Chapter 2: 'Ere We Go!

Let me start by saying how much I love animals. I love them so much I could just eat them up... IF I HAD THE RIGHT FUCKING TEETH! Seriously, what was I supposed to do with a mouth full of molars? And then it hit me like a sucker punch to the kidney. I knew what I had to do. It was either face the music or starve. I didn't have a choice.

What I was about to do filled me with immense shame. The kind of shame I had not felt since one particular evening involving an obscene amount of vodka and my grandfather's BMW. With a heavy sigh I picked up a handful of grass, winced and took a bite. My brain was having trouble processing reality, which considering the circumstances I think can be forgiven.

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What the hell? I have woken up with grass in my mouth before. I know what grass tastes like. This... this distinctly did not have the foul, grass-like taste that I was expecting. Had my tongue been altered, or was it some weird property of the flora here? Either way, the grass tasted neither good nor bad. It was, in fact, utterly flavorless. My guess was that this was why we never see ponies grazing. They had much more appetizing options. Well, I've eaten military food. As long as it isn't going to be nasty, I can live with it I guess. I was so going to miss eating dead animals though. Fuck you PETA. You go to hell. You go to hell and you die!

Seeing as how I had all the time in the world to munch on the grass I figured I had better see about finding a place to sleep. After all, if Minecraft had taught me anything it was that sleeping in the open leads to very, very bad things happening. While I doubted that I would be attacked by green exploding block monsters or giant spiders in my sleep, it did look like it might rain soon. Which was odd considering, y'know, Equestria. Maybe there just weren't any pegasi around wherever the hell I was to keep the weather in check? Seeing the mass of gray clouds on the horizon continued to thicken, I definitely wanted a roof over my head.

Looking across the lake I saw that the opposite shore was composed of very little sand and a lot of boulders. It was time to put this body of mine to the test. Soon I had made my way around the lake and stood scratching my beard. Hopefully this worked out the way I thought it would, but most likely it would result in me throwing my back out or getting a hernia. Or both. Taking a breath I bent down and put my arms around a stone that was as large as I was.

I lifted the thing like it was nothing. These could have been the Styrofoam prop boulders from Legends of The Hidden Temple as far as I was concerned. I set the rock back down and started assembling a pile that would eventually turn into my makeshift cave. Hopefully it wouldn't collapse on my head while I slept.

By the time I was finished the sun had sank below the horizon and the moon had come up. As I ate my dinner which consisted solely of handfuls of raw grass, I looked at the sky in amazement. It was indescribably beautiful, and I've seen the night sky from the deck of a ship in the middle of the ocean. Out on the water there's no light pollution whatsoever. Out there, its as dark as it gets. I remember reading somewhere that the scientists actually had counted the number of stars in the sky, or at least had a rough estimate. According to them, you could see about six thousand “stars” with the naked eye, although most of them were actually galaxies.

Let me tell you, our sky cannot even compare to Luna's handiwork. Er, hoofdiwork? Whatever! The point is, the princess 'done a great jorb' okay? As the rain started to fall I headed into my shelter and positioned a rock in front of the entrance. Then I laid down to sleep.

That first night in Equestria, I had a dream. It wouldn't be until much later that I remembered it, and God I wish I hadn't.

I was lying on my back in the darkness, not knowing at all where I was. Sitting up I looked around and saw that I was on the road that lead to the farm of one of my all time favorite ponies. 'Apples! Apples! Buy some apples!' I chuckled to myself. It was physically impossible for me to look at one without thinking about Friendship Is Witchcraft.

Intent on tasting the legendary fruit I hopped over the fence and into the orchard, looking around conspiratorially to see if Winona was around guarding the place. The collie was nowhere to be found. Bad dog. I really wanted a sour apple, but as I walked among the trees I realized that I couldn't tell one kind of green from another in the night. Ah well. I reached up to take an apple and froze. A sense of dread washed over me.

Glancing back and forth I saw nothing and shrugged it off as my mind playing tricks. Once again I reached for the apple, and this time I heard the rustling of leaves somewhere behind me. I slowly turned and looked. There, standing between two rows of trees was a sight that turned my veins to ice.

Slender Mane.

Its pale, featureless face practically glowed in the moonlight. Its bizarrely long limbs moved and it started coming towards me. I ran, my mind telling me that it was useless to try and escape, my body telling me I had to get away. I ran through the trees, leapt over the fence and started heading for the town. Every time I looked back it was there, unhurried but still somehow a little closer.

The streets were utterly deserted. All the houses were closed up tight as if all the ponies had gone on vacation. Then I saw a light in the darkness. It was like a light of hope, and it was coming from the most recognizable building in town sans Sugarcube Corner. Twilight's library. I raced to the literal tree house and burst through the door, slamming it shut behind me. Peeking out the window I saw no sign of Slender Mane.

The unmistakable sound of a quill scratching at paper caused me to turn around. There, sitting at Twilight's desk was a hulking figure wrapped in a dark cloak. It would have looked like some kind of bloated, corpulent bird if not for the two massive hornlike protrusions poking up from the shoulders. The candlelight flickered, and I couldn't help but notice that the thing cast no shadow whatsoever.

A ridiculously long scroll trailed off of the desk, looking like one of Twilight's lists. Various horrible appendages reached out and picked it up: a metallic claw, a hand covered in eyes, a cloven hoof and even a purplish tentacle. Then a voice emerged from the hood of the cloak. It was like a thousand voices all merged into one.

The figure turned and glanced in my direction. The scroll slid through its grasp till it found the section it was looking for.

The creature stood up abruptly, knocking over the stool it had been sitting on. It turned towards me in full and the cloak around its body seemed to melt away into nothing. Then I saw what it was. Faces. Just faces. A horrible writhing mass, seething and bubbling. All of the faces were laughing, even as they sank down into the flesh only to be replaced by another. But one face did not move at all, one face looked out from where the chest should have been. It had blue and gold eyes, and it laughed and laughed and laughed.

The true terror came when I realized that I knew what this was.

Of their own accord my lips uttered its name.

I woke up screaming. Some kind of demon spawn had crawled onto the end of my snout. So much for my shelter keeping out giant spiders. Guess I should have made torches. I slapped the monster away and burst through the wall of my shelter, flailing my limbs like a Wacky Waving Inflatable Arm Guy. I ran straight into the lake, diving beneath the surface and hiding there for as long as my breath held, which was considerably longer than it would have been in my old body.

When I came up for air I saw no sign of the hell beast. Not wanting to take any chances I decided to leave the pile of rubble as it was. Uh... I mean, the temporary shelter had served its purpose. No point in going back there, right? Right?

Swimming across the lake was kind of awkward with hooves, but at least I had hands and arms to work with. Idly I wondered how the Cutie Mark Crusaders' swim fins stayed on. Emerging from the water I shook myself off as best I could and made my way back onto the path. It was time to get going. Surely today would be the day I reached Ponyville! Just a little more walking and then Flutters would be mine to glomp to my heart's content! All mine! “You're... going to... LOOOOVE MEEEE!!!”

As I strolled down the road, a song came into my head. Maybe it was something weird about Equestria, but I was compelled to sing it out loud:

The path I was traveling on finally cleared the trees, and what I saw then would shatter my view of Equestria forever.

Author's Notes:

Hey, it could be worse. Much, much worse.