//------------------------------// // The Dead City // Story: Hey There, Cthulhu // by Count Rodrigo de Vasquez //------------------------------// Vinyl slowly opened her eyes after what seemed like hours of unconsciousness. She found herself lying down in a pile of moss, and quickly jolted up away from the icky goo. She looked around and realized she was in a cave. There was horribly dim, green lighting to faintly illuminate the stone walls. To her right she could see the cave's seemingly endless pathway lined with pointy jagged rocks. She began to tread slowly through the cave's supposed road, the dim green light she could see in the distance seemed to move back just as she moved forward. She trotted faster this time, the light still seeming to run away from her. Her trotting soon escalated into a gallop, and as she galloped she noticed the walls of he cave begin to change. Strange Heiroglyphs began to cover the walls, and sharp rocks transformed into statues, statues of fish like bipeds, and octopus-headed dragons. The pictures on the walls depict of a form of primitive worship to the octopus-headed dragon, portraying sacrifices of ponies and other equines. Vinyl slowed down as she saw the mouth of the cave nearing. She stopped to think for a while...How did she get here? And where in Equestria exactly is here? She proceeded to exit the cave, and in a blinding flash of green light, saw what was on the other side. A city, of none euclidian form, with stairs leading to ceilings, walls on the floors, windows on ceilings roofs under the buildings, this place was like the fantasy of a crazed mad-mare. The buildings were afloat, not on land, water fell above, and below and the entire "city" was inside an even bigger cave. Strange Writings now fill up every wall writable. Writings of a strange and enigmatic culture that nopony has ever heard of or seen before. Vinyl tried to recap on what had happened, she went to Zebrica for her first world tour; went back on the largest cruise ship ever, the RES Equitanic; the ship sank and she drowned in the ocean; and now she's here, in a strange and enigmatic city with crazy architectural designs, and absolutely no sign of anypony, or whatever the hell is living in here, to be found...that just sucks.... Vinyl was lost, she started her way down the steep steps of the city's stairwells. The stench of rotting fish was in the air, a smell that would have made Vinyl heave out her lunch, that is, if she had any...The Light was dim, but good enough for her to see within 30 meters. It was green, as if made by green flames, and the cracking sounds of flickering fire echoed through the city's halls. It was fairly silent, Vinyl could hear her own hoofsteps echo, She was still a bit ditsy, probably because of the smell. Her hoofs were a bit shaky. She trudged on for what seemed like hours before coming to a stop, she was exhausted and needed to rest. She rest her flank on one of the inverted steps sticking out of a building's wall, that seemed to lead nowhere. She gave out a sigh and bowed her head. "I'm never getting out of this place." She said to herself. AAAAAAUUUUUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHHHAHAHHHHHAAAAGH!!!! Out of nowhere, a loud groan resounded all over the empty city, Vinyl jumped to her hooves, startled by the sudden noise. "I-is anyone there?" She asked looking from left to right for any sign of life. AAAAAUUUUUUUUUGGGHHHHHHHH!!!!! It groaned again, whatever it was it sounded as though it was in pain. Vinyl jolted left and right trying to find the mysterious thing that's making all the noise. "Are you hurt? Where are you!?!" Vinyl shouted. AAAAAAGHHUUUUUAHHHHHGH!!! This time the noises got louder, Vinyl attempted to follow the noise, which led her to a series of empty walls, stairwells that led to ceilings, and doors that go nowhere. Vinyl was loosing hope of ever finding what was making the sounds. AAAAAAUUUUUUAAAAAAGHHHHHGHHH!!! All of a sudden, the walls in front of her began to crumble. The buildings collapsed and before they could hit Vinyl, who was already flat on the ground covering her face with her hooves, they crumbled into dust, which only made Vinyl sneeze. And in a bright explosion of greenish flame, she beheld the most magnificent sight. In between a trench, a gigantic octopus-headed dragon was stuck, squirming and squealing making all the horrible groans. She felt pity for the creature, as it struggled to escape, it's tentacles wriggling in the air smashing the cave walls above. Vinyl could not believe her eyes, she's seen dragons, hydras, ursas, and manticores, but she couldn't point a single name to this gargantuan monster. She went in through the dust and rubble and in front of the trench where the creature was stuck. It had an enormous belly, which caused it to be caught between the stones. AAAAAAAAAAAAGHHUUUUUUAAAAAGHHHHH!!!!! "Hey, hey! Calm down there, I'll get you out...Somehow.." Vinyl tried to reassure the thing touching it's claw, which was just about as big as her. The beast stared down at her with red gleaming eyes, and Vinyl stared up at it with her red eyes. Normally, ponies would run screaming, oblivious to the world if they saw something like this creature. But Vinyl felt an aura in this thing, something that tells her this thing isn't evil. The beast wriggled even more, this time causing a quake from inside the cave. Vinyl backed away and held on to a large rock. She looked up at the creature and said, "Hey, now calm down! I can't think of something if you keep causing earthquakes!" The beast seemed to understand her, and stopped squirming. "So you can understand me huh?" Vinyl thought out loud. She looked left and right to see if there was anything that could help her free the creature. "I'm stumped, I got nothing..." Hearing this the creature groaned again, and started to squirm once more. "Hey! I said calm down! You're going to get yourself even more deeper in if you keep doing that!" The creature calmed down again and stared at Vinyl. "So, d'ya have a name?" She asked looking at the creature's face. The creature changed his posture into a more straighter form. His face moved, as if he wanted to talk. His tentacles sliding this way and that, finally a small sound was heard. A faint deep sound that quickly escalated into a loud roar. Vinyl covered her ears, closed her eyes, and gritted her teeth. Soon the roar transcended into what sounded like throat clearing. Vinyl looked up surprised, the creature was now clearing it's throat! "Agghhemm! Gahem! Agghhhaemm!" The creature spat out a huge blob of phlegm at his side. "Cthulhu, my name is Cthulhu." The creature spoke in a deep, raspy voice which echoed throughout the cave and outside into the city. Vinyl's mouth was wide open, her eyes had a look of shock. She's heard of dragons talking, but normal dragons have mouths. This Cthulhu on the other hand, didn't seem to have any form of mouth that would enable it to speak with such fluency. The creature tilted down towards her. It wriggled it's tentacle around, making an impression of it stroking it's chin, he crossed his brows and began to speak again, "And you are?" Vinyl shook her head and closed her mouth, she then made a hasty reply as to avoid being rude. "Vinyl, Vinyl Scratch. So, Cthulhu, how long were you stuck here?" Cthulhu shuddered and face-palmed himself. "ten-freakin'-thousand years.." Vinyl's curiosity was sparked even more so, " Wow, no wonder you had a hard time talking huh?" Cthulhu laughed, "Oh no, that whole growling thing before? Nah, that was just because I thought you spoke deepish." "Deepish?" Vinyl was puzzled. "Language of the deep ones, I never expected someone to speak the language of the land dwellers deep down here you know." "Deep ones?" Vinyl was stumped, all these references Cthulhu was talking about sounded like one of the characters of those retro fantasy comic strips she used to read a lot when she was a filly. "So, how did a land dweller like you get in here anyway?" Cthulhu leaned closer and supported his head with his hand. "Oh that, yeah. The ship I was on sank, shit happened, I blacked out, woke up here without a clue how, and now I'm hee talking to a giant octo-dragon thingy." "Hey, I'm not an octo-dragon thing...I happen to be a Great Old One." "A great what now?" Vinyl was puzzled again. "A Great Old One, an Eldritch God, the 'Harbinger of Madness', 'Destroyer of Minds', you know.....Great Old One...." "Now you sound more like a d&d antagonist..." Vinyl chuckled. "D&D...huh, I wonder what the world up there is now..." Cthulhu said looking up. "Well, depends, how long have you last seen our world" Vinyl replied, she was growing fond of Cthulhu. Something about him made her comfortable, even when the vision her return to the surface was bleak. "Last I've been there, it was ten thousand years ago...Lots of humans there...oh yeah, so how are the humans?" Cthulhu said with beaming eyes. "Humans? What are humans?" Vinyl put on her puzzled look again. "They sound more like those mythical creatures Lyra is really obsessed about, but nah, there aren't any humans in Equestria, or anywhere else in the world." Vinyl finally declared. "Oh, that's a bummer, so what's up there now?" Cthulhu said still curious. "Umm...There's a lot of my kind around, I guess." "And what are you, perhaps?" "Um, a unicorn pony" "Oh, and the humans said unicorns didn't exist" Cthulhu said crossing his arms. "So, Cthulhu, what are these humans like?" "Oh, nothing much really, you know the usual sapient creatures walking on two legs. They're fiercely intelligent, and viciously greedy, they start wars on each other, make huge-ass weapons of mass destruction, and they aim for the stars. They probably achieved that, since there is no absolute sign of them around now is there?" Vinyl was interested about everything Cthulhu knows. She even forgot about home, and friends, and Octavia. "So, Vinyl..." Cthulhu snapped Vinyl from deep thought. "Huh?" "Thought of anything to help me get out yet?" "Oh, yeah right, sorry. Vinyl looked around, she saw a couple of rocks there, some debris, and the slimy moss that was around everywhere. "Aha! I got it!" Vinyl exclaimed. "So what have you thought of?" Cthulhu asked Vinyl who was trotting here and there, picking up the gooey moss. "Imma slide you out of there!" She said. When finally she picked up just the right amount to slide Cthulhu out of the trench, she began to plop them around his belly while making dub-step noises. "Unts unts unts unts unts." She hummed. Cthulhu saw that he was already beginning to slide down, he began pulling himself up and started flapping his enormous wings, soon he was out of the trench and Vinyl was cheering below. "Oh yeah! And Tavi said I couldn't get someone out of a sticky situation if I tried! Hell yeah!" "Thanks, there Vinyl, I owe you one." Cthulhu said, seemingly smiling. Vinyl looked up to her new-found friend, she saw in him a zeal she's never seen in anypony else she's met before "Um...Cthulhu?" "Yeah, Vinyl?" "D'ya know any way out of here?" Cthulhu scratched his head. "Umm....Yeah, maybe. just follow me." Cthulhu put Vinyl in his shoulders and they went on strolling through the dead city, looking for a way out.