friendship is magic part 2

[allcomplete]

The forest is dark (Clarity and Guiding Star light their horns to see by, but it's almost worse than nothing, making the distant shadowed spaces darker by comparison; they soon give up). The plants that make it up are closely spaced, not all of them have friendly textures, and it is full of scary noises, only some of them the harmless snapped twigs and disturbed leaves of their own passage.

Before they've fully adjusted to the darkness, and are aware via anything but the feel of earth under their hooves that the path has sloped downward a little, it has given way under them, some of the flora and some distressingly large rocks along with it. Clarity can't even teleport. It's too dark to see where she might be going.

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[allcomplete]

Once Guiding has managed to extract herself from the grateful manticore they proceed!

[joyfulnoise]

"That was really cute," says Joy. "Like, really."

[follow_polaris]

"I guess so!"

[on_what_wings]

"I'm with the dragon on this one," says Blaze. "Adorable."

[allcomplete]

Clarity chuckles.

[follow_polaris]

Guiding traipses, for one step, then hears a scary noise and stops.

[joyfulnoise]

Traipsing! Joy decides to start traipsing too. The scary noises do not affect him.

[pythbox]

Perhaps his feelings will change as the ponies progress into deeper, darker, and scarier woods, populated by older, taller, and...

...toothier trees? That can't be right. But there it is, lit just slightly better than its surroundings - a tree with gnarled knots in the shape of malevolent eyes and its trunk split into a jagged gaping maw appropriately sized to swallow somepony whole, surrounded by spiky branches like reaching claws.

It creaks ominously.

[clearthestorm]

...Streak's first impulse is skepticism, but she can't detect any inconsistencies or irregularities that point to an illusion at work. The tree has fangs. The fangs are moving.

[allcomplete]

"Holy smokes, what's happening?"

[clearthestorm]

"I don't know."

[on_what_wings]

...Blaze may in fact be more frightened by that than by the tree with fangs.

[pythbox]

There's plenty of frightening things to go around.

For example: the echoing sound of galloping hooves, followed by a creaking roar from the tree, and a dark and ragged figure bursting out of its mouth.

[allcomplete]

Clarity shrinks back, closer to the others.

[clearthestorm]

Streak narrows her eyes.

[ipso_amore]

The tree's mouth snaps shut just short of the mystery pony's tail. She rolls to a stop and sits up, coughing.

It's Cordy. A dripping wet Cordy with twigs and leaves and fragments of bark tangled in her mane and tail.

"Hi, everypony," she says, and coughs again. "How have you been?"

Behind her, the tree slowly opens its mouth again.

[follow_polaris]

"Whoa, Cordy, what happened to you?"

[ipso_amore]

She gets up on all four hooves, shakes herself, and gives the tree's half-open mouth a firm kick, breaking half its teeth. The tree moans, a long drawn-out creaking cracking shuddering splintering sound.

"Fell into a pond," Cordy summarizes. "And when I got out, there were a bunch of these - " she jabs a rear hoof at the tree " - crowded around the edge, giving me the eye. I went around, and there were more behind them. It seemed like one way I could go was all scary all the time, and every other way there was a nice smell or decent lighting or something interesting dropped on the ground. So obviously something didn't want me going this way, and you have to figure the likeliest candidate for dark mysterious forces turning the forest against us is Nightmare Moon, who seems to be motivated to keep us apart. Therefore, scary path must lead to you guys." The tree creaks again. She gives it another kick. "I don't know why I held out hope that when I finally found you, the scary would stop."

[allcomplete]

"It doesn't seem to have. I never heard of a - tree monster like this."

[ipso_amore]

"Me neither."

[joyfulnoise]

"I dunno," says Joy, looking speculatively at the tree. "I think it's kind of - "

[on_what_wings]

"Don't say cute," beseeches Blaze.

Behind her, a chorus of ominous creakings heralds three more trees transforming into fanged monsters. She looks, eeps, and huddles closer to Streak.

[follow_polaris]

"Know any snazzy tree-swatting magic, Clarity?" asks Guiding, shivering.

[allcomplete]

"If it were daylight I could teleport us someplace I could see but I can't see anyplace well enough."

[joyfulnoise]

"No but they are cute, though," says Joy, reaching toward the tree whose fangs have been mostly demolished by Cordy's hooves. Its remaining teeth snap shut on the tip of his claw. He giggles.

And the tree's fangy maw and clawlike branches and knotty eyes untwist and smooth out into a perfectly ordinary tree.