“It’s back!” Twilight gleefully proclaimed once more, rubbing the purple shaft of her now undamaged horn. “Colgate it’s ba...” She trailed off when she looked at me before forgetting about her cured horn to look me down. “You certainly seem better than before,” she observed, looking intently at my neck and legs. “Your various cuts and bruises have completely vanished, as if they had never existed.”
“I was just about to say the same about you, Twilight,” I replied, looking again at the perfectly unscathed body that had collapsed in front of me not more than an hour ago. Not only did she seem unhurt, but she seemed to have nothing wrong with her at all. It was as if the bright light had revived every aspect of us before dumping us on the floor of wherever we were.
“We ended up in a clock shop,” Twilight commented, turning around and looking at the various clocks littered about the room. We were indeed either in a clock shop, or a crazy stallion’s basement, as the walls were filled with clocks of all sizes and shapes. I would have thought the ticking sounds would have been maddening, but the entire room was silent. Looking around at each clock, I saw that all of them were frozen at the same time the clock we had just escaped from was situated. Every single one of them were stopped at the same time, and everything in the room was covered with a thick layer of dust, as if the clocks hadn’t been in working condition for quite a while.
“These probably haven’t been used for ages,” I commented, seeing that the layer of dust wasn’t only confined to the clocks themselves. “In fact, this entire room seems to be covered in dust.” I brushed my hoof along the ground and noticed the streak it left. There had to be at least a paper-thin layer of grime glazed along the entire room, save the ceiling. The floor even had various dust bunnies scattered about its surface, and mismatched debris strewn about the room.
“This building probably hasn’t been used for ages either,” Twilight responded as I walked around the room and inspected the state of all the clocks. “Look at the ceiling,” she said with her eyes transfixed on a large crack running through the plastered roof of the room. I looked up from one of the fancier cuckoo clocks that had the bird lying on the ground next to its shattered face. What I had originally thought was one particularly large crack actually had many intertwining broken bits all strung together. The ceiling itself even had the impression that it was starting to dip inward. It seemed like a miracle that the ceiling hadn’t collapsed inward as we stood here.
“I don’t feel safe in here,” I commented, looking around at the broken bits of clock and shattered glass strewn across the tile floor. “Nearly every clock in here is shattered, and there’s glass all over the place. Plus, the ceiling seems like it could cave in at any minute.”
“This place is oddly familiar,” Twilight said, ignoring my comments about the hazards around us. “I can’t put my hoof on it though.” I sighed, knowing full well that at this point it was going to be impossible to pull her attention away from whatever memory see seemed to be trying to get a grip on.
Pulling myself away from her, I traversed to the other side of the room, careful not to step on anything that might get stuck inside my hooves. The place seemed to be laid out like a minefield, with broken bits hidden in plain sight due to the musty atmosphere of the building. I carefully sidestepped my way through the miniature rubble and finally made it to a set of steps. I dusted off the bottom step with my front hoof and coughed as the dust particles scattered around. I sneezed once, and a cloud of dust arose from what was left on the bottom few steps. I rubbed my eyes a bit and opened them back up to the gloomy atmosphere of this basement of a room. I sat down to check my hooves for loose objects when it dawned on me.
The entire room should have been cast into darkness as there was no way a source of light could stray in from anywhere. The door at the top of the steps I was sitting was the only conceivable place light could be seeping in, and even then it wouldn’t light up the room as much as it was being lit. The room seemed to almost glow with an unnatural light, but it didn’t seem to originate from any one spot. Now that I was paying attention, everything in the entire basement seemed to have a slight hue of red mixed in with the normal greys and browns.
“Twilight,” I started, standing up and looking around at everything, a sudden feeling of fear in the pit of my stomach starting to rise, “Do you recognize this place yet?”
“It reminds me of...” she trailed off, staring into space and instantly becoming unresponsive. She stood there for a few seconds almost frozen in time before seeming to develop a haze around her. Suddenly, the sound of distant static caught my ears, almost exactly like the one in Twilight’s Library when I had tried to leave. Her form started to warp and stretch impossibly, as if I was watching just her through a television that was losing reception.
“Twilight!” I shouted, wanting to sprint over to her. I felt stuck into place though, and as hard as I willed my feet, they wouldn’t budge. “Twilight what’s happening!” I shouted as loud as I could manage, although all the came out was a loud whisper. I tried to scream again as Twilight started to fade away, the same quizzical look plastered on her face, but my mouth refused to open. It felt as if I were slowly turning to stone.
Twilight warped more and more, her figure slowly transforming into an outline of static and her colour fading as the seconds ticked away. Soon her entire body had been replaced by static, and I was helpless to try and go save her, as I felt glued to the spot by some dark force keeping me from lifting my hooves. I started to panic, darting my eyes back and forth as I lost the control to even turn my head. I couldn’t move anything else. I suddenly found it difficult to breath in and out, as each subsequent breath felt harder and harder to take. The air seemed thick and impossible to breath. It got worse by the second, and when Twilight’s still frozen figure started to fade, I found I couldn’t breathe altogether. My heart raced as I tried to figure out why I wasn’t able to take in air. I looked down and found out why.
My mouth and nose had both gone.
I panicked even more, breaking out in a nervous sweat and trying desperately to tear open the spot where my mouth had previously been to try to let fresh air grace my lungs. My vision started to fade as Twilight started to slide backwards towards the wall with broken clocks. The room around us started to form massive cracks on the walls and ceiling, and the floor fell out beneath us. Twilight stayed afloat as my mind reeled to comprehend what was going on. The walls around us shattered as my heart started to slow down from the lack of oxygen, and the pieces created fell into a massive black expanse going infinitely down below us. The clock we had escaped from was the only thing left between us, and soon it floated to the middle of the room, growing massive and blocking my view of Twilight altogether.
I tried desperately to scream, but my vocal chords felt frozen into place. Soon the clock face was all that I could maintain in my vision, but instead of the dusty and grimy face that had greeted us on the inside, this glass was unblemished and crystal clear. I could see my reflection in the glass and could make out that the same thing that had been happening to Twilight had also been happening to me. My shape and color in the reflected image had been replaced with static in the reflection, and I was starting to fade. Looking down at my own lipless and noseless face, I saw that my green hue was still there in contrast to what the reflection was telling me. My vision started to fade as the lack of oxygen was finally getting to me. In a few seconds I was sure to pass out.
Looking down at the six, where we had escaped recently from, I saw thousands of pricks of red and heard saw the hazy smoke of the Time Protectors. My heart skipped a beat and I closed my eyes, not knowing how I was going to survive this. It looked like my end had come. Mother... Father... I thought, on the verge of tears, Help me... I don’t want to die... not yet...
“Colgate,” I heard a voice whisper to me, and I opened my eyes to see my mother’s green eyes looking at me from a distance. I wanted to shout back, but I had held my breath too long. My vision faded entirely to black, and a black mist took ahold of me and dragged me under, taking control of my mind.
“Colgate,” I heard somepony whisper into my ear, almost sounding like a desperate cry for help, “wake up and save us.”
My eyes shot open to reveal I was back where I had began before Twilight had started to fade into that horrible static. I was lying on the floor, and my head was pounding against my skull, almost as if somepony had knocked me out by bucking me right in the head. I rubbed my head gently and winced when one spot felt as if I had just set a lit match on my skin.
I blinked a few times before hoisting myself up with the dusty table next to me. I stood shakily on my hooves feeling extremely lightheaded, still leaning on the table of clocks for support. Looking around I saw that Twilight was no longer with me. I panicked a bit and my eyes darted around the room for any sign of struggle or anything that might indicate where she might have been taken. The room looked exactly the same as it had when I passed out, only Twilight wasn’t there. The clocks were stuck on the same time, the dust not been disturbed at all, and the tables and bits of broken glass were all the same, save where I had fallen on the ground.
I glanced down at the table and saw why my head was throbbing. A patch of dried blood was stained into the corner of the wooden structure. I lightly tapped the throbbing wound, wincing at the small pain that pulsed through my head, and shuddered, wondering how long I had lain on the ground since I had passed out. I patted my horn, which made it through the ordeal unscathed. I wanted to be sure that the appendage still worked as it was supposed to, though, so I closed my eyes, and, ignoring the dull throbbing in my brain, willed a simple light spell to be cast.
The light spell came easily, telling me that nothing was seriously damaged on my horn, but when I opened my eyes, the eerie yellow glow it produced cast long shadows on the floor and sent a shiver down my spine. I extinguished the light, noticing that the odd red glow that seemed to emanate from the walls was still present. I stood there for a second, almost in a daze, before snapping my mind back to attention and thinking about what to do next.
“Hello” I called out, just in case somepony happened to be around. I stood for a second in the complete silence, noticing once again the creepy atmosphere that it produced before hearing something.
It was nothing more than a whisper, but I heard a distinct and distant voice whisper, “help me.” The sound had come from behind me, through the door leading outside.
I turned my head around slowly, not knowing what to expect behind me. The stairs were empty, covered with a thin layer of dust that, like the rest of the room, seemed to have been undisturbed. I placed a hoof on the grime and wiped it slowly towards me, noticing the dust and dirt clung easily to my hoof. When I pulled my hoof away, there was a distinct patch of dust gone. I wiped the grime off onto my coat, which seemed to be riddled with tiny pieces of glass and dirt already.
“How did she get out of here without disturbing any of this dust?” I wondered aloud, taking a step and noticing the tiny dust cloud raised from the motion. “Did she do the time spell again? Maybe if I just...”
I closed my eyes, willing power into my horn, trying to cast the time spell once more. I planted my feet and grunted, forcing magic into my horn, building up the power to cast the spell. I imagined the clock ticking and I tried to slow down the hands. They wouldn’t stop, though, and I concentrated harder, willing more magic into my head. A dull throbbing reminded me of my recent injury, but I paid it no attention, concentrating on the spell at hoof. I concentrated more and more, the pressure building until suddenly, the imaginary clock burst. I shot my eyes open, flying back from the pulse that erupted from my horn and smashing into one of the stairs behind me, completely shattering it.
That had never happened before.
I coughed, pushing a chunk of wood off my chest as dust rained down from the ceiling, the blast apparently having shook the entire room. I pushed myself to my hooves and looked around to see that everything had fallen into place against the wall from the shockwave. “At least now I don’t have to worry about stepping on any glass shards...” I said lightheartedly, trying to keep myself calm.
Looking up, I noticed that the curve of the ceiling seemed to be further indented than it had been before. I panicked a bit when I saw the indenture, but I closed my eyes and took a few deep breaths, calming myself down again. On the third breath in, I swore I heard a faint whisper say something from outside the door.
“Hello?” I called up the steps to be sure that I had not just imagined the sound. “Is anyone there?”
Great, I thought to myself. Now I’m starting to go insane and imagining that I’m hearing noises. Any other brilliant ideas you want to go through with? You already lost Lily and now, when you go back to save her, you lose Twilight, the most advanced magical unicorn you know!
“Colgate” the faint whisper resounded again, but I felt as though I recognized the voice this time.
“Twilight?!” I shouted, my ears perking up and my head staring intently at the door. Excitedly and in a slight state of panic, I jumped over the massive hole I had made in the wooden stairs and rushed up to the door, skipping two steps at a time. When I got there, I pushed hard on the oak frame, but the door seemed to be locked. “Twilight, are you there?” I asked again through the woodwork of the door.
“Colgate, help me,” I heard Twilight’s voice call out in a muffled whisper. The voice sounded really far away, but I couldn’t place how far since the door was in the way. She needed help, though, and I wasn’t about to let a slightly-rotted door keep me in. I turned around on the steps, placing my forelegs on the top step and my back legs on the wooden door. I rocked back and forth a bit, trying to determine my balance in case the door didn’t break on the first. I rocked forward a final time, lifting my hooves off the door itself.
I kicked back with all my might, and the wooden door cracked near the hinges, but the frame still stood upright. I replaced my front hooves firmly on the wooden-plank step and replaced my back hooves on the door exactly where I had just bucked. The wood creaked softly when I placed my dirty blue hooves on the doorframe once more, making me smile a little. Giving the door one last swift kick, the wood splintered and the door fell over with a massive thud.
I rubbed my back hooves, an odd numb feeling from bucking a solid wood door partially immobilizing them. I looked around to see that I was now standing in the middle of a back alleyway. The cottage next to me had a window that was oddly barred from the inside with wooden planks. I turned to my right, noticing the crunch beneath my hooves as I did so. Looking down, I saw that the grass in this obscured alley was completely dead and browning. Glancing up, I noticed that the alleyway led to a wooden fence off to the right, and to the left, there was a cobblestone street.
Unlike when I had first gotten into the world, there was now a thick, red fog out on the street. I could barely see the cottages on the other end of the road. Crunching my way over the dead grass once more, I stepped out into the cobblestone road, my hoofsteps seeming to echo up and down in the dead silence. A cold sweat broke out on my forehead as I realized that something about this frozen world was different from the one I normally visited.
The weather usually was the same as the regular world, but never had I seen a fog so unnaturally thick. Also, the sounds in the other frozen world never echoed, regardless of the circumstances. My hair stood on end as my skin seemed to crawl. Something about this place just creeped me out. I just wanted to go back into the cellar of broken clocks, but I knew that Twilight and Lily were out there somewhere.
“Hello?” I shouted to the emptiness, my voice echoing up the street far too many times than should have been possible. “Twilight?” My voice reverberated back to me, almost seeming like it was mocking me. I felt uneasy standing in this abandoned road full of fog by myself.
“Lily, can you hear me?” I asked the red cloud in front of me, taking a few steps forward. The repressing clip and clop of my own hoofsteps was setting me on edge. “Can anyone hear me?” I softly said to myself, not wanting to shout since the echo already raised the volume to uncomfortable levels.
I walked down the street a little, the scenery not changing one bit. I had no idea where the trip through that clock world had landed us, but the buildings vaguely reminded me of Ponyville. No streets in Ponyville were this long, though, and I was at a loss to what other village had a need for this many cottages. My slow walk soon became a quick trot. I wanted to find an intersection so I knew where I was going.
Finally, after about five minutes of fear-induced trotting, I came upon a crossroads. I looked down the intersecting road as far as I could with the red fog blocking my vision, which meant that I could only see a cottage or two before everything else was blocked out. The intersecting street seemed to be made up of cottages as well. I looked left and right, not knowing what to do when it dawned on me.
Every cottage was the same.
I looked even harder at the buildings around me. Every single cottage I saw had the same front door, the same color exterior, and the same amount of windows obscured by wooden planks nailed in the exact same fashion. Curious fear got ahold of me, and I walked up to the nearest cottage. Walking up the three steps identical to the cottage next to it as well as the one across the street, I put a hoof on the identical wooden door. Pushing on it, the wood wouldn’t budge. I gave it a kick, and, unlike the door I had smashed out of, it didn’t budge the slightest inch. It had felt like I just kicked a brick wall. The hinges didn’t even vibrate.
My heart sped up as I gave the door another kick to see if the first had loosened it in the slightest. The door reproduced the same solidity, and I started to panic. Images raced through my mind of something coming down the street. Where would I hide if one of those “time lords” came marching down the avenue and I couldn’t outrun it? My eyes darted to the side, looking towards the alleys between the cottages. I jumped off the stairs and in front of the alley to the left, my heart pounding as the echo of my hooves landing on the cobblestone seemed to threaten my very being. Looking down the alley, I hoped to see something different or out of the ordinary.
It was identical to the one I had left, smashed door and everything.
I trotted over to look down into the cellar and saw that it was the same one I had left not ten houses back.
“Twilight!” I shouted to my surroundings, hoping that she could somehow hear me through the think and suppressing fog. “Twilight, help!”
“Colgate,” a voice whispered behind me, clearly in great pain. It sounded like Twilights, and I wasn’t about to stand and start guessing. I ran out onto the street to see a figure in the fog, just beyond what I could view with detail.
“Twilight?!” I shouted at the pony-like figure which seemed to be limping towards me at a deathly-slow pace, its hoofsteps rattling the houses around me. “Dear Celestia, Twilight!” I shouted again, the figure finally collapsing on the ground.
I ran forward, and sure enough, it was Twilight, but she looked nothing like I had seen when she disappeared. Her back left leg was bent at a horrifying angle, the bottom half completely covered in blood. It looked as if it was slightly shorter than the other three. The smell of dried blood and decay covered her, despite her only being gone for a few minutes. Her back was caked with patches of dry blood and there were other sections where her fur had been completely ripped out. Her horn was once again snapped completely off, and she seemed to be breathing very heavily.
“Twilight, speak to me!” I cried, putting a hoof under her chin and lifting her head up. What I hadn’t noticed was that her face was covered with cuts and bruises. “Please don’t be dead,” I said, tears coming to my eyes.
“C-C-Colgate,” she gurgled, barely opening her eyes. I could see that they were completely bloodshot.
“What is it Twilight?” I asked, trying to get her sweaty, rank mane out of her face.
“R-Run,” she said before closing her eyes once again, her chest completely motionless now. Before I had the chance to say anything, a strange wind blew over us. Had I not been so worried about Twilight, I would have realized that this shouldn’t have been possible in the frozen world. A tear escaped my eye, and I closed them to wipe away the grief I had held for my friend. As I was about to say a prayer for her, I opened my eyes to take one last look at her. She was gone, her body completely disappeared. There were no traces of her anywhere, not even a sign that she had ever been there.
“Am I going crazy?” I asked myself, glancing around and standing up. I looked down at my hoof. “She was holding my hoof. How is that possible?”
I stared at my hoof for a little bit before it dawned on me that my mane was still blowing in the wind. The only problem was, that couldn’t have been possible. Wind can’t be produced in the frozen world because everything, even the air currents, gets paused in whatever state it’s in when the spell is cast. I turned to my left, looking down the intersecting road where the wind was coming from. I took a few steps forward when I thought I saw something right on the edge of the red fog.
I took another step and suddenly a blood-curdling screech, one of pure agony rang out in front of me. For a second I was paralyzed with fear, but then I saw another movement at the edge of the fog. A black mass was running directly towards me. It filled the entire street, but I could detect no sound. I squinted, trying to make out what it was, and whether or not I should heed the imaginary Twilight’s words. That’s when I saw them.
The tiny red dots I knew all too well.