Enter a pegasus

[needs_fern]

Somewhere out in the forest, a call is made. It's a very quiet call, but it really is intended to draw someone's attention.

"No, really, please do come back. I'm awfully sorry about the clock, but you really need-"

The voice cuts off as its owner comes into view. She's a small pegasus, looking around in confusion. Sure, she's not very familiar with the Everfree Forest, but this doesn't look anything like the parts she does know. And the rabbit she's been trying to catch is nowhere to be seen. And - are those buildings?

Well. Where there are buildings there are usually other ponies. She nervously steps out away from the forest's edge, softly calling "Hello?"

Comments

[needs_fern]

Fluttershy looks a bit unhappy at this. She came in from the Everfree Forest, after all, which is easy to get lost in. And, also, not a friendly place.

[hecu_marine]

"I ain't the one who made the rules, ma'am," Shephard says, not unkindly. "You, uh... you got trouble waitin' back home?"

[needs_fern]

"Not... not exactly," Fluttershy says. She pauses, trying to decide just what to say. This Shephard is basically a stranger, and he said he doesn't even know what the Everfree Forest is.

[hecu_marine]

Shephard grunts. "Things ain't always so hot the other side of folks' doors," he says. "Y'ought to know, time don't pass back home. Long as you're here nothin' happens. You go right back to whenever you left. So if you need t'git your bearings or somethin', you just go on ahead'n hang 'round here 'til you feel up to goin' back."

[needs_fern]

"Um, w-what?" asks Fluttershy. She must have heard wrong; even in old pony tales, time almost never stops. (The sun, occasionally, but that's different.)

[hecu_marine]

"It's like pickin' up a book," Shephard says. "Shit don't happen in the book while you ain't readin' it. Pick up the book again and the story starts rollin' once you read it.... uh. Shit. Forgot you're a horse. You got books where you come from?"

[needs_fern]

Fluttershy nods. "Oh, yes," she says. "I don't read them as much as Twilight, but I have books."

[hecu_marine]

"'Kay," says Shephard. "You just up'n stepped out of your regular book, so to speak. Soon as you go home you're back in it and things happen again, that's all."

[needs_fern]

"Oh."

...Fluttershy's feeling rather out of her depth at the moment.

[hecu_marine]

"Anyway," Shephard says, "there's a building over that way, you might want to pay a visit. Gives you a better idea who all's here and what's goin' on."

[needs_fern]

"O-okay," says Fluttershy. "Um, thank you, Shephard."