"But according to this book, you're supposed to add the sodium chloride first," Twilight Sparkle said.
Beside her, an equally tiny and adorkable Moondancer placed her textbook down atop a schoolroom lab table. "I read ahead, and to make a proper salt lick you need to add the molasses first."
Lyra sat at the next table, staring blankly across the room. Twinkleshine and Minuette were busy chasing after a distraught Lemon Hearts—her head stuck impossibly inside the confines of a beaker. The unicorn blinked, fidgeting with her hooves as she fumbled for words. "Girls, we need to help Lemon Hearts..."
"Well, I read ahead too, Moondancer," Twilight said in a lecturing tone. "And I'm sure it said 'sodium chloride' first."
"Oh." Moondancer droned, "I've got the wrong book."
"Girls... listen to me... I-I'm serious..." Lyra shuddered. She glanced out the windows. All was black outside. "Lemon Hearts might die. We... have to save her. She... needs help."
"That's so hilarious," was all Moondancer had to say.
"Please..." Lyra shivered, hugging herself as the darkness crept in. "...we all... c-could die..."
~o~It's no use.~o~
Lyra gasped. She looked all around.
~o~They understand fear. Not dread.~o~
"Who..." Lyra grimaced, teeth chattering as the windows melted away. "Who s-said that?"
"There are lots of heroes out there tonight."
Lyra gasped. She spun around and looked across the cafe.
Bon Bon knelt beside a mint green unicorn inside the Canterlot establishment. Survivors of the invasion huddled about while rescue workers rushed to and fro outside.
"Thanks to ponies like you." Bon Bon smiled. "They'll always be remembered."
"Yeah. I guess. But..." The unicorn in front of Bon Bon shivered, clutching her blankets. "There's a hero in here too."
From afar, Lyra whimpered. "Bon Bon...?"
~o~Hmmm... this is getting closer.~o~
The hairs on the back of Lyra's neck bristled. She spun around as the walls of the cafe started to shrink. "Where—?!"
~o~But that's not quite it. Let's see... just how deep the void is within you.~o~
"Who...?"
~o~And how much stands to be filled.~o~
"Why..." Lyra felt her own chest, wincing all of the sudden. "...am I here?"
"Because I love you."
Lyra gasped sharply. She spun around, gazing across the burning apartment.
Her mother sat in the far corner of the living room. Ceiling beams collapsed around her as the chamber filled up with smoke.
"Mommy... please..." A filly tugged and tugged at her father's heavy figure. "Mmmmrfff... don't let him die! Come and help me!" She sobbed. "If you love me... why won't you h-help me?!"
Lyra hyperventilated. Her vision started to fog... so much so that she almost didn't see the dark figure as soon as it shuffled across the room. Her head jerked to the side, eyes wide and blinking.
~o~Ah... I see.~o~
A black-coated unicorn—tall and slender—trotted to a stop, gazing at the parent seated catatonically in a chair.
~o~And such a curious choice of words, too. I bet it simply stings to hear anypony else say that 'they love you.'~o~
She tossed a smokey-green mane, and turned to peer across the burning building at Lyra. A pair of green eyeslits narrowed, and fangs showed through a deep, dark smile.
~o~No wonder we flow together so well. You've been starved just as much as me all these years, haven't you?~o~
Lyra snarled. "Rrrrnnngh!" She marched across the room, stepping over the filly and her father. "You get out of here... do you hear me?!"
~o~Hmmm?~o~
"Get out of your head!" Lyra hollered, slamming her hoof across a burning piece of debris and spitting everywhere. "GET OUT OF YOUR HEAD! NOW!"
The mare merely raised an eyebrow. ~o~My head?~o~ A forked tongue flitted, and then her eyes FLASHED green.
Lyra gasped. Ponies in pre-classical aristocratic dress galloped away from her, scampering across a snowy landscape.
"Run!"
"Flee!"
"The Chancellor has gone mad!"
Beams of green light flew at them, melting earth and flesh alike. Peasants screamed, clinging to their loved ones as the dark magic converged on them, serenaded by cricket song.
FLASH!
"No! No!"
A stallion squirmed and flinched, chained to a rack inside a deep dungeon. Hundreds of thousands of spider-like creatures crawled up his writhing flesh, dragging viscous slime all across his body until they formed a tight white cocoon.
"No! No, please! Milady, I'm begging you!"
More screams echoed across the slime-coated walls. A green light pulsed, illuminating stacks upon stacks of pony-sized sheathes in the distance—all thrashing about as stumbling thralls barreled them deeper into the cellar.
"Aaaaagh!" The stallion on the rack shrieked as the arachnids skittered up his howling face. "I don't want this! Please! Don't! I don't want th—" His screams turned muffled as the cocoon covered his entire body. The green light penetrated his form, and blood poured out from every silken seam.
FLASH!
"Rrrrgh!"
A gray stallion with a smoke-black mane levitated his shield, deflecting a blast of green energy. Clank! He dove forward, swinging his floating sword hard—only to receive a blast to his chest.
"Augh!"
He slid back across the snowy courtyard. A crumbling castle burned behind him, its smoke rising high into a sunless sky.
"Kathleen!" he hollered loudly, horn glowing as he snarled at his opponent. "You will pay for your treachery! Restore my vassals to me... or I swear you will pray that the sorceresses of Clover reach you first!"
~o~Or maybe I will add them to my hive, Miller~o~
A warbling voice chuckled.
~o~Such weak, feeble emotion. Her 'love' for you will only sustain my subjects for an hour. You know that, yes?~o~
"Grrrrrr..." Miller charged yet again, sword swinging. "RAAAUGH—!"
FLASH!
"A monarch who rules over mindless slaves is just as lonely as the day she dies," the old sorceror said, aiming her horn across the stone platform. Vaporous heat rose in pockets all around them. "Now join your abominations in bottomless darkness."
"No..." Lyra whimpered from the shadows. She looked around. She felt around. She was lodged in the walls of smoke.
~o~We are all alone, Madame Clover~o~ The voice warbled. There were fangs.
"Nnnngh..." Lyra slammed herself against the rock... the vapors... the flames. She burst through the pupa, ripping past slime and mucus. The fire grew higher, and she crawled away from the scene just as the dark unicorn teetered upon the brink.
~o~Meditate on that in your own prison.~o~
"Will... not let you take control..." Lyra hissed and struggled. "Will... not... g-give up..." Crying, the filly tugged and tugged at the adult's forelimb as the apartment crumbled around her. "I'm going to get you out... out..." She panted and wheezed. "Out of y-your head..."
Her last words echoed, as if she was saying them over herself.
Panicking, the filly looked down at the pony she was dragging.
Lyra smiled back up at her.
~o~It's not our head we need.~o~
The forked tongue flitted again, and a wave of moths and centipedes poured out.
Lyra shrieked—absorbing the blow. The dark unicorn fell, and Lyra with her. Together, they sank into the pit of Tartarus. And as their body hit the flame...
...she drifted out the other side, sinking towards the depths, alone in insurmountable darkness.
And she hugged herself, pulling the blanket tighter, clinging on despite the shivers.
The waters all around her shook... resonated... echoing like a cave.
"Lyra Heartstrings..."
Mandibles and antennae.
"I promise..."
Beakers and doughnuts.
"I'm going to protect you..."
Dark runes and harpstrings.
"I'm going to keep you safe."
Plucking.
Plucked.
A gentle chord...
...and silence.
TO BE CONTINUED IN...
==ACT THREE: SHELLSHOCKED==