When nothing happened she was almost disappointed, but she lifted her cello on her back and took stock of where she was. It was a bit surreal, and she’d be lying if she said she had any idea where this lay between Hollow Shades and Canterlot mountain. She didn’t know how long she’d napped before waking up, so she couldn’t even guess based on time. The fog prevented any of Luna’s light from reaching her, and the single lamp on the platform provided minimal illumination. The platform itself stretched off in both directions, but the only lamp that was currently lit was the one she was standing under. Something smelled wrong with this whole mess, and Octavia didn’t like it one bit. Missing train cars, no lights, shady operators, and why in the bloody hell couldn’t she see the engine? Somepony was taking the piss out of her, and she didn’t like it at all.
Should she wait here for the next train? It was the middle of the night, and the fog was making things quite chilly. She might end up waiting for hours until morning, and this really wasn’t the place to be doing it. If she could find an inn or hotel or something, that would be preferable to this soggy mess. She started toward where the exit was likely to be when she saw the suitcase the operator had thrown at her. He must have assumed it was hers and she’d left it behind. It wasn’t, but she might as well take it. See if she could maybe find the owner, or maybe it was contraband and full of bits. Either way, it belonged to her now. She lifted it up, and balanced it on top of her cello, then started away from the tracks, moving through the fog toward the opposite side of the platform.
She found the wall and looked both ways, trying to decide which way might have the exit, when she saw a figure sitting on one of the benches in the mist. She trotted toward them with a smile, pleased to have finally found a local to ask about where she might be. As she got closer and the figure became clear through the fog, her smile faded. It appeared to just be a pile of clothes, filthy and abandoned on the station platform. She walked up and poked it with a hoof, only to have it collapse. A few cockroaches crawled out of it, much to Octavia’s disgust. She continued walking down along the wall, feeling a little bit nervous when she reached the edge of the lamp’s light.
The darkness ahead of her was absolute, filled with nothing but the swirling fog and the occasional noise of the wilderness that must surround the station. That told her she was on one of those many stations in the countryside that were unponied, and you just bought your ticket from a machine nearby. The fact that she was surrounded by wilderness did nothing to comfort her, what with the single lamp being her only companion. How far away would the nearest village be?
The thought gave her an idea, however. If there weren’t any ponies nearby, nopony would mind if she borrowed the lamp. She turned around and went back to the center of the light, where the lantern hung in from a pole far above her. It was pretty high up, so she definitely couldn’t reach it without some help. She would have to climb it, or find something to stand on. She first tried jumping, but that obviously did not work very well at all. She didn’t even make it halfway up to the lantern.
Octavia jumped a couple more times, but was unable to reach the lantern, even with a running start. She thought about standing on her cello case, but didn’t want to risk damaging it or the cello inside. Her saddlebags weren’t solid enough, and the suitcase she was given was too thin. She’d have to climb the pole, then. She looked at the pole, and the ten-foot distance up it to the lantern out at the end of its arm, and she felt a little wary, but nopony ever gained anything by avoiding challenges. She jumped as high as she could and latched onto the pole, then attempted to scramble up the rest of it. She made it a couple inches before losing her grip and sliding back down to the bottom. She tried again and made it slightly further before sliding back down.
“Celestia’s solar arse!” Octavia cursed.
She kicked the lamppost, shaking the light, but it didn’t fall. Not that she really wanted it to. She still wanted the damn thing in working condition when she got her hooves on it. She left her luggage under the lamppost and walked about the edge of the light, looking for something she could use to get it down. She saw the benches, and she considered pulling it out to the post, but it was bolted to the platform. She grabbed it, pulled, yanked, and even bucked it, but it wasn’t giving way.
“RAAAAAH!” She yelled, shaking it as hard as she could, the metal rattling loud in the darkness.
Still nothing. Not even after that outburst. She looked around the rest of the area near the bench. Wall in both directions, disappearing into the darkness on either side. That inky, terribly, foggy darkness she loathed so very much. Not even a pony here to guide her to a hotel or anything. Absolutely terrible service.
She wandered over to the bulletin board, looking at what was on it. It wasn’t going to help her get the lantern down, but she was still curious. Most of the messages were torn, tattered, faded, or otherwise damaged beyond recognition, but from what was still there, somepony was looking for his or her cat, which had gone missing some time ago. Likely a decade or more judging by the condition of the message. Somepony else was teaching piano. Somepony was looking to hire workers for something she could read, and somepony had gone missing. She fiddled with the postings, seeing if there was anything telling her where she was. She pushed a few illegible messages out of the way, and stopped when she found a message behind the rest, that for some odd reason looked newer than the others. It was written on one of those flash cards used in school all the time. Octavia used to use them to help her memorize different notes when she was younger.
“Exit on the rails.” It said.
Octavia looked back at the yellow line that indicated the edge of the platform. At this station it was faded and patchy, not appearing to have been upkept by anypony at all. ‘Exit on the rails’, it read. But what did that mean, exactly? That she should get onto the rails and walk in one direction or the other? That would be stupid. Not only would it head for a very long time without directly hitting a town, it would likely not even intersect with most roads. She’d ridden the train before, and those kinds of intersections were sparse. Most happened down at the frontier near Appleloosa. Did it mean that she should just wait for another train to arrive, because that looked like that’s what she’d be doing. She couldn’t see a bloody thing, and getting lost in an unfamiliar place was a bad idea.
That lead Octavia back to her original goal: Get that lantern.
If she had the lantern, she could carry it with her, make sure she was still on the road itself instead of mistakenly wandering off into the wilderness in the dark. Good way to get eaten by a timberwolf, that. Octavia walked a little bit further down, until she was near the edge of the light, just past the pile of dirty clothes. She squinted as she looked out of her little bubble of light. The fog made it look like more things were moving out there than there actually were. Maybe those were ponies, or maybe those were swirls of light. The most likely option was that they were swirls of light reflected off the fog. If there were other ponies here, it was more likely they would be hanging out underneath the single working streetlamp.
…Unless they liked being in the darkness…
Octavia shivered and stepped away from the shadowy edge. She’d successfully given herself the shivers. Paranoia about the dark sped up her spine and into her throat. She coughed quietly and glanced quickly out into the night. With just a little bit of hurry in her step, she walked back to the streetlamp and stood directly underneath it, waiting for nothing in particular. If a new train came along, would she even be allowed on it? She had no ticket, and she couldn’t find the bloody ticket booth at the Celestiaforsaken station. If this even was a station! Nopony to help, nopony watching the platform for ne’er do wells and other unsavory characters. Maybe if she promised to pay the difference upon arrival? Surely they could make some sort of leniency for that. She had the bits, but she just didn’t have the ticket. She’d happily pay if they could just make it more convenient.
Octavia sat down next to her luggage and waited silently. At first, all that could be heard was the occasional whistling of the chill wind. As time passed, however, Octavia would have sworn that she could hear something else. It was rhythmic, and only happened sometimes, but it seemed to her to be hoofsteps. Light hoofsteps, but hoofsteps nonetheless. Her ears twitched as she strained to hear better, but just when she thought she had picked it up, the wind would whistle, causing her to lose it.
“Is somepony out there?” She called, not sure if she wanted a response or not. “Is there a hotel nearby? Or do you know when the next train will arrive? Please, I’m trying to get to Ponyville.”
When she got no response, she huffed in frustration. It sounded like there was somepony out there, but nopony was responding. The initial fright had given way to immense frustration. If something was out there that wanted to hurt her, surely it would have done so already. Octavia paced back and forth out of boredom, trying to fill her time until the next train’s arrival. After a while she stared up at the lantern again, then kicked the lamppost, then walked in circles around it.
Nothing happened the entire time she was there. Hours must have passed, but nothing gave way to anything interesting. No trains, no gang members out of the fog, no extra lanterns, nopony showed up. Absolutely nothing happened. The worst part was that the sun didn’t rise, nor did the fog dissipate. The fog itself, from her time standing in it waiting, didn’t seem like normal fog, either. It swirled and danced in what felt like wind, but all of it didn’t seem to be going in a single direction. She could see the whorls it made in the lamplight, and it kind of moved in what seemed like a circle.
Octavia went to the edge of the lamplight and looked inward at her luggage. She observed the fog for a moment as it moved sluggishly about her hooves. It moved inward, toward the lantern, but the clouds moved around the right side of the lantern, then turned around and disappeared into the darkness out over the tracks, following a curve that would push them back around to behind her if she had to guess. Which would then push them back under her hooves and into the lantern light. That should only happen if she were inside some sort of room, and not out exposed to the wilderness.
Maybe that was why the sun hadn’t yet risen! She hadn’t seen any grass or anything either! But then where in Tartarus had the fog come from? Was there some sort of accident that was causing the fog? And why did she hear somepony walking about? It seemed to make sense, but there were too many unanswered questions. The only way to answer them would be to… go outside.
Octavia walked slowly back to her luggage, breath caught in her throat. She still hadn’t managed to acquire the lantern, and it was still absolutely pitch dark beyond the edge of her lantern’s little aura. It made her extremely uncomfortable to think about leaving the light, but waiting here wasn’t accomplishing anything. With how thick the fog was, would she even be able to find her way back if she needed to? What if the train came while she was gone and she couldn’t get back in time to get on? It would seem silly that she couldn’t, but the fog prevented her from seeing much, and it really muted what meager light there was to begin with. She could test it though. She could step outside the ring of illumination down the platform in a straight line, then see if she could find her way back from a short distance. That should be easy and safe.
Octavia opened her saddlebags and rummaged through them. She had an ugly scarf that Vinyl had given her as a Hearthswarming gift. She wore it because it was a gift, but at this point in time, she needed something to guide her back. She wasn’t going to take chances. She pulled out the scarf, looking at it solemnly for a moment, thinking about Vinyl. She really wanted to get home. She felt tears welling up, but shook them back. She had to focus, and now was no time to get emotional. She was about to tear it when she remembered: The pile of old clothes!
“Of course!” She exclaimed.
She didn’t have to destroy her own scarf at all! She could just use those moldy old clothes instead. Depending on the material they were made of, of course. She put down the scarf and trotted over to the edge of the light, where the pile of clothing sat on the bench. They were still as disgusting as the first time she touched them, but she hoped most of the cockroaches had left. Gingerly she reached a hoof out and poked the pile. It made a moist sound when she touched it, but nothing else spilled out of the gross mound. She lifted off the top article, and dropped it to the side. That one wasn’t going to be of any use to her, it wasn’t the right type of material. It wouldn’t unravel like she needed. The next one was some sort of thick, material that was extremely tough in places, but cracked in others. It smelled incredibly foul, and had a sheen of moisture on it from the fog. She didn’t know what it was, but she definitely couldn’t use it. It didn’t even seem to have a weave to it at all.
Octavia pulled cloth after cloth out of the pile, looking for one that might unravel like she wanted. Most were too rotten to be of any use. One of them unraveled well enough, but the thread didn’t stay in one piece and would be no use to her. She didn’t want to get out into the darkness and not able to find her way back when the thread snapped at the slightest gust of wind. Finally, however, she found a sweater that looked like it had been hoof-knit, and pulled it out of the pile. The rest of the clothes collapsed sadly as part of their support was removed. She stepped back as the musty mound flopped onto the platform, spilling out a single remaining cockroach. She held up the sweater in front of her and looked at it carefully. Hoof-knit, tight weave, but loose enough to come apart, and… it had her cutie mark on it?
“What in the…”
Octavia looked at the treble clef adorning the front of the sweater, and felt a chill. She shook her head slowly, fear tugging at her, but forced herself to calm down. It was a treble clef, that’s all. It was musical notation, and nothing more. It wasn’t exactly her cutie mark on the sweater, it was just a treble clef. She draped the sweater over a foreleg, kicked the remaining pile of clothes under the bench, and went back to her lamp to work at pulling it apart.
When she approached her luggage, she noticed that her saddlebags had spilled, trailing a line of stuff out toward the darkness. That surge of fear over the sweater came roaring back and raced straight up her spine. She also noticed her scarf was missing, and felt a surge of anger in addition to the terror of something being out there.
“Oh give me a bloody break! It’s bad enough that now I know for certain you’re out there, you tosser, but you feel a need to rob me of a personal bloody gift? If you got a beef with me, bloody show yourself!” Octavia raged. She didn’t leave the safety of the lantern’s light, however.
After she had yelled her peace into the darkness, receiving no response, she plopped down with a huff, put her items back inside the saddlebags. She took a quick accounting of what was there and what was missing, and after a quick mental assessment she determined that not much had actually been taken, if anything other than the scarf. With it being so unnaturally chilly, she could understand why that item had been nabbed first. As she thought about how chilly it was, she realized that she now no longer had her scarf, and she was getting rather tired. There was going to be no way she could sleep comfortably with some sort of protection from the cold. Octavia looked ruefully down at the sweater she had pulled from the rotted pile of clothing. It was big, and felt to be made of wool. Definitely big enough for her to wear comfortably. Maybe even fit her hinds into it if she stretched it a bit, and compared to the rest of the pile, it was fairly clean. She looked over at the pile she’d kicked under the bench, and as if to illustrate her point, it toppled over.
“Ugh, fine.” Octavia said. She slipped on the sweater, pulling it over her head, and slipping her hooves into the sleeves. Her head popped out the far end, and she looked down at herself in it. The treble clef sat directly in the middle of her chest, and the sleeves extended out past the ends of her hooves.
“Feels kinda greasy, but not bad.”
She resolved to take a quick nap, then unravel the sweater and investigate the darkness. She didn’t know how well she could sleep with something out there watching her, but if whoever it was wanted her dead, they would have bloody well done it by now. She wasn’t going to be able to function if she didn’t have sleep. Not to mention food and water. She didn’t feel particularly hungry or thirsty. The thirsty was probably thanks to the damp fog floating about, but she didn’t know what she would do when she got hungry. Eat a cockroach? She gagged at the thought. Either way, she wanted to sleep, so she set her luggage up next to the lamppost, crawled on top of her cello case, and put that stupid suitcase on the outer edge of the pile. If that thing out there wanted to steal something, the suitcase would be easy to take instead of her personal effects. She curled up, pleased that her hinds could fit inside the sweater like she thought. She closed her eyes, cracking them open a few times as she watched for whatever was out there, but she eventually fell asleep.
She was awoken by a scraping sound sometime later, and her eyes snapped open to see some…’thing’, running off with the suitcase she’d planted. It had unnaturally long legs for a pony, and its tail was also strangely long and hung limply down its flank. Its mane was similar; long, limp, and covered the sides of its face, so she could only see it holding the suitcase in its mouth, but nothing else. One thing she did notice, however, was her scarf. Wrapped on top of the tattered and filthy clothes covering its body was her clean, hoof-knit scarf that Vinyl had given her.
“H-hey…!” Octavia blurted, and immediately regretted it.
The thing slightly turned its head, allowing her to see a single eye. The eye, such as it was, was covered by some sort of secondary eyelid, and it squinted as it gazed back at the light and her, there was a noise something like the hissing of steam escaping a pipe, then the thing loped off into the darkness. The clopping of its hooves was muted and seemingly far away as it disappeared into the black, taking her scarf and the suitcase with it. Octavia was silent for another second, frozen in horror and confusion at what she had just seen, but then she realized it was getting away with her scarf and the suitcase.
Octavia opened her mouth and almost shouted after it, but she had no idea what that thing was capable of. Sure, it could have killed her, and it seemed completely unnatural, so who knew how dangerous it was! It was like, twice her height! And if it could survive here, then it must be prepared to live out in that pitch blackness, so it would have the advantage on her there. Should she just sit here, impotent, until it slowly began taking everything away from her? There wasn’t really much she could do about it, really.
Octavia gripped her head in her hooves, trying to think, and she came to yet another realization: This wasn’t an actual train station, this was something far more sinister, and whatever it was, that thing out there knew something. Could it talk, would it talk? Why hadn’t it killed her? Why take that suitcase and her scarf? What was in that suitcase? Why hadn’t she looked? She really should have looked inside it. Maybe it was a bundle of yarn she could have used, or maybe it was some magical artifact that would have helped her escape! Celestia, she was a fool!
Octavia wrung her head in her hooves and felt more tears building up behind her eyes. She tried to hold them back and think clearly, but she was just a mess right now. She started sniffling, and felt tears coming. They were on the edge of her eyes when there was suddenly a bright flash of light out in the darkness. It was coming from the direction the thing had gone. There was a second flash of light, and a low moaning sound. Was something in the suitcase doing that? It sounded like the creature was getting hurt. Maybe there was something to defend herself with in it, and she’d let the creature take it! Octavia looked down at herself, in the frumpy, greasy sweater. She had intended to unravel it and go out there with some way to get back, but if something was happening out there, she couldn’t let this chance go by! Another flash of light and a higher pitched groan came from the darkness, some distance away. It was now or never.
“Alright you tosser, be ready, cause Octavia’s coming for you, r-ready or not!” She said, her voice barely shaking.
She rolled up her sleeves, took a deep breath, and when the next flash happened, she oriented herself, took a look back at the lamppost and started toward the flash. She was nearing the edge of the light when she caught herself slowing down, and forced her pace to quicken, she was almost there when the long sleeves of the sweater slipped down below her hooves, causing her to trip. She fell, tried to catch herself, and cracked her head on the platform. Her vision swam, and she tried to orient herself, but the pain and disorientation was a bit much, and she tripped on the sleeve again, falling head over hooves. as the toj�ڙW+