Southern Anon in Equestria: Chapter 3

>It's been two hours, according to your phone (still not one bar of signal), and you're still walking.
>You still haven't seen a single living thing besides the foliage growing up around the path
>Who knows? That horse you chased here could have been a ghost
>Or a demon luring you in to suck your soul out
>...
>No, we aren't going down that line of thought again
>Not again
>If you ever get back home, you swear you'll never watch another horror movie again
>It's not that you're afraid of the woods
>On the contrary, you grew up on the edge of the woods in a rural town
>The woods were a huge part of your childhood
>You hiked all over your family's land, found all the good fishing spots in the river, and had a great time
>You never bought a gun and went hunting, though
>Your father was strictly against it
>When you asked for one on your thirteenth birthday, he gave you a guitar, and said "Boy, learn this. It'll get you a lot further in life than killing."
>And thus started your evening guitar lessons with your father
>He never did let you buy a gun, and it just felt wrong to buy one in the wake of his death

>You check your phone again
>5:03PM
>It's only been a half hour since you checked it last.
>Thankfully, the battery hasn't gone down at all yet
>You look up into the reddening sky
>The sun's going down and it sure as hell wasn't winter when you left
>Everything's so different here...
>Right, different worlds, different seasons
>Makes sense that it would be like that
>The lifelessness of this forest scares you, and you don't want to be caught out, alone, at night
>Whenever you went into the woods as a child, you always saw birds, rabbits, the occasional fox, and even deer
>Absolutely nothing so far
>Are they avoiding you?
>That's a silly question
>They've probably never seen a human before
>They've never seen how cruel your race can be
>There's no reason for them to be afraid
>But they are
>And that's what scares you
>You always hated being alone
>To pass the time, you begin playing your guitar
>Walking in time with the beat

>The forest looks like it's thinning out ahead
>Through the trees, you can see the mountain descending into the horizon
>You can also see that the trees number fewer further up the path
>Most uplifting of all, you can smell wood burning
>You're probably near the rising smoke you saw back at the castle
>You pray that your journey is going to be over soon
>The woods abruptly end in a sharp tree line, and you find yourself about a hundred yards from a yellow cottage
>With a green thatched roof
>Wait, is that grass growing on top?
>You write it off as more new-world weirdness
>The smoke still rises, so someone has to be home
>You figure language is going to be a bit of a barrier
>And...shit.
>Another realization:
>The dominant species might not have seen a human before
>They might consider you a non-sapient species
>You have to prove that you're intelligent
>You get an idea
>Music is universal
>Every culture has had music
>Music requires thought and skill
>You take your guitar and lay down some fingerpicking so fine it'd make Chet Atkins himself jealous

>Hey, we're not in a land devoid of life!
>That's always good. Plant life is good. Animal life is (usually) better. Intelligent life maybe?
>There's a yellow horse outside the cottage
>With butterflies tattooed to its flank
>And holy shit it's got wings
>That's different
>Your jimmies are a little rustled from seeing the spawn of Pegasus at a few dozen yards away
>It's noticed you, too
>It's ears are also pricked up and facing you
>You've got its attention
>It's equine in nature, and the horse you chased here could talk
>Could this one talk as well?
>You stop a few feet in front of the horse
>Its head comes up to your chest
>You keep playing guitar, and decide to greet it
Hey there. Can you talk?
>Its mouth moves, but you can't hear anything
>This world might have developed differently; maybe vocal chords evolved to be out of your hearing range
>Everything else in the world seems at least somewhat similar to your own
>You decide to try again
Heya...can you talk at all?
>"...aryn't deya"
>You sigh when you realize it was just talking too soft to understand
>That and from the high vocal tone, it's likely female
>Her voice also sounds very humanlike
>There's definitely a language barrier
>That's going to present a problem
>When you sigh, she blushes and walks backwards, away from you
Nono, wait! I didn't mean it!
>She pauses and just stands in place, staring you down
>Does she know what you are?
>Are there humans here?

>The yellow horse turns around and runs back to what you assume to be her cottage
>She's a bit small, now that you think about it, to be a horse
>She's more p0ny-sized than horse-sized
>You're not dead yet. This might be a nonviolent species.
>If an unknown creature walked up to a human farmer, it would be dead already, killed out of fear
>You stand there contemplating equine behavior until your jimmies reach a new magnitude or rustlage
>The yellow winged p0ny comes out of her cottage with another p0ny
>It's not a p0ny, though
>It's an honest-to-God unicorn
>You never went to college, but you're pretty sure unicorns aren't a thing back home
>It's confirmed: You are no longer on Earth
>You are on a strange, alien world
>Possibly a different universe
>You have no means of meaningful communication
>A pegasus is walking to you with a unicorn
>And, to top it all off, you haven't had anything to eat all morning
>This is going to be a long day.