“Mr. Monster thing!” Pinkie shouted throughout the forest obnoxiously. “Mr. Monster thing?!” she looked over at a nearby tree, spotting a large claw mark with green, glowing ooze dripping from it. “I really like your tree art-”
“Pinkie Pie! Stop shouting!” Twilight scolded in a harsh whisper. “For all we know it could be stalking us right now!” she shoved a bundle of bushes out of her way, leading the group through the swamp-like land.
Spike joined the conversation, pointing a small finger to Twilight. “Twilight, I think you’re being a bit too worried about all of this monster stuff.” he began. “Zecora has always been the type of pony to over mystify things.”
“I do believe that she’s a zebra, Spikey.” Rarity commented.
“Yeah, she’s the type of zebra to over mystify things.” the dragon corrected himself.
Twilight nodded, leading the group further along. “Occasionally,” she agreed at first. “But this time was different, she would hardly ever mention death outright. Something's off.”
As the unicorn made her way about, she felt a small rumble from her saddlebag. “Stay weary, princess. The È̷̢̨v̷͕̝̓ỉ̶̻ḻ̶͙̎ ̷͍̈́̂may be around any corner.” the mass of voices muttered in her mind. Her eyes grew wide, turning to see if anypony had just heard the object.
Spike was still looking at his pony-sister while Rarity and Pinkie were chatting about what kind of monster they could be battling. “Oh! Perhaps we’ll be fighting Diamond Dogs! I’d love to steal their gems again.” Rarity grinned mischievously.
“They cannot hear us.” they whispered in Twilight’s mind.
A thoughtful look formed on her face, looking forward again and beginning to mutter apparently to herself. “They can still hear me.” she pointed out, nearly forgetting the object’s insistence of the use of plurals to refer to itself.
“No, us.” it emphasized.
Twilight began to notice how confusing this was, slowly understanding. “Oh, alright?"
"You may need assistance battling i̶t̷, princess." It began. "Once you feel you are in danger, use us.” They informed.
Her ears folded back in annoyance at its crypticness. "Use you? And what do you mean by “it?”-"
Pinkie butted in. "Who are ya talkin' to?"
The alicorn's ears folded back in surprise. "Eh, nopony!" she answered.
"Twilight." she said in a scolding manner. "Are you going coo-coo again?"
Twilight scoffed. "That was a couple moons ago! You went pretty coo-coo too." she defended, pointing an accusing hoof.
"At least I didn't hurt anypony." she defended.
"At least I didn't pretend to have a party with stuffed animals like a foal-"
"What is that atrocious smell?!" Rarity announced, interrupting the feud.
Pinkie Pie sniffed the air, Twilight joining her. The party-pony "Blegh!"'d after a moment of inhaling the smell.
The scent of death hit the alicorn's nostrils, just like with the 'apple-lava.'
"I don't know what you all are talking about." Spike gave a small shrug. "It smells fantastic out here!"
Twilight gave the dragon a completely confuzzled look before stopping suddenly. She gazed through the areas between the leaves of the heavy foliage, a glowing red light catching her eye.
"What is that?" Rarity queried, leaning aside from Twilight.
Twilight set aside several bushes, opening to a clearing. In the middle sat a sizzling, crackling pool of the lava-like substance. Something about it gave an ominous feeling to the three mares, Spike pushing past them excitedly.
"Don't mind if I do!" he said happily as he rushed to the pool, arms outstretched.
Rarity started after him. "Spike! I'm not sure you should drink that!" she suggested as the baby dragon got on his knees in front of the pool.
Spike snickered. "Why would it be bad for me?" he brushed it off.
Spike? Ignoring Rarity? she averted a suspicious look to the pool. She could hardly imagine such a thing happening. "Maybe you shouldn't?" Twilight suggested.
"Nah, I'm fine." he replied, dipping his head and beginning to drink desperately. As if it was the first thing he had ever drank in a week.
Rarity gave Spike a weird look as he gulped the disgusting fluid.
"If we were you, we wouldn't let him drink that." they rumbled from her saddlebag.
Twilight headed their advice, engulfing Spike in her magical aura, hovering the still sipping dragon away from the pool.
Her dragon-brother opened his eyes, looking around for a moment as he realized the stuff was gone. "Twilight!" he groaned.
"How could you even drink that?!" the white unicorn scoffed dramatically. "It just smells reprehensible!" she withdrew a hoof further from the pool, Twilight hovering Spike nearer to the group, back into the shady foliage.
Pinkie Pie nodded quickly in agreement. "I wouldn't even drink it for a joke! And I'd drink anything to make somepony laugh!" she exclaimed.
Spike crossed his arms grumpily within his pony-sister’s magical grasp. “Nothing that tastes that good could be bad for you!” he retorted. “I’ve never even tasted anything like it! Never smelled something like it either.”
The alicorn tilted her head as she looked at him. “What about some of the apple-lava back home?”
“What’s apple-lava?” he asked curiously.
Twilight gave him a concerned look. “You don’t remember that? It was just today.”
Spike returned a confused look before he squinted his eyes at the underbrush behind the ponies, spotting something in the foliage. His eyes suddenly widened, pointing at the bushes. "RARITY, WATCH OUT!" he shouted with a scared look.
"Hm?" Rarity turned, the other ponies looking behind her. She gasped in horror, staring up at an ominous figure, three growing green dots across its head. There was a light green x across its chest. "AAAAHH!" she screeched, jumping away just before the beast slammed a large hand into the grass, narrowly missing the posh unicorn.
A much lighter green trailed from the grass as the monster drew the claw from it, swiping once more at Rarity. The mare jumped back again before turning to dash off. The lanky creature gripped the unicorn’s finely stroked tail just before she could sprint off, the mare yelping from the tug. “SOMEPONY DO SOMETHING!” her screeches pierced the air as she was grabbed, the monster letting out a gurgly growl at the pony, mandibles stretching.
Spike had been dropped by Twilight a couple seconds ago, the alicorn letting out a small shout in surprise. “Twilight! Use that tablet thing!” he urged.
The alicorn shookily nodded, already having the saddlebag opened. She floated the tablet out, flying it towards the monster, straining to remain calm as her magic sputtered slightly. As it floated out, the alicorn could notice the familiar insignia now glowing a bright red rather than being lightly etched into it.
The tall beast’s grip slipped slightly at the sight of the tablet, Rarity tearing away from its large claws. Of course, the hands still took away a good couple of hairs from her tail on the way out.
“Stop hurting my friend!” Twilight shouted at it as the tablet was presented to it, its three beady eyes growing wide at the sight of it. It stepped back for a moment, screeching in horror. Just as the alicorn drew it nearer, a bright green flash went off where the creature was, the flash lowering to reveal that the creature had vanished.
Rarity gasped for air, panic filling her veins. She turned back to where the monster used to be. “Wh-where did it go?!”
The rest of the group looked about frantically. “I’m not sure!” Twilight replied.
“Pinkie, behind you!” Spike pointed in alarm. Twilight Sparkle looked over swiftly, noticing a small green flame sizzling mid-air behind the party-pony.
Pinkie glanced behind her. “What? It’s just a fi-” the beast suddenly fwooshed back into this plane, taking the flame’s place before swiftly gripping the mare’s jaws with either hand.
Terror struck her usually joyful eyes as she was lifted to her hind legs forcefully, the monster putting her in a position to completely rip the pony’s mouth apart. She yelled through the thing’s long claws, her mouth’s lining scarring and beginning to bleed. Pinkie muffled through the blood as the thing attempted to murder her.
“Pinkie!” Rarity shouted in a ghastly fashion, a cracking noise coming from the pony’s jaw as the beast took its sweet time, hoping the pony was relishing in the agony.
“Use us.” the cube urged rather stoically for the occasion.
“Use?! What does that me-?”
The cube hovered out of the saddlebag swiftly, a loud SHINK shooting out. Several sharp circles of blades and pointy ritualistic looking objects spread from the cube. It hummed ominously as the weapons orbited around them. “Sorry, it is a force of habit.” it apologized for the delay.
It flung towards the monster, the rotating blades just barely missing the party-pony and slicing straight through the thing. It chopped off the head of the tall creature, the blood fountaining from the beast’s neck. The horrifying head toppled off, the body slumping and falling to the ground, bringing Pinkie down with it.
Rarity let out a horrified gasp, watching the gore with extremely wide eyes before putting a hoof to her head and collapsing into a faint.
Twilight’s eyes widened at the sight of the kill. It was so… Quick. She could hardly capture her barings as the cube slowly returned, its circulating blades covered in green and red viscera. The blades retreated back into itself before slowly hovering into her bag.
Pinkie was lying on the ground next to the bleeding corpse of the thing, it’s hands still in her mouth. She mumbled and muffled around it, seemingly no serious harm to her as she tried to remove the hands.
Twilight rushed over. “Pinkie! Are you okay?” she gasped in worry for her friend, engulfing the beast’s limp hands with her magic and slowly setting them away from Pinkie’s mouth.
“Never been better” she pushed past the pure agony writhing through her mouth and jaw muscles, managing to cover it over with her usual cheerful self.
“Are you sure?” she gave a confused look.
She coughed a bit of blood from her mouth, crimson dribbling down her chin. “Some cotton balls would be nice! Oh! Those taste good.” she grinned sweetly, only giving the group an uneasy feeling.
“That is… Erm, interesting, Pinkie. Just get away from that thing, alright?” Twilight pleaded, urging her party-loving friend along as she stepped away from the corpse of the monster.
She nodded joyfully. “Okie-Dokey-Lokey!” the pink earth pony made her way next to her unconscious friend
Twilight went up to it as Pinkie walked off, nudging the corpse of the still bleeding monster. It had tried to kill one of her bestest friends, but something about the way its severed green and red bleeding head stared up with those fading lights for eyes made her feel bad for it.
“Rarity, are you alright?” The young dragon asked, poking the unconscious unicorn not too far from Twilight and the corpse.
The studious alicorn had never seen such a being like it. I guess the most comparable thing would be a dragon? But it has no wings and it’s too spindly. Plus, the beast would be scaly, this thing has large patches of bug-like armor and exoskeleton. At least she guessed it was an exoskeleton.
Rarity clambered to consciousness as Twilight mused to herself, blinking the tiredness away from her mind as she slowly sat up. “I-I think so, Spike.” she offered a hoof to the clearly tinier dragon, essentially pretending to be brought up by him. The unicorn made sure to keep her vision averted from the dead body.
Twilight had also never heard of a creature able to teleport like that, aside from ponies and other blatantly magical creatures. However there was no sight of a horn. A being this tall? With such sharp claws, tough natural armor and poison? It had to be some kind of apex predator. A creature that had intentionally evolved to kill. Its horrifying appearance didn’t make it a much friendlier sight either.
She shook her head gently. “I… Haven’t seen anything like it.” Twilight mumbled to herself as she gazed across the grass in front of where the thing’s head would be, painted in it’s blood.
Pinkie Pie jumped in front of Twilight’s gaze. “Thanks for the save, Twi! If you hadn’t used that cube then I would’ve been dead meat! Literally!” she giggled.
Spike gave the party pony an estranged look. “How in Celestia’s name could you be so ha-”
“Classified information!” she bounced in front of her, blood dribbling down her chin. She stepped away before starting off back in the direction they came. “Let’s get back to the hospital. Fluttershy definitely should be better now!”
Twilight gave an uneasy look, before beginning to follow. “I need to give this tablet back to Zecora anyways.”