Fluttershy surveyed the mess on her front lawn with a frown.

It had been a bird at one point, that much was certain. There were feathers everywhere. More feathers than most ponies might think could come from a single bird, but she’d seen this play before and knew how it ended.

The feathers were colorless down, spread out over a wide swathe of grass. But here and there she spied sturdier pinion and covert feathers, all gray striped with blue. A bluejay, then and—oh, yes, there was its head. Birds, as a general rule, didn’t have very expressive faces, but it looked rather surprised.

Wonderful. She hadn’t even had breakfast yet, and she was already cleaning up after something else’s. A weasel or fox, probably. They could be vicious, and whatever had taken this poor little bird had torn it apart.

“No one saw anything?” she asked. Beside her, Angel Bunny shook his floppy little head.

The critters who shared Fluttershy’s home were giving them a wide margin to work. They weren’t frightened – they were, after all, wild animals, and death was simply a part of life for them. Mister Bluejay’s untimely demise was unusual for her front lawn but not unusual in the forest. But few animals would remain near a fresh kill unless they were interested in eating or stealing it, and she fed them well enough already.

She looked up from the lawn. Directly ahead lay the acres of dark wood that bordered the Everfree Forest. Somewhere in there was a predator with a belly full of bird.

It wasn’t the animal’s fault. Fox or weasel or bobcat, it was only acting according to its nature. Later in the day, she would go searching for it. A few words should dissuade it from returning.

She started sweeping the feathers into a pile. The animals who shared her home wouldn’t mind the mess, but other ponies might. They sometimes lacked her understanding of nature and its ends.

The woods near Fluttershy’s cottage were dark, even in the mid-afternoon. Fall had stripped the canopy overhead of half its leaves, but those that remained, in all their many colors, still conspired to block the sun. It was closer to night than day on the soft, moss-covered floor.

She had the bluejay’s remains – feathers, head and a few bits of viscera – and dumped them out of her wrap onto the ground. She wiped the canvas on the springy moss and tucked it into her saddlebags.

“Hello?” she called. “If you’re out there, you don’t have to be afraid of me. I just want to talk.”

Only silence returned. She waited for hours, in case any hungry animals wanted to come home with her. Aside from a curious chipmunk and a stoic snake, she had no visitors. As the sun neared the horizon, she sighed, lifted the chipmunk into the branches out of the rat snake’s reach, and bid them both farewell.

Some mysteries, perhaps, weren’t meant to be solved.

Fluttershy spent the next morning running errands in Ponyville. She was up early, before the sun was more than a pink suggestion in the east, and by the time she returned, laden with groceries, it was well on the way to mid-morning. Soon it would be time for lunch, and she already had designs on a fresh arugula-and-tomato salad.

She paused at her front door. The hard surface was covered in scratches. Thin curls of wood littered her doorstep.

She considered the marks carefully, then looked around. Nothing appeared to be lurking in the bushes or the grasses. Slowly, she opened the door, walked inside, and shut it firmly behind her.

“Does anyone know what scratched the door?” she asked of the various critters in her living room. A few of them paused in their play to look in her direction, but nothing more.

It would’ve been surprising, frankly, if any had. She loved all her critter friends, but Celestia bless them, they weren’t the brightest stars in the night sky. Even Angel Bunny, her oldest confidante, had trouble understanding ponies and their complex emotions. Things were simpler for rabbits, she supposed.

She needed a nocturnal friend for this. A animal who could watch the cottage during the night. She flapped her wings and floated up into the rafters, where a dark form huddled in the shadows.

“Hello, Mister Owl,” she whispered, settling down beside him. His eyes slowly opened as he woke, and at her beckoning he leaned forward to hear her instructions.

Mister Owl was missing the next morning. She spent hours flying through the woods, stopping at each hollow tree where an owl might make a home. A few were occupied, but not with the owl she wanted.

By the time she returned to the cottage lunch had passed, and her woodland friends were cranky with hunger. She apologized to them as she passed out bird seed for the birds and cantaloupe for the tortoises and sugar-dusted carrots for Angel Bunny. None knew where Mister Owl had gone.

Later, after the sun had gone down and her animals surrendered to their natural rhythms, she sat by the fire and brooded. Angel Bunny dozed beside her, his legs twitching in response to some rabbity dream. She wondered, for a moment, whether he was chasing or being chased.

Some animal, it seemed likely, had taken up residence in the woods outside her home. Some animal viewed her woodland friends as convenient snacks. She was not offended by this – cats had just as much a right to life as birds, much though birds might object. Cats were simply following their nature.

But still, she couldn’t have a wild predator trying to claw its way into her home. Her home was a refuge. Outside, in the forest, the law of nature might rule, but in this cottage she was god.

Something would have to be done. She carefully picked up Angel Bunny, deposited him in his nest, and turned into her bed for the night.

The sound of scratching at her bedroom door roused Fluttershy from the depths of sleep. She heard it in a groggy, half-awake state.

It was not an unusual sound – after all, she lived with dozens of clawed animals, any number of which might want into her room. Usually she just ignored it until whatever restless animal was at work grew tired or bored or disheartened by her lack of response, and went elsewhere for the night.

So that was what she did.

And in time, the scratching ceased. She smiled and quickly fell back into slumber.

The critters were nervous the next morning. Fluttershy didn’t blame them.

Something had left scratches on almost every wall and door in the cottage. Only the interior of her own room and the cellar, which was latched shut, showed no signs of vandalism. Everywhere else, little bits of plaster and curls of wood had fallen to the floor.

She conducted a quick census. A few birds were missing, but that might or might not be important – birds came and went as they pleased, and never stayed for long. Mister Owl was still absent from his roost in the rafters.

“Well, Angel Bunny,” she said. “If you have any ideas, I’d love to hear them.”

He said nothing, but then, he never did. Together they set about cleaning the floors.

“Wait,” Twilight Sparkle said. “It’s inside your cottage?”

“I think so,” Fluttershy said. “I don’t know how it would scratch the walls if it wasn’t.”

Twilight paused at that, her mouth halfway open in the act of responding. She closed it, gave Fluttershy a look, as though she couldn’t quite tell if that answer was an insult or not, then apparently deciding that of course it wasn’t, this was Fluttershy, she nodded.

“That’s kind of concerning, isn’t it? Don’t you, uh, worry about what might happen at night?”

“I live with a bear,” Fluttershy said. “You live with a dragon and a reformed sorceress who tried to destroy the world and the very concept of time itself in a mad scheme to get revenge. I have an omnipotent friend who is the literal personification of chaos. No, I’m not afraid of some animal scratching up the walls in my cottage.”

“Oh, um.” Twilight frowned. “Aren’t you, uh, still afraid of ponies sometimes?”

Fluttershy set down her tea. “Ponies can be wicked, Twilight. Animals are just obeying their nature. If you understand them, they can never frighten you.”

Fluttershy was ready that night when the scratches woke her.

She floated out of bed, her large wings beating gently, silently. Over toward the door she drifted. The sounds grew louder with each passing moment. She tried to consider how large an animal it must be to shake her door like that.

Fairly big, she decided. Not as big as a bear, but maybe the size of a pony. She took a deep breath, steeled herself, and pulled open the door.

Nothing. Only darkness. She peered around the cottage’s main room, the floor, and then the ceiling above her because some animals liked to hide on ceilings. Still nothing.

Dozens of little critters filled the air with the sounds of their slumber. It was like rain on a windowpane to her, soothing and relaxing. After only a few more minutes of futile searching around the cabin for whatever stray animal was causing all this trouble, she surrendered and returned to her bed.

Fluttershy dreamed that night of pursuing something. She dreamed that night of being pursued. She dreamed of hunting, killing and eating. She dreamed of her friends and her enemies, laughing with them, flying with them, swimming with them, even sleeping with them. Normal dreams, in other words. Embarrassing to talk about, but not embarrassing to experience.

She smiled more that day, her friends said. She laughed more freely. Something about her seemed more alive.

Fluttershy was already awake when she heard the scratches the next night. She’d been waiting for them. Silent as a hawk, she drifted through the air of her bedroom, slowly opened the door, and landed in the hallway outside.

The scratching was coming from the main room of the cottage. She waited for her eyes to adjust to the dim moonlight pouring in the windows, then headed toward the stairs. The sounds grew louder.

At the top of the stairs she paused. An odd, unplaceable grunting sound mixed with the scratches.

She took the stairs slowly, one hoof at a time, carefully avoiding the spots she knew would squeak. She had a lot of practice at this, moving around silently at night to avoid waking her critter friends. In seconds she reached the base of the stairs, and saw the source of the sounds.

It was a pony. A pegasus. Hunched over something, tearing at it with forelegs. She must’ve gasped, for it jerked and looked up at the sound. Blood smeared its muzzle. But most of all she saw its eyes, a bright cyan that glowed in the darkness. Bright cyan eyes like hers, filled with lust and hunger and insanity, and the not-Fluttershy pony opened its mouth to expose teeth like diamonds, and somepony began to scream, and—

Fluttershy woke in her bed. She stifled a scream, every muscle locked in place. The dream that seared her mind was already fading, leaving behind only those bright eyes, and in moments that memory was gone as well, and she could not remember why she was so frightened.

Something caught in her throat. She coughed and spat up a bit of down. The loose, fluffy feather drifted down to her sheets. She stared at it.

Somewhere in the cottage, she imagined she could heard something scratching.

Best go see what it was.