//------------------------------// // Chapter 6: Ramification // Story: A Cold Night's Sleep // by CamoBadger //------------------------------// Chapter 6: Ramification         The faint scent of oil filled the air of the cramped hotel room, covering the odors of cleaner and bleach from the sheets, remnants of the owner’s diligence to keep a clean building. The floral pattern wallpaper sat bathed in the yellow glow of a table lamp, the only source of light within the small room aside from the currently closed window. Bed sheets lay undisturbed over the old spring mattress, their current tenant having never even considered sliding under the covers for a night of rest.         A large pony sat under the golden light of the lamp, busily looking over his work. A metal clip held firmly to his forehoof, extending outward to end in a small prong; a device of his own creation to assist in his work. The prong carefully turned each gear as his eyes scanned through the teeth to ensure there were no catches or slippage. The polished cogs gleamed lightly under the lamp as they spun, moving without effort as each was tested by the engineer pony who had pieced them together like a puzzle. The carpet beside the table was stacked with several old, discarded clocks; all stripped for the gears Lug Nut needed to complete his project.         The sun’s rays had been fighting to breach the drawn curtains for hours before he completed the machine, casting a thin beam of light onto the floor beneath the window sill; an unnoticed sign of how long the pegasus had been at work. After spending the night with Ice Crystal at the bar and walking her home, Lug had made his way to the cramped room at the Northern Winds motel; perhaps the only Inn that Snowhoof had to offer. Despite the small amount of inebriation he continued to experience, the stallion pulled the gathered clocks and watches from the scrapyard onto a short table, getting right to business rather than risk sleeping too far into the next day.         Through the early morning the pegasus had been carefully polishing scavenged gears and pins, using just enough oil to allow movement. Each gear was placed in its planned spot, soon to be hidden within the wooden casing of what Lug Nut considered his most important work to date. Though the walls of the box didn’t appear to be much, they still gleamed with a perfect layer of lacquer, a detail which would be hidden by the intricately carved clock face. Unfortunately, the closing of this clock would have to wait for the pegasus, his creation still incomplete despite his night of toil.         A small ding broke the silence within the room as the pronged device was dropped from his hoof, no longer able to serve a purpose until the final pieces were found. The pegasus looked down to the pile of discarded clocks and imperfect gears, promising himself that he’d take them back to the scrapyard once he finished with a quick nap. The light clicked off, casting the room into an almost perfect darkness, broken only by the dim, grey light behind the shades.         In the dark, the sound of rustling sheets finally filled the room as Lug Nut carefully slid onto his back, sure to keep his wings out from underneath him. A soft sigh blew through the stallion’s nostrils, his eyes slid closed, and the bliss of sleep slowly began to spread through his mind.         As the furthest reaches of his body embraced sleep, one of the buck’s ears twitched toward the door, pulling an eyelid open in response to sudden activity. A quiet rustling accompanied small shadows under the room’s door, a crowd of hooves standing just outside. Hushed voices conversed beyond the thin doorway, their words unintelligible to the pegasus resting within. Memories of Lug’s past flew into the front of his mind, bringing his pulse up with them. The buck’s eyes shot open as adrenaline began to pump through his veins, stealing any hope or thought of sleep from his body.         With a quiet swiftness, the pegasus flipped himself from the bed, landing with slightly more noise than he had hoped to make. Using only the pale light from the blocked window, Lug Nut quietly placed his project into a saddlebag and packed as many of his belongings as possible into another. The rustling outside increased, but the voices died down, as if the ponies outside had dispersed without warning. The pegasus refused to believe that was the case, speeding up his own activity despite causing more of a ruckus within the room.         As he flipped the flaps on his bags closed, a rough knock came at the door, not the crash of splintering wood that Lug had expected. His body tensed slightly at the sudden noise, but after checking that the door had not indeed been cast from its hinges, his pulse began to slow. Leaving the saddlebags at the foot of the bed, Lug Nut cautiously approached the door, his hooves tensing with each step. Luckily, the landlord of the Northern Winds had thought to install a small peephole on each door, allowing the tenant to check who may be bothering them during their stay. Upon looking through the small hole, Lug’s pulse dropped considerably at the pony waiting outside, even if she likely wasn’t alone.         The door swung open, allowing the pegasus a full view of the black vest worn by the pony standing in the hall, and the golden snowflake-shaped badge pinned to the inner lining. Her mane was a deep brown, though a stripe of grey had begun to form close to her right ear, a detail which gave her a look of experience rather than just aging. Her coat was a brilliant white, and obviously cared for daily to give a constant professional look. A sterling silver choker rested at the base of her neck, holding a diamond ring close to her heart.         “Lug Nut?” Her voice was rough, but had a ring to it that told Lug she may have had a beautiful voice in her younger years.         The pegasus nodded in response, still slightly tense from the adrenaline rush moments before. It had taken him only seconds after seeing the badge to know what the mare’s visit was about, and what was going to come next didn’t worry him in the slightest.         “I’m Detective Goldenhoof with the Snowhoof Sheriff’s Office. Do you have a minute to talk?” As she introduced herself, the earth pony nodded quickly to her badge as if to emphasize her position. Her steel grey eyes never left Lug’s own, trying to read his next action in case she needed to act first.         “Of course,” the stallion replied coolly. Once it was clear he was calm and not aggressive, five armored ponies moved into his view from the walls alongside the door. Their armor plating was painted solid white with a blue snowflake printed on the flank, remotely resembling armor worn by Canterlot’s royal guards, but lacking the decorative touches. It seemed they expected more of an aggressive response from an accused murderer, but even with such an allegation Lug Nut was surprised at the drastic approach of Snowhoof’s police force.         The pegasus politely invited the officers into his room, fully ready to be taken into custody despite what he may tell them. He pulled back the curtains, allowing the greyed sunlight from outside to fill the room, revealing a thick blanket of black clouds forming near the outskirts of town in preparation for a large storm.         While the armored officers began to casually search the room, Goldenhoof took an immediate interest in the discarded pile of clocks, staring at each one for a few seconds before turning her attention back to Lug Nut. “Collecting?”         “Not exactly,” the stallion responded as he sat at the center of the room, providing no further explanation than was necessary.         “Can I assume these were what brought you to our scrapyard yesterday?” the detective asked skeptically.         “You’d be right.”         “Uh-huh.” While the earth pony paused to pull a scroll from her vest, one of the armored ponies began to rifle through Lug’s packed bag, causing his nose to scrunch up momentarily. “And while you were there,” Goldenhoof continued, pulling the pegasus’ attention away from the other officer. “Did you happen to run into anyone else?”         “Yes, a pair of stallions,” Lug answered, fighting to keep himself from snapping at the armored officer still pulling supplies from the saddlebags.         The detective nodded and looked back to her scroll, her eyes scanning over whatever had been written for her. “What did you do when you saw them?” she asked snippily.         Lug hesitated for just a moment at how quickly the mare had gotten to her point, suspecting that she had already written the outsider as guilty, a point which was only strengthened by the presence of the combat ready officers. “I cracked one upside the head with a lead pipe and told the other to leave.” At that point , the pegasus realized that this was probably the exact information Goldenhoof already had, and nothing else. The dead pony’s friend had probably been the one to report the incident, and as with most all ponies Lug had met in his past, the other stallion likely didn’t wish to be punished for his own wrongdoing. The detective probably knew nothing about what Sweep and his friend had been attempting before Lug Nut showed up.         “So you admit to killing, or at least trying to harm, Sweep?”         A burst of anger hit the pegasus as the detective finished speaking. He had been right, the mare had already decided that he was guilty. The only reason she had offered to talk was because it must be required for her to do so, not because she was actually trying to get his side of the story. Lug wasn’t sure if the police force in the town always acted so quickly out of close-mindedness or if they just didn’t appreciate outsiders causing trouble, but either way he was furious.         “Yes, I killed him,” Lug barked, drawing the attention of the armored guards immediately toward him. His ears began to grow red with anger, no longer caring to stay calm for the officers. “And I don’t feel bad, not even a little! And I bet that you would understand why if you had even bothered to ask why I did it before deciding I was guilty.         “And don’t you try to say you haven’t Detective. Why else would you bring your own personal SWAT team if you only wanted to talk?” As his attitude escalated, the armored ponies began to take more aggressive positions, waiting for the pegasus to do move even an inch from where he was.         Goldenhoof sat frozen in front of the pegasus, her ears pressed flat to her head as she endured the tongue lashing. “I-I,” she squeaked, clearly not expecting anything remotely close to that outburst from a pony who had been perfectly calm only moments before.         “Maybe you should ask Sweep’s buddy what he was doing in the scrapyard, but I doubt he’ll tell you that they were trying to rape a young lady there.”         The detective’s ears shot up from her head, her eyes narrowing to pinpoints at the accusation. Her stammer disappeared in an instant, her voice taking up a tone more serious than Lug had heard from her up to that point. “Did you happen to get this mare’s name?”         The 180 that Goldenhoof pulled nearly caused Lug Nut a moment of pause himself. It was as if she had completely forgotten about the killing in an instant, her mind completely focused on the new accusation. Part of the pegasus wanted to find out why she had flipped so quickly, but another part told him that she wouldn’t be inclined to tell him. “A unicorn named Ice Crystal.” The stallion had notably calmed down since his outburst, no longer shouting at the detective, but rather calm like he had been at the start of their conversation. A small hint of anger still lingered in his voice, but not from the brash actions of the police.         “Cryssy,” the detective quickly yelped, her voice filled with worry and sadness. The break from seriousness was the first time since the mare had entered that Lug saw any amount of actual emotion from her, not including the surprise after his rant. Something told the pegasus that his addition to the story almost made the case more personal to Goldenhoof. “Thank you for this information sir,” she told him more gently. “And I apologize if I offended you, it’s just that we take murder very seriously here.”         Lug simply nodded in response, not moving from his spot on the floor in case the armored officers were still waiting for a reason to jump.         After stuffing the scroll back in her vest, Goldenhoof waved the other ponies from the room, turning to Lug Nut briefly. Just before she disappeared through the door, the detective mouthed “thank you” to the stallion who sat at the center of his now trashed hotel room.         Once she was gone, Lug got to his hooves and trotted to the window. The clouds which were building outside town had begun to move closer, filled to the brim with snow and ready to fulfill the town’s name. The pegasus watched as the six officers trotted across the street, likely to continue questioning Sweep’s friend, or to talk with Ice. While Lug was no stranger to police interviews, he was still slightly confused about why the officers in this town had acted so drastically to a murder accusation against an outsider. It was common for every town to be forceful against murder, but most even Manehatten’s police didn’t approach a suspect with a fully armored team. Either something had happened there in the past to cause it, or they really were just close minded.         The other thing which caused him some confusion was how Goldenhoof had reacted to Lug bringing up Ice, and what she had said right before she left.         “Why did you thank me?” < < < > > >         It was late in the afternoon when the heavy wooden door of the library groaned open, casting a long shadow through the entry. Celestia craned her head from behind a tall shelf, peering to the door to see who had entered, hoping it was her old student finally arriving. A smile jumped onto her face as the lavender coat of Twilight Sparkle trotted slowly through the tall archway, softly shutting the door behind her with a shining aura of purple magic.         “Good afternoon Twilight,” the Princess chimed, trotting around the bookcase to meet her one time pupil at the doorway for a brief break from reading.         Once Twilight had pointed her to the historical section of the library, Celestia had bid the unicorn a good evening to get back to her husband and young daughter, not wishing to keep her any later than she already was. However, sleep did not await the alicorn as it did for her librarian; her mind was far too worried for her sister and her search to allow such relief. Instead, she had spent the night and all of the following day skimming through every book she found on the shelf that held information on pony history, ranging from the time before ponies had settled in Equestria, up until the return of Princess Luna.         When her former student never arrived early in the morning as she usually did, Celestia had just assumed she decided to get a healthy amount of sleep for once in her life rather than race to work, and paid no heed to her absence. She had plenty left to read through, and if anything did arise she was certain that Twilight would be in at some point during the day to at least check up on the search.         The point where the Princess began to worry is when lunch came and went without any sign of the lavender unicorn. Even if she had decided to take extra time for sleep or to spend with her family, Twilight was still Twilight, and for as long as Celestia had known her, the unicorn never went a whole day without at least keeping updated with her commitments. She’d never even taken a full sick day before, choosing to send a letter almost every hour to the castle to check if there was anything she was needed for or if any issues had come up. Her dedication was inspiring, but it did tend to wear on the Princess’ nerves at times.         And now that Twilight had arrived, she hardly looked rested or ready for a day at the office. Her mane was frazzled and uncombed, looking as if she’d just gotten out of bed a few moments before, and her hooves dragged beneath her with each step. The smile which had shined upon Celestia’s face faded away at the condition of the librarian, replaced by a slight frown at the obviously exhausted pony.         “I’m sorry that I’m late Princess, little Gem had a rough morning,” the unicorn said tiredly, dropping her saddlebag behind the book-covered desk where she usually resided. Her voice was dry and raspy, hardly sounding like the usual Twilight at all, which only furthered the Princess’ worry.         “Is the poor thing sick?” the alicorn asked sincerely, hoping nothing bad had happened to Gemstone, Twilight’s four year old filly.         “No, thankfully,” the librarian said with a sigh. As if just discovering her ragged appearance, a small comb levitated from her bag and began pulling knots and tangles from her violet mane, eliciting a short wince at some points. As the unicorn ran the brush through her hair, she proceeded to apologize again and again for being late, ever the ideal student.         Celestia dismissed her worries with a wave of her hoof, assuring Twilight that it was perfectly fine. “Family comes first,” she said matter-of-factly.         The unicorn smiled briefly in response before wincing as the comb caught on one final knot in her mane. The comb dropped back into her bag, and Twilight turned to the Princess, taking a deep breath as if preparing herself. “So, anything you need help with Princess?”         “Actually, I would greatly appreciate it if you could help me get through some of these books,” Celestia explained with a smile. “I’m not quite as fast a reader as when I was younger.”         With a small chuckle, Twilight nodded in acceptance. “Of course Princess.”         Despite her apparently slow reading, the alicorn had been able to get through a large chunk of the historical section, leaving a rather large mess in her wake rather than attempt to replace the books in their proper location. She apologized for the mess, but Twilight put her at ease, stating that she needed to reshelf the books soon anyways. Most of the completed texts were stacked toward the back of the room, ensuring Celestia didn’t accidentally go through the same book twice, while a few rested open on a nearby table.         “I’ve found the name ‘Deimos’ mentioned a few times in these older books, but they don’t say any more than that,” the Princess explained, shaking her head slowly as if disappointed by her searching ability.         “How old exactly?” Twilight asked, apparently on to something.         “It’s quite a wide range, but nothing mentions the monster after the founding of Equestria.”         Twilight rubbed a hoof under her chin in thought, looking to the shelf a few times before finally speaking up. “I knew I should have ordered them chronologically instead of alphabetically.” The unicorn clopped her hoof against the stone floor in frustration before turning back to Celestia. “With how much you’ve gone through, I think it’s safe to assume that this Deimos was sent to Tartarus before Equestria is founded, which means we need to look only in the older texts. That should narrow down the search quite a bit, but now we need to sort through these to find the older stories.” The unicorn sounded almost upset, as if she had organized the books poorly.         “Not a problem,” Celestia reassured the unicorn with a smile. “Older texts are easier to spot anyways right?”         Twilight couldn’t help but laugh softly as she began to levitate books and a few scrolls from the shelf. “Books yes, but scrolls are harder.”         While Twilight began to sort through the books and parchments she pulled from the shelves, Celestia trotted to the table that she had been behind since the night before, ready to continue her search with the help of her old pupil. The first book she unfolded was a recounting of the first pegasus invasion of earth pony lands, and coincidentally, the first alliance between two tribes in pony history.         The earth ponies had been a peaceful group that survived off of the land, growing all of the food they needed to survive themselves, but at the mercy of uncontrollable weather. Then one day, a race of winged ponies from the south arrived and began demanding control of the earth pony lands, stating that the ‘Dream Weaver’ promised them their land would soon die and they were claiming the earth pony land for their own. The earth ponies resisted, and a long war resulted between the two tribes.         As the war raged on, the pegasi held an obvious advantage, and conducted airborne strikes against which the earth ponies had no defense. But the earth ponies had their own advantage; a consistent food source. In the new lands they had found, the pegasi had not been able to cultivate the land quickly enough to feed their soldiers, and did not understand that their own native wheat and fruit couldn’t grow in the dryer climate where the earth ponies thrived. Soon, the pegasi began to starve.         When neither side would concede victory to the other, the leaders of each tribe met to discuss what to do. Neither side wished to see the other completely killed, and neither wanted to sustain more deaths of their own, so a compromise was made. The earth ponies agreed to take up the responsibility of cultivating crops for both sides, a task which was made much easier by the pegasus side of the deal; they would regulate the weather in the earth pony lands to allow farming to be easier and yield more plentiful crops. It was the first story of true harmony between ponies from two completely different walks of life, which is why it was one of Celestia’s personal favorites, but unfortunately it held nothing about an ancient evil monster.         Once all of the books and scrolls from the time period they anticipated any information on Deimos would be found in, Twilight sat down across the table from Celestia, unrolling a scroll of her own to begin scanning. The two sat for hours upon hours reading through the heap of text which had been prepared for them, working long after the moon had replaced the sun overhead. A pair of lanterns lit the text for the ponies once there was no longer enough natural light to read by, casting the library into darkness, broken only by the bubble of light around the two.         As the pile of unread history began to dwindle toward nothing, Celestia grew fearful that they wouldn’t find anything at all to give them more about the monster who doubtlessly stalked Equestria at that moment. Luna was the most likely of the two sisters to gain any useful information, after all from her knowledge of the prison, Tartarus kept good records of everything they knew about their inmates. But there was no way of knowing how long it would take for her to get anything solid, and even then it would be almost another day before she could return with that knowledge. If Celestia could find something here, she could start combatting this threat earlier, limiting any damage that may be done.         But her hope for that chance was spread thin, a mere string trying to hold the boulder of reality from falling onto her kingdom. Perhaps she had been wrong to even try, only wasting time she could be using to keep an eye out for any mysterious behavior throughout Equestria.         A sudden gasp from Twilight caused the alicorn’s eyes to shoot up from the boring tale of a pony who claimed to know the exact day of the apocalypse. The lavender unicorn’s coat was drained, her eyes narrowed to pinpoints as she stared into an old, wood-covered book with no discernible title. A shiver of hope and worry flowed down Celestia’s spine at the young pony’s appearance; hope that she had found something, and fear that she wouldn’t like what Twilight had found.         “What’s the matter my little pony?” the Princess asked as soothingly as she could, trying to hide her own worry.         The unicorn slowly lifted her eyes from the book as it slipped from her magic, clattering to the table with a resounding echo that filled the halls of the abandoned archive building. That did nothing to calm the Princess, and the hope that still fought within her was being beaten back by the fear of what was within the ancient words.         Twilight’s mouth opened and closed several times without a word leaving her, replaced by a soft squeal as if her voice had been stolen by the book lying open before her. After a few moments, the unicorn shook her head and seized the book within her magic once again. Her eyes returned to normal, but her coat remained pale.         “I don’t think it’s what we’re looking for…but…” Twilight’s voice shook with every word, her voice so low Celestia could barely hear her speak. The unicorn cleared her throat softly, and continued. “It’s an old mares tale from the unicorn tribe, back before they met either earth ponies or pegasi.”         “What is it about?”         “It’s…” The unicorn seemed to lose her voice again for a brief moment, but once again she cleared her throat and pushed on. ~ ~ ~ Once upon a time, there was a colt named Obsidian. This young pony was born into a world of wealth; the son of a duke and duchess in his village. Obsidian had everything he could ever want, and once he came of age, any mare he wished. This was known to him, and to every other pony within his village. But this colt did not appreciate everything he’d been given, everything he had. Instead, young Obsidian still fought to be the center of attention, often in the worst of ways. He would bully the less fortunate foals, steal food from the markets and blame another, and he would even throw the pets of other children into the forest. His parents warned him again and again that his terrible deeds would come back to haunt him, but being young, the colt did not listen to their advice. On the eve of Obsidian’s ninth year, he committed his most horrible of crimes. He met a young orphan on the street, one who asked only for a single piece of fruit to eat for the day lest he starve. Obsidian promised the colt that he would bring him a piece of bread if the foal waited for him in front of his large cottage. Hopeful for food, the orphan agreed and followed Obsidian home. When Obsidian returned outside, he did indeed carry a loaf of bread for the orphan, seemingly giving a wonderful gift to one who needed it most. But when the foal bit into the bread, a snake slithered from within, biting the orphan. Not a pony saw this action aside from the orphan and Obsidian himself, so he knew he could get away with it. Who would believe an orphan after all? The next morning, young Obsidian woke in a sweat, shaking in his hooves and screaming of a black serpent. His parents came running to his bedside, urging him to calm down, and promising him that it was just a dream. The boy did calm, but only before he saw his pet dog quartered and strapped to the ceiling of his chamber. In his later years, Obsidian never again tormented the less fortunate, or any other creature, and he passed the wisdom of his horrible awakening to his own children. He passed to them the lullaby which he had heard first on that night, and every night after in punishment for his youth. Hush now quiet now, it’s time to lay your sleepy head. Hush now quiet now, it’s time to go to bed. Dear don’t dream of him, keep your mind off of his hymn. Dear don’t dream of him, or wake and see the dead. ~ ~ ~         When Twilight finished retelling the story, her hooves shook on the ground, clattering loudly in the surrounding silence. While the story had been strange, and perhaps frightening for a foal, Celestia was unaffected by the tale of Obsidian and his snake. Still, that fear remained in her body as her student reacted much the way a child in those old times would from hearing the tale.         “Why does this scare you Twilight?” the Princess asked hesitantly, hoping it was just that the unicorn had a deep seeded fear of snakes resulting from an incident in a cave or something of the sort.         Unlike after the first time Twilight had read the story, she was no longer stricken silent by her fear, though she was still shaky. “Remember I said Gem had a bad morning?” Celestia nodded her head, recalling that it was the reason the unicorn had come in so late. “Well, it was because her pet birdie died. We didn’t want to tell her, so we told her that her Daddy accidentally left the cage open and her bird must have flown away.”         In just the first portion of Twilight’s explanation, Celestia began to see where this was going to end, and suddenly her fear felt warranted and necessary.         “Truth is, when Azure and I woke up this morning, the bird was…well, you heard the story.” A haunted look passed over Twilight’s face, as if the mutilated remains of the bird were hanging from Celestia’s horn.         “And…did Gem…” For reasons Celestia didn’t quite understand, she couldn’t bring herself to finish the question. Part of it may have been that she considered Twilight’s daughter to be a part of her own family, and she could never imagine the filly going through what happened in that story. She was so innocent, and had never done anything bad to another pony in her short life, so she couldn’t have been tormented by a maybe-not-so-imaginary nightmare.         The other part of her hoping the filly didn’t have the nightmare was that her mind had already begun work on linking the nightmare in this story to Deimos. After all, it couldn’t just be a coincidence that something like this had never happened until the day she had been told a prisoner escaped Tartarus, could it?         “No, she didn’t,” Twilight said softly, her voice hinting that she was extremely thankful that her daughter didn’t dream of a horrible serpent. “But Azure did.”         The dread which had been fighting to consume Celestia’s mind finally won out, given the final push it needed to win the war with hope. As much as the Princess wanted to say it was just a coincidence, as much as she wanted to believe there was no way this could be happening, her mind wouldn’t allow it. Every story held at least an element of truth, that much had become clear to Celestia during her long life. Ponies could twist and cover the original story as much as they wanted to, but they all had to start with a real event; the truth. Unfortunately, it seemed that some pony-tales were more truth than fiction.