The big black-and-white stallion looked like he had to be in pain with all the cuts, scrapes and gashes, but he didn't reply to her question. In fact, he didn't acknowledge her with more than a fleeting glance, and it made the filly deflate a little with a feeling of having done something wrong, or maybe unnecessary. Tiny cloves shuffled awkwardly in the red-tinted moss as she hesitated, concerned but ultimately too shy to persist in a care she had no tools to go through with...

... and all thoughts of anything disappeared as the world was rent asunder. It was as though the very molecules of the air screamed in fear and fury as the portal was torn open once more. She was pushed back by the surging energy, shocked and overwhelmed, the woolly ears ringing with something that wasn't quite sound but definitely not silence either. The sparking stallion was moving again, extending wings that snapped and popped and crackled, he shouted to get back and Erthë obliged quickly; her diminutive frame tore off to hide behind the big, comfortably broad back of the Time God (what was a god, anyway, and what had he meant by brethren?) but she had barely reached his shadow before another blast sent her flying backwards. She spun in a tangle of legs, wings, tail and terrified bleats and landed with a splash in the pool. Its content clung horrible and thick and nasty to her and dyed the white strands in sickly red, it got in her nose and mouth and ears and for a few horrible seconds Erthë couldn't breathe. Struggling wildly she managed to get her feet under herself and heaved herself up on dry land again, coughing and spluttering, watching in dazed confusion how the ground changed around her. the earth and plants and everything had seemed quite healthy before - strange and in the wrong color, admittedly, but completely like plants and water should look - but with terrifying speed a sort of decay was spreading from the open portal.

Erthë sobbed in terror as she stared around, desperately lost and scared and home sick. Where was momma, and papa, and Vlasi and uncle Badger, why had she gone out on her own and why was all this madness happening? Was the world always like this? If it was she didn't want to play anymore, she would go back to the world of warm, quiet darkness she now only remembered just before she fell asleep, and she would never come back to this terrifying existence known as life. Sea-green eyes stared transfixed at the nightmarish monster that pushed its way through the rift, from the Rift, shuddering at the way its voice sounded as it spoke. What the beast and the God spoke about she didn't understand, they said things that made no sense and used words she had never heard before. If only she could close her ears and not hear and...

"Erthe...

The filly flinched and stared wide eyed at the Time God. How did he know her name?

"... collect the crystals that fall from his side.

What? Crystals? Why? Why her? And where... then she spotted the shards that glittered and gleamed on the back of the monstrosity, and hiccuped in surprise. How was she supposed to get to those?

She was not accustomed to disobeying or disbelieving the words of adults, however. For that she was too young, too fresh into the world and much too trusting. Sobbing and scared she nodded and rubbed away the tears from her cheeks with a knobbly knee, alarmed at the prospect of approaching the beast but also a bit grateful to have a task, a purpose, something to do besides watching. It was almost like a barrier had been placed between herself and what was going on in the clearing. The child felt a growing numbness overtake her as she wobbled and staggered under the force of the nothingness that opened up around the beast. She saw the Time God fly up and kick out at the hard materials, watched shards come off and plummet to the ground - and suddenly she understood.

She couldn't look away as the battle continued, no matter how much she wished to. This was not something a child should ever have to experience; the savagery of ganging up to defeat something bigger than yourself, the brutality with which hooves and teeth and magic pummeled the beast  or the immense bravery it took to uproot yourself from the ground and step forward into the fray.

But she did it. In the mouth her tongue was dried to the roof of the mouth, within the tiny chest her heart was beating fit to burst. Innocent eyes narrowed in fearful concentration, and with all the clumsy agility of a confused butterfly Erthë began the process of weaving her way amongst the fighters. Ducking, darting and stopping dead in her tracks to let someone past, she swerved in delicate disgust the sizzling piles of blue drool that burned into the ground, avoided flying hooves and sweating bodies until she found herself right beneath the massive, towering mockery of a bear. It was the last place on earth she wanted to be, but she had been given a task. Whenever a shard, splinter or piece of crystal tumbled down through the air she hurried over and picked it up, gingerly wrapping the long tail around them so that she could carry them off, out of the way and dispose them in a steadily growing pile at the edge of the fray.

She felt the need to cough tear in her weak lungs but held it back as best she could. Time and time again her useless left eye made her misjudge distances until her frail body became battered and bruised after bouncing into and off of others, and her left rear hoof was burning and itching after she had nudged one of the oozing piles of luminescent goo. It hurt, she wanted to go home, tears streamed continuously down blood-splattered cheeks... but the child persisted, desperately longing for everything to just end.

---

Team Time God! Erthë does as she is told and darts in and out of the battle, picking up crystals as they fall from the bear.