Flutterbat truly was quite a beautiful creature.
Before, when she had come to the orchard, the grey bat had only been able to get a quick glimpse of her, enough to see her long, leathery wings and her bright red, voracious eyes. But now, now that he could behold her in all of her true glory, now he was beginning to see how perfect his choice was. There was no one alive, bat or pony, better for the job of Queen.
She was large and intimidating enough to scare away possible rivals, yet gentle and kind enough to talk sense out of the ponies who tried to come and take their apples away every year. She could be menacing if she wished, and she could communicate with every creature the woods could throw at them.
The grey bat knew this; now he just had to make sure his comrades felt the same.
It was difficult, choosing two other bats come with him to see their new Queen, but in the end he had decided on his bratty little brother and another who had always seemed quite a bit nicer than the others in the colony. He had hoped that perhaps they could see his reasoning better than any others.
It was predictable – they couldn’t. But they had still tagged along to see how things had turned out, and, ‘laugh at his miserable failure afterword.’
If that wasn’t absolutely infuriating, what was?
He had to convince them; it was now or never. Fluttershy sat across from them at her kitchen table, slurping up apple after apple while the bats tried to keep up.
The grey bat sighed. Either they left with a Queen or left with no dignity.
He doubted his companions would care either way. Indeed, they were leaning against the side of the apple bucket. His brother had actually started to fall asleep, while the other was making faces at a bunny that kept poking his head out from the top floor. Clearly it was up to him.
‘Miss Fluttershy,’ the bat began, and she looked up at him, fangs showing. Oh, those fangs! So much longer than the fangs of any bat! ‘We have come to offer you a…proposition, of sorts.’
She cocked her head to the side. ‘What’s your name?’
It was a question that caught him completely off-guard.
Vampire fruit bats had no friends. They had relatives, but they had no one they were particularly close to; in a world where everything was ‘fight for your own fruit’ what was the need for company you enjoyed if they could just backstab you and take your fruit? And if you had no friends, no need to refer to anyone or call out to them, why have names at all?
Siblings or mothers or fathers called each other just that – ‘Mother,’ ‘Brother,’ ‘Son,’ and so on and so on. But after that, there was nothing at all the fruit bats were called.
So he answered truthfully. ‘Brother, to one. Son, to two. There is no name other than those that I have; no name other than those is required.’
Fluttershy contemplated this, brow furrowing in concentration, before she turned back to him and smiled, a delicate little movement that perfectly showed off her exquisite fangs. ‘Then we’ll have to fix that, won’t we?’
The grey bat’s brother choked on the apple he was sucking; the companion froze. Both turned and stared at Fluttershy as if she was the strangest thing they had ever seen, and frankly, the grey bat couldn’t blame them; he was doing the same thing. Give him a name? That…that wasn’t done!
‘What do you mean?’ he hissed nervously, anxious to hear that he had misheard her, that she had misspoken. But in a way, he was curious. A name, like Fluttershy or Applejack? His own name?
‘Well,’ she reasoned, ‘I can’t just call you Grey Bat for the rest of this talk, can I? It would get terribly redundant, and I can imagine that would annoy you greatly.’
The grey bat blinked. It was something he had never thought of before, and he didn’t particularly like thinking of it now. So much difference! An actual name for him?
‘What about us?’ his brother asked, clawing his way up the side of the nearly-empty apple basket and peering at Fluttershy curiously. ‘Do we get names too?’
‘I suppose,’ she replied, looking at him; he flushed and dropped out of sight, back behind the basket to his safe haven.
‘Now,’ Fluttershy said, stroking the grey bat’s head on a whim; he nearly winced and pulled back, but quickly decided he enjoyed the feel of her almost-velvety hoof on him – it felt quite nice, in a way. ‘What to call you?’ She inspected him up and down with those beautiful scarlet eyes, stroking his side with one hoof and feeling the leathery texture of his wings at the same time. ‘You’re quite skinny.’
His brother snickered; the grey bat glared at him through eyes half-shut.
‘I believe,’ Fluttershy continued, in the language of the bats, ‘that I’ll call you…Worm.’
Worm? Of all the possible names out there, she chose Worm? The newly named bat sputtered in protest; his brother collapsed on the table, rolling back and forth, propelled by fits of laughter. ‘Why?’ he yelped, trying hard to suppress a screech.
‘You’re skinny,’ she explained, giving a firm glare to Worm’s brother, ‘and you seem sneaky. Quiet. Peaceful. These are all qualities that a worm has, you see. I’ve talked to quite a few of them myself.’
Worm had to bite his lip to stop himself from whining and lowered his head, as if he was a baby bat being scolded by his mother. ‘I understand.’
And that was when it hit him.
The power to give them names – names that fit their personalities and individual tastes. The power to hold authority over others, maintaining balance and managing to stay kind in the process. The power of a Queen.
Worm shot bolt upright. ‘Miss Fluttershy! I’ve almost forgotten the reason we’ve come to speak with you!’
His brother rolled his eyes; their companion hissed softly. ‘The Worm still hasn’t given it up, has he?’
Fluttershy tipped her head to the side. ‘I’m all ears.’
Worm inhaled. Exhaled.
And spoke.
‘Will you lead us? Will you become our Queen, our leader, our mother, our ruler, our…other large, looming things? Will you protect us from danger? Will you become the Mistress of the Night, the Queen of the Night, and eat apples with us? Will you give us all names, give us a purpose other than to fight each other and take away the reputation that has so sourly poisoned our species?
‘Will you be our Queen, Miss Fluttershy?’
She stared at him, mouth slightly agape, looking incredibly flustered and quite pink in the face. ‘Worm…I…’
His heart sank, slowly at first, and then faster and faster until it was falling, falling, falling down into a bottomless pit because this wasn’t good it wasn’t good it wasn’t good she was going to –
‘I’m sorry, but I’ll have to say no.’
Worm’s heart came crashing to the bottom of that bottomless pit, and splintered into a million pieces.
His brother laughed out loud. ‘Told you so.’
The grey bat had never hated another of his species so much as he did right that very moment. His wings flared; his eyes narrowed, and he let out an ear-piercing shriek that trembled the walls of the cottage. Fluttershy stared at him in shock, and when he looked at her, the first thing he noticed was that her eyes were no longer the beautiful crimson they once had been, but were now quite an ugly shade of teal.
‘Worm,’ she sputtered, clearly out of breath.
But that was it. He was done.
Out the door Worm flew, going so fast no one could see but a grey blur and hear nothing but a whisper of wind.
A mare’s voice, not the screech of a vampire fruit bat, whimpered. “Oh…I do hope he’s alright.”
Worm’s brother turned and followed, their companion lagging slowly behind, as one by one the vampire fruit bats turned and flew out the door, leaving a partially confused pegasus mare staring after them with eyes of teal.
The wind whistled through an empty basket of apples placed on the tabletop.
“And we have Mr. Nibbles, Mrs. Nibbles, and the little baby Nibbles’. I think that’s everyone, Angel, or am I wrong?” Fluttershy frowned, placing a hoof to her chin as she thought; Angel pulled on her tail and shook his head in response to her question.
Out from the doorway peeped the head of a tiny, shivering, red-furred squirrel. Fluttershy didn’t know his name, but she did know that he looked like a sweetheart. Grinning and clucking her tongue, she called him forward. “Come out little one, the bats are all gone now.”
But instead of coming into her welcome embrace, the squirrel shivered uncontrollably and darted back behind the shelter of the doorway.
Fluttershy frowned. What did I do wrong? Again she called out, voice a little bit softer and a tiny bit sweeter than before, “All the bats are gone; it’s safe to come out.”
The squirrel shook his head, beady black eyes wide and bright with fear. His mouth moved, but no sound came out of the rapidly opening and closing jaws.
“Angel,” the pegasus whispered to her steadfast rabbit companion, watching out of the corner of her eye at the shivering squirrel, “what’s wrong with him? Can you ask?”
The bunny saluted, breaking form to bounce forward and cautiously whisper something in the nerve-wracked squirrel’s ear. It hastily squeaked something back in reply, so soft that Fluttershy couldn’t make out the words, but Angel obviously could, as he frowned, eyes narrowing into an angered position. Fluttershy knew that face all too well. Someone had said something that had upset him, and he didn’t like it.
The little squirrel already looked like he was going to crack under the pressure of being spoken to, and the pegasus didn’t want that feeling tripled when Angel began to yell at him; quickly she intervened, calling her bunny friend back to her side. He came, but his eyes were still narrowed into tiny slits and his stomps shook the floor like thunder.
“What’s wrong?” Fluttershy asked, afraid to hear the answer.
Angel exhaled. ‘You know that stupid thing you did with the apples ‘bout twenty or so minutes ago?’
Biting her lip, Fluttershy nodded in response, ignoring his insulting remark.
‘Well, you hissed at one of the squirrels when ‘e tried to take your food, and you got all scary-like. Your eyes got red and you had big teeth – really, really big! – and your eyes were all slit, dragon-style. That was the guy you got mad at.’ Angel tipped his head back towards the still-nervously huddling ball of fur in the doorway.
Fluttershy shook her head. “But I don’t understand. Why is he scared of me?”
Angel’s eyes flitted off to the side. ‘’E said something. It wasn’t a good thing to say. ‘Specially not to me.’
“Angel Bunny.” She had to fight hard to suppress her voice from rising into a shrill shriek. “What did the squirrel say?”
The rabbit coughed into his paw. ‘You know how you told ‘im all the bats were gone, and it was safe now?’
Curious, Fluttershy nodded slowly.
‘Well...’e said that not all the bats were gone, not yet.’ Angel looked her straight in the eyes for the first time, and she was shocked to see that his gaze was full of dismay. ‘’E said there’s still one left, and that it wasn’t safe, not yet. Especially since that bat’s the one who takes care of us.’ He sighed. ‘And ‘e’s referring to you.’