The Noponies pt VIII: Just the Two of Us

                                                    Just the Two of Us

After waking from my…..interesting dream, I felt like it was finally the time for me to ask Pinkie a question which I had been considering for quite some time…The most important question in any young stallions life. So I went downstairs to make her breakfast while she began to wake up, then when she walked down, she smiled and gave me a hug “Aww, you’re so nice to me Hanzy, what’s the special occasion?”
I looked nervous, but knew it had to be asked “W-well… you see Pinkie, you and I have been dating for quite some time, and since we have settled down here in Hoofenstein, I was wondering if you would…. Well…like to get married?” I blushed deeply and looked away as the words came out of my mouth, but before I could look back at her, she pounced on me and was kissing me all over “Yes, yes, yes! I’d love to Hanzy, we make a great pair, ya know?” She said as she kissed my nose over and over childishly “Though…there is one problem: before we can get married, we would have to go back to Ponyville to get my parents’ permission, would you be willing to take that risk for us?” I had to think about it, but I slowly nodded, nothing was too much to ask of me if it meant me and my love could become official.

I left Pinkie at the house so that she could get ready, as I went back to my brother Adolf’s house, knocking on the door and after being let in by Rarity, I went up to his office and walked in “My brother, I have great news! Me and Pinkie have decided to get married, but in order for us to tie the knot, we need to get her parents’ permission, so I was wondering if you could get the police to escort us to the border, and find a good way to sneak back into Ponyville?”
He smiled and nodded, getting up to hug me happily “Good job on finally settling down with someone, Hanz! And of course, I’ll do everything in my power to help ya, but why not just invade, or get the police to kidnap her parents?”
“I’m sorry Adolf, but if me and her are tying the knot, I want us to do it the right way, so all I ask is for help.”
Adolf frowned, really wishing he could invade Equestria, but nodded and waved his hoof carelessly “Sure then, if you say so. Allow my unicorns to survey the border, and we will be ready for you by 8pm.  Just come prepared, because if you get caught, we won’t be able to help you in time.”
I saluted my brother and walked out and back down the stairs to the door “Looks like you got some work to do now, Rarity” I said in a joking manner, and she just rolled her eyes as she let me leave, so I walked out and back to my home.

We went around town enjoying the sights and had a couple of bratwursts from a street vendor, and before we knew it, it was 8pm, so me and Pinkie made our way back to the capital building where we met up with Rarity and 2 large stallions who were with her, apparently members of her survey team. “Ah, it’s good to see you’re on time, Hanz. Now, we found a hole in the wall near the Everfree Forest, which is your best bet to get to her parents house, according to our resident Cartographer.” Rarity said as she walked with Hanz and Pinkie to their destination, on the border to Equestria.
We arrived at a little hole in the Horst Memorial Wall, which separated the evil, capitalist Equestria from our wondrous Fascist Hoofenstein. “Are you sure this will take us to their rock farm, Rarity?” I said, uneasy because everypony knows to never go into the Everfree forest, But she nodded and handed us a map “Yes, just follow the map, and you’ll be alright…but do not stray from the path I marked, do you hear me?” We both nodded and I handed the map to Pinkie before we climbed into the hole and came out on the other side, getting one last look at Hoofenstein before Rarity had the men stationed to guard it in case anyone else tried using it.

“Well…I suppose I’ll lead the way, Hanzy.  Since I have the map, after all.” Pinkie said as she nervously took the lead, starting to walk into the forest with me close behind her. The whole place had an eerie vibe to it, the light seeming to fade away into obscurity the deeper they went into it, until the only light that we had was the glow of my horn, acting like a lantern to let my partner read the map.

“Sweety…do you feel like we are being watched?” I asked as I looked left to right, even the trees appearing like threatening objects “Y..yeah, I do Hanzy. You’ll keep me safe, right?” Pinkie nervously said as she led the way “Of course love, I always will.”

And then, like many of us do in life, we came upon a fork in the road. And the darkness seemed to disappear for a moment as we stopped to ponder our course of action. We looked at the map, and despite following the path perfectly, this fork was not on the map anywhere, so we had no clue what to do.  “Well…what do you think, Hanzy?” Pinkie asked, looking over to me “I…I don’t know, love.  But the path on the left seems cleared and safe, while the one on the right looks like nopony has gone there in years, so surely the one on the left is the one the map means for us to take.” And with that, we began walking down the path on the left and the light stayed with us, not fading unlike last time, so we both agreed that we had made the right choice.

We continued along the path outlined on the map, which seemed to correlate with the road we were on well, until a thick fog seemed to descend upon us, decreasing visibility to a mere 5 feet. We stumbled around in the fog blindly until a figure appeared standing in front of us, and when we approached it, we discovered that it was….Applejack? Or…at least it looked like Applejack in appearance. Upon further looking, I saw that in place of eyes were two black holes with a strange, dark liquid dripping out of them. She didn’t talk; she didn’t do anything but slowly walk towards us “A…applejack? Is that you? What are you doing out here!?” I said as I stepped forward, only to have her growl and jump on me, and I had to hold her off of me with my hooves or else she would have surely killed me “H-help me, Pinkie!” I yelled in horror, and Pinkie took her hidden scalpel she always keeps on her and stabbed it into the back of Applejack as I shoved her off, and she began to drip acidic black blood, but before we stopped to think about it, we both ran off  down the path to what we hoped would be safety.

“Hanzy, what was that…that thing?!” Pinkie said as we kept running, but I had just as little of a clue as she did, so I shook my head “We just need to get out of here…where are we on that map?” She pulled out the map and we both looked at it: there was nothing on it. What was once a pathway through a forest was now simply a white dot on a page of nothingness. “Well…looks like we are lost now.  We just have to keep going, hope this road leads somewhere.” I said as I took the lead, Pinkie shaking a little from fear.

And then we reached the cliff: beyond which stretched an endless nothing. Upon looking down, the world disappeared behind us, and all that existed was a 5x5 square that we were standing on. I held Pinkie close and nervously placed my hoof down in front of the square, and another 5x5 square appeared for us to step on, so we continued to move forward, but each square behind us continued to fade away into the never-ending nothingness. But on our sides, far off in the distance, were massive shadows that looked like the “Applejack” we ran into earlier.

After 100 feet more of slowly walking along the magical bridge, it stopped forming, and we were trapped there.  To our left: Nothing. To the right: Nothing, and just as little behind us.  “W..what do we do now, Hanzy?” Pinkie said, looking to me for guidance, but I was just as clueless. “I think this is where we get off?” I said, looking over the ledge and grabbing her as I stepped over the ledge, falling into the blank light of the void, and there was a bright flash of light that blinded me and knocked us both unconscious.

I awoke nearly 5 hours later to the feeling of being dragged by my tail through mud, looking to my right to see Pinkie was still unconscious, and then I looked behind me to see that I was being dragged by my best friend in all of Ponyville: Zekora. “Z….Zekora?” I mumbled weakly, that light having zapped all my energy, and she could not talk because she was busy dragging us, but we eventually got to her hut in the middle of the Everfree forest, where she sat us in the corner and finally told me how she found us.
“Careful young colt, I had heard screams, so I unfastened my doors bolt.”
“I found you and her laying out cold.  You must have been running from something quite old”

I nodded weakly, trying to make sense of what she was saying. Had we really been in the forest just running around for all this time? The answer did not truly matter, for we were at least near Pinkies family rock farm now, and I was with a friend who I knew I could trust to house us while we recovered from whatever it was that had drained us so badly.

After a day or so, Pinkie woke up finally, and I told her where we were and what had happened. She didn’t really believe me, but she knew how to get to her rock farm from here, so we decided we would set out soon.
“Oh, Zekora. There is something I must ask you: Since you are my best friend, and I know nopony else would do this for us, would you do me and Pinkie the honor of marrying us once we get her parents permission?
The Idea of the opportunity to serve as the priest at her friend’s wedding delighted Zekora, so she smiled and nodded happily “Yes child, I would be elated to do it, for my services, I will not charge a bit”