//------------------------------//
// 48: Spiders 
// Story: One Way 
// by jroddie 
//------------------------------//

Chapter 48

Morning came a little bit more quickly than I had hoped. The sun peeking out of the window, shining right on my face like it had a right to be there, made me wish that ponies had invented curtains that could actually block light properly. I groaned and rolled over and right onto the floor. My loud thump that I created made Luna stir a little bit, but I wasn’t concerned at the time. I got up drunkenly and made my way to the boudoir to look at myself in the mirror. 
“Oh my God.” I muttered. I reached up with a hoof to pull down my lower eyelid to look at my eye. It was completely bloodshot. It was only the one eye, though, which made me look dangerously lopsided. I rubbed my mane with one of my hooves and lumbered out of the tiny little bedroom and into the rest of the Carousel. It was a strange place, but I had definitely seen stranger in my time as a pony. It was mostly blue, but there were piles of fabric almost everywhere there was a surface to put them on. I groggily admired the place as I tried to find the room where the food was. There were also a lot of places to get lost in the boutique, which was discovered very quickly. I was hopelessly and utterly out of my element when Rarity found me neck deep in a pile of velour. 
“Clothing usually works best when assembled, dear.” She said. I perked up my ears and tried to get out of the pile. I managed to extracate myself with only a few rather clingy strips of fabric hanging from my ears. Rarity smiled a little bit and sighed.
“I wish that I could be young like you.” She said, longing. I felt shocked.
“You look young.”
“Yes, but that’s not the point, darling. I’ll explain one day. But you need to come with me now. Chop chop!” She said sternly, walking away to some other part of the boutique. I sighed and followed her, figuring that I wouldn’t be able to find her again if I just let her go. She led me through a maze of clothing piles and strategically placed dressers to a largish room filled with little pony mannequins. There was a big pink platform in front of a semicircle made of mirrors. Rarity went over to a dresser near the wall and pulled out some measuring tapes and other things that would befit her profession. I grudgingly and groggily took my place up on the platform and waited for her to do whatever it is that she does. She finally rushed over to me with a whole bunch of measuring tapes in a cloud of pale blue magic. She wrapped them around me all kinds of different ways, taking measurements that she would need to turn me into something that would look good in a suit. She was measuring my neck when a thought occurred to me.
“What if I don’t look good in clothes?” I worried aloud. Rarity scoffed, moving down to my shoulders. 
“In one of my suits? You would have a better chance getting struck by lightning.” She said lightly. I laughed once at the hidden joke. She looked at me for a moment like I was crazy. 
“Oh, it’s nothing.” I said. Rarity sighed and kept measuring. I wandered for a moment in my mind. There was so much pressure. I had to save Equestria, almost entirely by myself. I could barely take care of a cat when I was alive, but now I have an entire dimension to take care of. It was a terrible, terrible blessing. I sighed just as Rarity made some noise over by her bureau. I opened my eyes to look at her putting away her measuring tapes and whatnot. I hopped off of the platform and moved over to where she was. 
“Done?”
“For now. I’ll need to sew up a template while you go away somewhere. I will need my space while I work, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh, no, it’s no problem.” I said, rubbing one of my ears with a hoof. Rarity shuffled around in one of her drawers and pulled out a strip of pale pink paper. It looked like an old-fashioned movie ticket, with one end that would rip off. She handed it to me, and I almost grabbed it with magic, but I remembered that Rarity was a normal pony, despite her name. She would run away screaming if I used magic around her. So I reached out and grabbed it with my mouth. 
“A free pass to the spa, down near Sugarcube corner. It looks like you might need it.” She added, looking at my mane.
“Mrrh mr meh mahd?” I tried to say, but the ticket got in the way. 
“You look like an absolute train wreck, dear! I’m surprised that nopony has said something to you yet.” She said, turning away from me to her things. She started to write on a little scrap of parchment. I decided that my presence was no longer needed in the boutique and tried to get out. Rarity was so preoccupied that I just decided to teleport out when I turned a corner. It wasn’t long till the familiar cool breeze and the muggy smell of a fresh rain greeted me. I opened my eyes to see a small dirt road stretching off around a hill. I rolled my neck and started to walk down the road. There wasn’t much to see. The occasional tree, a few bushes every now and then, but then I crossed the bridge. Suddenly, there it was- Ponyville, in all of its quaint splendor. There was a few short seconds, and then the morning bustle was there. Ponies almost everywhere were buying things, or selling them in booths, or just milling about talking to each other. I wormed my way through town, avoiding ponies trying to sell me pots and flowers and candy. I edged my way around the gingerbread house. That would be Sugarcube corner if nothing else was, I reasoned to myself. I looked around for a spa, and managed to find a perfectly normal brown house with a sign in the window that said “Spa” I smiled and walked over.

“Bleh.” I said, placing my ticket down on the counter. The pale blue pony cringed a little bit and picked up the ticket by the corner. “One please.” I added. She nodded once, placing the ticket in a nearby trash can and walking out from behind the counter. She gestured for me to follow her. I did. She led me to a room with a few massage tables in it. There was a curtain over half of the room, splitting it down the middle. I couldn’t see over to the other side, but I assumed that there were other tables there. The pony had me lay down on one of the tables.
“I’ll be back in a minute. Try to relax.” She said, and wandered off to another part of the spa. I sighed and settled in to the table. It was very cushy. I groaned a little bit as I tried to relax. I was way too tense. I looked around the spa. It was mostly blue. There were some windows behind me, and I had absolutely no idea where they fit them on the small brown house. I wiggled a little bit and finally settled in to my table. The spa pony came back in with a tube of something balanced on her nose. She squirted a whole bunch of it on my back.
“oooooh” I moaned, slumping into the table. She rubbed the goop in and my back started to tingle. She rubbed away all of my knots, my sores, my troubles. It was complete and utter bliss. “You’re reeeeeaaally good at this.” I groaned out. She smiled and pressed on. I closed my eyes and settled into a blissful smile. I heard some rustling in front of me, followed by some grunting. I opened one of my eyes in annoyance.
“Oh no.” I said. The pony across from me smiled. He had another pony that was working on his back too, but his was a bright pink. I closed my eyes and frowned.
“Do you come here often?” The pony asked. 
“No.”
“I come here almost every day.”
“I’m on vacation, you know.”
“Yes, I know. I know just about everything about you.” He said. I scowled again.
“I don’t have time for you. I never have time for you.”
“That’s very mean, and you should feel bad about it. I just love our little get togethers.” The pony said. I grunted and looked away, which was hard while getting a massage. 
“I don’t feel bad about much these days.” I said. The pony blinked his red, red eyes.
“I’m sorry to hear that, Captain. You really do need to come here often, these twins work absolute wonders.” The Angelic said, the words flowing out of his mouth like music. I felt my mane rise up. I scowled at the pony.
“Let me guess. Manticore venom in the goop?” I asked. The Angelic smiled.
“No. As you said, you are on vacation. No need to take your work home with you.” He said. 
“Then why?”
“Why what?”
“Why here? Why now!? I want to know why you’re just showing up and expecting me not to kill you!” I almost screamed. The two mares didn’t seem to notice.
“I wanted to give you a little reminder.”
“What on earth would you want to remind me of?”
“Our deal. You leave Angelics alone, and we... Well, let’s just say we won’t be as much of a problem as before.” He said, his strange jawline contorting under the host’s skin. I shuddered.
“I won’t accept. There is no place for Angelics in Equestria.”
“Don’t be so hasty. But, if you won’t change your mind today, you do have a short window of opportunity before the ship sails. Also...” The Angelic paused. He waved his hoof and the pink mare stopped her massage and walked out of the room. The Angelic hopped off of his massage table and walked over. He leaned down and whispered in my ear.
“You must remember that the world does not stop turning just because the Almighty Captain Shell decides to tromp off to Ponyville for a weekend. Just because you’re out getting massages and fucking your mare. Angelics still exist, and we are a real and very, very close threat. I plan on eating out tonight, at the local Ponyville diner. You have been warned.” The Angelic finished. He walked out, flicking me on the nose with his dark orange tail. I snorted and rose to my hooves, my body crackling with electricity. The mare squealed and dove out of the way.
“Give me one reason, Angelic scum!” I shouted at the top of my lungs. He looked back at me over his shoulder. Like he didn’t even care.
“I’ve given Slim orders to enter Ponyville and kill anything that moves if I don’t get back within the next thirty minutes. Last time that I checked, you didn’t fare too well last you saw of him.” He stated. I was shocked for a moment. The Angelic must have seen that, because he grinned smugly. “I’ll just leave it at that, Captain. You have masseuses to attend to.” He finished and walked out of the room. I stood there for a moment, steaming. Angelics, running free through Ponyville. Ponyville wasn’t exactly a special case, but it might turn out to be the last bastion for pure equine life in Equestria. I finally managed to get back down on the table. The mare was still huddled underneath another table, whimpering. I was too enraged to talk to her right then. There was another voice, however, that did.
“Hey. Come on out, it’s safe now.” A quiet, male voice said. I looked. The Doctor was leaning down on his front hooves to look at the mare. He didn’t have any wings. I stared at the Doctor. He helped the mare out from under her table. “You go on outside. Captain and I have a bit to talk about.” He said gently, and the mare stumbled her way out of the room. The door slammed shut behind her. The Doctor groaned, rubbing his forehead with his hoof.
“You scared her so much.” The Doctor said. I looked away from him.
“I wasn’t thinking about her.” I said, slightly angry. The Doctor slammed his front hooves down on the ground. I jumped.
“That’s the bloody problem, Edwin! She is the thing that you are bidden to protect, and you weren't thinking about her!” He shouted. I cringed away from the Doctor, surprised by his rage. He didn’t stop when he saw my aversion, but pushed on. “You need to know! You’ve been such a hypocrite of late. Slaying Angelics left and right, amid a score of dead or dying ponies! Angelics aren’t the priority! She is!” The Doctor emphasized, pointing a shaking hoof at the door. “You need to get you head out of your arse and realize this! That Angelic threatening you, it could have already killed the receptionist and gone on to eat the rest of Ponyville. If it were Othello, or- or Evangeline, or Marcus, hell, even Gespard, they wouldn’t have hesitated to kill it right then and there!” The Doctor screamed at me, his eyes wild. I was leaning away from him. He was only an earth pony, but the Doctor was a dangerous creature. The Doctor calmed down slightly, enough for me to get a word in edgewise.
“Doctor, I’m sorry, I-” I started, but the Doctor started shaking his head. He turned away from me to reach for something behind the massage table he was standing next to.
“You don’t need to apologize. Guilt should be enough.” The Doctor said, rummaging through something. He finally emerged, holding a sliver of blue something in his mouth. He gestured for me to pick it up. I grasped it with magic, and pulled it over to me. It was Luna’s headstone, a perfect crescent sapphire. It was naturally beautiful, the essence of nature itself. It made me want to throw up.
“I don’t want it.”
“Give it to Rarity, then. She’s the one that found it for me in the first place.” The Doctor explained, and I nodded. I hopped off of the table and balanced the gem on my back. I was about to walk out of the door when I looked back at the Doctor.
“Doctor, when you brought O-” I started, but the Doctor motioned for me to stop.
“You can’t tell me about my future.” The Doctor said bluntly. I frowned, thinking for a moment.
“Do you know where I can get a letter to Canterlot fast?”
“Twilight has a dragon in the Library that can send letters to Celestia in an instant. You might want to go there.” The Doctor said, getting a set of saddlebags on. I didn’t say anything back and ran out of the spa as quickly as I could. 

The treehouse was easier to find the second time around. I ran up to the hollow tree and was stopped in my steps. The nostalgia was almost overwhelming. The smells, the sights, they all unusually vivid and striking. The onslaught of sensory input was almost overwhelming. I took  a deep breath and pushed open the tiny purple door to the tree. It was dark on the inside of the tree, with two or three windows letting in little light. The bookshelves were reflecting a faint red glow from somewhere. I looked around to try and find the source, but I couldn’t. Also, I thought that the tree was a little bit too small to hold a dragon, so I didn’t think that Twilight could have one in there. I was about to walk out of the door again when I heard a whistle from above. I looked up, and I jumped out of my skin.
“Holy shit!” I exclaimed, looking at the scene above me. There was a transparent red orb hanging from the ceiling. The ball was covered in changing symbols and runes, which made it magical in origin. That wasn’t all, not by a long shot. There was also a big black glossy spider. Not a usual spider. He had eight legs, but was completely hairless and the size of a pony. It also had a pony body and pony head, but he had four bright red eyes and fangs. I rose a hoof to it, shaking in a cold sweat. 
“Don’t do it!” The creature in the orb shouted. I looked at him a little bit more carefully and recognized him to be a really really small dragon. I squinted at him and then turned back to the spider thing. It cackled its fangs and purred. The tiny little dragon cringed.
“It- It says that Ponyville isn’t yours anymore. I-It belongs to them now. It wants you to leave.” The dragon said, tears shining on his face. I grimaced and looked back at the spider. It looked at me with the three eyes that were facing me. They didn’t have any pupils, but were just a straight red all the way through, like an opaque marble. It snarled at me, clicking his incisors and baring his fangs. His crinkled snout was actually oozing a strange green liquid from his pores. I growled at the disgusting thing and thought for a moment. The big spider snarled at me while I did almost nothing.
“Get out of here!” The dragon shouted. I blinked, and then put my plan into action. I leaped from my hind legs and tackled the spider, crashing into the ceiling. The spider screamed, making a long, screechy gargly noise. We fell from the ceiling and onto the floor, wrapped up together in a ball. The spider had the advantage of four different forelegs and insanely strong hind legs. He actually lifted me into the air and threw me out of a window. The glass shattered in a deafening burst of noise, cutting into my skin in a million different places before dumping me unceremoniously onto the ground. I coughed up some blood, and had a moment to get up to a half-crouch before the spider leaped out of the window, screeching its head off. Ponies were screaming, trying to get away from the monster that just landed in their lap. I tried to limp away from the scene, but the spider jumped on my back before I could cover any real ground. He flipped me over and punched me in the chest with four of his legs. I could feel something snap in my chest, making my breathing extremely labored. The spider opened his mouth, stretching it so wide that I could see down his throat. It was lined with hundreds of inward facing barbs, which only made the spider so much more menacing. He lowered his head down slowly, trying to eat me. I pressed both of my hooves into his neck and tried to keep him away. The spider sputtered and growled and kept going down towards my face. I turned away from it and grimaced. Suddenly, there was a warm splat and my face was covered in blood. I opened the eye that was facing the spider and saw a red spike sticking out of the spider’s face. I cringed and watched the spike slowly retract from his face, leaving a neatly bored circle that was squirting blood from all sides. I could see through the hole. The sight ran chills through me. Something pushed the now-dead spider off of me, and that something grabbed me by the chest and hoisted me up. I looked at it. It looked at me. It smiled.
“Y’jes don’t know when to roll over n’die, do ya?” Something said, tilting his stetson with one of his free hooves.