The Stare, Malevolence of Evil

by Peusterokos

'...Seen To Us...'

The Stare: Malevolence Of Evil

Chapter 2:
'...Seen To Us…’

"Why do I have to get stuck with this misadventure of yours? I never asked to being dragged outdoors!"

"Will you quit your whining already!? It hasn't been half an hour and you're already insupportable!"

In the back seats of a transport wagon, Shadow Rush and Zequus had been arguing ever since their departure from Canterlot, mostly because the latter had been complaining why he couldn't stay back in the majestic city to enjoy some 'well deserved vacations'. The unicorn prodigy was now reconsidering his choices in bringing his zebra friend due to that obnoxious rant of his.

(Why did I ever think that it would have been a good idea to bring this guy with me?)

___________________________________________________________________________________________

-Nearly an hour before-

"ZEQUUS! ZEQUUS!" a unicorn shouted as she ran through the doors leading to the Starswirl the Bearded archives.

Shadow Rush came to a halt when he found the place where his zebra friend was earlier left empty. While scanning the library for him, he also noticed how many ponies there were since there was no one around when he was originally here, and just how most of them were now staring at him with awkward glares skewing him. He apologized to everypony for the disturbance, as then after his mind felt confused to where Zequus could be right now. After a few instants of thoughts, a light bulb appeared over his head as he now had an idea where his friend would be at such an hour. He guided himself through the many book shelves and on occasion passing by a fellow pony, going to a precise direction: the library’s wheel chariots, also known as where the bookworm mares could be found in this place. After a few twists and turns, his eyes set on something that did not surprise him one bit: Zequus was there, hitting on a group of mares studying. He approached them and arrived behind his zebra friend, of whom he did not hear the unicorn sneak behind him, and gave away a small cough before...

"Zequus, what... have you been doing all this time?" Shadow Rush asked his friend with a seemingly calm but obviously maddened tone.

"Why, hello there! Come on sit down and let's chat along with these mares." his friend cheerfully replied, surprised by his friend's presence.

"This, is clearly not THE time to be chatting with girls right now. Have you even tried looking for the things I asked you before? My guess is no, because I am sure that you've spent the whole time chatting with them while I was gone and...and...an..." Shadow added before his tongue became twisted at the sight of somepony standing behind the library wheel table: it was the mare that he liked so much.

The other girls started giggling at the baffled colt. Shadow Rush couldn't take off his eyes off the teal colored mare that was so beautiful to him. As his brain completely turned into a fart, his words became incomprehensive blabbering as he miserably tried talking normally with his friend. Even Zequus burst out laughing at the sight of his friend. With that, Shadow Rush snapped out of this aneurysm, completely aware of his dumb moment and the glowing red blush on his face.

"Ok you there are coming with me!" the unicorn exclaimed, as he dragged behind him a zebra dying of laughter by his tail, using his magic.

A few minutes later, after Shadow Rush dragged Zequus away, managed to quiet him down and convince the head librarian not to kick them out...

"Shadow Rush, when it comes to talking with girls you have to be the funniest thing alive, as it always seems that your gifted intelligence takes a sharp dive!" Zequus continued snickering about his friend's not-so-slick attitude in towards mares.

Shadow Rush, on the other hoof, did not find this any close being amusing whatsoever. His only answer was a smoldering stare and a deadpanned silence. Zequus knew, by experience, what that blank and emotionless stare of his that it served as the final warning before he would use his 'gifted intelligence' to use a spell on him. One that he would probably regret if he didn't stop.

"Fine..." Zequus put his hoof on his friend's shoulder.
"I do apologize my friend, and you already know that all my antics are for joking around in the end. You are my best friend Shadow. Wherever you go, I will follow and stand by you, even if it means going down the darkest hollow. Now, do tell what you had minded, as my attention is now undivided." he smiled upon his friend, granting him the power to speak at his will.

"Thank you Zequus, that means a lot to me when you do listen to me..." Shadow Rush replied to his friend, a smile growing on his face.
"Now. I went to talk to Princess Celestia. At first it seemed hopeless, Princess Celestia seemed reluctant in giving us the permission to continue further research on The Stare. But in the end my persistence was worth it, as it seemed that I somehow convinced her in giving us the permission to go to Ponyville. Isn't that exciting?" he finished with a big sheepish grin on his face.

"Now, that there Shadow is quite admirable! But there is one question that I may ask, as it is quite answerable... What do you mean by 'us'?"

"Well that means that both you and I are going to Ponyville for six days to perform quite more than just a few studies on the Stare."

While Shadow Rush said that with a smile on his face, Zequus' face somewhat lost all of its glee as it sunk to a dismayed expression. The zebra baffled a few incoherent spasms of a question before managing in creating an actual word with his mouth.

"Well, it seems that I have already planned into getting a few 'well deserved vacations', after that you have left for the princess' locations, but it can all work in the end. When is this supposed departure of ours, friend?"

"Oh you won't have to worry about these 'vacations' of yours, because we are leaving just about...now." As Shadow Rush finished saying these words, two Royal Guards came through the main doors of the archives, walking automatically towards Zequus. Easily and rapidly overwhelming the zebra, the two guards dragged him by his forelegs, following back to the exit as Shadow Rush trotted behind the trio, carrying all their required materials.

"NO, SHADOW RUSH YOU TRAITOR! I DON'T WANT TO GO NOW, I WANT TO GO LATER! NOT BEFORE THE PARTIES, AFTER THE PARTAY WITH THE LADIES! TRAITOROUS I SAY, TRAITOROUS!" Zequus shouted his last over dramatized words in the library before disappearing out of sight and hearing to anyone in the room.

___________________________________________________________________________________________

-Present-

(Oh Zequus, what a drama queen…)

With that sudden flash in the past, Shadow Rush smiled, as he remembered why he brought Zequus the zebra with him on this expedition. Despite all the laziness, spontaneous personality and lack of discipline this character had, and to add that he overdramatized everything that was not in his favor, he was a loyal and all truly dedicated friend of his. He knew that he would definitely not abandon him whatever the situation would call for, even if what the current moment was saying otherwise. He was the type of pony that he could count on at times where a unicorn's magic and physical capabilities would be otherwise unhelpful. Zebras were adepts at arcane chants, and with time their kind had adapted to survive in a terribly hot and desolate land that is Zebrica. Perfect for any encounters with rogue of unknown types of magic they were hunting for and the now mostly ravaged lands of Equestria. In the end, this was a win-win situation for him and the research that he was all so excited abou-

*THWACK*

Zequus threw a hoof behind Shadow Rush’s head, effectively waking him up from his day dreaming and his face connecting with the seat in front of him. After a few dazed moments, Shadow Rush rubbed with his hooves the places where his face had well smacked the seat, before turning back to Zequus with eyes full of revenge.

"SON OF A…" Shadow Rush shouted as he jumped on the zebra, as the two rapidly engaged into a quarrel inside the wagon. While it was being shaken up by the two fighting colts, two stallions pulling the vehicle gave each other a stare that could only be described as:

(This is going to be a long ride…)

___________________________________________________________________________________________

-Later that day, at night fall-

It has been hours now that both Shadow Rush the prodigy unicorn and Zequus the zebra left Canterlot Castle to Ponyville in a ground-based transport wagon. Because of the dragon menace, airborne transport chariots were temporarily banned for the safety of the equestrian populace, which made this travel unnecessarily longer than it should have. Unfortunately, time was clearly the enemy to everyone participating on the travel, thanks to Zequus’ abilities to annoy anypony to death with amazing grace. If he had been a blank flank, his cutie mark would probably have been a troll’s face stuck upon his flank by now. This had made everypony but Zequus in a twitchy mood for the longest time, as the prodigy unicorn, along with the two other stallions, had to take drastic measures at one point in the trio to shut the zebra up. Even so, he still managed to continue his murderous spree of annoyance while being both gagged and tied upside down. He loudly moaned entire songs, he kicked entire beats on the wagon’s ceiling, and he even flailed his tail to the rhythm of his mischief! Those were nine punishing hours, until a wooden panel appeared in sight.

“FOR THE LOVE OF THE GODDESSES, WILL YOU STOP IT ALREADY?! WE’VE ARRIVED TO PONYVILLE’S OUTSKIRTS, NOW STOP IT ALRIGHT?!” Shadow Rush snapped at his upside down zebra friend.

“Hmph mmh dhmph mmph mh mhmph mhhhd!” Zequus moaned a gagged reply.

Shadow Rush deadpanned. His friend had actually stopped singing, but had instead replied to his annoyed question. Probably with a smart-ass reply to add more to the insulting punishment that he made everypony suffer in the last nine hours. Shadow ripped the thing gagging Zequus’, of which the latter let out a painful and loud yelp.

“I said ‘Ah Ah Ah. You didn’t say the magic word’.” Zequus finally managed to say his friend with a sheepish smile, of which was met with the sound of gritting teeth from both the stallions carrying the wagon and Shadow Rush’s, whose face was now twisting into pure hate.

“Now help me come down back on the world, as I do require assistance to get out of these cords.”

Shadow Rush fired a ray of magic at the lonely string holding the zebra from the ceiling, of which he took a painful dive down onto the vehicle's floor, now completely dazed. Shadow Rush was satisfied, and hoped that he would stay quiet for this time until they got out of the wagon. After observing his zebra friend taking a fall, the unicorn set his eyes out of the open windows to observe the surroundings. Ever since Princess Celestia had taken the young unicorn under her wing, Shadow Rush had become quite the observant pony. With his wish of finally coming out of Canterlot to visit the surrounding lands, he finally had the quiet and chance put those eyes to the test, even as the nightfall dominated the exterior.

The first thing noticeable was the air. Either because they were near the Everfree forest or because of smog pollution, the air seemed to be quite foggy and dense, unlike the air at Canterlot which seemed much more pure and thinner. A few minutes passed and he saw the town’s welcome sign, of which had a depressing story to tell. It seemed that it had been in the past quite a populated village, but now it essentially was a mockery to what it was in time, with its population count covered up by numerous numbers each one getting significantly smaller from the previous one. Of what seemed to be at one point in the tens of thousands, the current numbers showed a population of 682. From what Shadow Rush hypothesized, the population dwindled probably because it was met with many disasters, including famines and epidemics over the years. Soon after, a large piece of land covered in apple trees came in sight. It seemed all casual until Shadow Rush noticed that the trees had a clear border difference with the Everfree Forest and had completely overgrown on what seemed to be a farm, at least from what it seemed as he saw in between the trees.

(This place must have been an apple orchard a long time ago…How could this village deteriorated this bad in time? Isn’t anypony doing anything about it?)

His previous hypothesis came back to his mind, reminding him from what he learned in his history books that Equestria had not encountered, until recently that is, any major disasters ever since the last time the Elements of Harmony breathed. Minutes passed by as the ex-apple orchard was still in view before he heard a familiar voice exclaim right behind him.

“Goodness, this whole is a shit-hole.” Zequus exclaimed right behind Shadow Rush nodded to that, as he turned back to look out in the open and continued assisting the desolated areas of the town’s outer region.

Then, something completely different caught the attention of the two equines after the apple orchard was gone. This instead of being depressing was a very eerie sight: a shed completely overwhelmed by time and nature. Whenever the place was like that before, as it wasn’t uncommon for ponies to live inside living trees or the likes, this place was completely absorbed by vegetation growing wildly everywhere and damaged by the powers of negligence. The crimson color of rust and decay was present on all that was once house parts such as the windows and what was left of the door. Zequus was now saying things as he attempted to engage in a conversation with his friend, but that proved to be fruitless as all the words passed by one ear and came out of the other without even registering inside the unicorn’s head. His mind was too sucked in the amazing sight that stood before him. As he continued his focused state on the structure, he had a glimpse for a fraction of a second of something inside that abandoned shed. It had glowed…no… they had glowed for the smallest instant: a pair of glowing orbs of emerald color appearing to him from one of the remains of a window. He could of sworn that he heard a faint, pleading voice and a cackle in his head simultaneously, but he quickly dismissed both of those as the result of Zequus’ psychological warfare on him and the others in the many hours of the trip. Still, that had greatly disturbed him for what felt like an eternity, as he felt like he was being watched.

“…Rush? Shadowy Rushy, are you listening to me?” Shadow Rush heard an annoying and pampering voice behind his ear.

“Yes. Well actually no, I wasn’t listening. And don’t ever call me that again.”

“I swear, not only you can dream during the day light, you can also dream awake during the fright of night.”

From that point, the two friends jumped into an actual friendly conversation.
___________________________________________________________________________________________

-Not long after-

At last, the wagon came to a halt after a long waited travel. They had arrived in Ponyville’s city square. The unicorn and zebra disembarqued from the vehicle they had been sitting inside for nearly ten hours. They gave the two stallions their well-deserved pay after such a long and painful treatment and trotted off. Before disappearing out of sight, Zequus turned back and made sure that he told them that they would have to come back for them soon, and that he looked forward in meeting them again, before trotting off toward Shadow Rush’s direction. With that final comment, the biggest of the stallions broke into torrents of tears and his head fell on his partner’s shoulder, as he could already feel the punishment coming to him so soon. Zequus’ trolling was complete.

It now has been a quarter of an hour that the two have been walking through the near-ghost town, looking for any of the inhabitants of this village, but all thankful to the under population of this place it was hard to find anypony. Either that the public places had been closed for the night, were so permanently, or everypony was already asleep. The search had begun not that long ago, but enough to make Zequus start complaining just as fast as when they had left Canterlot earlier that day. Thankfully for both, they arrived in front of a pub that reminded Shadow Rush of a giant gingerbread house, which thankfully had a lot of activity inside, shutting up Zequus quickly. It had a panel written ‘The Blazing Pie’ on it. A pictogram of a piece of pie spewing flames with dragon wings on its back was found underneath the place’s name. This seemed like a stereotypical place for two adventurers to start their quest in Shadow’s opinion, but it always proved itself as an efficient source of information. In books that seemed to be truthful at least.

They both walked in the place, and the first thing they noticed was the pub's music playing loudly and saw the place crawling with all kinds of individuals: ponies, griffin, a pack of diamond dogs, a few zebras, a pair of humans and even…pandragons, all drunk and enjoying themselves. How original. The two equines were met with no such thing as a greeting or even a stare from anypony of the place. That was until they went to the serving counter, where a dark-pink earth pony with a cider mug for a cutie mark was working, probably since before they had even arrived in the outskirts of this miserable town. After serving a few drinks to some already drunk stallions, she finally turned around and trotted towards the new comers.

“Aye there strangers, and welcome t’Th’Blazing Pie. I’m Swiggie Pie an’ I’m th’owner of this place, as’well as th’ bartender/cook/drug dealer/escort/gambler/gipsy/jester/joker/land lord/manager/mopper/party thrower/ her’. What can I git you two lads tonight?” she said with a heavy Struttish accent that made her barely comprehensible.

“Wow, that’s…uh… an awful lot of jobs on your hooves there, lady. And what was that part with the thing of throwing a party?” Zequus replied to the mare, with a sign of interest on that party part mentioned by her.

“Well I guess aye can’t blame ya on that first part. Gotta somehow find th’money, ya know. As fo’ th’party thin’, that’s kind o’ been’ a lon’ tradition stuck in me family. Basically, every time we met a stranger recently arrived in town, we throw ‘em a party so they feel welcome. Kinda been hard t’ fin’ anypony new comin’ t’town no’adays, with all th’shit goin’ aroun’. Not’a mention’ how broke’n shit I am. Aye.” she added.

“Very interesting…” Shadow Rush replied to that with fake interest, as he wanted to prevent Zequus any chances to start flirting with her.
“I am Shadow Rush, and this is my friend Zequus. We are magic adepts that are looking for a peculiar spell that originated from around these parts. I’ll have a glass of cider. What about you Zequus?”

“I’ll have what this lady thinks what treatment I should get. I’ll put everything on what I can bet.” the zebra answered, with a hint of flirting in his tone and expression.

(And in less than a minute. That’s an academy record.)

Suddenly, she hinted the zebra to come closer. Surprised, he did so, only to have his head smashed on the counter with amazing speed and strength by the mare. She had done so as if she had developed that efficiency over the years of working in this pub. With shock and astonishment, the unicorn could only blink at what had happened so fast in front of him, as his friend hugged his muzzle with both forehooves as this was the second time today his face collided with something hard.

“Ya gon’ have t’pay extra fo’ tryin’ t’spread your genetic codin’ in this body, zebra. As fo’ your unicorn friend, he can extra discount fo’ being sweet an’ nice.” she added, giving a friendly wink to Shadow Rush.
“Now, Ponyville has over them many years after its foundation’ many ponies who created many spells, some o’ which are real famous for their own good o’ bad reasons, and no I will not be givin’ any examples. Which one o’them would it be?”

“Well…” Shadow Rush exhaled, trying to unnerve himself.
“We are looking for a mind control spell that goes by the name of The Stare.”

At that moment, the music came to a halt and the ambiance of drunk-induced joys suddenly came to a total silence, as every single individual in the place turned to face the two strangers, fear and concern both present on all their faces. The two friends noticed the change, turning around to face the crowd and seeing their expressions and back to their host, who had a similar expression to the clients behind these two. Her mouth was gaped open, with no sounds coming out of it. The pub stayed like that for what felt like a long time before Shadow laughed nervously…

“Uh…was it something that I said?”

Swiggie Pie slowly nodded her head to confirm his question, her terrified eyes keeping contact with his as she closed her mouth using her hoof.

(This is going to be a long night…)