Principal Celestia opened her eyes.

Instantly she regretted this course of action as pain coursed through her body making her gasp out a loud, “Aaaaah!” Blinking once, then twice, she propped herself up on her elbows and attempted to take stock of her situation. She didn’t know much. She remembered even less, but through short, haggard breaths she tried to piece together what she could.

She was laid at the bottom of a twenty foot gully. Looking up the steep rocky embankment she could see where she had fallen from. Her path down was marked by the earth and loose stones that her body had disturbed along the way. It was night now. It had been daylight, roughly three in the afternoon if her broken watch was anything to go by, when she had fallen. ‘That means I’ve been passed out anywhere from six to twelve hours…’ she thought, not comforted by that in the slightest.

Foolishly she tried – without thinking – to get up from the grassy floor of the gully where she lay. “AAaaAARGH!” the loud scream followed the sharp, lancing pain that shot up her left leg from her trapped foot. “D-Damn! Damnit oooow!” thankfully it was a full moon and she had enough light to see that her foot was securely wedged between two very large, very sharp boulders, while a third was fitted in the gap on top, preventing her from removing it.

Sobbing, she laid back down, instantly feeling some relief. She felt the grass under her as well as the breeze on some exposed skin. She didn’t have to look to know her brownish-yellow khaki shirt and shorts were torn from the fall and, besides her left foot which was twisted in a way that feet aren’t supposed to twist, she had picked up numerous little cuts and scrapes thanks to her fall.

‘Shit…it’s probably broken knowing my luck!’ this thought was followed by another loud scream of pain. All she’d done was try and flex her toes. ‘O-Okay…me-mental note, don’t try that again…’ Celestia sighed and, slumped on the grassy surface, tried to think what to do. As she thought of her limited options she realised her pack was missing.

‘Rucksack must’ve come off when I fell,’ as she thought that, she looked behind her, upside down from her vantage point and saw her brand new rucksack laying a few feet away from her head, just on the edge of a fast moving stream. ‘Damn it!’ she cursed as she stretched out her right arm – for some reason her left refused to move at all – and tried to reach her pack. Tantalisingly it was just a few inches out of reach.

‘Maybe if I just stretch…’ she tried to do just that, inching her body just a teeny bit but… “AAaaaAARGH! Damn! Damn! Ooow!” pain, intense agony from her trapped left foot dissuaded her from trying such a manoeuvre again. Her pack, her new pack, as well as all her supplies, were so close but, trapped as she was, they may as well have been a mile away.

Everything she needed was in that rucksack. She’d packed it herself the day before, bought everything new just for this excursion. Her first aid kit, several packs of matches, a few lengths of rope, tarpaulins, her tent, a large jar of peanut butter, her flashlight and her headlamp, her map and compass were all in that damned rucksack. Even her satellite phone. Especially her satellite phone. Luna had taken great joy in gleefully mocking her purchases when she’d laid them out in their living room.

“Really Celly,” she’d laughed as she surveyed the laid out items on the floor, “it's like you’ve gone and bought a ‘My Little Explorer’s Starter Pack’!” Celestia sighed a defeated sigh. Her sister’s laughter rung in her ears even now. She hated to imagine how bad Luna’s mocking would be when she got out of this.

‘If I get out of this…’ she thought sadly. She couldn't deny it looked bleak. Then, with a loud “Aha!” Celestia remembered her cell phone in her khaki shirt pocket. ‘Maybe…just maybe…’ she fumbled with her right hand – her offhand, as it happened – for some reason her left still refused to move, to retrieve her cell phone.

“Ah shit!” she couldn't see much in the moonlight but what she could see was her cell phone touch screen cracked and shattered. Hopefully she thumbed the power button in the hopes of coaxing some useful life from her phone. All she needed was a moment of power to ring for help. Several times she pressed the button. Several times she was rewarded with a whole load of nothing.

“Damn it!” in a fit of temper, she threw her useless phone away, which hit a particularly large rock and shattered into many pieces beside the stream.

‘Maybe Lulu was right…’ she thought miserably as she slumped back onto the grass by the stream. ‘Maybe I am too old for this. Maybe I should’ve listened to her…’ ever pragmatic and sensible, her thirty eight year old sister - younger than her by seven years - had warned against this hiking / camping holiday in the Everfree Forest. But, oh no, she had been adamant, hadn't she? With all the essentials purchased, she had gone over her plan with Luna several times. Drive up to Camp Everfree where they used to spend their childhood vacations, do a little hiking, do some camping, get away from it all for a few days. Maybe a week at the most, during the summer holidays.

Celestia just wanted to get away from all the otherworldly events of the past year, that’s all. A nice relaxing camping trip. What could possibly go wrong? ‘Sunset Shimmer bullying the whole school, Sunset Shimmer turning into a raging she-demon and brainwashing said school. Having to acknowledge and accept the existence of a parallel world full of magic ponies…’ Celestia sighed internally on the grass for what felt like the millionth time as she carried on her mental checklist. ‘Then there was the Musical Showcase, the Sirens, being brainwashed…again, more magical nonsense…’

Celestia knew this was why she felt so tired and worn out. After all that there was the Friendship Games with Crystal Prep Academy and the fiasco that had become. She had hoped with the start of the games that all the magic malarkey was over. ‘Ha! Fat chance…’ she thought miserably. If anything there had been more, what with Midnight Sparkle and the magic and the portals and the magic.

And now here she was, trapped in an isolated gully far away from the beaten track deep in the Everfree Forest with a smashed cell phone and her satellite phone a hair’s touch out of reach. Nobody knew exactly where she was. ‘Nobody knows where I am…’ she thought, and with that thought came panic. Sure, her car was parked up at the camp parking lot run by Timber Spruce and Gloriosa Daisy, but jeez the Everfree was huge! At a hundred and twenty square miles, most of it out of the ability of all but the most determined off-road vehicle or helicopter, Celestia knew full well that unless any rescuers knew where to look, the chances of her being found were slim.

‘That’s if they even know I’m missing!’ she thought despondently, ‘I told Lulu I’d be gone for a week!’ A week. It would be at least a week before anyone would start to miss her. ‘Damn!’ Again, she looked over at her rucksack. Tauntingly out of reach. All her brought along bottles of fresh water were in there. Out of reach.

Frantically she searched her khaki shirt and her shorts with her right hand. She couldn’t understand why her left arm wouldn’t move. Her search resulted in a candy bar, a pack of trail mix and a pocket knife. At least she had some food. Water however was an issue. Flipping open the pocket knife she again tried to reach overhead for her pack. This just succeeded in pushing it an inch further away. “Damn, damn!” she cursed aloud. Without water, she’d last maybe four or five days at the most.

Again, she heard Luna’s taunting voice running through her head. “Celly, you drive a beige 1969, 122s station wagon! It hardly screams 'adventure-cation'!”

‘To hell with you, Luna.’ Oddly she laughed out loud at that. At least she wouldn’t have to listen to her sister’s ‘I told you so’ speech. She’d be dead long before that could happen. Just then though, as she was about to make another attempt at reaching for her pack, she saw a large black shape move on the ridge twenty feet above her where she herself had been standing hours before.

At first she thought her eyes were deceiving her, but there was definitely someone or something stood up there. This was confirmed to her when she saw he or her or it move towards the edge where she had fallen. Celestia didn’t pause to think. “Help!” she called out as calmly as she could. She was saved!

The large dark shadow moved away from the edge of the ridge. “Wait! Help! Help me!” Celestia called out again, but still, the shadow moved back.

“Please! I’m trapped down here!” Celestia screamed this time. She couldn’t believe her salvation had seemed so close at hand, only to be snatched away. “PLEASE HELP ME! HEEEEEEELP!”

Just when she had resigned herself that her hope, slim as it was, had gone, the large shadowy shape reappeared. It was moving fast, very fast towards the ridge as if it was going to jump down but, at the last moment it stopped and skidded to a halt. Celestia wasn’t given much chance to process this however as, in the process of stopping so abruptly, the large whatever-it-was dislodged several medium sized rocks.

In a matter of seconds, these rocks were sent rolling down the steep embankment towards the trapped principal. In the bright light of the full moon she saw them coming but she was powerless to get out of the way. Two rocks hit a large boulder and sent that bouncing her way. Bracing herself, it just missed her by scant inches. It did however roll on the grass and hit her rucksack, sending her pack into the fast moving stream.

“Well thank yo…AaaaaAAAARGH!” Celestia’s snarky comment to the thin air was rudely cut short as a second boulder was sent rolling. Unlike the first, this one did not miss her. This one bounced once then twice on its way down the rocky embankment and landed squarely and heavily on her lower left leg with a loud sickening crunch of splintering bone.

“GAAaaAAAGH FUuuUUUUUCK AAAAARGH!” Celestia knew her left leg was broken. It wasn’t just broken. A quick glance at it revealed the jagged edge of her tibia sticking out and blood was seeping from the awful wound. Somewhere in the back of her mind, the part furthest away from the pain, she knew at least she wouldn’t have to worry about starving to death. Now she’d bleed out or die of infection instead.

This wasn’t as comforting a thought as her brain had intended it to be. With a violent shudder, due to the blood she had lost from her leg her she fainted and went into shock.

~ ~ ~

“Ugh…” Celestia’s closed eyelids fluttered. She didn’t want to open them but she felt insistent sunlight beating upon her face. The next thing she felt was a truly astronomical amount of pain from her left leg. That more than anything ruined the possible dream/hope that she might have died and was in heaven.

“Aaah…damn it that hurts…” she breathed deeply and forced herself not to panic. She remembered the cascading boulders, she knew her situation was dire, but she was alive at least. She had somehow survived the night. She still didn’t want to open her eyes.

Something however happened then that forced her eyes wide open whether she wanted to or not. She felt something move next to her on the grass. Something large. As she threw open her eyes and squinted due to the sun in her face the large ‘thing’ moved to position itself between her and the sun. “Καλή μέρα.” the large thing had said.

“What…what the…what?” her vision returning to her, Celestia looked up at the large ‘person’. Her eyes were still adjusting, but she assumed it was a person, and from the voice she assumed male. It didn’t matter to her that she didn’t understand what he had said, it was a person, and person meant rescuer, and rescuer meant she was going to be rescued.

She was saved!

“Καλή μέρα.” he said again. His voice was deep, strong, and confident. “Είμαι στην ευχάριστη θέση να σας δούμε ζωντανά.”

“Huh? What…I’m afraid I don’t understand…oh…” Celestia’s eyes had finally adjusted. She had expected a male to be sat beside her, and it was. What she wasn’t expecting was a male with the lower body of a horse and the strong muscular body of an adult human to be sat by her side. “Oh…” was all she could say as she looked him over again and again. His fur was pale grey with white spots, as was his skin. His mane and long tail were pure white. His eyes a sparkling green. “Oh…” Celestia seemed stuck on that word. It was all she could process.

‘A…A centaur? A centaur!?’ At least her brain had progressed from ‘oh’. Without thinking, she tried to get up, only to be met with a sharp stab of severe pain that made her scream.

“Δεν μείνει κάτω.” with a shake of his head, he placed a strong broad hand on her chest and gently pressed her back down. He pointed a finger at her broken leg and foot, which, she had just noticed, were no longer trapped by the boulders. “Άκρων σας.” he placed both hands together in fists and made a snapping apart motion. “Σπασμένος.”

Celestia got the message. He wanted her to stay down, her leg was broken. She wondered why her brain seemed to be bypassing the fact that this was a centaur. Then again, for all she knew she could be hallucinating from pain, shock, hunger, dehydration, exposure, anything. She tried to place the language. It seemed awfully familiar, but strange at the same time. “το χέρι σου.” he said next, his strong voice bringing her back to the here and now, pointing to her left arm. “Θα φτιάξω.” Only when he lifted it up did she realise it was dislocated. “Λυπάμαι.”

“N-No! No please!” in a moment of horrible realisation she knew what was going to happen next.

“Λυπάμαι.” the apologetic look on his rather equine face spoke volumes as he quickly and firmly popped Celestia’s shoulder back in its socket.

“GAaaAAH!” Celestia screamed. Pain from her shoulder joined the pain from her broken leg and foot and it proved too much for her system. For the second time, she fainted into unconsciousness, the centaur’s worried face was the last thing she saw before her vision went black and she stopped feeling anything.