Hunter in the Night Ch. 1

>Day 42 in this place.
>Time: roughly 1 in the morning, if the moon is anything to judge by.
>You are Anonymous, a Lone Hunter subspecies human.
>And you eyed your prize from the cover of the foreboding wood.
>A pen full of cattle, all fast asleep standing up, near a small estate on an apple orchard.
>This was getting almost too easy.
>The owners of these cows must be pretty slow, considering you’d stolen one every week for the last five weeks, and they weren’t hunting you.
>Implying they could catch you in the first place.
>Breathe in, breathe out, the smell of apples and livestock heavy on the air.
>You slunk from under cover of the forest, and after crossing a couple hundred yards of open space, you reached the pen.
>Your entry point was the tree that grew right along the fencing of the enclosure.
>You scaled it in a matter of seconds and crept along a branch hanging just above the cattle.
>This was so much easier than hunting those lion things in the woods. Sleeping cattle didn’t run, and didn’t fight back.
>The breeze shifted and brought a new smell to your nose.
>You glanced around and noticed a small… horse?
>It was bright orange, and had a smell as though it had been recently bathed with soap.
>Hehe, it even had a little cowboy hat on its head.
>The things people will do to their pets.
>Well, back to grocery shopping.
>You drop the fifteen or so feet from the branch down to the stable, sticking a perfectly silent landing.
>You slowly reach for the nearest cow, grab its head and snap its neck, the only sound being a muffled crunch.
>No bleat.
>No struggle.
>You heft the animal onto your shoulder, hop the fence and begin silently trudging back to the forest.
>But….
>“Hey! Git back here!”
>You don’t even look behind you.
>You.
>Just.
>Run.
>You cross the two hundred yard stretch in roughly thirty seconds, surprising even yourself, considering you had a dead cow on your shoulders.
>You slow a bit when you enter the woods, but not much.
>The adrenaline pumping through your veins is almost at a critical level.
“If they send other Hunters after me, I’m done,” you thought aloud.
>You press on, leaping over stream and roots, tearing through bushes using your prey as a shield.
>Until, after roughly thirty minutes of running, you finally reach the secluded cave you have made your home.
>You drop the cow unceremoniously inside the cave and bend over to catch your breath.
>The last thing you need right now is for the local Pack to find the cave, as you’d probably then become a main course.
>You never played by those rules, as your parents always told you,
>“Never eat anything that talks back.”
>But that didn’t mean that everyone lived by your code of honor.
>You suppress a shiver at the thought.
>Your best option at this point is probably to head back out and try to disguise the all too obvious trail you probably left, and if they were already tailing you, to lead them off course.
>With one last deep breath, you head off.

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>You are Applejack.
>And you have just seen…… something.
>You’re not only completely bewildered by what you’ve just seen, but utterly horrified as well.
>Just yesterday, Mooriela had told you something very strange.
>She said that once a week, for five straight weeks, one of her herd vanished.
>The way she said it was slightly disconcerting, not a trace of worry or even slight concern in her voice, chalking it up to “going on holiday.”
>There was a reason cows needed ponies around. Someone had to do the thinking.
>And tonight, you stayed out on the porch, on the lookout for any escaping cows.
>You slipped off to sleep at one point, but awoke when you felt eyes upon you.
>You glanced over to the cow pen, and that’s when you saw it.
>A large, monkey-lookin’ creature dropped out of the tree near the pen, and landed without a sound.
>It paused for a moment then reached out and killed a nearby cow.
>It happened so fast you didn’t even realize what exactly occurred until he was fixin’ to leave.
>The creature then lifted the cow up, (a whole cow!) set it on its shoulders, and lightly hopped out of the pen.
>Only then did you act. Or rather, shout.
“Hey! Git back here!”
>It never turned, instead, it ran like the dickens back to the forest.
>You’d never seen anything so fast.
>It took a few minutes of standing there slack jawed before you realized the best course of action.
>Careful not to wake your family, assuming they hadn’t awoken with the earlier outburst, you break into a decent lope and head towards Ponyville.
>More specifically the library.
>The entire trip there was spent glancing over your shoulder, and jumping at the smallest sound.
>Even though you wouldn’t go down without a fight, judging by what you’ve seen, a lot of fight to you is almost nothing to it.
>After what could’ve been an eternity, you find yourself in front of the hollow tree.
>You start knocking, no hammering on the door in front of you, only to stop as you hear faint grumbling and the clip-clop of hooves approaching the door.
>The door swung wide to reveal a very tired and disgruntled looking Twilight.
>The disgruntled expression vanishes as she sees the look on your face.
>“What happened, Applejack? You look like you’ve seen a ghost!”
“Ah might as well have, Twilight,” you reply as you step inside. “But Ah didn’t. Ah saw somethin’ else.”
> “Okay,” she responds slowly, urging you to continue.
“Well ah don’t know if ya heard from Mooriela, the cows or even through the grapevine, that some of the local cows have gone missin’, but they have. One a week for the last five weeks.”
>”I hadn’t heard that!”
“So anyways, when Ah heard it, Ah decided to keep watch, cuz tonight is always the night they vanish. Ah dozed off a bit, but ah woke up when Ah thought Ah felt somethin’ starin’ at me. Right as Ah sat up from where Ah was sleepin’, Ah saw this thing fall out of a tree and silently land in the middle of the pen. It broke one poor cow’s neck, and lifted the cow onto its shoulders without breakin’ a sweat. Then it jumped over the fence and began to sneak back to the Everfree forest. That was the scariest part. It was so quiet, if Ah hadn’t been lookin’ at it, Ah’d a never known it was there. Even when it killed the cow, the cow didn’t make a sound. Anyway, Ah shouted out after it, and without lookin’ back it took off. Ah swear to Celestia, Ah ain’t never seen anythin’ move that fast, at least on foot, and not to mention it was carryin’ a whole, fully grown cow!”
>You didn’t even realize how terrifying the spectacle was until you said it out loud, and in your fervor to tell Twilight, your voice had raised quite a bit.
>“That certainly is bizarre, Applejack, not to mention disconcerting. Can you describe the thing to me?”
“Well, it walked on two legs, and it was very big. Even though it was crouched, Ah’d say if it was standing up, it’d be taller than a Minotaur, with shoulders about the same width. It was a light pinkish color, Ah think, and it had a long brown mane. Ah never saw its face. Ah also don’t think it had hooves on its legs, but Ah ain’t sure.
>Twilight furrowed her brow, and as she was wont to do, immediately began pulling books off of the surrounding shelves, trying desperately to find something that matched your description.
>After an hour of joint efforts on behalf of two very tired ponies, you both gave up, having come up with absolutely nothing.
>Twilight then invited you upstairs to sleep, and you gratefully pulled the covers of the  spare bed over yourself.
>Despite how tired you were, sleep did not come easy.
>As soon as you closed your eyes, you found yourself on your porch again.
>You watched as the creature dropped from the tree and reached for the cow.
>Except now, it seemed gaunter. It was emaciated and covered with sores, with a greasy, ropy mane.
>Again it reached for the cow, and again made short work of it.
>But now it paused.
>And looked right at you, locking with your eyes.
>It had huge silver, glowing eyes that seemed to sap your sanity the longer you stared into them.
>You blinked, breaking the unnatural link, even if for an instant.
>When your eyes opened, it was slowly crawling towards you, hunched and twisted, making its movements all the more unnatural.
>It again gazed into your eyes, expressionless and calculating.
> Too frightened to run, you maintained eye contact until your eyes watered, and closed your eyes again.
>You felt a pressure on your neck….
>And you snapped awake, panting heavily.

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>You are Anon.
>And you had walked the perimeter of the forest near the orchard and along the path to the small village.
>No one had followed you.
>This was more disconcerting than if they were in full pursuit.
>Was it a trap, or had you just imagined the shout?
>This question consumed your thoughts as you made your way back to the cave, making sure to use a winding route.
>Technically, either possibility was plausible, and you secretly hoped your ears were playing tricks on you earlier.
>But you had a sickening feeling you were wrong.
>Finally back at the cave, you drifted into an uneasy sleep, your dreams full of angry mobs with pitchforks and torches, or silent Hunters who came to slay you in the dark.