//------------------------------// // The world looks different when painted in moonlight // Story: Cutie Mark Camp Blues // by Moonbeam Thought Writes //------------------------------// “Ho-lee crap. It’s been a Celestia-damned while, Applebloom. Why haven’t you visited in so long?” “There were always a few… complications when Ah tried to see ya, Scoots.” “Are you talking ‘bout Honey? I can’t believe he was a conpony!” “…me neither.” Applebloom grumbled under her breath. “I mean, he was always so nice! So charmingly nice. And that smile of his… a total dreamboat, that one.” Scootaloo sighed wistfully. “Mhm.” was her friend’s only reply. “Anyways, how’ve things been on your end?” Applebloom smiled grimly. “Two murders, one stallion Ah had to fire, a filly bit by a werewolf, an’ a Vampony.” Scootaloo flinched away from the other mare, her eyes shooting open. “Bucking Tartarus. A kid got bitten by both a werewolf and a Vampony?” The mare in question shook her head with a slight grimace. “Different fillies. So much more paperwork.” The orange mare seated across from her chuckled lightly. “Paperwork, am I right?” Applebloom grinned. Why hadn’t she kept in touch with Scootaloo? She was so much more fun than any tottering old council members she had to endure working with. “Ya get it!” She pretended to cheer. “Yeah, tell me about it. I haven’t heard from Sweetie Belle lately. You know how she’s holding up?” “She’s bin’ tryin’ to get in touch with ya, Scoots. Our Sweetie’s a married mare now!” “Truly? Who’s the lucky pony?” “Ya’d never guess. Diamond Tiara.” “What? No way! DT and Sweetie? That’s crazy!” Scootaloo gasped and smiled widely, the happiness for her friend evident in every facial feature. “Ah know, right? An’ Ah was jus’ as surprised as ya were!” “I wish I could’ve attended the wedding. Look, I’m sorry for being so distant. The parliament’s been very tricky to be in. You know, with the elections and all? You’ve got no idea the Tartarus it can be sometimes.” The two were silent for a few minutes. The minutes stretched quickly into what felt like an eternity. An eternity of silence. And when Scootaloo finally broke the quiet, it was with little sparks of silver gleaming in the corners of her wide, royal purple eyes. “Keep in touch, won’t you? It’s been way too long Applebloom. I don’t want to have that much of a gap between us again.” Applebloom nodded. “Ah think Ah will, Scoots. Ah think Ah just might.” One week earlier. I was not absolutely sure that Vig’s plan would work. Of course, she was, but then again, she didn’t have the looming threat of a wolfish beast lying in wait, just beneath the surface. My surface. I was that wolfish beast just beneath my surface as much as I was a pegasus on the very first, most physical layer of my surface. She didn’t have to worry about what would happen in the next hour, as the full, bright moon rose over the Everfree Forest. Granted, she probably had other worries, like the dangerous critters that stalked the long shadows of these woods. Or the vicious vegetation that sometimes decided to eat ponies alive. At least the sun had set, leaving behind no trace of it’s burning golden light. And leaving the forest a much safer place for Vig to walk through. And for some reason, those long shadows that haunted the woods were getting no darker. I could still see as if it were a summer afternoon, minus the summer. Or the afternoon. Why was it that the woods that had been so dimly lit and filled with a dark gloom of shade and mist before, were now a safe-looking, grove-like place of perfectly visible light? The trees hadn’t been so welcoming a few nights earlier when I had been b- A low whine escaped me, and I clapped a hoof to my mouth. Whines certainly were not equine noises. Pony vocal chords just didn’t really produce that kind of slide. I threw a glance up at the sky. Barely there between the dark green leaves of the canopy. It was starry, but behind the stars was an indescribable purplish-blue-black void. And, thank whoever or whatever would hear my prayers, no moon. Yet. “Remember; I’ll be with you the whole time. When you- you know -I won’t run away. When I speak, focus on my voice. And most importantly- wait, are you listening? Moonbeam! This is an amazing, brilliant plan that can’t possibly fail! Listen to me!” “Vig, we’ve been over this plan a gazillion times. And besides; You based this on crappy young adult fantasy books!” I muttered. “Hey! I can hear you! And those books aren’t ‘crappy young adult fantasy books’, they’re comprehensive pieces of complex world building based on the author’s rich imagination! That just so happen to resemble your current situation! Oh, and would you look at that, I rhymed!” She retorted. “Poet and I just don’t know it” Vig sang. I laughed and rolled my eyes somewhat affectionately. Somewhat. We were in the deep woods now. In a small clearing, ringed with sweet-scented bushes of something. The starlight overhead was a sight to behold. But what caught, and sunk hooks into my attention, was the small piece of glowing silver that had become apparent over the tops of the trees. It held my gaze captive, though out of terror, or sheer… something I could not explain, I couldn’t tell. “Vig, this is it.” I said quietly. “Don’t forget. The most important thing is to not freak out. Stay calm. Moonbeam Thought, I know this is going to be tough, but please. We can get through this.” The moon was more than just a small piece, now. Any moment the rays of it’s pale light would reach me. It was hard not to start panicking. Not with the knowledge of what was about to begin. What was about to happen to me. I could already feel the strangeness of the other side of me; the other state of mind start to creep in around the edges. “I’m scared. Please. V-Vig I’m bucking terrified.” I choked out. The moon was already halfway above the trees. I stumbled back, crashing into the undergrowth behind me. A shiver overtook my body, shaking my very bones. This was it. There was no more waiting. There was no more hoping for a nice, peaceful, monster-free night. The moon called to me. I, enraptured by its siren song, had no chance of resisting. I felt dizzy, disoriented, like any moment now I could keel over, like a ship in a storm. My heart beat too fast. Too loud, like a drum thumping away right next to my ears. Nausea, my long-awaited friend, slammed into me like a hammer on glass. I reeled, taking a few more steps back into the sweet-smelling bushes around the edges of the clearing. Stay calm? Not freak out? How was I supposed to stay calm? How was I supposed to not freak out?! The moonlight had finally reached me, rolling across my coat in waves. It was cold and alien, and yet all at once, warm, inviting even. And then it began. I could hear low cracks and crunches, as my bones shifted and moved, some lengthening and reforming until they were entirely different bones, and some shortening to make way for strange new organs. The miniature hairs that made up my coat grew longer, thicker, until I was covered in coarse fur. I rolled my shoulders back, as they clicked and made weird snapping noises. Shook out each of my legs, once the bones finally settled in them. When I looked over my shoulder, my body was not my own. Different and yet eerily similar. I had a tail. A proper, wolf-like tail. Pain lanced through my front hooves, and when my gaze flicked down to them, I didn’t have hooves anymore, but a set of paws, four-toed with wickedly sharp claws. And the strangest, scariest thing was that it wasn’t painful. Besides the not-hooves, that was. I should have been in pain. Agony. My body was tearing itself apart and reforging into something else. But all I could feel was a strange sense of peace. It was awful, in a way. And when my teeth elongated and sharpened into deadly points, I wasn’t scared. I blinked, once, twice. That’s when my gaze unfocused. Then it came back, with piercing clarity that made my head hurt for a minute. When my hearing cut out, leaving the world a silent bubble, I didn’t scream. And when it returned, the world exploding back into sound, I merely flicked my ears back against my head. This was terrifying. Terrifyingly peaceful. And when I thought it had finally stopped, that there was nothing left to change, that maybe, there was the possibility of coming out on the flip side, the dawn after the dark, unscathed, it got worse. So much worse. I was grateful I hadn’t remembered this part of the night from last time. A voice. Wild, untamed, monstrous. Ripping through my head, like claws through butter. ‘The night. It’s glorious. The moon. A thing of utter splendour. Let us run free in these dark woods. Tonight, we are not the prey, but the hunter.’ Surprisingly well spoken, too. “Moonbeam, can you hear me?” I whirled around to face the speaker, a growl building in my throat. “Hey! Easy now. You know me. Easy now. Easy now.” She began slowly backing off. I couldn’t hear her heartbeat. How strange. I advanced, long striding steps, towards her. Was she somepony important to me? Moonbeam. It sounded so familiar, but hazy, like a dream dissipating into nonsense upon waking up. ‘Tear her limb from limb. She should have known better than to be out here after dark.’ the voice whispered. I bared my fangs at this strange pony. Was she not scared of me? How foolish. How utterly foolish. “Moonbeam Thought! You stop that! Remember me?” Moonbeam Thought. It almost sounded like something I heard a lot. Alarm bells clanged furiously in my brain. This mare was not what she seemed. “MOONBEAM THOUGHT! STOP THIS BEHAVIOUR AT ONCE. OR DID YOU FORGET WHO YOU ARE WHEN YOUR BRAIN-MEATS GOT REARRANGED?” She bellowed. This mare had fangs. Two sharp little teeth marring the pearly white rows of her jaws. What the Tartarus? Did I know her? Was I Moonbeam Thought? “I AM SAUVIGNON GLAMOUR, YOUR FRIEND. SO CALM THE BUCK DOWN AND COME BACK TO YOUR SENSES!” Oof. Now that name sounded familiar. I definitely knew her. But from where? Who was she to me? ‘A threat.’ Of course she was. Nopony had those kinds of eyes, red and slitted, without being dangerous. Nopony had fangs, without the possibility of using them. And what was she calling herself? Sauvignon Glamour? Where had I heard that before… The growl rose loud and rumbling through my throat, a warning, to this strange mare with the strange visage and the heart that didn’t beat. She should turn, run. Try to escape with her life. But still she stood, awaiting her grim demise. How unfortunate. But if she was going to flaunt death, just standing there, not doing anything to save herself, then she had to be prepared for the consequences of that inaction. “MOONBEAM THOUGHT, I AM WARNING YOU!” There was no other creatures in the clearing, nopony to warn. Was she warning me? Again. Foolish. Who did she think she was dealing with? Evidently not the powerful beast of the woods I was. She walked closer. Stepped closer to me. To her impending death. Truly, honestly foolish. Took another step towards me. Defiance shone in her eyes and her lips peeled back in a snarl, revealing the true length of those unnatural canines. And the uncomfortably sharp points of the rest of her teeth. Not quite fangs, but not the teeth of an equine. ‘Attack her! Show this foolish mare our true might!’ Sounded good to me. I prowled in a slow, deliberate semicircle around the edge of the clearing, tail swishing behind me. And when I had finally reached the other side, I stopped. Tensed every inch of powerful muscle underneath my fur. And leaped, mouth open, ready to bite into the mare, with two jaws of fangs, and claws extended, ready to rend flesh from bone. I rose up in a small arc, clearing the space between us in one second, two- A hoof hit me square in the side of the head, snapping it around to the side with a terrible crack, and knocking me off course. I fell with a thud onto my side, skidding a few centimetres. Bright light danced at the edge of my vision, and my eyes hurt. “Please, for the love of Twilight, don’t be dead. It wouldn’t be very nice to have to dispose of a body at this hour” She snarked. Wait… I did know her. Lying on my side, in a body that was nowhere near my own, in a dark forest, it was all coming back to me. Moonbeam Thought? That was me. How could I have forgotten. The pony who’d just socked me so hard I was seeing stars was Vig. More importantly, the fact that I was even having those thoughts meant her plan was working. “I’m alive, I’m alive. Keep your hair on” I grumbled, trying to get to my hooves in a way that didn’t hurt. “And thank Twilight for that. Bodies are so much harder to get rid of than living ponies!” “Yeah, I’m sure. What’d I do, anyways, to get knocked onto my side like this?” The memory of the last… twenty minutes? Was a blurry snapshot that was quickly fading out of my mind. Vig shook her head solemnly. “Terrible things, Moonbeam, terrible things.” “Forgive me for doubting you.” I muttered She nodded in mock seriousness. “You are forgiven, friend.” Wait, if I was in full control of my thought processes, and body, then was I- a quick glance down at the rest of me revealed that I still wasn’t quite equine. It was a right shame. I enjoyed being a pony. An experimental try at flapping my wings revealed that I couldn’t even feel the muscles there anymore. Finally pulling myself back up onto my hooves again, wincing with every tiny movement. Thankfully, there was no blood. Or any scratches or bruises, for that matter. Not even a red mark or tender spot where I’d skidded. Odd, but it meant there was nothing to explain to Sage Mercy come morning. I brushed off some of the dirt absentmindedly. “So. We made it, the plan worked, what next?” I pondered, more to myself than anypony else. Vig’s expression froze, as if she’d also just realised this. “I have no idea.” I sighed and brought a hoof up to my forehead, in a feeble attempt to put off the headache that was starting to form. The forest was loud; too loud. Every ominous rustle of leaves, or vocalisation from a nocturnal creature pounded in my brain like a jackhammer. “Well buck.”