//------------------------------//
// Bats! 
// Story: Two Background Ponies Revisit Season Four 
// by Piccolo Sky 
//------------------------------//


Bats!


Sam let out a groan as he approached the door to Carl's apartment. He had missed his "cookie get-together" for this week...and that was never a good sign. In fact, if he was smart, he would probably just stay at home and forget the whole thing until it blew over tomorrow, as around that point Carl would no doubt have a new obsession. But...because he was a good friend, he had to check it out. On arrival, he gave a knock on the door.
"It's open...but you're not invited in!" Carl shouted from the other side. "Let's see if you're really a mortal pony!"
Sam facehooved. "Oh Celestia...he's obsessed with vampires now..."
He soon pushed open the door, and went a bit wide-eyed. In addition to having wallpapered his room with holy Celestia sun symbols and having hung garlic mustard plants all over the place, he had a small pile of wooden stakes next to the couch and was eagerly sharpening more...which wasn't that easy when one had hooves. He had ended up taping a stake to one hoof and his whittling knife to the other. He soon looked up as Sam walked in.
"Great, you're here. Could you do me a favor and go out and get some holy water?"
Sam didn't move and raised an eyebrow. "...What are you doing, Carl?"
"I'm ending the horror, that's what I'm doing, Sam. While she's still asleep during the day in that tree of hers, I'm going to go over to her house and stake her through the heart."
"...Who?"
"Who else?! That Butter...Mutter...Putter...you know! The flower child one!"
"...That's a bit rude, and her name is Fluttershy. We met her a few weeks ago."
"Oh, that what she says her name is...or is it 'El Diablo'?! She has to be destroyed! And if no one is going to assist me, I'll do it myself!"
Sam groaned. "...You're not still going psycho about her temporarily turning into a Vampire Fruit Bat? That was only for two nights..."
Carl paused in his whittling and looked up. "Oh, this has been going on for waaaaaay longer than 'two nights', Sam! Who's the only pony you know of in Equestria who can bend a thousands-of-years old elder wyrm to her will?"
Sam blinked. "Uh..."
"Who's the only pony who can look into the eyes of a cockatrice and not turn to stone?"
"Um..."
"Who decimated the Grand Galloping Gala that year we were in Canterlot by going into a ravenous, berserker, animal rage that made the front of every newspaper?"
"Well...she had help..."
"Who supposedly can't generate more than 2 horsepower from her wingbeats and yet was able to outfly the fastest flier in central Equestria while tethered to an air balloon with other ponies in it? Who has enough physical strength to smack around crowds of ponies and wagons whenever they make her angry and knows how to 'cut' a pony, and a dracoequis for that matter, emotionally where it hurts them the most? Who turned into an anger-fueled 'hulk' just a week ago?"
"That was in one of those enchanted comics! And alright, so she's bipolar!"
Carl shook his head. "Oh no, Sam... I've been telling everyone at the vegetable store, the lumber yard, and the Celestian bookstore...I've seen her 'true form'. I left out Jonathan Apples on the windowsill the other night and I saw her with my own eyes. That ragged coat...those pointed, ultrasonic-sensitive ears...those leathery bat wings...those needle-like incisors... She's clearly not a mare but an infernal demonspawn, and she must be destroyed to end her reign of terror! Only none of them believed me, of course...but I'm going to end the nightmare...er, a real nightmare, not a mare of the night...if it kills me!"
Sam stared back a moment.
"...You told every pony in town all that?"
"Yeah. Why?"
A knock suddenly went off on the door. Carl raised his head. "It's open...but yo-"
"Carl, shut up." Sam cut off as he went to the door and opened it. His pupils shrank a bit at what was on the other side.
Three of Princess Luna's stand-by chariot-pullers were there. One of them had a bat, the wooden, ball-playing kind...although it probably wasn't going to be used to play ball at the moment...in his teeth, and another had a set of "brass horseshoes" and was lightly tapping that hoof against his other. A third one narrowed his slit pupils at Sam.
"So..." He said in a South Manehatten accent. "We heard over at the lumber yard there's a stallion here who don't like bat-ponies..."
Sam swallowed and turned his head slightly.
"Carl? Some guys are here to see you about your latest obsession..."


---


So Carl, how’d you ever clear up things with those bat-ponies anyway?
…I didn’t.
“Hey! There he is!”
“Don’t let him get away!”
“I still got to knock out another three of his teeth!”
Uh, Carl? Those bat-ponies are…
Aw shi-


EXPERIENCING TECHNICAL DIFFICULTIES – PLEASE STAND BY