams, trying to hear the telltale thrum of a nightmare disturbing the flows. She, fortunately, could not hear the signs of terrible dreams, so it was on to figuring out what had happened last night in Ponyville.

She made her way towards the direction that Ponyville’s residents tended to reside in the dream realm. To her curiosity and horror, the darkness she had seen last night still resided over that portion of the dream realm. When she reached her destination, she was somewhat relieved to see that the dream bubbles showed the dream within, but over them, wisps of shadow crawled, threatening to infect the dreams within and turn them into nightmares. She could not sense the source of the darkness, but could see that it centered near the dream bubbles of Spike and Twilight.

Seeing this, she had a sneaking suspicion about what was causing the darkness. The issue was that the dream realm was able to show all dreams within Equestria, regardless of species, so why could she not find out if her theory was correct. Before she could decide on what she should do a pulse of immeasurable darkness emanated from the center of the murk. The pulse forced Luna to close her eyes, and when she opened them again, her stomach dropped.

Before her, the darkness of the area had grown. What was once a cool shadow with wisps dancing around the edges of the dreams had now become a mercilessly cold abyss. She was still able to see into the dreams but they had become less clear, like trying to view a play through a dusty window while the play used only a few candles for lighting. What was worse was what now resided at the center of the darkness. Sitting in front of her was a dream bubble, but instead of the solid border that other dreams had, the edges of this were wavy and thin, constantly fluctuating. If she was a betting pony, she would say that this dream was somehow trying to meld and become one with the dream realm itself.

The worst part about this dream was that its sudden appearance and continued presence were having an effect on the dreams of Ponyville. The darkness had started to seep into other dreams and turn them. If she didn't stop whatever it was that was causing this, she feared that tonight all of Ponyville would be subject to the worst kind of nightmares. She approached the strange dream and was surprised at what she was seeing. The dream continually shifted from a black void that refused to show what it contained to a vivid and clear sight of what was within the dream. When she was able to clearly see inside she was mortified.

Rivers and lakes of blood covered the ground of a hellish landscape reminiscent of the cities of a thousand years ago. The structures were however wrong on every level. They twisting and linked in ways that no buildings should physically be able to achieve, and were covered in rolling stone hills, like the city had been summoned into the landscape rather than having been built. The dream shook her to her core, she never knew a nightmare of this caliber could exist, she wanted nothing more than to leave whoever the dreamer was to their fate, to run away and never look back. Her duty to help anyone in need with their terrible dreams and the sound of dreams becoming corrupted from this one's presence, however, forced her to stand her ground.

She waited for what felt like minutes, but in reality were mere seconds, for the contents of the dream to become clear and visible. When it finally occurred, she walked forward into the dream. Whatever it was that was causing this terrible dream to manifest, she needed to stop it. With bated breath and with a fear that no words could properly convey, she delved into the nightmare to end all nightmares.

Author's Notes:

It's finally here, YAY. Hopefully, I can get these chapters done and published for your enjoyment in less time in the future.