Dragonshyness

by Jordan179

Chapter 7: Before the Dragon's Lair

The cavern mouth was gigantic.

All six of them could have walked down it in line abreast. It was almost twice as high as it was wide. A decent-sized house could have been stuffed into the entrance, and there would have been room for alleys on either side.

They lined up before the tunnel and peered in, silenced for a moment by the implications of this immense cavity. This close, the stench of sulfur was almost overwhelming. That could have come from natural volcanic emissions, but there was also that subtler scent, alien and yet horribly familiar in a way that raised their manes with primal fears, of some immense archosaur. In some instinctive sense they all knew that creatures like this had once hunted Ponies, and it took every ounce of their courage to avoid fleeing in terror at the close presence of the Dragon.

Fluttershy crouched at the left end of the line, which was also the end nearest the path she had just climbed up. She did this instinctively, ensuring that if was necessary to bolt and run she would be the closest to the only route of escape which did not involve hurling herself into the immense void which surrounded the mountain, a leap which -- her wings paralyzed as they were with fear -- would surely prove fatal. On her immediate right was Applejack -- Fluttershy drew strength, both moral and otherwise, from the protective presence of the big orange Earth Pony. Next were Rarity, Pinkie Pie, and Twilight in order. Rainbow Dash was at the far right of the line, which suited Fluttershy just fine, for it meant she did not have to bear the look of contempt for her that surely lay in her dearest friend's reddish-pink eyes.

Twilight Sparkle stepped a little ahead of them, surveyed the situation, for a moment seeming as overwhelmed as any of them. She lowered her head. Then she turned to give her orders.

"Rainbow Dash," she said softly, "you'll use your wings to clear the smoke."

"Mm-hmm," affirmed the blue pegasus. She launched herself skyward and readied herself to perform this task.

"Rarity and Pinkie," continued Twilight, looking at those two Ponies, "you'll create a diversion to distract the dragon if things get a little hairy in there."

Pinkie Pie was quick to respond. She produced a yellow rubber chicken squeaky toy, grabbed it by the neck in her teeth, and proceeded to vigorously whip it back and forth before her.

Rarity stood next to Pinkie, looking and pointing at the antics of the pink Earth Pony with an expression of confusion on her own face.

Twilight stared at this for a moment, uncertain of exactly why Pinkie was doing this. Then she turned to Applejack.

"Applejack," Twilight asked, "you're ready with the apples in case he decides to attack."

It was a statement rather than a question; Twilight obviously had complete confidence in her.

Applejack grabbed two apples from her bags and nodded, smiling. She demonstrated her capabilities by tossing them behind her and bucking each one in mid-air with her hind hooves, slapping them accurately into a target tree. The fruit hit with enough force to completely splatter. She gave Twilight a fierce look, indicating her confidence.

"But it shouldn't come to that," continued Twilight, "because Fluttershy will do what she needs to do to wake him up ..."

A wave of utter terror swept through Fluttershy from nose to tail at the very concept. I knew I was going to do this, she thought to herself, but I'm actually supposed to wake ... up ... a DRAGON?!! Oh no no, if the Dragon's asleep let him stay asleep because when he's asleep he won't be tearing us all to pieces!

"... and between the two of us, we should be able to get him to understand why he needs to go." Twilight concluded.

I'm going to go into that dark .. stinking ... horrifying ... cave and wake up a DRAGON? Fluttershy mind cycled again and again and again on the same thoughts. What if he doesn't like being woken up? What if he crushes me or eats me or crushes me AND eats me?

"Is everypony ready then?" asked Twilight.

Four Ponies affirmed their readiness. Rarity and Applejack nodded, standing there with brave determination. Rainbow Dash hovered, ready for action. Pinkie Pie bounced up and down in glee at the prospect of getting to meet a real live dragon.

Fluttershy cowered in the dirt. I can't go in there. I just can't! She wanted to not be a part of this. Don't look at me! Don't notice me! her mind was screaming.

"Okay then," said Twilight, narrowing her eyes with determination. "We're going in!"

She turned and walked slowly into the cavern mouth, assuming that Fluttershy would follow her.

Fluttershy did not get up to follow her. Instead, she closed her eyes tight shut and buried her face in the dirt. Fluttershy hid under her own mane and tail, trembling in utter terror, desperately hoping that nopony would pay any attention to her.

Nopony did, for quite a while.

Fluttershy was not quite sure why. She was aware that, sometimes, when she really didn't want to be noticed, she wasn't. Ponies who should have seen her, or known where she was, seemed to slide their eyes over her without registering her presence, or even forget she was there. Sometimes this happened to her without her consciously willing it to occur. It was a good way of avoiding attention.

It bought her a couple of minutes this time. Nopony noticed that she had not gone into the cave with Twilight Sparkle.

Until Twilight Sparkle herself noticed Fluttershy's absence.

***

"Come on!" cried Twilight Sparkle with an edge of exasperation in her voice, grabbing Fluttershy's wingtips in her teeth and pulling painfully backward, until Fluttershy was forced to pull her face out of the dirt. "We have to do this!" She got her nose under Fluttershy's rump and pushed upward, trying to make Fluttershy stand up.

Fluttershy did, for a moment, but as soon as Twilight pulled her head back, Fluttershy sat back down again on her rump.

"Now!" insisted Twilight, in what only the scholar-mage's extreme emotional self-control and the knowledge that there was a potentially-hostile Dragon in the cave was keeping from becoming a full-fledged shriek of rage. She resumed pushing.

Fluttershy felt somepony else also shoving at her, and dimly realized that it was none other than Rainbow Dash. Her fear was so great that this knowledge only slightly increased the dull pain at the core of her being. She dug her front hooves firmly into the ground, struggling with all her might to prevent herself from being forced to get up and confront the Dragon.

"Every ... second longer that dragon ..." Twilight said in a voice rising slowly in volume and pitch, interspersed with her grunts of effort "... sleeps is another ... acre of Equestria that is covered in ... smoke." Rarity, then Applejack and finally Pinkie added their strength to the effort to force Fluttershy to her feet.

The pressure was immense. Fluttershy was only a single Pegasus, and five other Ponies were uniting their strength in the attempt to move her. But they were not animated by Fluttershy's stark terror: her adrenaline surged, and somehow she found the ability to withstand their combined efforts.

Isn't this ridiculous, some detached, sane portion of her mind commented. I've gone berserk with fear. I can summon all this strength to stop my own friends, but I can't find the courage to face the Dragon. Or even to face my friends. They don't understand why I'm doing this -- I have to tell them ...

Fluttershy did what she should have done at the start of this. She spoke.

"I ... I ... I can't go in the cave.," she said.

Everypony stopped pushing, looked at her, and groaned in exasperation.

"Oh, great," said Rainbow Dash, flitting up to the top of the cave mouth. "She's scared of caves now, too!"

"I'm not scared of caves," Fluttershy addressed Rainbow directly. Through everything it was still important to her that Rainbow understand that she was not a total coward. Maybe someday Rainbow would forgive her this betrayal. Fluttershy looked away, ashamed to admit the truth. "I'm scared of ... dra ..." she mumbled the rest of it, afraid to name her horror.

Applejack stepped over close to Fluttershy, a concerned look on her face. "What's that, sugarcube?" she asked.

Fluttershy looked away from those soft green eyes. "I'm scared of dra ..." again, still flinching from the word.

Twilight came up on her side. "What?" she asked.

Fluttershy rose to her hind legs, forelegs gathered close to her, and forced it all out in a single burst of speech. "I'm scared of Dragons!"

Possibly by coincidence, possibly because the Dragon may have already been coming awake, there came from the cave mouth a titanic snore, the infrabass undertones shivering through their bones and shaking the whole ledge, immediately followed by an immense cloud of choking, sulfurous smoke.

Fluttershy screamed and hid in what instincts dimly remembered from her foalhood told her was the safest place possible: behind Mother! She tried to crawl under Mother, but for some reason her mother was too close to the ground, so instead she pressed her own hindquarters against Mother's, crouched to the ground, and curled herself up very small.

Her actual mother, of course, was interned in a mental hospital in far-off Cloudsdale, in part because of an even more extreme and irrational fear of Dragons. So how could she be here? As the capacity for logical thought returned to Fluttershy, she discovered that she was, in fact, hiding under Applejack's tail. Applejack, with her usual kindness, tolerated this familiarity.

Twilight Sparkle bounded around Applejack. "But Fluttershy," Twilight pointed out, "you have a wonderful talent dealing with all kinds of animals,"

"Because they're not Dragons!" replied Fluttershy.

How to explain the sheer terror of it -- something huge and carnivorous, something so brilliantly malicious, so sadistically willing to tear apart comfortable safe seeming homes like the one in which she had been raised and seek out and tear apart helpless little pink-and-yellow fillies hiding under their beds? They would never understand. They would just think she was crazy. Like her mother.

"Oh, come on!" shouted Rainbow Dash, waving her forelegs in midair by way of emphasis. "We've seen you walk up to a horrible manticore like it was nothing!" Rainbow's expression seemed to change, less contemptuous and more annoyed.

Maybe she can understand -- that I'm not a complete coward, Fluttershy thought, a faint hope kindling in her breast. That this is different ... Fluttershy knew that she had to make the effort.

She turned, looked straight at Rainbow Dash, silently pleading for understanding. "Yes," she said, "because he wasn't a Dragon."

Manticores could be savage in the hunt or a dominance fight; males killed the cubs of their rivals; and they were certainly capable of killing Ponies. However, they were beasts like any other -- innocent, and gentle to those they considered friends. Dragons were different -- they had an evil, sapient cruelty that had been created specifically to search out and destroy helpless little Pegasi like herself, she knew it, that's what her mother had constantly told her and even if it didn't make sense it was seared into the depths of her soul.

Dwelling on the very thought terrified her further and she once again hid behind the uncomplaining Applejack. There was something about Applejack in this time of utter fear and humiliation that reminded her of Mother -- not her actual mother, who had been confused and flighty -- but some ideal of Mother that was even deeper in her mind than her fear of Dragons. She knew that Applejack was only a couple of years older than herself, but at that moment she wished she could have been Applejack's foal. It was an embarrassing thought, but at the moment she drew immense comfort from the orange mare's nearness and warmth, and strength from her love.

"Spike is a Dragon," pointed out Pinkie Pie. "You're not scared of him."

For the second time that day, Fluttershy reflected upon Spike's nature.

Spike was not big and frightening. He was small and loveable. She knew he was potentially far more dangerous than he looked -- more dangerous than perhaps even Twilight Sparkle realized. He had teeth that could shear and claws that could gouge through solid stone, an armored hide impervious to anything but considerable and well-focused force, and a metabolism that let him breathe fire hot enough to set wood ablaze -- in a few more years, probably hot enough to melt steel -- but Spike seemed to have no inclination to use these natural abilities in any way that would harm Ponies.

For a moment, Fluttershy teetered on the edge of a general realization regarding Dragons, one she had long ago experienced regarding dangerous creatures in general -- but in the end her childhood conditioning was too strong. So she came to a different conclusion.

"Yes," she said, slowly peering out from behind Applejack, "because he not a huge, gigantic, terrifying, enormous, teeth-gnashing, sharp-scale having, horn-wearing, smoke-snoring, could eat a pony in one bite, totally all grown-up dragon!"

At this -- perhaps coincidentally -- the Dragon within the mountain let out a tremendous, snarling and ratcheting snore that Fluttershy felt in her internal organs and bones. Whimpering in helpless fear, Fluttershy flung herself down on her belly and pressed herself to the ground, eyes shut tight, making incoherent little cries and shaking uncontrollably.

"But --" asked Twilight Sparkle, utter frustration plain in her tone, "if you're so afraid of Dragons, why didn't you say something before we came all the way up here?"

Fluttershy looked away from everypony.

"I was afraid to," she admitted.

Rainbow Dash covered her own eyes with a foreleg. "Augh," she said, clearly disgusted at Fluttershy's cowardice.

Fluttershy felt a nudge up and under her rump, realized who it was, and offered no resistance as Applejack got her back up on her own four hooves.

"All of us are scared of that Dragon," Applejack said, giving Fluttershy a sympathetic smile.

"I'm not!" insisted Rainbow Dash.

Applejack frowned and rolled her eyes. "Almost all of us are scared of that Dragon," she amended her statement. Her face softened, and she moved in closer, smiling at Fluttershy, "but we've got a job to do." Applejack's expression grew more determined, but still friendly. "So, get in there with Twilight, and show her what you're made of!"

Fluttershy struggled with her fear.

"I ... I ..." she began. Her friends were all smiling hopefully and encouragingly at her, hoping that she would say yes. Except for Rainbow Dash, who looked angry. That's because she knows me too well, thought Fluttershy. She knows what I'm going to say. "... I just ..." She closed her eyes. She could not look at her friends when she was about to disappoint them all, prove to them her own utter worthlessness. She opened her eyes again for a moment. The image of her friends was blurred by her own tears. "... can't." She hung her head in shame, set her foot on the path down the mountain.

"Oh, Fluttershy," she heard Twilight Sparkle say sadly.

She had failed. Failed her friends, failed herself.

Just failed.

Author's Note:

-----

Yes, Fluttershy has the power to "cloud minds" to her presence -- psychic augmentation to her stealth. This is a subsidiary power of her Stare. As you are seeing here, she can activate it subconsciously. She becomes essentially "unnoticeable" -- the reflected light from her still registers on the retinas of observers, but their visual cortices do not properly process her as an image, nor can anyone near her even focus on the thought of her. Hence, Twilight did not realize that Fluttershy wasn't by her side, and more significantly, the other four Ponies outside with Fluttershy did not realize that they should have been seeing Fluttershy walking into that cave with her.

It's an ideal power for the ultimate Changeling Infiltrator, which was the role her sire intended her to play. It is, however, a limited power -- it doesn't work on a strong-willed Pony actively looking for her, nor does it work on anypony when another pony is calling attention to her location. She'd have to give somepony a full Stare in order to overcome that degree of mental resistance. And Fluttershy isn't willing to do that to her friends.

Fluttershy is drifting in and out of sanity during that conversation. She is well aware that Applejack is not her mother, and Fluttershy does not have a neurotic desire to be a foal again. Still less, despite her own bisexuality, does Fluttershy have a sexual attraction to Applejack -- especially not one based on strange maternal fantasies.

What's going on here is that Applejack has been consistently kind to Fluttershy -- this whole expedition, and really over the whole period Fluttershy's been her friend, and Fluttershy is in the kind of emotional extremis that makes even adults wish for their mommies. Applejack can tell that Fluttershy is in a really bad state, and feels protective toward her friend.

-----

Note the alternation of sanity and insanity in Fluttershy's thoughts about Dragons. On one level, she's aware that they are simply dangerous creatures like many other dangerous creatures. On a deeper level, though, they are the bogies of her infancy and childhood -- it's a phobia, and reason alone can't banish it.

Where do Buzzies fit into this? Oh, she's scared of them, too. But then, she can never entirely get away from them, since she knows she's partially one herself. And no, this doesn't help her sleep better at night.

-----

Dragons are light sleepers, they have excellent hearing, and the shape of the cave acts as an acoustic conduit (which is one reason they can hear him snoring from the valley below). He's been perfectly aware of the presence of the Mane Six since at least they got to the ledge in front of the lair. It is probably not coincidental that he made an especially-loud noise when Fluttershy finished her lengthy description of why she's scared of adult Dragons. He's toying with them.

Comments

[FanOfMostEverything]

That paragraph early on had me imagining myself behind a DM screen. "Alright, marching order. Who's where?"

The bit about AJ fitting a sort of maternal ideal had me wondering if she's what a changeling queen is supposed to be. The author's note rather put the lie to that. Besides, that's a different story.

Also, wow, the dragon's kind of a jerk. Of course, if he weren't, he probably wouldn't be here. At least he's not going to eat anypony. Of course, that's probably because he enjoys having his constituent atoms attached to one another...

Fluttershy's naturalist insight on the others' attempts to reason with, charm, kick, and... Pinkie the dragon should be fascinating, assuming she isn't too consumed by self-loathing. On the other hand, if she is, then the story will probably fast-forward to her moment of awesome. In either case, looking forward to more.

[Jordan179]

4427549

That paragraph early on had me imagining myself behind a DM screen. "Alright, marching order. Who's where?"

This occurred to me as well when I was writing it. Of course, the march order is important to both action and character development in this story, which is why the original episode was careful to show it in establishing shots. Do you notice that Applejack made sure that she was close to Fluttershy most of the time? I'm not telling the story from Applejack's POV, but I figure she was thinking something along the lines of "Fluttershy's right spooked, I better stick by her and make sure she's all right."

The bit about AJ fitting a sort of maternal ideal had me wondering if she's what a changeling queen is supposed to be. The author's note rather put the lie to that. Besides, that's a different story.

Applejack would make a great Changeling Queen. She's already fairly eusocial, just as a normal Earth Pony. She would certainly make a better Changeling Queen than Chrysalis, were AJ a Changeling. Applejack's behavior in this story -- which is mostly in the original episode -- is very maternal and protective toward Fluttershy.

Fluttershy actually demonstrates some tendencies in that direction, which may or may not have something to do with her being part-Changeling. For instance her assemblage of animals cluster around her rather as a Hive might around their Queen. And she actually does subsist in part off their love.

Also, wow, the dragon's kind of a jerk. Of course, if he weren't, he probably wouldn't be here. At least he's not going to eat anypony. Of course, that's probably because he enjoys having his constituent atoms attached to one another...

Watching the original episode, I concluded that the Dragon was mostly playing with them the whole time. At no point, save possibly after Rainbow Dash kicked him in the head, was he attempting to do them serious harm. The reason, obviously, is that he knows he'd attract Celestia's wrath if he started killing Ponies.

I'm glad you like my version.

[Redric Carrun]

"because Fluttershy will do what she needs to do to wake him up ...

*missing quotation mark

***
.

"Come on!" cried Twilight Sparkle

*mysterious period

."Oh, come on!"

*extraneous period

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself. And dragons. Because, seriously, dragons.

[JAPH]

the close presence of the Dragon

"Dragon" probably shouldn't be capitalized here, unless maybe you mean to refer to the primordial archetype that they're afraid if for evolutionary reasons (as opposed to the specific animal in the cave).

overhwhelmed

"overwhelmed"

looking at those two Ponies

"Ponies" shouldn't be capitalized here.

The capitalization issues recur several times.

Additionally, you're inconsistent in your capitalization of "pegasus". Personally, I wouldn't capitalize any of the three races/Kinds/whatevers, but that's up to you--but you need to do it the same way every time.

[krazykidfannumber2]

Couldn't you have a chapter that takes place after the end of the episode in which Fluttershy explains why she's so scared of dragons?

[Walabio]

After returning to 1 of your other stories for reasons which you know, I realized that I never read the FlutterArc. It is interesting that changelings in your ShadowVerse can both mimic and block perception. They are like octopuses and cuttlefish (capable of breaking up their outline so that they look like nothing or mimicking objects. Blocking perception seems much better than breaking up outline because fluttershy can move without others perceiving her.