//------------------------------//
// Like A Stone - Ch. 3: Cherub Rock 
// Story: The Doctor And Derpy Adventures 
// by Closer-To-The-Sun 
//------------------------------//

Like A Stone - Chapter 3: Cherub Rock

"Dinky!" the grey pegasus shouted in horror. She was quick to glide over to the stone figure of her daughter.

"Derpy, wait!" the Doctor called out, galloping quickly to follow.

The mare didn't listen to the Doctor. Instead, she threw her front limbs around the statue and held it close to her, crying. "Doctor….why happened to her?"

Taking out a device from seemingly nowhere, the Doctor scanned the petrified Dinky with his sonic screwdriver. Looking at it, he came to a conclusion that made no sense to him whatsoever.

"Doctor?" Derpy asked again, her eyes shut as she held the statue closer to her.

"I don't get it. This doesn't make any sense. The little filly is coated in stone. Not solid stone, but covered in it, like a blanket of snow on tree tops," the Doctor spoke to himself. He began to pace around, thinking. "Dinky isn't gone, but neither alive. Almost a purgatory of sorts….but not. She's still alive, but for how long?"

Derpy finally looked at the Doctor, her yellow eyes were full of tears that were beginning to flow down her cheeks, "What are you talking about?"

The Doctor hit his head with one of his hooves in self-anger, "Why can't I figure this out? What purpose do the angels have with turning victims to stone?"

"Doctor, please! What is happening? Who are the angels?" the pegasus's voice was in distress.

"These creatures over there are called 'weeping angels'. I've encountered them a number of times and to say the least, they are deadly," the Doctor turned his head to keep his eye on the row of angel statues on the far end, "They can only move when you are not looking, and this includes blinking. One wrong blink and you are dead."

"D-dead?"

"One way of putting it pleasant terms, yes," the time stallion continued, "these creatures are the only psychopaths in the universe to kill you nicely. With one little touch, they will send you back in time, before your birth, to live out your death. They feed off the 'energy', if you will, of the time you would have lived."

The explanation from the Doctor caused the mare to cling to her daughter's statue even more.

"And they can even be worse than that…."

"Such as snapping necks and using the bodies to communicate with other species," a slightly familiar voice spoke.

Both ponies were caught off guard by the seeming disembodied voice.

The Doctor seemed to panic, "Was that…."

"Dinky?" Derpy relinquished her hug on the statue to look at the small unicorn's  face.

"Hello, Momma and Mr. Doctor," the voice filly's voice spoke, but her stone body did not move. The voice was certainly Dinky's, however it seemed to be lacking her emotion.

"Dinky, is that really you? Please!" Derpy had tears run down her face at a quicker pace.

"It is me, Momma," Dinky replied.

The Doctor placed the sonic screwdriver to Dinky's stone head and scanned again. Reading the data, he nodded, "It's her alright. She's in there good. While her body seems fine, it is slowly being turned to stone from the outside in. But why?"

Dinky answered, "Because the angels want me to join them. And they want you to join as well."