Hitch walked down a familiar hallway, though at a slower pace. Several inches of standing water now flooded it, the icy water freezing his hooves and slowing his circulation. He had to walk on the tips of his soles to keep his soft frogs from getting cut by the several jagged crustaceans and mollusks embedded in the floor.
There was an acrid scent in the air, and he tasted something coppery in his dry throat. As he entered a familiar obsidian hallway, the moonlight shone through the windows brighter than his last visit, revealing an intricate pattern on the floor. The lines in the cut stone spiraled and squirmed, giving him a headache the longer he stared at them.
What have you unleashed? I can’t contain him any longer.
He tilted his head and let his ears move as he tried to find the source of the voice, but it ended too soon for him to pinpoint it. Hitch continued forward, staying on the well lit part of the path that lay before him. It struck him that something was guiding him, and no sooner had he thought this, than a waterlogged red carpet appeared in the shallow sea water.
Several pillars had fallen across the room, forcing Hitch to climb over them to find the pedestal. Something was missing, but he couldn’t remember what. It stood empty now, in a pillar of moonlight.
Destroy the orb. Do not let it remain anchored.
He turned to the right, from where the voice had come, noticing a hole in the wall. Hitch then looked to his left, seeing eyes opening in the dark and glaring back at him. The room began to rumble.
Not waiting for what he recalled happened next, he approached the gap in the wall, noticing it was shaped like a pony. It looked just large enough to fit him, as if the hole had been cut into the stone just for him. Hitch heard an angry growling from deep within the ruins, and stepped forward into the hole unsure of where it led.
He fell to his hooves on dry cracked soil, a loud booming filling his ears. All around him trees were burning, the thick smoke making it difficult to see anything but vague shapes in the shadows. Up above him he saw flashes of light, and heard screams loud enough to cause trees to uproot and fling themselves through the air.
Hitch wasn’t sure what he was seeing, but he could feel the aura of malice as several indistinguishable shapes collided in the air. A beam of energy cut through the ground near him, as a large shadow flew overhead slamming into the ground behind him.
Some things should stay dead, slumbering, never awoken.
There was a familiar doorway in a tree just ahead of him. As he approached it he felt a deep rumbling shake his bones as the shadowy figure that had crashed behind him lurched up to its feet. Hitch looked up and saw only the silhouette against the moon. It was tentacled with wings and two red eyes, and just to gaze upon it for a second gave Hitch a jolt of pain that made him close his eyes and wish he could gouge them out.
He recovered a moment later. Two distant specks that could have been ponies approached the horror behind him, and something slithered out of the bushes. They rejoined the battle, and the pressure in the air built up enough to cause Hitch’s ears to pop and his breathing to falter. Hitch pushed his way through the doorway in the tree in front of him.
Banish it.
Hitch stumbled out of the Sheriff’s office and was met with the loud siren used to signal a severe storm warning. He looked back inside the precinct, but there was nopony in it. Turning back, there was nopony on the street either.
The rooftops were lined with crows, every single one facing out to the sea. He followed their gaze. Lightning flashed over the bay, and a distant storm was rapidly moving towards the town.
Release me.
“Sprout? Anypony?” Hitch called out.
There was no answer as he made his way slowly towards the storm wall, and gazed down upon the beach. The water had withdrawn, further than low tide, revealing a stretch of sand a couple hundred hooves wide. Down in the dirt were more dead animals. Everything from rats to birds to bovines, and again dozens of species he could only begin to guess at, all in various states of decay.
He looked up towards the ocean as the town siren grew louder. Hitch knew he should be worried, but couldn’t remember why. There was a loud crashing sound, and he looked up to see a large piece of cliff falling into the bay. A wave at least fifty hooves high had hit the storm breaker and washed right over it. By the time it reached the wall he was standing at, most of its energy had been lost.
This wasn’t a good place for him to be standing, and he should have turned to flee, but he had seen something in that massive wave. A dark shape, riding right into the bay. Hitch doubted he actually saw it, until the lightning flashed in time with the next wave, revealing that something large was out there.
The silent crows began to call out in unison, forming a chorus that hurt Hitch’s ears. He couldn’t cover them and walk at the same time, so he tried not to focus on their song. Every crow in town was flying out into the bay at once.
Save me. I will help you.
They were diving into the water, towards the dark shape, and letting the ocean consume them. The darkness grew. Hitch stood there transfixed on what was happening, unable to look away.
Finally a massive wave hit the cliff and sprayed over the top, misting the lighthouse. He noticed the beacon was lit, shining out over the sea. The other side of the bay barely slowed the massive wave down, and Hitch finally found his common sense. He turned to run as the massive tsunami bore down on the town.
He shouldn’t have looked back, but he had to know if he was outrunning the wave. It had collided with the storm barrier, and shot up into a massive shower of seawater. A wall of water collapsed, washing through the streets and knocking over any trolleys and food carts that had been left out.
Hitch had made it just far enough up the incline towards the lighthouse to escape the wave. Looking back, the lightning seemed to have stilled and the bay appeared normal again.
There was a skittering sound as something dashed behind Hitch, darting down an alleyway. He didn’t get a good look, but gave chase anyway. Perhaps it was some pony who could tell him what was going on, or the voice he had heard from earlier.
He came to a gap between buildings and was uncertain which way to go.
This way.
The voice called to him again. Hitch turned left, approaching a sewer cover that had been knocked loose.
“Hello? Anypony there?” Hitch asked.
When there was no reply, he lifted the sewer cover and peered inside. He didn’t have a flashlight with him, but there was a familiar green glow emanating from inside. It was the same he had seen earlier in the underwater citadel.
Hitch lowered himself down the ladder and gave his eyes some time to adjust. There in the darkness loomed a vast shape, slowly shambling towards him. As it neared the light coming through the access hole to the sewer, Hitch recognized the glowing barnacles on the creature.
Beneath a ragged cloak were more growths and hundreds of feathers. Leathery skin stretched between the wings and the beast’s hide. It was dripping a noxious black substance, staining the ceiling and walls with his passage. The entity looked too big to fit in a sewer, yet somehow continued squeezing itself closer.
Little pony. Come here.
Hitch stood his ground, unsure he could climb back out of the sewer before it reached him. As the creature righted itself, two sets of glowing purple eyes opened and gazed down on Hitch. The effect was immediate. The creature let out a soft cooing sound. It unfurled a large talon, pushing aside its cloak.
The razor sharp claws reached for Hitch, and just as he reached for the ladder, they clamped down around him. He braced for pain, but the touch was gentle. It pulled Hitch in close, and he felt another claw from somewhere patting him on the head.
The creature was hugging him.
Hitch squirmed and tried to push away. His head was throbbing and he felt a burning in his lungs as he breathed in the foul scent of the creature. The insides of his ears itched, and his eyes felt like hot coals were being pushed into them just to gaze upon this unearthly being.
I shall hug you and pet you forever.
He screamed as the creature spoke again. His heart was racing as he noticed something beneath the cloak with him. It was a small emerald orb. There was something important about it, but Hitch couldn’t quite recall. Something a voice had said. A warning.
Hitch realized as the pain grew that he couldn’t breathe well. His ribs felt like they were on fire now, the talon clenched too tightly around him. He recalled the voice from the moonlight’s warning. He had to destroy the orb.
With both hooves he reached out and tried to pry the orb free from the small claw that was clutching it. The creature screamed, a thousand crows crying out in anger at once. The tattered cloak burst into flame as the ancient evil unfurled its wings. Dozens of birds issued forth at once, clawing and biting at Hitch in anger.
He refused to let go of the orb, even as his vision was blurred by blood. His body was breaking, but he was resolved to end this here and now. He would send this dead god back to whence it came, no matter what.
Finally, the orb was pried free, falling to the floor and shattering. The talon gripped like a vice before seeming to vanish completely, dropping Hitch to the floor. He landed with a splat in a puddle of expanding obsidian fluid. The liquid was rising, threatening to drown him, and Hitch reached out desperately to grab the ladder and haul himself free.
The intense pain in his skull crescendoed and the pressure built until he blacked out.