Skanky Biscuits was a filly again, alone in her room. It was dark outside. She had her dog-eared copy of Pinkie Pie’s What it Was Like in Ponyville clutched against her chest. Her little pink human doll Ralphie was curled against her side. Her Twilight-Sparkle-as-a-pretty-ballerina nightlight cast a soft purple glow over the room.
Except for the closet. Something was moving in the closet, coming out of it, closer and closer. Its dark wings enfolded the room.
It offered her a gift.
✭☆✭☆✭☆✭
And then Skanky woke up dead.
Well. Not really dead. Mostly dead maybe.
Her hooves landed on a hill covered in green grass and yellow daisies. The sky was so blue it hurt her eyes. The clouds were fluffs of white cotton. A gentle breeze tugged at her mane. There was a small town in the distance, cradled by trees and mountains, dominated by a crystal castle. She recognized this. Every Equestrian who’d been a public school student in the last eighty ears would. The Ponyville of Pinkie Pie’s memoirs; as iconic as it was historically inaccurate.
Skanky would never tell a living soul, but she loved Pinkie Pie’s book. More than Monster Heart’s short stories, more than Cut Up’s Clothed Lunch, more than Kawaii Corpse’s magic realist horror. It might be her favorite book of all time.
So then, this was definitely her afterlife. How was she supposed to find Smooth here? He didn’t seem like the type for Ponyville, though she could be wrong. She watched the town for a while. Friendly ponies pranced through the streets, singing and working together. She imagined she saw Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy amongst them, though they were too far away to tell for sure. At last, she turned away — if she didn’t stop looking, she’d never leave this place.
“Hey! You’re not from around here!” said Rainbow Dash, who was hovering right behind her.
Skanky squawked and jumped back.
“Sorry to scare you," said Rainbow. "We just don’t get a lot of living visitors, here. And… I mean, it’s great you’re here. Pinkie’s Ponyville is one of the nicer places to be dead; most ponies are pretty lucid here. But… you’re not dead. So what’s up with that?”
“How do you know I’m not dead? And are you really Rainbow Dash?”
“Well, you’re breathing, that’s a dead giveaway. Plus I can smell you. Dead ponies don’t really smell like much. But you?” She waved a hoof in front of her nose. “Woo! Take a shower!”
Skanky turned pale.
“Naw, I’m just jerking your chain. You smell nice. And darn tootin’ I’m Rainbow Dash! In the flesh! Or… not in the flesh actually. Just my soul. But it’s an awesome soul. So who the heck are you?”
It took Skanky a moment to respond. One of history’s most iconic bisexuals had just said she smelled nice. It was a lot to take in. “I’m… um… I’m Skanky Biscuits. I’m here because my friends have been transgressing the boundary between life and death. One of them got lost here, and I’m trying to track him down.”
“Oh, wow. I used to get up to shenanigans like that with my pals when I was your age. Brings back memories. Good times.”
“His name’s Smooth Operator, he’s an orange unicorn about this tall and he’s kind of a douchebag. Have you seen him?”
“Can’t say I have. But maybe you can help us, while you're here. There’s something wrong with Pinkie.”
Skanky’s heart, which had been flying, suddenly took a nosedive. “Oh no.”
“We could use a hero. Wanna fly back to town with me?”
Skanky scowled. "I’m not a hero, and I can’t fly."
“You can totally fly. Death is like a dream — you can do anything if you think you can. I mean, you’ll never be as good a flier as me, but, why don’t you give it a try.”
Skanky looked at her hooves. She tried to visualize them rising off of the grass, and they did. “Holy mother of buck it's working!”
Rainbow laughed. “See? I told you. Would I lie to you?”
“Can I do a sonic rainboom?” said Skanky, floating up next to her.
“Let’s not get carried away, kid.”
✭☆✭☆✭☆✭
Rarity and Fluttershy waited by Pinkie Pie’s bedside. Rarity was sewing an infinite blue dress that trailed out the bedroom window and across town. Fluttershy was mopping Pinkie’s brow with a damp cloth. The cloth came away gray.
Skanky walked over next to Pinkie. She lay there, eyes focused at a point kilometers away, coat graying and brittle. Her mane spread across her pillow and sheets, as straight as wire. She wasn’t breathing, but then again none of them were, so maybe that wasn’t a problem. Skanky felt her throat tighten — she’d never met Pinkie; in fact, she’d died before Skanky was born. But she’d read her book so many times that it felt like she was at the sickbed of a friend.
“How long has she been like this?” she asked.
“Oh, we have no way of knowing, darling,” said Rarity, looking up at Skanky over the tops of her little red glasses. “Time doesn’t work for us the way it used to.” Rarity’s magic didn’t miss a stitch as she spoke. Needle went in, needle went out, like a sewing machine.
“She says things, sometimes,” said Fluttershy. “Horrible, horrible things.”
“Like what?” said Skanky.
Pinkie’s jaw creaked open, and a voice like an avalanche playing a glass harp reverberated out of her mouth.
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons, even death may die.
Pinkie’s mouth creaked closed again.
“Things like that,” said Fluttershy.
✭☆✭☆✭☆✭
Rainbow and the others had suggested she move towards the light. Fair enough. That seemed to be the way things worked around here. A gray light rose in the western sky as she walked. It looked like a sun, but larger than the yellow one over Ponyville, and twice as bright. That must be the light they were talking about.
Skanky walked until her legs felt like jelly. Then she flew for a while, but that wasn’t any easier. She touched down, fell to her knees, and flopped onto her side. She was in a forest. Ants were already crawling on her recumbent body. The trees were green and leafy near her, but grew more monochrome as she looked west. There was a strange noise, quiet at first, but growing. A clattering and rustling like old celluloid running through a film projector. She gritted her teeth and forced herself to stand again. No time for rest. She had to find Smooth and get out.
The trees grew more withered as she walked, and the ground cracked and dried into rough hexagonal chunks. The not-sun beat down on her, making her sweat.
After walking a very long time, Skanky came to a valley full of metal spikes. They loomed over her as she walked, glittering in the light. The ground was growing more treacherous — sometimes it would cave in under her hooves, creating a massive sinkhole that she'd have to fly over.
At the lowest point of the valley was a bulkhead — two massive stone slabs with no apparent means of opening them. A massive painting of Smooth’s cutie mark — a red pill — on the slabs made it look like this was a place she needed to go.
But how to get in?
She laid her hoof on the doors and noticed how the stone crumbled like sand. A few solid kicks and she was through. So that part had been easy.
She crawled through the hole into a wide corridor. It echoed with voices from below. Moans and screams. But not bad moans and screams. Skanky was from Canterlot; she knew an orgy when she heard one.
The ramp went down to a large, domed room. The walls and ceiling were covered in mirrors. She had no idea what the floor was made of because it was totally covered in mares. Skinny, pink, big-bottomed porn mares, all with sex-related cutie marks. And in the middle of them, twisting amongst their bodies like a salmon trying to swim upstream, was Smooth.
No wonder he didn’t want to come back.
A horrible pain crackled through Skanky’s chest. She fell to her knees, gritting her teeth. No. They were trying to bring her back! It was too soon!
She pushed herself to her hooves and wiped spittle from her lips. If they were using the paddles, that meant she had been in for almost an hour, and they needed to revive her to avoid brain damage. Well. She had half a mind to leave the poor horny bastard to his eternal rest. Then she saw something blindingly gray in the mirror across the room.
In the mirror, a pony made of gray light was descending the walkway. She looked behind her. Empty corridor. Freaky.
The gray pony stepped out of the mirror like that wasn’t a big deal, and waded into the porn mares, who exploded into dust where she touched them. They screamed and tried to run, but there was no place to go. Skanky leaped into the mass of panicked mares, trying to reach Smooth. She didn’t know if the porn mares were real pony souls or not. She hoped they weren’t, but there was nothing she could do for them. She was here for Smooth.
She’d almost reached him when the pain hit her chest again. She stumbled and was soon covered in a sea of roiling pink flesh.
“What’s happening?” shouted Smooth “Skanky, where are you?”
Skanky glanced up at the ceiling mirrors. Smooth was a few feet away. The gray pony was closing in on them, slow but implacable. “I’m here to save your soul. Come on!”
“I can’t find you!”
Skanky kicked a mare out of the way. She squealed like a foal, and Skanky felt terrible about it, but she had to do what she had to do. Another porn mare pushed in front of her, and Skanky surprised herself by biting into her neck. She tasted like white chocolate and copper. Skanky let go, shocked, and the mare scurried away from her, pressing other mares back in her paniced flight.
When Skanky reached Smooth, he didn’t look happy. His fur was matted, his eyes dark and hollow, his posture slouched and exhausted. Apparently death-world orgies sucked almost as much as real ones. The gray pony loomed behind him, light dulling his outline. It climbed onto his back and sunk its teeth into his neck. Skanky thought all was lost, but he didn’t turn to dust.
“Help!” he wailed.
“Hold still!” said Skanky. Sparks bloomed in her chest again. She jumped forward, grabbed Smooth with both legs, and… sort of… opened herself to the pain in her chest. Everything melted into gray.
✭☆✭☆✭☆✭
It was 3 AM the next night.
Skanky slammed her head back in forth in time to the music. The mic was off and nopony else was in the WSCU radio station at this hour, so she sang along, making up in rage what she lacked in any kind of musical skill at all.
FATAL!
FECAL!
FACIAL!
FROTTAGE!
That was practically the whole song, over and over again. By the time it was done, Skanky’s neck ached and her head felt light. It was a good feeling.
She flicked the mic back on. “That was The Dementors with ‘Fatal Fecal Facial Frottage’. So. Real talk." Skanky took a deep breath. Publicly asking for help like this was embarrassing, but it was the only way she had to reach out. But whatever, nopony listened to her show anyway.
"This is a message for Twilight Sparkle. Are you out there? Because I need your help. There’s literally no way to contact you; I looked everywhere online. I can’t talk about the details on the air, but something really bad is happening. Your friends — yeah, I talked to your friends, the dead ones — said they believed in me, and that I was the only one who could save them. Which is bullshit. Sorry. I’m not supposed to swear on the air. Anyway. But I could really use your help. So call me or whatever it is you do.
"Anypony who isn’t Twilight Sparkle that’s hearing this? I’m on drugs right now and you can totally disregard this, ‘kay?”
The studio door opened, and Firmament came in. Skanky nearly choked.
“Aaaaand here’s Public Servant with ‘Emergency Services are Underfunded in Your Town’.” She started the song and switched off the mic. “Firmy, what are you doing here?”
“Just checking on you,” she said, setting her bags by the door. She pulled out a stool and climbed up on it next to Skanky. “How are you doing?”
Skanky grabbed her by the mane and spent the next two minutes trying to lick Firmament’s tonsils. When she pulled back, Firmament’s legs were shaking.
“Can Ether do that for you?” said Skanky.
“N-no,” mumbled Firmament.
“Anyway, how’s Smooth doing? He all right? The gray pony actually caught him. I’m surprised he made it out alive.”
Firmament nodded. “He’s fine. He says he’s fine, anyway. He says his cutie mark means he’s good at accepting difficult truths.”
“That so. I thought it just meant he was a pretentious ass-hat,” said Skanky.
“You’re pretty mean,” said Firmament.
“I know,” said Skanky. “I don’t think I was always this way? I was such a sweet little filly. But in this case, I’m also right.”
“Skanky, I’m scared,” said Firmament. “The things we’ve seen… I’ve talked to Ether and Eternal. They want you to go in again.”
A wave of bowel-loosening fear swept through Skanky, but she tried to keep it cool. “I don’t know, Hearthie’s pretty keen to go looking for her mom. I don’t wanna stand in the way of that.”
“You could go with her,” said Firmament, laying her hooves on Skanky’s foreleg. “We know that’s possible now — that we can find each other in there. Something bad is going on, and we need you to help us.”
“Why me?” growled Skanky.
“Because you brought Smooth back. You’ve got a gift. You can save us.”
Skanky gritted her teeth, and cued up a long set — KMFSS, Crazy Train, Parasprites will Eat Themselves, Daisy Age. “Firmament. Look at my flank. What do you see there?”
“Um… a film reel?”
“Does that suggest dominion over the land of the dead to you?”
Firmament ducked her head and laid back her ears. “No?”
“Secondly, whatever's happening is happening to the dead. It sucks, but they’re already dead. There’s nothing worse that could happen to them!”
Firmament’s tight frown grew deeper. She went over to her saddlebags and came back cradling a broken coffee cup in her hooves. “I carried this here in bubble wrap. It’s from our lab.” She set it on the stool that she’d been sitting on.
Skanky glared at the cup. It was dusty, and small cracks ran away from the large chip on the rim. “So?”
Firmament gave the cup a tap on the handle. The whole thing fell apart into a cloud of gray dust.