Chapter 1

My ear twitched, waking me up from a very peaceful slumber. Shifting slightly, I discovered I was laying down in some grass, under the warm sun. I didn’t exactly know when I got outside, but I wasn’t complaining.

Then, the sunshine started messing with my eyelids, which is a bunch of shit. Reluctantly, I opened my eyes, only to get the full blast of the sun's blazing rays. ‘Yeah, I hate you too, nature.’ I squeezed my eyes shut trying to shield them from the brightness; sadly, it was all in vain. The damage was done and I was now fully awake. ‘Still not going to open my eyes though.’ Yeah, that's me, finding ways to fight the system the best I can.

Laying there, I basked in the warmth and tranquility of it all, sleep, slowly trying to retaking my body. Might as well get a few more minutes in, right?

Wrong! Apparently God said ‘no’.

“Zack, wake up. You’re going to want to see this,” Colten all but hissed at me.

Why is he hissing? I haven’t the slightest clue, but right now, I’m too tired for all this.

I groaned and lazily swatted him away with my hand. “Five more minutes.” I could already imagine him rolling his eyes at my response, but I don’t care and there’s not a think he can say to change my mind.

"Ugh... If you don’t hurry breakfast might get cold," Colt said tauntingly.  

That immediately got my attention. My eyes shot open, sunlight annoyances long forgotten, and I sat up quickly. Instantly, I froze at what I saw before me. My bewildered expression contorted to a look of fear as I started trembling at the beast before me. Instead of my brother, a giant, black snake looked back at me, only inches away from my face.

There comes a time in your life when you are faced with tough situations - like giant snakes for instance - with your back against the wall and the only tools you have to help you are your own fists. I found myself in one of these situations and did what any regular person would do.

Quickly, I stood up and tried to run away. “Tried” being the key word here. The moment I stood up, my legs collapsed under me. I tried to get up to walk again, but I immediately tripped over my own feet and smacked right into the forest floor. ‘We’re in a forest?’

I spat out a good pile of dirt before flipping over onto my back. The evil beast was right on top of me, and I couldn't do anything about it. So, I accepted my fate and closed my eyes, waiting for the snake to attack. The pain would be immense, yet swift. One quick strike and then I'd become this snake’s next meal.

I slowly opened my eyes and found the snake still there, staring at me with a deadpan look on it's face. Before I could express my vivid opinion on how ugly it was, the snake decided to break all logic as we know it.

"Would you be serious for once and get up!” the ‘snake’ practically hissed at me, again. I couldn't believe my ears. It's impossible. It couldn't be!

"Colt?" I asked.

Staring at him in shock, Colten slowly nodded his head. ‘This can't be real... does explain all the hissing though.’ As I tried to figure this out, Colt decided to continue his destruction of logic.

“Okay, you done now?” He asked with a hint of exasperation.

The most I could give in response was a slight nod of my head. ‘This is surreal. How did he turn into a snake? Why are we outside? What the hell is going on?!’

“But, what? How are we in a forest?! Where are we?” My brain felt like it was going to explode. Suddenly, I was spooked by Colt nudging me lightly with his nose to my shoulder, in a failed attempt to comfort me.

“It’s ok, calm down. Take a deep breath, and I’ll explain everything.”

In a very calm and collected manner, Colt began to remind me of the events that  brought us here. I myself got up off the ground and listened attentively.  After a few sentences, it all started coming back to me. The argument with Mr. Finch; our Tivo coming to life; the whole ridiculous game that got us sent here. ‘Here. Where is here?’

A smile slowly plastered itself across my face. Colten saw my look and rolled his eyes. He knew what it meant, he also knew what came next. With a sigh he granted. “Go ahead, let it out.”

I wasn’t even listening as I began to bounce up and down vigorously, not like I needed his permission anyway. “OhmygoshOhmygoshOhmygosh! We’re in Equestria! Yesss!”

Oddly enough, Colten began to shake along with my bouncing. I  abruptly stopped my foolishness and looked at him, tilting my head in confusion.

He seemed to have read my expression perfectly as he said. “Oh... that’s another thing. Now, as you’ve probably noticed, you're not exactly yourself anymore either---”

I held my newly acquired paws out in front of me and stared at them. “Yeah, the paws are new... also, it’s a little hard to stand up.”

Colten frowned at that. “Well, you're a lion... with horns.”

“That’s awesome!” I looked up to see if I could catch a glimpse of my horns. No good. “Dang it.”

“There’s more to it, but you have to swear you won’t scream, or yell, or panic. This might be a hard pill to swallow,” Colten continued. I nodded and sat down in front of him, taking a deep breath to signal I’m ready for the news. “Well, I’m just gonna put this as bluntly as possible. You have wings and I’m attached to your butt.”

“...”

“Zack, you okay?” Colten tilted his head with a worried look on his face. I’d completely frozen up. I slowly looked down at Colten’s tail and followed it down to the tip...except there wasn’t one.

“W-what the fuck?!” I finally stuttered out.

“Okay, not the reaction I expected from you, but yeah...” Colten tried offering me a sheepish smile to lighten the mood. It didn’t help, but at least he tried.

I forced a smile back at him. Then, suddenly, I just snapped and started freaking out. After dramatically falling to the ground, I began rolling around on my back screaming out profanities. I don’t like change, it challenges me.

My brother tried to use calming words to soothe my troubled mind, but nothing was working. He probably would have tried yelling, but something caught his attention over in the brush yonder. I didn’t care that much to look myself as I was a quite busy squirming with the shitstorm within my mind.

I was so busy I almost overlooked the arrow that whizzed past my head and implant itself in the ground only a couple of inches over. My brother’s eyes went wide as he looked to the arrow then slowly back at me. We met each others gaze for a split second, before I could even blink a second arrow swivelled past Colten’s head.

“Zack, move! Now!” Colten said as I rolled to my feet.

I stumbled around a bit as I began to run away from the direction the arrows had come from. Behind me I could hear lots of loud hissing and yelling. These guys were getting closer with every second I wasted trying to figure out how to run. It was as confuddling as it was frustrating.

The only word running through my mind was ‘Run!’, but my body wasn’t getting the message. I’d just about figured it out, when a giant blob of fur jumped down from the tree’s and landed in front of me, swinging a spear at me with the intent to kill. My first instinct was to quickly spin around and slam the guy with my tail. ‘Sorry Colten.’

I must be pretty strong now because that dude went sailing into the air and slammed right into a tree with a loud crunch. ‘Ouch.’

Looking around, it was plain to see that I was surrounded. By what exactly, I can’t really say. They all looked like humanized cats. Think Skyrim and you’ll get what I mean.

There were at least a dozen of them all circled around me. My eyes quickly scanned for any possible escape, but I found nothing. I was trapped.

Then, one particular cat/person/thing caught my eye. It was different from the others, quite literally. Must be a different type of cat than the rest of the pack or something. But that’s not what really got my attention, this cat had a bow drawn and aimed right at my head.

I froze up again and gulped. This could be it. All my life amounted to was being orphaned and hunted down like an animal! Not really what I had hoped for.

No, I can’t think like that. I’ve got to live! Not just for me, but for Colten! Now, how do I go about living? I don’t have that many options. From what I can tell all the cat people are armed to the teeth and have me completely surrounded, so running is out of the question. I can’t fight them all, that’s just suicide. ‘Think think think, what should you do?! Wait, what’s that noise?’ Suddenly, an electric charge kicked started my brain and I grinned. “Brainblast!”

Suddenly, I burst forward and rushed towards the archer. Now this had the potential to end very badly, but I was staring death in the face here... again... so I think my actions were justified. Running closer, I let out a mighty roar and pounced the cat. Things went all according to my poorly thought out plan. The cat person flinched and missed his easy shot. He let out a small yelp as I tackled him to the ground.

After a bit of wrestling I somehow got behind him, his vulnerable neck right in front of me. I opened my mouth and bit down on the fur of his neck. Then l picked him up by the scruff and growled. ‘Yay, My first hostage!’

The others heard my growling and slowly backed away. ‘Good, maybe now we can negotiate.’ Just as I thought that one of the more feminine looking cats chunked a spear and nailed me right in the paw. ‘.... ohmygod.’ I was about to scream before a remembered what was in my mouth, so instead I just bit down on the little kid’s (Just a guess really.) neck. ‘AAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!’ I screamed inside my head. The pain was immense.

I breathed heavily and looked down at my paw the best I could. It was a bloody mess. ‘Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuudge.’ It has to come out or it’ll just get in the way. God, this was just not my day. I grasped the spear with my good paw and yanked.

I bit so hard into the cat in my mouth I could feel his blood trickling. It let out a pained cry. ‘Sorry kid, but I think I’m in a bit more pain than you are right now, so buck up and shut up.’

My ears twitched, I heard that noise again. It almost sounded like... I quickly took off in a random direction, walking now almost impossible. I slowly hobbled to the next clearing over, keeping the other cats at bay by biting down on the cat and making him squeal in pain. They stayed back, but kept following.

Before I knew it I came up upon a ledge, right next to a raging waterfall. The roar of the water splashing down is what drew me here, this was perfect. I turned back to the others and continued backing up to the edge of the cliff.

“Z-Zack, what are you planning?” Colten asked nervously. “Don’t do anything rash, just think this one out... maybe we can talk to them.”

“Apturētu, zvērs!” one of the frisky felines yelled out loudly.

Me and my brother both blinked at that. “Okay, maybe not,” Colten oh so very graciously conquered.

‘Okay, that won’t work, but maybe Colt is right. Maybe this can be worked out if I could just have them hear me out.’ The second I thought that, another spear flew past my head. ‘Yeah, fuck that, I’m doin’ it.’

I took a deep breath through my nose, then jumped back. Next Chapter: Chapter Two Estimated time remaining: 56 Minutes