Rainbow Dash held her breath. She knew not to swim against a current this strong, not to swim at all until she was sure which way was up.
After a moment of being submerged in slime too thick to see through, Dash felt that she was falling. Thankfully it wasn’t a long fall.
“Rainbow Dash!” Twilight’s voice came as Dash felt herself being forcefully ripped from the slime with magic.
A second later, Dash was able to breathe again and open her eyes. Dash was floating in midair with Twilight while things continued to fall around them. There didn’t seem to be any debris falling on them at the moment.
The sewers were below them now, slime spilling into it. She could see Pinkie hanging on a wall down below with two of the kids caught in the psychic powers and reaching for the third who was being washed away.
Dash secretly hoped that one was Snails. What was that idiot thinking?
At least they were safe now.
That was a thought that lasted a few seconds, anyway. There was something down there!
Crouched down low in a corner, looking up at them was what Dash thought was a pony. As Dash’s mind reeled she realized it wasn’t a pony, but a piece of cloth, an empty hooded cloak. After even more reeling Dash realized that it wasn’t a normal piece of cloth after all. It held its shape as if an invisible pony were wearing it and the cloak itself was translucent, looked like it was made of shadows.
Dash knew a little bit about ghosts. Was it a phantom?
She was about to call out to the others when it rose up completely. The ghost lifted its hood and everything went dark.
She could breathe, but she couldn’t feel the ground nor did she feel like she was in the air. It was like she’d been swallowed by a void of some kind.
She couldn’t see anypony else. They were all gone. Dash was completely and utterly alone, more alone than she’d ever been in her whole life.
Of course, they were gone. How could Dash be stupid enough to even think somepony else could ever care about her, that anything but this loneliness could exist? Even if she got out of here, she’d just be alone forever…
No!
Dash closed her eyes tight. She breathed in and out slowly, trying to regain control.
This was some kind of illusion, like the kind a ghost would make. She’d never actually been in one, but Dash heard some types of ghosts could trap you in one of these fear voids. If you weren’t careful, you could get seriously lost in one of these. That was if you didn’t die of cold or fright first.
Even reminding herself of this was an illusion, Dash was still trembling, still felt that horrible feeling of loneliness. But it wasn’t getting worse. Whatever ghost laid this trap wasn’t trying to kill her, at least not at the moment.
Then a stroke of brilliance struck her!
Phantoms could only trap so many ponies at once! So Dash just needed to become a whole lot of ponies.
Dash cast the murder spell and split into twenty crows. The plan worked almost instantly, at least for the crow Dash became. It was still dark, but there was a ground now. She’d broken out of the void and into the sewers.
The moment she was out of it, Dash turned back and fell to the ground. The memories came flooding back. Apparently, she’d been one of the lucky crows, a few of them had been stuck in there.
She got up and looked around. There was no hole in the ceiling above her and no massive blob of gremlin guts. That stupid ghost must have dragged her into another part of the sewers entirely.
She was in a part of the sewers with high ceilings. To her left was a row of ten-foot-tall statues of mole-ponies, stoically looking down on her. To her right was a canal that water rapidly flowed through. She noticed a surprising lack of stench but wasn’t about to complain about that.
The question was whether the others were nearby.
Dash noticed a commotion coming from one direction and ran off in that direction.
To her relief she found Twilight and Pinkie Pie, finishing off a rather large group of gremlins. There were still a few more, but they didn’t bother with them, instead focusing on Dash when she came in. This wasn’t the place with the broken ceiling either.
“Oh good.” Twilight let out a sigh of relief. “I thought you’d be too stupid to get out of that by yourself.”
“Can you make up your mind about whether I’m stupid or dangerous?” Dash asked.
“You can be stupid and dangerous.” Twilight turned away. “And for your information, I broke out of that instantly.”
“And I’ve been in those things more times than I can count. I can get out of those easily.” Pinkie nodded to herself twice before opening her eyes. “Oh wait, no! It was only eight times. I can count to eight.”
“Where are we anyway?” Twilight looked up at the high ceiling.
“This is the sewers,” said Dash.
“What’s a sewer?” Twilight asked.
“Um!” Dash tried to think of a halfway dignified way to explain it. “Well, it’s like your outhouse but we don’t have an infinite void at the bottom, so we need all this.”
“And how are statues involved in this process?” Twilight looked up at one of them.
“That one’s a funny story. There was like this old religion who was really into the underground scene,” Dash explained. “They built all kinds of massive underground labyrinths like this. But their religion hinged on the fact that there were mole people living in the center of the planet. When we found out there weren’t, the religion dried up. So we just converted all their churches into sewers.”
“I feel like there’s a lesson there,” said Pinkie. “But I can’t possibly imagine what it is.”
“The important thing is that all of us got out.” Dash took two steps forward, then remembered the flaw in that statement. “Wait! No, we didn’t! Those stupid kids! They don’t have any powers that can get them out of that. Do you think they’re still inside that thing?”
“Uh oh!” Pinkie closed her eyes, feeling the area out with her ESP. “I think whatever ghost did this took them somewhere else.”
“I didn’t even know there were ghosts down here,” said Dash. “You think somepony would have noticed that. Especially since this one seemed like she was waiting for somepony to fall into the sewers.”
“Looks like another sewer adventure for Pinkie Pie.” Pinkie frowned and crossed her forelegs with a sigh. “But I just had one of those! If my life were a TV show, the audience would be so angry right now. Nopony wants to watch me crawl around a filthy sewer for thirty episodes in a row.”
“Filthy?” Twilight bent over to look at the swift stream of water going through the center. “This water looks perfectly clean to me.”
“Huh?” Dash and Pinkie ran over to look at it. It was a bit dark down there, but as far as Dash could see the water was pristine if the few dead gremlins that had just been knocked into it. “You’re right! Isn’t this place supposed to be filled with sludge? And I notice a distinct lack of smell.”
“Me and Snails were down here two days ago.” Pinkie nodded. “Back then it so was putrid I had to take three baths that night plus a shower. You shouldn’t even be able to breathe in parts of this place. And now that you bring it up, where are all the mutants? Sewers should have lots of alligators and mutants in them! There were mutants two days ago.”
“You don’t think it was the gremlins, do you?” Twilight asked. Another one crept up and jumped on her back, but she ignored it.
“That’s like asking if rabbits ate all the wolves, Twilight,” said Dash.
“I’ll see what aetheric imprinting shows me.” Twilight closed her eyes to cast a spell.
“Oh! That’s the one that shows what happened before, right?” Dash asked, remembering seeing several ghostly images of herself from before.
“You are learning.” Twilight nodded.
Twilight cast the spell, but it looked different from before. The air itself turned a deep red, making it hard to see anything at all. The red light didn’t move at all. It shattered a few seconds later and then things were back to normal.
“What the crow was that?” Dash asked.
“I have no idea!” Twilight shook her head. “I’ve never seen something like that before.”
“Was it fire?” Dash asked. “Or maybe you messed up the spell?”
“Neither of those.” Twilight put a hoof on her chin, thinking hard. “Now I’m curious.”
Pinkie hummed and narrowed her eyes.
“Maybe I should have mentioned this earlier, but I am getting that ‘certain death’ kind of feeling.” Pinkie lifted her head back up and looked at the other two. “Like something super hungry that wants to devour everything.”
“What? Is it that ghost?” Dash asked.
“Maybe, but it’s coming from every direction!” Pinkie pointed down both tunnels at once. “Up, down, left, right, diagonally! Actually, not so much up. A normal ghost would only come from one.”
“Then like a million ghosts?”
“They’d have to be really hungry.”
“Yeesh.” Dash stepped back from the water. “Normally I’d say we should go tell the guild about this. But who am I kidding? If the three of us can’t deal with this what are they going to do?”
“Ah, yeah! The dream team!” Pinkie held up her hoof to Twilight to bump. “There hasn’t been a team-up this powerful since me and Nailbat fought the tarrasque!”
“Hey!” Twilight took a step back. “I didn’t come here to fix your ridiculously huge outhouse! I was only supposed to be here for five minutes and I’m already at my limit!”
“But what about those snot-nosed kids?” Dash reminded her. “We can’t just let them die!”
Twilight moved to lower her hat over her eyes, only to find out it was a gremlin on top of her head. She quickly threw it off against the wall and instead turned to the side and groaned uncomfortably.
Dash knew for a fact that Twilight might be apathetic about more hypothetical people, but she couldn’t stand to see anyone nearby getting hurt.
“Fine!” Twilight relented. “But after this, we’re going straight home! And we’re not coming back for a month.”
“Okay, but you do have to bump me,” Pinkie reminded her.
Twilight sighed but bumped Pinkie’s hoof.
“Yeah!” Pinkie gave a small jump.
“So one of you two has to be able to find where they are, right?” Dash asked.
Pinkie closed her eyes for a moment and Twilight cast a spell that summoned a wisp of light. At the same time, Pinkie opened her eyes and pointed to the wall behind them and Twilight’s wisp flew to the same spot.
“Though that doesn’t help us too much,” said Pinkie.
“You gotta have some other spell, Twilight,” said Dash.
“I can just use you.” Twilight pointed down the tunnel. “You go in as many directions as you can and tell us what you find. It doesn’t matter if any instance of you dies. You only need one to return to normal. That’s why you’re the perfect scout.”
Dash struggled with what she meant for a moment, then remembered her necklace.
“Oh right! The murder spell.”
Dash spread her wings and cast the murder spell. Suddenly the world was larger and less colorful, Dash was surrounded by several other crows. Half of the crows broke off to the left and half to the right, only one crow staying behind, perching on Twilight’s back, to ensure at least one would survive.
The current Dash was one of the ones who went off to the right. It was cool knowing she effectively had a spare life in this situation. Dash could be as reckless as she wanted, and it wouldn’t even matter if she died because only one crow needed to live.
There was a heck of a lot of gremlins down this path, more than Dash had ever seen before! Many of them tried to jump up and grab her or throw things at her, but Dash was far too nimble for the clumsy idiots. They didn’t manage to get even one of her.
It made her think that the epicenter of it must have been underground and the surface was just the edges of it. But that wouldn’t make any sense at all. Gremlins came down from meteors. For that to happen the meteor would need to somehow teleport into the sewers. Could one big enough to have this many gremlins even fit down here?
Every time she came to a fork, her crows would split up. When she had about four others left by her side, Dash got to a dead end. But it wasn’t a dead-end because the tunnel ended, but because there was something in her way!
It was a solid wall of slime that filled up the tunnel despite its considerable size. It wasn’t gremlin slime either, but a red, somewhat translucent slime. It was pulsing ever so slightly, pushing its way forward through the tunnel.
All the crows that made it this far stopped to watch for a moment.
The gremlins were having fun with the stuff. They’d laugh and throw one another into the slime, where the gremlin would dissolve inside. That would be more worrying if the gremlins weren’t so fragile to begin with. Chlorinated pool water was strong enough to kill them.
One of the other Dash crows crowed, apparently brave enough to test the danger. No doubt she knew she wouldn’t really die.
That crow flew forward and tried grabbing some of the slime with her talon. It didn’t work out so well. The blob lashed out and engulfed that crow! Dash watched as she was quickly pulled in deeper and dissolved inside. She’d know if that hurt or not in a few minutes.
But now she knew this stuff was dangerous. It was moving slowly but in their direction.
She wondered if there was a way to get a small amount of this back to Twilight. Dash looked around for a broken pipe or something of the sort.
Before Dash could come up with one of her patented brilliant ideas, the blob lurched forward a few feet, consuming multiple gremlins. Every crow managed to fly back, out of the way, but the speed it jumped with was unnerving.
She saw it pull back just a little and already knew what was coming! All of her crows flew back a safe distance, or at least what she thought was a safe distance.
This time, the blob lurched forward an incredible distance, several yards at least, and consumed a huge number of gremlins. Worse, it didn’t hold its shape and several smaller blobs broke off from the main body, splattering in every direction.
One unlucky crow got hit and dissolved before she hit the ground. Then all the blobs, big and small, pulled back again.
If it kept going like that, it’d be where the other ponies were in a minute. Dash had to book it!
She flew as fast as she could, swiftly down to the first bend. The blob soon slammed into the wall behind her and a second later she heard that hideous squelching sound again.
Dash got to the second bend. Another wave of blobs flew past her, taking down one of the remaining crows. Then that sound came again. If only there was a way to tell safety Dash to change back. The blob slammed into a wall behind her yet again.
She got to the last bend with only two crows left and the blob not far behind her. She started crowing as loud as she could and thankfully the main Rainbow Dash was smart enough to take the hint.
She blacked out briefly and then was standing right next to Twilight.
Dash shook her head as the memories of all the crows flooded into her head. For the record, getting eaten by that thing hurt but not as much as you’d expect. Urgency took her as she recalled everything.
“There’s a huge blob monster coming at us from that way!” Dash pointed down the hall that crow just came from.
Pinkie and Twilight only had a few seconds to get ready, but they were crucial seconds. Twilight put up a shield and Pinkie jumped forward, ready to grab whatever was about to come through.
The blob slammed into the wall at the end of the tunnel.
“A bunch of smaller ones come out when it moves forward,” Dash warned them just in time.
The blob charged down the hall, spraying several smaller blobs. Pinkie used her psychic powers on the main one while Twilight attacked the spray.
Twilight threw a fireball forward, which split into several, smaller fireballs, one for each of the smaller blobs. They all hit their targets. The goo wasn’t destroyed, but that did send it back into the main blob.
Pinkie stopped the blob but struggled to hold the enormous thing back. The real test came a second later when it pulled back and tried to lurch forward yet again. Pinkie closed her eyes tight and dug her hooves into the ground, wincing hard as she focused on it.
Thankfully, it was mostly successful. It only moved an inch or so this time. It was still making ground, but very slowly towards the three of them.
“Holy smokes! What is that thing?” Pinkie asked. “I’ve been around the block a bunch of times, but I’ve never seen a blob monster!”
Twilight stepped forward, towards a small bit of the red stuff, and started looking it over.
“That’s not ectoplasm, is it?” Dash asked. “I mean, we know there’s a ghost down here too, right?”
“Nope! I’ve seen ectoplasm and this is not it!” Pinkie took a step back. “I have no idea what the protocol for this is. Maybe my chaos bag will have something that can get rid of this stuff.”
She reached deep into her bag and rustled around, but never took her eyes off the blob monster.
“Let’s see. A mop?” Pinkie pulled a mop out of her bag. “Not nearly big enough. Duct tape? Probably the one time that’s not useful. Rubber glove? I don’t even have hands!”
Pinkie threw all of that stuff to the side.
“Bleach?” Pinkie took a bottle of it out. “Actually, there’s a chance that one might work.”
Pinkie threw the bottle of bleach at the blob. It exploded in midair, dousing the monster. It did work, to an extent, causing a large chunk of it to burn up.
“Hey! It’s working!” Pinkie pointed to the missing chunk of the blob, though it quickly refilled. “Now we just need eight hundred thousand gallons of bleach.”
Twilight walked over to the main blob. She tore out a few hairs and threw them into the blob. The hair quickly dissolved but Twilight thought this was a good thing.
“Ah! I know what this is!” Twilight gave a happy nod. “This is a self-replicating molecule. I actually made one of these myself once! It converts any organic matter they touch into more of itself. It must have come through here earlier and destroyed all the organic matter and that’s why everything is so clean and all the mutants are dead. Mystery solved!”
“Wait. You made this stuff?” Dash asked.
“I’m not the only pony who can make things, you know.” Twilight rolled her eyes. “Somepony else must have had the same idea. Mine was blue and moved a lot faster. More importantly, I realized that it would eventually destroy all life on the planet and, since I’m life on the planet, decided to destroy the stuff.”
“Wait.” Dash held a hoof out. “Tell me about the destroy all life on the planet part again.”
“I mean it could.” Twilight shrugged. “Hypothetically.”
“Why the crow are you so calm about that?!”
“These have one major weakness.” Twilight gestured to the blob. “Ultraviolet radiation should burn it up in seconds, plus a few other conditions make it hard to go above ground. I assume that’s why we didn’t see any of it above ground. It dies the second it tries. Of course, the problem is that self-replicating molecules can rapidly evolve and if it ever evolves resistance to UV there won’t be any stopping it.”
“And let me guess. We have like five minutes until that happens?” Dash guessed.
“No, that process should take decades under normal circumstances,” said Twilight.
“Oh.” Dash blinked, then shrugged. “Guess I got lucky for once. And now we know its weakness! You can just cast some spell to make us glow UV light and we’ll be invincible to it, right?”
“Ah-ha!” Pinkie pulled out a lamp from her bag. “UV lamp! Though I don’t have anywhere to plug it in. Huh.”
“No!” Twilight pulled Dash back and knocked the lamp from Pinkie’s hand, smashing it on the floor. “Hitting it with ultraviolet radiation is the worst thing you could do!”
“But you just said—"
“Yes, it will kill some of it now,” said Twilight, “but not all of it! And the more you expose it to ultraviolet radiation the faster it will evolve a resistance to it.”
“Point taken. But we need to get rid of some of it now.” Dash pointed at the encroaching blob.
“I suppose there are other, safer, short-term solutions to this.” Twilight cast a spell; an orb of cold air that frothed mist began to form in her hoof. “It should be highly susceptible to the cold as well. If we freeze the front part of it, that’ll seal the rest of it off for now.”
Twilight threw the orb forward at the blob. The orb hit and the surrounding tunnel was instantly It sent a shiver through Dash and Pinkie, but the blob was completely unharmed.
“Hey!” Dash hugged herself tightly, shivering as she looked at Twilight. “I thought you said it was weak against cold.”
“What?!” Twilight did look genuinely stunned by that. “But how could—?!”
Twilight started trotting back and forth muttering to herself. Dash had lived with that pony long enough to know how hard it’d be to reach her when she got like that.
Meanwhile, the blob gained on Pinkie a little, moving a solid foot or two this time.
“How much bleach can you pull out of that thing?” Dash asked Pinkie.
Pinkie stuck her tongue out and reached into the bag again.
“Laundry detergent.” Pinkie pulled a bottle of it out. “It’s not easy to get anything specific out of here!”
“Oh! I think I know!” Twilight snapped out of it. “See, this is what I was talking about before. Somepony must have been hitting it repeatedly with ice magic and now it’s immune to the cold. The more you hit it with something, the more resistant it becomes to that. See?”
“Cold magic?” Pinkie looked back at Dash. “You know, I bet—”
The blob moved two or three feet this time and it looked like Pinkie struggled with that one.
“Why am I the only one worried about this?” Dash raised her hoof.
“Okay, okay.” Twilight got ready to cast another spell. “This one seems to have significant resistances already, so I don’t think we should attack it until we find the main source and know we can destroy all of it. We’ll just—”
One, two, then three stone walls came out of the ground, blocking off that part of the sewer completely. Pinkie let go of her telekinetic grip to let the walls be tested. There was a slight pounding noise on the other side, but the wall didn’t budge an inch.
The three of them waited a moment to be sure it wasn’t oozing through. Twilight’s walls held for now.
“But sheesh! How unlucky are we? That’s like three major problems we have.” A gremlin jumped on Dash’s back, but she just ignored it. “Four if you count the gremlins, but I can’t in good faith put them on the list.”
“If you’re saying none of this stuff was here yesterday then it has to be related,” said Twilight. “I think one thing set everything off in a chain.”
“Okay, I think I’m starting to piece this together with my super-genius brain.” Dash pointed to her temple. “That stuff was coming from another part of the underground and the ghosts kept freezing it over and over to contain it. But then it stopped working like yesterday or whatever and now the sewers are full of the stuff.”
“That would make sense,” said Twilight. “They lost their ability to contain it, then everything else gets pushed back when it starts to spread.”
“So a bunch of ghosts made that stuff?” Dash asked.
“We can’t conclude that yet,” said Twilight. “We should probably get going for now. Did you see anything in the other direction?”
“Right! There was something down this way too.” Dash pointed down the remaining hall. “I’m pretty sure I found where the main ghost in charge is hiding. But be careful. I saw a lot more of that red stuff around and it chases you if you get too close. Come on.”
Dash started running off, the other two following close behind.
She remembered the crow that discovered this being briefly angry at the other Dash for turning back before she could study it a bit more. Now that they were remerged, Dash was willing to forgive herself.
It didn’t take very long at all to get to the spot.
“Ooh!” Pinkie pointed down the next hall.
A literal wall of darkness sat halfway down the next tunnel. There was no transition from light to dark, simply a cutoff point where it became perfectly black. To make it even harder to mistake this for any normal darkness were the clawing tendrils of darkness that whipped out of it like shadows dancing in candlelight.
“Do you know what this thing is?” Dash asked.
“Yep! This is like the ghost equivalent of an electric fence. They gotta be hiding something behind this.” Pinkie tapped her head. “Most ponies aren’t psychic enough to get through one of these, but it’s not so bad if you realize the trick is to—”
The darkness rushed down the tunnel at the three of them. Dash was completely blinded, then her heart started to race just like before.
The feeling of fear was dramatically more intense this time! Dash could only stand perfectly still, looking down into that endless darkness.
If she took one step forward, she was going to die! There was nothing she could do! She had to run away from whatever this was but couldn’t manage. It wouldn’t even matter if she did. Dash was going to die! She was absolutely going to die!
Pinkie was wincing, but more like she was merely in a windstorm. She said something to Dash, but whatever she said simply didn’t matter. Nothing mattered.
Pinkie trudged her way to Twilight, who was stunned and sobbing and said something to her next. This time, Pinkie managed to snap Twilight out of it. Twilight regained her sense and said something that didn’t matter.
Twilight’s horn lit up and an orb of light appeared before her. Like a drain in a tub of water, the darkness swirled into the orb of light until the room was visible again. Then, with a second spell, Twilight destroyed the orb in a small blast.
The whiplash of that stuff vanishing was so intense Dash stumbled forward and had to gulp to keep herself from puking. Only after another second did Dash realize it’d just been another, more intense, fear illusion.
With the darkness gone, Dash could see the ghost who’d been behind all this. She was the ghost of a long-haired mare with the familiar blueish coloration of a ghost strong enough to keep its old form.
The ghost floated there, stunned like somepony had just walked in while she was on the toilet. The important thing was its eyes. Her sclera was black, and her iris was a dark blue! Only one type of ghost was like that.
The ghost let out a small ‘eep’ and flew down under the ground.
Shaking, Dash got back to her feet and wiped a few tears from her eyes before turning to Pinkie.
“Pinkie! I saw their eyes!” Dash tried to shake off the lingering effects and get ready for a fight. “That one was a specter!”
“What?!” Pinkie turned and pressed her backside against Dash’s, lowering her head as if ready for a fight. “Quick! Back-to-back formation! Oh, man! Today is a bad day for Pinkie Pie!”
The three of them quickly stood back-to-back, facing three different directions like Pinkie asked them to.
“How bad is this, exactly?” Twilight asked.
“Very!” Dash watched the ground and walls carefully. “Specters are like the worst type of ghost you can run into. They’re like the bosses of other ghosts.”
“Yeah! I’d rather fight ten banshees than one specter, Twilight!” Pinkie kept her head down, looking left to right. “But we might have to do both since specters are never alone. Expect at least thirty or forty more ghosts to show up.”
“And that’s not even mentioning that they have the strongest ice magic of anything on the planet,” said Dash. “Or that they can make echoes of the catastrophe that created them. This thing could potentially destroy the entire town if it decides to use that.”
“I wanted this to be a short trip!” Twilight sighed miserably. “You’re sure it wants to fight?”
“Specters are extremely territorial,” said Dash. “We have to be ready.”
Dash scraped her hoof against the ground, getting ready for the fight. Dash was almost certainly going to break into crows the second it tried something. She didn’t have much of a choice. She couldn’t fight at this level.
A long minute passed.
Then an even longer minute.
Dash wasn’t sure how long she could stay on edge like this. She wished the epic battle would start already!
“What’s it doing?” Dash asked.
“Still under us,” said Pinkie. “Maybe she’s waiting for us to drop our guard.”
Another minute went by.
Things were way too quiet. Pinkie seemed to think so too.
“You know! This blob monster might be her catastrophe spell,” Pinkie suggested. “What if she’s like— like a slime specter! So she can summon tons of pony-eating slime!”
“And thousands of ponies died in a slime accident?” Dash asked. “I feel like one of us would have heard of the great slime spill of whenever.”
“That’s a good point,” said Pinkie.
“Um.”
An unfamiliar voice set all three of them off. They all spun around to face the newcomer.
The specter poked her head out!
Twilight reacted the fastest, shooting a bolt of lightning at her head. The specter ducked down under the ground again just fast enough to avoid it.
The three of them slowly backed up. It looked like the specter was about to start its attack.
“E-excuse me,” the specter spoke softly as she popped out of a wall this time.
Pinkie’s eyes glowed as she tried to grab her but was too late once more.
After another brief pause, the ghost came back out of the floor, only enough that the top half of her eyes were visible.
“Hello.” The specter’s voice was a meek little squeak. “Can I ask you something?”
The three of them shared a look.
“Yeah?” Dash raised an eyebrow.
“When you said you saw a ghost.” She came up just a little bit more this time and looked behind her. “Did you mean me? Or was there another ghost?”
“Um.” Dash looked at Pinkie, who shrugged. “Just you? I hope?”
“Okay, good.” The specter let out a sigh of relief. She came up out of the ground just a tiny bit more, enough that Dash could see the tip of her muzzle now. “Um. So, my attempt to scare you away didn’t work. Sorry. I know I shouldn’t have done that. I just panicked with all the crazy stuff that’s been going on recently. You can just do whatever you came down here to do. I won’t bother you again. Though I don’t have any treasure if that’s what you’re looking for.”
“Treasure?” Dash turned to Pinkie. “Do specters have treasure?”
“Oh, loads! They’re like ghost royalty so they’re loaded,” said Pinkie. “Usually.”
“You are a specter, right?” Dash asked.
“Um. Maybe?” The specter sank back down a little. “Okay, yes. But we really don’t have to fight! You can just go. If that’s okay with you.”
This seemed a little too good to be true.
“Pinkie, is this a trap?” Dash asked her. “You’re the ghost expert here.”
“I’m not sure,” Pinkie admitted. “Ghost emotions are easy to read and she really is scared. But I can sense there’s way more ghosts around here too. And danger is everywhere so that doesn’t help. Hm!”
Pinkie jumped forward a few steps and lay down with her chin against the floor, so she was face to face with the specter.
“What’s your name, little guy?” Pinkie asked.
“It’s um, Fluttershy,” she said.
“Well I’m Pinkie Pie and this is, uh—“ Pinkie looked back to Twilight. “Hey! What was your fake name again?”
“I’ll admit the only type of ghosts I’m familiar with are orbs and spirits,” said Twilight. “Why are we so afraid of this one again?”
“Because specters are the most dangerous type of ghost,” Dash reminded her. “If something kills more than a thousand ponies, a specter is created from one of the dead ponies. They can recreate the disaster that killed them.”
“That’s not exactly how it works,” Fluttershy mumbled but not loud enough to actually interrupt. “See if like….”
“They’re unique because they have this aura that lets them control other ghosts,” Dash went on.
“Actually, every ghost has an aura, it’s just um…”
“And they’re insanely territorial.”
“I’m pretty sure I don’t have a territory and also that’s not really true it’s more like uh…”
“See, ghosts are almost like ants when you get down to it. They have this strict hierarchy with specters as the ‘queen ghost’ at the top,” Dash went on. “Specters always have an entourage with them.”
“That’s not true at all!”
That last one was loud enough to get Dash to stop.
“Huh?” Dash turned back to her.
“Um.” Fluttershy backed up a foot or two, blushing as much as a ghost could blush. “Specter privilege isn’t really as great as everypony makes it sound. Every ghost has their will and emotions bleed into other ghosts, specters just have the strongest aura of will. Banshees, revenants, and phantoms often have their own territory where they assert their will over other ghosts too. They don’t want a specter anywhere near their territory because they’re afraid you’ll take over, and other specters are mean to me too. I can’t go anywhere except these sewers to get away from all the mean people. I get chased away no matter where I go!”
“I dunno.” Pinkie turned back to the others. “I’ve never heard of a specter who was this completely and utterly alone before! I mean, can she really not have a single ghost friend or any treasure at all? Not even a pathetic orb? Cause that’s like the ghost equivalent of drawing a face on a coconut. How could you seriously not manage that much?”
“You don’t have to rub it in!” Fluttershy covered her eyes and started crying.
“Oh no! I’m so sorry!” In a panic, Pinkie reached into her chaos bag and took out a balloon. “Here’s a balloon! Are you happy again?”
“I’m the most pathetic specter ever!” Fluttershy wailed.
“Hey now!” Pinkie tried to pat her on the back, but just patted the ground instead. “I’m sure there’s at least one pony who’s a bigger loser than you! At least you’re not uh—“
Pinkie looked around for something, but it was hard to reassure someone who lived in total isolation in the sewers.
“Um. Totally dead?” Pinkie smiled.
Fluttershy kept crying.
“Hey! Just because she doesn’t have any friends doesn’t make her a loser!” Twilight walked over to Fluttershy’s side. “There’s more to life than how many friends you have! Like power! Just because she’s insanely powerful doesn’t mean she’s insanely dangerous. If Fluttershy here chooses to be alone then that’s a perfectly valid decision.”
“I’m not sure if it’s really my choice, but thanks.” Fluttershy came up out of the ground enough that her whole head was up and wiped away one last tear.
“Yeah, I wonder where this is coming from,” Dash muttered to herself.
“It’s fine.” Twilight tried to pat Fluttershy but accidentally went through. “These ‘mainstream’ ponies just have an irrational fear of powerful ponies who want to exclude themselves from society. Really, they should all just leave us alone! Fluttershy clearly doesn’t mean anypony any harm.”
“Sure, but she might be involved with the kidnapping of the kids,” Dash reminded her.
Dash stepped forward.
“Look.” Dash knelt near Fluttershy. “If you want us to overlook the fact that there’s a specter who nearly gave us a heart attack living down here, you need to tell us where those kids are.”
“Kids?” Fluttershy asked.
“Someone pulled us into a void the moment we came down here,” said Dash. “We know it was a ghost. They still have a bunch of kids with them. Was that not you?”
Fluttershy shook her head.
“Then who did?” Dash asked.
“Well.” Fluttershy looked down the dark hall, shrinking down into the floor, eyes quivering with fear.
“We’re not letting you off the hook this easy,” Dash warned her.
“Okay!” Fluttershy winced. “I can smell that there’s a few other predeads down here. Their blood smelled so warm compared to everything else down here and—"
Fluttershy noticed the concern growing on all the other ponies.
“Not that I would ever freeze them!” Fluttershy put her hooves up defensively. "I've never eaten the heat from another pony, I swear. I only ever froze a single rabbit and I cried for days just from that. I could never freeze a pony!"
"Are you sure?" Dash asked. "I always heard that ghosts couldn't resist the urge to suck all the heat out of us for long."
"That's almost true," Fluttershy admitted. "Body heat is the most delicious thing in the world to us, and you get badly addicted to it. Still, I decided I wanted to be a vegan ghost because I didn't want to hurt any animals. It took me years to get over my addiction, but I barely feel any urge to, um, 'eat' the living any more. I promise."
Dash wasn’t sure how much she believed that. Ghosts ‘ate’ more ponies than just about all the other monsters combined. There was a reason they had such a bad reputation.
“Anyway, my point is they smell much colder now,” said Fluttershy. “They must be down where Boss Rattler and his gang hang out. It had to be them feeding off of the kids. They’re probably safe for now, but he’s not as nice as me. I doubt he’s above farming predeads like you.”
“Hey! Now we know who we’re looking for!” Pinkie winked at the others. “Can you take us to him? We kind of need those teenagers back before they spoil.”
“No!” Fluttershy shook her head, clearly terrified. “I’m too scared to go over there!”
“He’s gotta be pretty strong if a specter is afraid of him,” Dash whispered to Pinkie.
“What type of ghost is he?” Pinkie asked.
“He’s a revenant,” said Fluttershy. “He just bullies me a lot.”
That wasn’t too bad.
“But can’t you create a massive catastrophe?” Dash asked. “Who the crow would bully somepony who can do that?”
“Well I can, but mine would destroy most of the town and probably not hurt the other ghosts at all.” Fluttershy sighed. “I know the ability to wipe out a small town sounds impressive, but it really doesn’t get much day-to-day use.”
“But you have all kinds of other powers, right?” Dash asked. “Don’t tell me he’s seriously stronger than you.”
“I don’t think so,” said Fluttershy.
“But then why are you so scared?” Pinkie asked.
“Well.” Fluttershy twiddled her hooves about one another.
“Yeah?” Dash pressed her.
“It’s just.” Fluttershy sank nearly entirely underground.
“Just what?” Dash leaned forward to look down at her. “We gotta know what we’re up against.”
“I— you see.” Fluttershy covered her eyes. “I’m scared of ghosts! There I said it!”
That stunned everypony.
“But you are a ghost!” Dash shouted at her.
“I never said my life was great!” Fluttershy covered her eyes. “I used to live in the train station they hang out in now. It wasn’t great, but I had my pet spiders, and it was nice and quiet. But then that horrible blob monster showed up and ate all my pets! Even worse, Boss Rattler’s gang got pushed out from deeper in the tunnel. They kicked me out of my house and forced me to live in the sewers.”
“Can’t you just leave the sewers and go find some other cave to live in?” Twilight asked. “Or do you have to do the ‘pay rent’ thing to live in a cave too?”
Fluttershy shook her head.
“They stole something from me I can’t leave without. I’m too scared of ghosts to go over there and try to get it.” Fluttershy sobbed. “And they’ve been so mean to me this whole time! They know I have a phobia, but they constantly scare and bully me. They tell me about the parties they’re having just so I know I’m not invited and kill any spider I try to keep as a pet!”
“Yeesh. Now I just feel bad for you.” Listening to that gave Dash an angry frown.
“Thanks,” said Fluttershy. “I feel bad for me too.”
Dash had been the runt of the litter when she was younger. Maybe in some ways she still was. She used to get bullied a lot too. She learned the hard way nopony else would stand up for her so she had to do it herself.
Sometimes ponies could be horrible. And ghost ponies could be even more horrible!
Eventually, Dash did get rid of her bullies, even though she still never got any friends unless you counted Derpy. Dash wasn’t going to just sit around while someone who couldn’t stand up for themselves was being pushed around like that. She’d promised herself that she’d never be one of those useless adults who just ignored this kind of stuff.
“You know what?” Dash turned to the others. “We’re going over there anyway; I say we help her out. Get that thing they stole back!”
“Huh?” Fluttershy lifted her head. She nearly came out of the ground entirely this time. “You’d actually help me? Even though you’re predeads?”
“Just take us to where he is!” Dash hit her chest. “We’ll get rid of those bullies and get your stuff back.”
“I’m on board with this too!” Twilight stepped forward.
“There’s still a ten percent chance this is a trap,” said Pinkie, “but I’ve done way dumber things before so why the heck not?”
“You people are the nicest predeads I ever met.” Fluttershy’s eyes got teary again, but for once it wasn’t out of fear. “I’ll take you to where he lives, but there’s no way I’m going in there.”
Fluttershy led them down a few more corridors. That blob was everywhere, but if you kept a good distance it didn’t come after you. As long as they didn’t run into another big patch of it, which they totally would, they should be fine.
“But I gotta ask. Do you know anything about this blob?” Dash asked. “Or where the crow all these gremlins are coming from? Cause this is a lot of them.”
“No.” Fluttershy shook her head. “Or maybe a little. I know they came out of the same tunnel Boss Rattler did. I know it was supposed to be a subway tunnel, so it must have come from wherever that tunnel leads. I think he knows where that blob came from, but those other ghosts won’t talk to me.”
“And what exactly did they steal from you?” Dash asked. “We can’t get it back if we don’t know what it is.”
“Well.” Fluttershy looked off to one side, nervous again. “I guess I can tell you. See, it’s a teddy bear I kept past when ponies normally keep those things. I was kind of embarrassed I still slept with it and my unfinished business was that I never threw it away and grew up.”
“Okay, I see.” Dash nodded. “So we gotta get it back so you can throw it away and move on.”
“What?! No!” Fluttershy suddenly panicked and flew into a wall. “Why would you suggest that?!”
“Huh?” Dash looked at the others. “I honestly don’t know what I did!”
“Psst!” Pinkie whispered to her. “Ghost don’t like it when you phrase it as ‘moving on’, Dash. Just saying that phrase is kind of a party pooper for them.”
“But that’s what all the ghosts in the movies do,” said Dash.
“Those movies are racist and spread lies about ghosts!” Fluttershy managed to get enough nerve to float back out from the wall. “There’s no ‘moving on’. If a ghost ever finishes their unfinished business they just die! But like for real this time. Nopony wants to finish their business unless they’re suicidal.”
“Okay, okay! Sorry!” Dash put her hoof out. “I didn’t know.”
“It’s okay.” Fluttershy started leading them on again. “But that’s why I can never throw it out now. I don’t know what counts as getting rid of it. Somepony stealing or destroying it might mean I can’t throw it out, but then again it might not. For all I know, moving too far away from it will kill me. That’s why I’m stuck here without it.”
“Alright. So we find it and get it back to you,” said Dash.
Fluttershy stopped and pointed at a part of the wall that had clearly been broken up and dug through. There were no lights in the earthy tunnel, just darkness. Fluttershy hung back as the other three started into the tunnel.
Fluttershy and Pinkie both saw something coming. Fluttershy ducked under the ground with an ‘oh no’ while Pinkie got ready for a fight.
Three wraiths, one for each pony, came out of the walls. A wraith looked a lot less like a normal pony than a ‘high’ ghost. Their heads and forelegs were relatively normal but twisted immensely.
Their muzzles were elongated and filled with icicle-like fangs. Their hooves broke and split out into icy claws. Everything beyond that was completely unrecognizable, just twisting tendrils of cold and ghostly light.
They had more in common with animals than the ponies they came from, retaining the ability to feel emotions but not to think rationally. They were called wraiths for a reason, for how quick they were to anger.
The three wraiths came slashing at the ponies and inhaling deeply, trying to suck as much heat out of them as possible. The ones who went for Pinkie and Twilight were completely outmatched. Pinkie sent out a psychic wave that dissolved hers and Twilight threw a ball of green fire that burnt hers up in an instant.
Dash had fewer options. She split into the twenty crows. The wraith clawed one of the crows to the ground and started sucking the heat out of another. A lesser ghost like this couldn’t freeze you nearly as fast as a specter or even banshee could, so that crow got away without too much damage.
One of her crows flew back down the way they came, meaning most of Dash was free to be suicidally bold. She decided to try and scout ahead.
She flew down the tunnel with another five crows in tow. Dash managed to make it in as the others fought off the remaining wraith and she broke off in every direction.
On the other side was a subway station just like Fluttershy said, but an unfinished one. There was a platform and the tracks below it, but the walls weren’t fully cemented and there weren’t many rooms or any exits to the side.
The train was still here. There was a full train sitting in the station, then on the other, unfinished side of the track, they had several more train cars stacked on top of one another like a makeshift apartment building. It wasn’t ghosts living there, though, but gremlins. The ghosts must have packed them in because they were so full the gremlins were hanging out the windows.
Further back, the ghosts had made a barricade, with a wall of ice and a few train cars, at the tunnel the trains should have gone down. Dash got a bit closer to the wall of ice to see they’d had the same idea Twilight did. More of the blob was on the other side, that entire tunnel filled up with the red stuff.
She was starting to wonder where all the other ghosts were when they came pouring out of the walls, the train, and the ground.
There had to be at least twenty more wraiths and just as many wisps and shades. Mostly out of the train came the slightly stronger ghosts, poltergeists, and writs though Dash couldn’t tell the difference. All in all, there had to be over fifty ghosts swarming the place now.
But Dash didn’t see any of the more dangerous ghosts. That was until one more, much bigger, ghost came out from the front of the train.
Though he was in the shape of a pony, this guy was about as big as the train car he was now standing on. He wasn’t partially distorted, save his massive fangs made of ice and his hollowed-out eyes, filled only with a thick mist and a tiny flame where his pupils would be.
He created gnarled icicles around his hoof, forming into a clawed hand. He quickly grabbed Dash with this and drew her in close. A stream of mist came out of Rattler’s mouth as he opened it. At his current size, he wouldn’t even have to chew to eat Dash.
This had to be the boss. Only revenants got this big.
“Well that was a bit faster than I’d thought,” said Rattler. “But unless you can go and shapeshift into something a bit bigger, I’m afraid you’re just another hostage at this point.”
Dash crumbled to feathers in his grip as another instance of herself undid the spell. She and Boss Rattler were jarred by the change for about the same amount of time. Now Dash was standing next to Pinkie and Twilight at the entrance to the large room.
“Don’t underestimate me.” Dash ran a hoof over her mane.
“If you’re insisting.” Rattler curled his icy claw.
Another ghost, probably a poltergeist, floated out with two of the teenagers, the girls, just in front of him. Boss Rattler flew down and landed next to them.
They were unharmed but brought to a dangerously low temperature. Both of them were shivering violently, trying to curl up as tight as they could, and breathing heavily. Their lips and the inside of their ears had started to turn blue. If they stayed like that for too long they’d get frostbite.
“P-Pinkie Pie!” Diamond Tiara could barely speak through the shivering. “Get us out of here!”
Dash instinctively took a step forward but was quickly stopped. Rattler opened his mouth, as though he was about to freeze them to death.
“Careful now!” Rattler called out before climbing back up to his train car. “Little girly here is on the verge of frostbite and it won’t take my boy here long to finish her off. Try anything and she’ll be ‘moving on’ if you know what I mean. If not her one of them other kiddies.”
“What do you want?” Dash asked.
“What the crow do we want?” Rattler asked the other ghosts who all laughed. Rattler smiled, then scowled and climbed over the front of the train to glare down at them. “Why that’s exactly what I want to ask you filthy, blood-pumpin predeads.”