I awoke gasping for breath, ensnared in panic as I choked on a thick mixture of blood and mucus that glued me firmly to the filthy wooden floor I was lying on.

I tore myself free from the floorboard, tugging at the sludge that caked my face and ran down my nostrils. I coughed hard, hacking up a ruddy glob that sent a wave of revulsion through me so strong that I involuntarily tossed my head from the pain, flinging the phlegm into the corner of my small room. As it hit the wall with a meaty, wet slap, it stuck there.

Where the hell was I?!

I staggered to my hooves, finding myself in a room the same size and shape as the one where I’d fallen asleep last night. I looked for my belongings, which were now soaking in a foul reddish-black soup that was pooling under my hooves. I turned to the door, and crept forward. Each step ripped excruciating rasps from my lungs as I held myself against the flaking drywall. My bare legs brushing it a lurid crimson.

I lurched out into the hallway, trying to find somepony, anypony. A glance into the room to my right found me Glitter and Bubblegum, both fast asleep. Something in me dared not wake them. So I careened to my left, into the living room where I found Blackjack and Solidarity.

The light caught their sweaty bodies as they writhed in unison, highlighting every tensing muscle and taut, fleshy contour. A carnal dance that seared itself into my memories, one I was certain no amount of therapy would ever remove.

I managed a single word before faltering forward to the ground.

“Blackjack!”

I woke up again, this time on the musty couch in the living room. I had just enough sense to pray that a sheet separated my bloodied back from the end results of Blackjack's debauchery.

Hyacinth’s worried muzzle was instantly in my face.

“Dad! Blackjack! She’s up!” she called out, before shining a small light into my eyes.

A trio of shots rang out from close by. Pushing the light away, I struggled, straightening up to catch a glimpse of the commotion. Hyacinth’s front hooves pushed me back down onto the slushy couch. Ew.

“Stay down!” she hissed. “Some Family goons showed up not long after you walked in on Blackjack and dad uh…” She grimaced as she looked me over, disgust rippling off of her in waves. “You were bleeding all over. What happened?”

“I don’t know!” I croaked with a voice as parched as the desert around us. I choked on my words, setting off a coughing fit.

Puddle slunk her way over to my side as Hyacinth scrambled for water.

“You were bleeding from some scars on your back. The ones that look really old,” Hyacinth muttered as she held me up to drink from a banged up canteen.

Once empty, she swapped it for a bottle of healing potion.

“It was really scary!” Puddle added as I eagerly gulped down the healing nectar. “You… you lost a lot of blood, Threnody…”

Puddle sighed, pushing her snout lightly against my cutie mark. I immediately regretted the warm touch of her nose against the open book and quill. Fractured memories poured into my brain. Shards of a foreign life gone by bubbled up, streaming before my eyes. Puddle’s present fears and worry for me added to the stream, further muddying the waters of emotions and thoughts that decided to breach the levee of my consciousness. I recalled a few glimpses of what I inexplicably knew was a day at school in Stable 9.

“Well, that would explain why I feel like I’ve had a boat dropped on me,” I groaned, trying to clear my head of alien recollections.

“That’s not funny!” Blackjack groused from behind the couch.

A burst of shots echoed from behind the couch. Blackjack must have been firing out of one of the living room windows. A quavering howl trickled in from outside with other muffled noises.

“Ha! Gotcha!” Blackjack shouted. “I think the last shot went right up Main Street.”

“Can we have less shooting ponies up the butt?! Can’t we try figuring out how the great fuck we’re getting out of this mess without turning it into another damn bloodbath?” Bubblegum berated, his shotgun and grenade rifle oddly silent in what I had assumed was a shootout. “They obviously want to capture us, otherwise this place would be full of holes. Damnit, they are just close enough that I don’t want to risk using my grenades.” he said, lowering his grenade launcher with distraught anger.

Well, that explained why nopony from outside the house was firing in.

“I’m working on it!” Blackjack snapped back. “But… it was kinda funny.”

Bubblegum let out a long, exasperated exhale through his nose.

“Yes,” he snorted, “kind of, but I’m fairly certain that it might have an effect on Threnody. Which is why I’m not firing at them.”

“I can tell the buck didn’t appreciate it at all. I feel his pain,” I breathed before Hyacinth pushed me back down again, shoving another bottle of water in my face.

"It burns!!" The injured stallion howled from outside.

"...I'm glad you're here to tell us these things," Bubblegum deadpanned.

“Do you think his farts will whistle now?” Puddle asked innocently.

“It hurts to laugh,” I gurgled.

“Puddle, now ain’t the time,” Solidarity drawled. “Now, uh... I think Glitter Bomb and I have worked out how to get us out of here. Hyacinth, is Threnody strong enough to move?”

Hyacinth tugged a long cable out of her saddlebags, hurriedly linking both ends to our respective pipbucks. She frowned as she poked at her own. A pregnant pause later, she nodded.

“She’s doing... better. She should probably down another healing potion before we move her, but…” She bit her lip. “Dad, this would be easier if we were home. I still don’t know what happened!”

I wasn’t sure either. I remembered waking up from a horrible dream and the dreadful torrent of thoughts, feelings, and images that followed. I’d nearly choked on my own snot.

My body tingled, and my mind was sluggish. Bogged down in the hazy mire that usually followed a restless, over-extended nap. Part of me still felt lost in that dream, submerging me whole in the still waters of quiet panic.

“I don’t know,” I confessed after a moment. “Empathic feedback?”

I struggled to remember much of last night. The bizarre dream, in its prominence and clarity, fogged the rest of my memories.

Just the thought alone of the pretty filly with the mane like bacon was enough to disrupt my focus.

“I… suppose?” Hyacinth said, sticking her tongue out as she thought about it. “I don’t know enough about how heartmenders cope with magic burnout. I wouldn’t know what to look at.”

She unplugged her pipbuck from mine and shoved the cable back into her saddlebags.

“So... what’s your plan, dad?” she asked, passing me another healing potion.

Glitter Bomb’s gentle magic lifted me up as she put me on her back. As I touched down on her soft coat, the image of another mare flashed across my mind, this time she was blue with a silver mane, unlike the warmer-hued interloper, the fleeting presence of this one chilled me to my core. What in the sorrel hells was going on?

“Blackjack, covering fire, please?” Solidarity said as everypony gathered around Glitter. “If this works, we should end up close enough to the Red Forest to make a break for it.”

“Excuse me but what is ‘this’ and what happens if it doesn’t work?” I asked breathlessly as I looked up at Glitter. “What are you doing?”

Solidarity fired a trio of shots out of a nearby window with one of his revolvers. Blackjack’s shotgun followed up with a few barks of its own.

“I saw what the family were doin’ in Fold with their linked unicorns and I reckon Blackjack and I can do the same to give Glitter enough juice to flash the lot of us a short ways from here. Just far enough down the road for us to make a run for the Forest. Though… I’d rather not get too far off of the beaten path in that damned place,” he said, a frisson of cold terror running through him like a winter stream.

“What’s-” I stopped as Blackjack fluidly danced away from the window to squish her flank against Glitter’s.

My heart skipped as I watched her flirt. My chest tightened despite the sight of her... exertions with Solidarity being only moments old in my mind. Her shameless audacity… I couldn’t fight the lump of jealousy settling uncomfortably somewhere in my throat. Nor the burning indignation threatening to melt my ears off my head that rose in opposition to it.

“It’ll be fine. What’s the worst thing that can happen?” she asked, the lump in my throat absorbing her cocky smile and growing sharp, twisting spines.

“Glitter teleports us into a mountainside?” Bubblegum muttered, pulling Hyacinth and Puddle closer to the trio of magic users.

“Nothing’s gonna go wrong,” Blackjack sighed, lighting up her small horn. “You’ll see.”

Her adorable small horn.

Why are you thinking like this, Threnody?

Glitter swallowed as her horn flared up with purple magic. Solidarity’s pale magic mixed with Blackjack’s, both seeping in a stream towards Glitter’s horn.

I felt sucked through a hole the size of my eyeballs–

–and fell a good metre along with everypony else into a bed of flowers coloured in what was rapidly becoming my least favourite hue.

Crimson petals flew into the air as the seven of us landed with a collective whump on the ground. Puddle and Bubblegum kept their footing. I flew off of Glitter’s back as she botched the landing.

I crashed face first into the blossoms, only to come up utterly covered in sticky petals. Dazed by the fall and change of lighting, I hurriedly brushed the petals away. Each felt uncomfortably warm.

“A-am I bleeding?” I asked, as I focused on my hooves covered in a thick, red slime.

I shot a glance at Blackjack and the others. They were soaked in red, like they’d all taken a turn trying to clean up my morning’s rather bloody awakening with their hides.

One of the last few petals falling down came to rest on Blackjack’s nose. It instantly melted like snow on a stove into crimson rivulets.

Blackjack raised her hoof to catch the droplets running down her cheeks, and brought it to her mouth. She spat the slime right back out.

“Blood,” she said lowly.

“Ew! Are you sure?!” squeaked Puddle Splasher.

“Yeah. I’m sure,” she replied, her eyes defocusing and a turbulent flow of ugly, dark emotions surging below her calm exterior. “On a scale of one to Hoofington, this is getting into a new level of fucked up,” she muttered, flicking her hooves to get the slime off. “Is anypony actually hurt?”

Hyacinth shook her head.

“It wasn’t that high of a fall. We… just landed in Blood Blossoms. They’re gross but… for the Red Forest, harmless.”

“For the Red Forest...?” Bubblegum muttered, trotting over to help Glitter to her hooves. “Why would you say this?”

Hyacinth paled.

“Well, hopefully we’re not too far from the road. I don’t want to go into the Red Forest’s ecology.” She fluttered as I felt whirlpools of disorienting doubt engulfing her. “Where is the road?”

As Hyacinth looked down at her pipbuck, I finally took in where we’d fallen. Wherever Glitter’s teleportation had taken us, it certainly wasn’t anywhere near the cracked and potholed Long 26. The trees soared above us in a tight, ominous husk of dead, dry leaves thick enough to obscure the sky.

Every bit of bark had taken the colour of rust, making the forest into a giant bed of old, crooked nails. A few pines jutted high in between the oxidized deciduous trees. Their needles still inexplicably stuck to their dead limbs.

Even in death the trees jealously clung on to their needles and leaves, blotting out just enough of the sunlight to cast the forest floor in a dingy twilight. The bed of Blood Blossoms covered every inch of ground not occupied by trees. Gnarled ferns pierced through the bed in several spots, their fronds akin to deformed Gryphon talons rather than what I’d seen on Feather Fern’s cutie mark.

Bubblegum walked to the nearest one and studied the fronds. They were tubular and ended in a bulb of long mangled thorns. His facial expression grew dark.

Hyacinth! Her wave of panic crashed into me from behind. A cold and clammy tide, far removed from the warm, sticky petal’s embrace on my ears as they coagulated and slowly oozed down my scalp.

“This is bad. So terribly bad!” she whimpered before Solidarity snatched her up with his magic.

Solidarity held the quaking pegasus tightly for a long moment, keeping a hoof on her muzzle while the Blood Blossom petals finally settled around us.

“Can… somepony please explain this ever-living fuckery. Something. Or anything before I start shooting literally everything that offends my senses around here?” Blackjack asked tensely. “This isn’t my first trip to Fuckedupville, but I didn’t enjoy that one. I would prefer not having to star in a sequel.”

“Aren’t you the mayor of Fuckedupville?” Bubblegum asked Blackjack with a quirked eyebrow.

“Look. I kinda left the Hoof to avoid this sort of shit,” Blackjack seethed back with a glare.

Solidarity remained silent for another long, tense moment as we all settled and looked up at him. He released his daughter from his embrace, shot a look at Blackjack, and cleared his throat.

“Something went wrong when the Red Forest formed. We ain’t sure how. Nopony’s ever really been able to figure it out,” he said, turning to Blackjack. “You don’t need to shoot everything around here. There’s plenty does need shootin’, though. But some... shootin’ doesn’t do no good.”

That was a way to ratchet up everypony’s anxiety by a factor of ten.

“Went wrong? Is that why the flower petals are all goopy?” Glitter Bomb asked, gently lifting me into the air with her telekinesis.

Glitter ran a separate spell over me. The uncomfortable, sticky residue from the Blood Blossoms pulled at my fur as it was gradually plucked off of my coat and duster. I tried to not shudder; her magic felt like Blackjack’s. That same pinch-and-pulling as she had lightly preened my wings the night before.

Is my magic really that bad...? Glitter’s voice echoed in my head as she set me on her back. Does that make me a bad pony?

What in Equestria?

“That’s… part of it,” Hyacinth agreed with a nod. “From what we can tell, the flora and fauna of the Red Forest have some… unique properties to them. And by that I mean we’ve been finding equine hox genes in most plants.”

“Equine whats?” Blackjack blurted impatiently.

The yellow pegasus shuddered and wiped some of the disturbingly blood-like residue off of herself.

“In biology, hox genes are the parts of our DNA that tells our bodies what limb goes where. There’s quite a few plants in the Red Forest that possess these genes. And so, we’ve found them growing in the shapes of ponies. Naturally. Like, nopony comes out here to shape them to look equine. They just… grow that way.”

“Okay, so for those of us who didn’t grow up in a Stable and weren’t able to read until a few years ago, that means… what? Exactly?” Bubblegum asked, frowning as he ploughed ahead with his own struggle to scrape the Blood Blossom residue off of his hide.

“It means that were you to give a bit of the goop that’s on your coat to Hyacinth, and let her look at it with the lab equipment back in Stable 9, there’d be a frightening amount of similarity to equine blood,” Solidarity drawled. “Down to the fact that some of them even carry those markers that tell you what blood type you are. Right darlin’?”

Hyacinth nodded as everypony but her or her dad bolted out of the Blood Blossoms to take refuge under the nearest tree. I clung to Glitter’s back for dear life as the others rapidly tried to wipe away the plant’s equine fluids off of themselves.

“Momma said I have blood type QT, and I want no flower blood on me!” Glitter whined, her horn glowing as she used her magic to clean her coat.

“Okay, I’m used to ending up covered in blood for one reason or another, but… this is a new level of gross. Even for me,” Blackjack muttered, mimicking Glitter before helping Puddle with her own coat.

Solidarity shrugged and trotted out of the flower patch.

“It only gets weirder from here. But I know you’re looking for a threat assessment, Blackjack, so... I’d say don’t trust anything that moves. There’s few things that’ll kill ya outright. A lot of this forest isn’t just fangs n’ claws, mind. It is a mighty, uncanny place. Monsters beyond flesh and blood roam here. Ones you surely can’t fight.”

Solidarity looked around for any hint of a path. To no avail.

“I know we’d be a lot safer if we can get back to the Long 26,” he rumbled. “The forest... meddles with you no matter where you are in it but… things it does to yer mind don’t seem as strong there for some reason.” He turned to Blackjack. “Keep a sharp eye out, but stay close, don’t wander off shooting at shadows.”

I glanced between Solidarity and Blackjack. Something rippled between them. It was anything but what I thought a pair of ponies who’d just spent an intimate night together should feel. Almost like…

Glitter sprung to action, startling me out of my interpersonal analysis.

“Oh! Look! Grapes!” she exclaimed, darting over to a series of low hanging vines.

“Glitter! No! Stop!” Puddle cried, tripping over her own mane as she ran to stop her.

Glitter halted mid-stride to glance behind her at Puddle with bewildered eyes. As she looked back to the vine, she screamed. Not with surprise, gone was bewilderment. She screamed with terror, bloodcurdling and raw. She stumbled back and fell to her haunches, sending me tumbling off of her back as she frantically kicked herself away back-deep through the blossom patch. Her mind was a frothing, panicked tempest, too much for me to even fully take in, let alone perceive clearly.

I forced the acrid taste back down where it belonged with a very deliberate gulp and jumped over the hysterical alicorn before she could mush me through the whole blood blossom patch. I gingerly stepped forward into the path she’d just gouged in her mad retreat. With morbid curiosity outweighing every other sensible impulse in me, I inspected the plant from afar.

From the dark and mangled vines sprouted white grapes half enclosed between two fleshy, sickly brown lids. A single pitch-black seed jutted out of each fruit like a pinprick. As I took in the scene, and felt my disgust begin to plateau, the whole bunch began to squirm and one by one, the brown lids languidly drew themselves over the moist fruits. The grapes blinked…

The plants had eyes.

My heart suddenly felt like it was pumping ice water. I snapped my wings open and thrust myself back, only to be snagged in Blackjack’s magic. Bubblegum’s shotgun roared, tearing into the vines, the righteous hail of lead wiping the profane bunch clean from the world, if not from our minds.

“Stop shooting!” Solidarity shouted. “That ain’t a monster. Well… not the kind that’ll eat your girl. But if you keep firing that thing off, you’re liable to draw one that does have a hankering for pony flesh!”

“S-sorry,” Bubblegum muttered sheepishly. His eyes darted to Glitter, concern radiating off of him like low fog.

"What were those?" I interrupted with a shudder as Blackjack gently lowered me to the ground.

"Blink grapes," Hyacinth said. “Hox genes, remember?”

Bubblegum glared at her.

“No, I’m not likely to remember,” he seethed. “You keep using these weird words as if I’m expected to know them! I vaguely remember a class on how pony generations get their eye colours.” His irritation seemed to evaporate and his features softened as he began to look… wistful? “We compared a picture of a pretty mare with her granddaughters in the class. Honestly, I mostly remember really wanting to wear her outfit.”

Solidarity gave him a confused look. Glitter, Puddle, and Hyacinth looked thoughtful. I worried my nose might start bleeding again.

Blackjack, of course, broke the silence first.

“Define ‘outfit’?”

“Well, it was this bright white vest with a red cross hat. And a really cute miniskirt. Guess I thought I’d look cute in it,” Bubblegum replied with a shrug.

The mares in the party shared a collective dreamy look. Solidarity shook his head and sighed.

“Look, we’ll sort that out later,” he said gruffly, magically casting aside the ferns and their slimy ocular remains. “Let’s get moving before Junior here puts all you fillies into heat and you cook up a stew o’ hormones so thick it’ll attract something we can’t handle.”

I didn’t appreciate his attack on my daydreaming with logic about safety. I felt doubly insulted I might resemble that remark.

Finding a suitably defensible clearing for everypony to get their bearings or just catch their breath was a distant, and rapidly fading hope. We trudged, faltered, and staggered on, grinding ourselves down to the point of exhaustion. The forest was a cruel mistress.

Though all of us had an E.F.S. compass guide, we were completely lost. No landmarks on our screens or hints of our location in our surroundings. For all we knew, we were only heading deeper into the Red Forest from where Glitter’s magic deposited us. Apparently many, many kilometres from Stable 9. I secretly hoped the forest was messing with us, that the vastness of the place was just an illusion and that we were in fact close to the relative safety of the Stable.

After what seemed like hours of gruelling slog, we reached a clearing that while cluttered, was the likeliest place we’d seen yet to regroup and take a brief rest, I kept an eye out for the flora and fauna. The whole Red Forest was… contorted. Plants grew deformed and mangled. Leaves and shoots sprouted from places and in ways they had no business doing.

Blink grapes lazily watched us with chillingly equine eyes. Talonferns shaped into distorted claws splayed their thorns wide, ready to close on any creature foolish enough to get within hoofshaking distance. Hoof reeds grew in the marshy areas, always in groups of four, of course. Sets of maimed pony legs, ever reaching skywards. They were even topped with shiny hooves that gleamed dimly in the midday twilight beneath the oppressive, desiccated canopy. Were I to dig, would I find roots shaped like pony bodies?

“Why does everything have such simple names?” I asked as Hyacinth pointed out another cluster of blink grapes to avoid.

“Trying to give them scientific names was kind of difficult,” Hyacinth explained. “So the ponies who explored the place kept them simple. Especially when something was found to be dangerous.”

She fluttered over to a nearby tree branch to point to a cluster of multicoloured wildflowers.

“Take a look at this specific flower. This is Antirrhinum vexillo-calyculatum, or Sailflower Snapdragon. But look closely,” she said, pointing toward the stem. “There is no point where the snapdragon ends, and where the other flowers begin. Like that Alkali Marsh Aster,” she said pointing to a flower that looked like a pink daisy, “An entirely different species.”

She emphasised with the tip of her hoof where the flower stems fused together before melding into the tree bark they seemed to grow from. Each flower of a different species sprouted out of the same body.

“These plants grow like this. Naturally. Biologically speaking, this can’t happen. This shouldn’t happen. But here we have it. So…” The pegasus landed and shrugged her wings. “We just call them wildflower clusters, cause when organisms stop paying attention to species, what the fuck else are you supposed to call them?”

“Scientific weirdness aside,” Solidarity called from the front of our line, “I think this clearing may work for a broadcaster call. What do you think, little flower?”

Hyacinth looked up through the ruddy tree trunks toward an opening in the sky.

“Uh, I think so? The broadcaster’s radio should get out through that. Hopefully,” she added with a nervous swallow.

Blackjack and Bubblegum took up positions on opposite sides of the clearing, their eyes searching for hidden dangers. Puddle stayed close to me as I watched Hyacinth fiddle with her pipbuck. The yellow mare plugged an earpiece with a mouthpiece into one end of her pipbuck, and began speaking.

“CQ CQ CQ DX, this is 9EQLF calling out on frequency 7700. Requesting any stations or patrols to respond. Attempting to get a fix on my position in the Red Forest. Please respond,” she said, listening with a hoof to her ear.

After a pregnant pause, she repeated her message.

Solidarity frowned.

“Anything?”

“Nothing, dad. Either the broadcaster’s range is being shortened by the trees or… we’re really off the map,” Hyacinth replied, a ragged tide of panic rumbling beneath her composed façade.

“Can you make that thing loop your broadcast?” Blackjack asked, her eyes still panning the forest. “Pip and I both encountered repeating radio signals in the past. Some of them dated back to the end of the war.”

“I… um...” Hyacinth poked at her pipbuck. “Yeah! I can set it to a looping broadcast. It… may not help if we’re still trying to move toward the long 26. But! There’s a possibility one of the Wolves pick it up. At least, depending on how deep in the forest they’re doing recon for the Stable.”

“I’m sorry. Wolves?” I asked, suddenly remembering my conversation with Solidarity a couple of weeks ago. “Who or what are the Wolves?”

“A small contingent of Steel Rangers that joined Stable 9. It happened after Star Paladin Steelhooves made his stand. He called all willing to follow him, to return to the rangers’ initial purpose of defending Equestria. A mighty fierce civil war broke out between two contingents in VanHoover,” Solidarity explained. “Those who stood with Steelhooves were decimated. The survivors took refuge in the Stable, and they’ve lived there since. They earn their keep, but they bring us more’n our fair share of assaults from other Steel Rangers, though.”

Mom! Dad! No! Don’t open the door! Puddle’s voice echoed in my head.

What the fuck?

“Guess after what went down in VanHoover they didn’t feel much kinship with their chapters in the East, though. So, they dropped the Applejack’s Rangers name. The ‘Ranger’ part, at least,” Solidarity went on. “Anyway once they got settled in the Stable, they found out they really, really enjoyed working security, so they decided to stick around and give ‘emselves a new name. They even voted on it. One of the rangers, Knight Banana Cream Pie, heard Snow Berry’s wolf story and suggested the name. Figured ‘emselve the wolves that guarded the herd.”

Blackjack frowned.

“That’s… unreasonably badass for a bunch of those tin can wearers,” she muttered.

Bubblegum shot her a look.

“You’re just upset you didn’t come up with a name that cool,” he snarked.

“Shut up!”

“Quiet!” Solidarity hissed, dropping down to the ground.

Everypony ducked, our ears perked as we listened for any sounds. Rustling leaves crushed under heavy footfalls echoed in the distance. We froze, straining to localise the sound.

Something shuffled to my left. What I first assumed to be blackened tree trunks careened fluidly between trees and branches. My eyes must have been playing tricks, but I could swear the forest was avoiding it. Leaves moved aside, roots recessed as it passed. Something was digging its way through the landscape.

I caught a glimpse of it. Pale, cracked spikes jutted out of a blackened hide like broken bones from a horrific wound. A foul stench of rot followed, seeping into our clearing.

I stared at Puddle. She was the closest to the edge of the clearing. Her eyes wide, the seafoam green filly swallowed rapidly. She forced a hoof to her muzzle so she wouldn’t gag. The soil and soggy leaf litter on our hooves was sweet perfume compared to the horrid reek that encircled us. Moments passed as Hyacinth very, very slowly reached over to her, covering her muzzle with a wing. Silent tears ran down both filly’s cheeks.

My EFS showed nothing but the blue bars of my friends. Yet I was staring straight at it, seeing, and feeling it flatten blossom patches under its colossal weight. The stench seemed to hem us in as the hidden creature stalked about just beyond the edge of our clearing. The thing radiated wrongness. I didn’t need to have any idea what it was to know I loathed it. I couldn’t sense anything from it, but I still got the impression the feeling was mutual.

And still there was no red bar on the EFS. Nor a blue one that wasn’t accounted for by one of my friends. And yet it was there, its presence unmistakable from the sound and evidence of its passage as it moved about, shrouded in that overpowering miasma of decay.

Then the motion stopped, but still the sound drew closer…

Unicorns and earth ponies naturally looked for threats on the ground, and rarely so above their line of sight. Pegasi, on the other hoof, knew that danger could come from any direction. As the realization dawned on me, I froze, and looked up.

It was at least fifteen metres high, overshadowing the clearing. Far taller than anything I expected. I saw sets of luminous eyes glowering darkly in the early evening twilight. Even looking straight at it, my fear-stricken mind could only guess at its full form; as I could only tease out snatches of its features. I wanted to tell the others. Warn them, even just look away, but all I could do was stand and stare.

A tree collapsed at the edge of the clearing, snapping at its middle before crashing between me and my friends. I couldn’t pull my gaze from the gigantic thing above me, watching it freeze then look down. It made no sound, and its eyes never fixed on me directly. But I knew it had seen us.

The mute horror breathed, swelled and puffed out, its sickly coat inflating to become a bag of spikes. Even from its lofty perch atop its legs, the mephitic fumes sloughing from its carcass seemed undiluted. I could swear I could actually feel the rancid vapours brushing at my face for odd instants that felt like hours.

After what felt a lifetime of terror, it retreated. In the vacant, deathly silence that followed, nopony dared look at each other.

“What in the actual fuck... was that?” Blackjack croaked after a long, tense period of paralysis. “Is that on the ‘Things that eat faces’ list?”

“Can we not mention that list?” Glitter quavered with a painfully small voice.

Her kneecaps creaked as she broke stance and moved over to me. After she’d jumped over the snapped tree, she crept up to my side and buried her face in the back of my mane. Her sobs stabbed my soul and her tears scalded my skin.

Solidarity never looked away from where the sounds had come from as he spoke, “I don’t rightly-”

An explosion of sticks and leaves cut him off.

Bubblegum was suddenly airbourne, twisting through the air. Streams of blood fanned out in picturesque gouts as he flew, surging from deep, ragged rents in his armour that carried on as gouges dug across the battered hull of his broken grenade machine gun.

I turned and stared as a massive creature with a grotesque, desiccated skull for a face slid into the clearing. Had it been there all along as we’d faced the other horror? I didn’t know. I couldn’t think.

Putrid masses of pink fungi covered its hide, lashing its jaw to its head with wet tangles of tendinous fibres. The fungal mass tensed and receded as the beast opened its obscene maw.

It roared.

Blackjack screamed back in challenge.

The clearing exploded with the blinding light of her magic as she charged the massive beast. I screamed as Blackjack’s magic-born blade flickered out inside the monster’s claws.

The patchwork of diseased flesh and decaying vegetation slammed into Blackjack. With a sickening crunch, the beast slugged her clear out of the clearing.

A hard, wet slap followed by splintering wood echoed beyond my line of sight.

Bubblegum’s mauled body lay unconscious not far from me. Blackjack was out in an instant. Solidarity wasn’t exaggerating before, there was no way we could fight this!

As a rush of adrenaline finally kicked in and I found myself able to move, I watched Glitter dive for Bubblegum, the beast right on her tail. For a brief instant, I thought we might have a chance as she summoned the most solid shield I’d ever seen to keep the creature’s terrible slashing claws at bay. My hope shattered just as surely as Glitter’s shield under the impact of those savage claws.

Puddle and Hyacinth had already rushed to the cover of the trees. They turned, giving a last terrorized look back to the clearing before vanishing into the Forest’s inky depths. My friends were scattering. Who do I follow? What do I do?! WHAT THE FUCK DO I–

Solidarity slapped me. As I looked up at him, he said a single word.

“Run.”

And just like that, purpose crystallised in my mind. I hurled myself into the air, tearing at it with my wings as ferociously as any horror from this damned forest, flapping as hard as I could, desperate to climb out of the clearing, away from the monster. I didn’t know where to go, and didn’t care. Away was direction enough. I cast any doubt or semblance of rational thought that might weigh me down back towards the clearing and simply fled. Both my body and mind shrieked at me to flee.

I didn’t want to die.

I don’t know how long I flew over and through the forest. I simply put as much distance as I could from the clearing, and away from my friends. Hours? Minutes? Seconds? Right now, they all felt the same, and any number of any one of them could have passed before I eventually found a cluster of trees that seemed too tight for the monster to pursue me inside.

My heart thundered in my chest and ears. My lungs were on fire and no matter how much air I sucked in, I felt like I was on the verge of suffocating. Tears streamed down my face. I’d left my friends– left them to die somewhere in that damned place.

Bubblegum. The hit he took from that monster... a wound like that could be deadly even with medical care and healing potions, but with him at the thing’s mercy....

Luna fuck me with the moon! I had the medical supplies! With Glitter’s healing spells, my bandages and spare healing potions, I could have done something.

Blackjack…

I covered my mouth as mute sobs wracked my body. Did I just watch two friends get killed? Did that monster eat the others?!

I was alone.

Alone in this horrid, evil place.

I breathed rapidly into my hooves, trying to stymie the panic that was rapidly setting in. I was alone. Creatures could be waiting for me out there. The EFS wouldn’t even register them. I looked down at my pipbuck. That useless piece of old world junk!

I repeatedly bashed my forehead against it, drawing blood that streamed down my muzzle. The monsters were very real. That blood was real. And this wasn’t a nightmare I would wake up from.

What do you mean we can’t see them on the EFS? How the hell are we supposed to defend ourselves if we never see them coming!? Hyacinth’s desperate cry echoed in my head.

A tightening knot travelled up my throat. I slid against one of the trees of the copse as I curled into a sobbing ball. One of my legs wouldn’t stop shaking.

I repeated my friends’ words in my mind. Again and again. Each time I remembered a bit more of last night’s dream. That horrible dream with Peculiar and the memories of other pony’s nightmares.

Had we been dreaming together somehow? I didn’t know.

I held my head down between my legs, trying to slow my breathing. I needed to think, past the panic. Think and figure out how to find my friends.

My friends!

I wiped the blood off the screen of my pipbuck. It was still securely fastened to my right leg, resilient. I needed to be resilient too.

Before we’d left Fold, I’d snagged everypony’s pipbuck tags in case we got separated. If I could just find one of them, we could find the others together. I spent a minute searching the local map feature on my pipbuck for a nearby tag, and found of all ponies, Puddle! And she wasn’t far away!

I wiped the snot off my face, steeling myself for leaving the safety of my hiding place. If Puddle’s tag was out there, it meant she was still alive. And she was likely hiding.

Mustering my focus, I took in several long, slow breaths. Since neither of those massive creatures showed up on EFS, I would have to rely on my senses. Simple enough! My vision was excellent! My hearing? I flicked my left ear and found that it wasn’t ringing. Okay! Maybe I could do this. I chuckled worriedly to myself.

I slow crawled out of the knot of trees, my ears twitching and swivelling this way and that, straining to pick up any sound I could. Disturbingly, there were none to hear. No gunfire. No strange sounds of wasteland creatures doing whatever wasteland creatures do. Nothing. No sounds of crunching leaves, save for the ones under my hooves.

Opting to hover just off of the ground, I slowly made my way through the forest in the direction of Puddle’s marker on my pipbuck map. It took me close to thirty minutes to get close to her marker as I drifted slow and silent as a ghost through the underbrush.

“Puddle...!” I called out softly, hoping my friend could hear me.

Something rustled nearby, but no answer. Maybe she was injured? Was that why I wasn’t picking up any lifesign marks on my EFS?

I crept my way toward a talonfern bush.

“Puddle?” I whispered as the forest remained silent.

An explosion of feathers and squawks erupted from the bush. As I ducked down, dozens of feathered creatures darted out from the talonferns — Birds! I’d never seen real live birds before. Only in books!

My bewilderment quickly morphed into horror as something grabbed my hind leg. I screamed as something pulled me beneath a cluster of blink grapes!

A hoof forced my muzzle shut.

“Wait, Threnody?” Puddle asked, letting me go. “Oh, thank the Elements!”

Puddle threw her forelegs around me, pulling me into a wingbone-crunching hug.

“Ow… Puddle! Pega can’t breathe!” I gasped before being released by the terrified little demon.

“Sorry!” Puddle whispered, loosening her grip on me, but not fully letting me go. “Hyacinth and I got separated. You’re the first one to find me. I’m so scared! Did that monster get Blackjack and Bubblegum?”

Tears welled at the corners of our eyes. I blinked them away.

“I don’t know, Puddle. But... we have to find them. I searched for everypony’s tags earlier. You were the closest.”

I offered her what I hoped was a reassuring smile.

“If I know Blackjack, she’s rather hard to kill. And Bubblegum is an earth pony. I’m sure he’s hurt, but he’ll make it. You, earth ponies, are strong, right?” I said playfully pushing at her shoulder.

Sweet Baby Luna, she was made of spun steel, too! Freaking earth ponies!

Puddle sniffled as she wiped the corners of her eyes.

“You’re right. And they may need our help! I… I have some medical training. Maybe I can help out Bubblegum,” she said.

I felt something inside of her harden and galvanise against her fears.

“I have all the healing items,” I admitted. “So how about this? Let’s catch our breaths here a minute. Then let’s try to find the next tag. Does that sound like a plan? We’ll go really slow, and be ready to hide at the flick of a tail.”

Puddle nodded in agreement. Then she looked at me with widening, terrified eyes… No, not at me. Behind me!

“Le-” She paused as her contagious terror soaked into me.

I froze as she slowly raised a hoof toward the opening behind me.

The sour scent of urine filled the tiny alcove we shared as she stammered, “L-l-l-leg!”

The harsh crunching of leaves being pulverised rasped harshly behind me. A loud thump, like a massive hoof hitting the hard packed soil, rumbled dangerously close to us. A loud cracking sound resounded once above our heads.

The mute creature had found us!

Author's Notes:

Hey everyone! I am still alive! I am still writing! I... just got my life eaten up by work and trips throughout most of January and February.

That said, hopefully this was worth the wait. Also, for those that have asked, I finally got around to getting a Patreon, um, so... there's that? I guess?

Also if you want to hang out, chat, and have news about wasteland horses or Synchronicity or other random drabbles that I have, check out the Heartmender HQ Discord! If that link stops working please PM me for one!

Thank you all for being such patient, wonderful readers!
~Heartshine~