//------------------------------// // Prologue: Hide and Seek // Story: The Amazing Spider-Colt // by NotARealPonydotcom //------------------------------// MARVEL Studios and FIMFiction.net present... A NotARealPony.com FanFiction... The AMAZING SPIDER-COLT --╚╔═╗╝-- 1 "Seven...Eight...Nine...Ten!" The little colt uncovered his eyes and looked around the room. Nopony was there. He didn't think that anypony would be there. It would ruin the game. He stood up from his seat on the staircase and stepped down onto the carpet. He glanced around, wondering which way his father had gone. He was always the best at Hide and Seek. His father, that was. He himself was second in that category. He was always found, but he also always found the ponies he looked for. And this time would be no different. He glanced over at the door leading into the sitting room. It was ajar. The little colt smiled, and trotted towards it. Dad was making it too easy this time. 2 He entered the sitting room and looked around again.In one corner of the room, a TV was currently running one of his dad's favorite programs. Canned laughter sounded from it, and he stared momentarily at the bright screen before turning his attention to the rest of the room. There was no sign of life. Or at least, there appeared to be no sign of life. That was the point of the game. The foal shuffled past the TV, moving towards the door that led to the next room. Along the way, he noticed something odd about the curtains. Was that bulge normally there...? He smiled, and tiptoed to the curtain. He could see a pair of expensive black loafers sticking out awkwardly from underneath the curtain. He hesitated, reaching out slowly, then swiftly grabbed the curtain and drew it back, ready to yell "Ha! Found you!" when his father came out. Instead, he agilely stepped out of the way as a broomstick with a hat on it tumbled out from behind the curtain, pushing the loafers out of the way and clattering against the floor. The foal sighed and moved on, disappointed and glad at the same time that the game could continue. He stepped out into the hallway, peering down each side suspiciously. Picking a path, he trotted down the hall, looking for any sign of movement, or anything out of place that would clue him into where his father was hiding. He stopped at a nook sitting at the end of the hall, near his father's study. Sitting in front of a few pictures of their family were a spare pair of glasses. They weren't the foal's, but he tried them on anyway. Whoa, he thought, looking around at the strange, super-focused world around him. It was like having super-vision, and he thought for a moment that it might help him win the game. Then he imagined his father getting mad at him for taking (and maybe even breaking) the glasses without his permission. So he took them off (back to normal vision) and set them down on the nook again. He was about to turn and head in the next direction when he heard a tapping coming from the room he was standing outside of. 3 The colt entered the room with another smile on his face, knowing his dad had to be in there. What he found instead of his dad made his smile disappear twice as fast as the broom had. The room was a mess. Scattered papers fluttered everywhere, and the wind and rain outside was louder than anywhere else in the house, due to the fact that one of the small window panes that made up the glass veranda door was shattered. The tapping he'd heard was the sound of the door closing again and again as the wind blew it in and out. He saw that the coffee mug he'd gotten for his father last Hearth's Warming was lying on the floor, shattered. That hurt the most. "Dad?" he called out. He hoped his father wouldn't think he was trying to cheat. When he heard no hoofsteps, he called again, louder. "Dad!" To his relief, the old stallion came trotting into the room. He stood in the doorway and surveyed the area, his face pensive and (uh-oh) angry. The colt thought for a second that his dad might blame him for this, and he opened his mouth to explain. But his father shushed him and picked him up with his wings, setting him on a nearby stool. Then he moved over to his desk, looking through the papers quickly. He called for the foal's mother, and when she came in her attention immediately went to the frightened little boy sitting off to the side. While she comforted the foal, his father pulled open a drawer, then pulled the entire thing out of the desk. He picked a pencil up and positioned it on a spot on the drawer, and pressed it firmly down. Something slid back, and the stallion pulled out a large gray file that looked rather full. He shuffled through the papers in it, and the foal saw a funny-looking symbol amongst them: ØØ When his dad was done shuffling through the file, he shoved it in his trusty briefcase and trotted over to the chalkboard behind the foal quickly. He picked up an eraser, got up on his hind legs, and wiped at the numerous equations and figures on it, turning his work to chalk dust in seconds. Then he gestured for the little colt to go with his mother, out to the car. His mother nodded, and took him down from the stool. She led him out the door, and his father followed, his erasing work finished. He tossed the eraser aside, where it bounced off a Lucite case and settled on top of a pile of torn papers. Inside the casing, frozen in the Lucite, was a silver spider, propped up on a needle-like pointer. 4 The little colt had no clue what was wrong, but it had to be something bad. They had never had to go to Uncle Ben's without any packing before. Visits like that were always fun for him. He loved his Uncle and Aunt. He looked into the kitchen again, where his parents were still talking to Uncle Ben and Aunt May. Both of them looked worried, but when May looked up and saw he was watching, she gave him a comforting smile. It was supposed to make him feel better about what was going on. But it didn't. After a long talk, his parents were ready to leave. First, though, they had to leave something for Uncle Ben and Aunt May. Him. "But I want to go with you," he complained when his father broke the news to him. The stallion crouched down and rested a reassuring hoof on his son's shoulder. "I know, Featherweight. But you have to stay with Uncle Ben and Aunt May for a while." He smiled, like Aunt May had, trying to be reassuring. "Someday, you'll understand." Then he stood and turned to leave. His mother objected much more than his father did to leaving their son behind. She stayed at his side, brushing her hooves through his bushel of brown hair constantly, tears in her eyes. "...and he doesn't like the crusts on his sandwiches, and he sleeps with a little light on at night..." She was pulled away by his father before she could say anything else, and the two stepped out the door. The colt stepped forward too, trying to get his parents to stay. "Dad!" The stallion turned to him, and nodded. "Be a good colt," he said. Then he shut the door, and the couple stepped out into the rain. The foal watched them go, wanting nothing more than to follow them and go on whatever adventure they planned to have. And he would have gone after them, too, if Aunt May hadn't knelt down and tried to comfort him, looking out at the receding ponies along with him. She whispered that they would come back, no matter what, and that they loved him enough to leave him here with them, safe. The little colt never saw them again.