//------------------------------// // Part 18: To Slay the Eldritch // Story: Lost in a Terrifying World // by Erisn //------------------------------// Scootaloo watched in horror as the dark cloud engulfed Discord. He went into it struggling, but the tendrils sucking him into that mass of black oblivion, and strain her eyes as she might, Scootaloo couldn’t see any movement from within. She was paralyzed, unable to move and torn between running for help, and trying to pull Discord out herself. Her paralysis lasted for all of five seconds, before Scootaloo’s legs tried to carry her down the rubble towards the Slender Man. They never got the chance, however. There was a blinding flash of light, and suddenly an explosion where the Slender Man stood. When Scootaloo had picked herself off the ground, she saw Nightmare Moon. And it was Nightmare Moon, The terrible Mare in the Moon, the terrible monster of legend, the antithesis of light and happiness, Celestia’s nemesis and stealer of candy on Nightmare Night. It was definitely not Princess Luna. Scootaloo had grown to like the younger alicorn princess after her initial fright, and she had come to respect her after a certain incident involving bedtime tales and dreams. She knew Luna’s appearance. This wasn’t it. Nightmare Moon, or Dark Luna was tall as Celestia, garbed in blue battle armor, and possessed a flowing mane filled with the night sky and the stars. She also looked really, really angry. Scootaloo flattened herself to the floor as Nightmare Moon charged the Slender Man. She didn’t speak, shout, or utter a single word. She just attacked with spell and hoof, knocking aside tendrils as they shot towards her and sending back huge blasts of magic at the same time. One of Nightmare Moon’s blasts of magic missed the Slender Man, and hit part of the Everfree Forest some five miles distant. Scootaloo flinched as that part of the forest exploded, showering tress, rocks, and dirt into the air. The parts that weren’t obliterated then caught fire or melted. But that was only the beginning of Luna’s attack. Scootaloo held her breath as the alicorn soared into the sky, bombarding the stationary figure of the Slender Man with magical spells that created shockwaves in the air and broke the earth in two. Yet still his tendrils followed her even in the air, forcing Nightmare Moon to deflect them as she circled above him. And then, she was directly overhead the Slender Man as he stood in the center of his cloud of darkness. A hundred tendrils emerged from the cover of that blackness and sped towards Nightmare Moon. Scootaloo waited for her to conjure a shield, or dodge the tendrils or even retreat, but Nightmare Moon did none of those things. Instead, she dove into the black cloud, her horn shining like the stars. The darkness enfolded Nightmare Moon and there was complete silence. It expanded even further, and then consumed the Slender Man as well. There was nothing now except a huge roiling mass of darkness just outside of Ponyville, nearly a mile wide and long. Scootaloo stood on her seat of rubble and watched the cloud for any sign of movement, any indication of what was happening. She did not have to wait long. ---- The Slender Man was proud of his work. The darkness he had created, the cloud of light-destroying nothingness was his latest innovation. He had come up with it as a way to both move around freely and cripple his enemies. Already, the chaos-god and the moon goddess had been trapped within it, and were suffering its effects. The Slender Man’s darkness was simply an extension of his aura, and as such, it carried all of its effects. An ever-present taint of his eldritch origins that made direction and the other senses useless, a darkness from which no light could escape and not least, a corrosive effect that would destroy any being trapped within it for too long. It wasn’t the Glow Cloud, sure, but it was still damn impressive for something he came up with on the fly. Slender had dealt with the being known as Discord easily once he had been caught. The chaos god relied on visual senses far too much, and Slender had used that to his advantage, striking again and again in the darkness. A shame gods were so hard to kill. But Discord’s body was already a pincushion from the Slender Man’s tendrils, and Slender could feel him weakening. All things being equal, Slender would have taken the time to kill both gods and then hunt down the sun goddess before dealing with Twilight Sparkle. Except… The moon goddess didn’t stop fighting. What was she? Not just a goddess and not merely a pony. She was both and yet more. Her powers stemmed from the moon that hung overhead in the eclipse, and from her magical nature as an alicorn. But it also came from something else. It came from fear, and nightmares. The Slender Man felt it as she charged him. This wasn’t a being of love and happiness. This was something akin to his nature. She had appeared at first to be a simple goddess of the moons, a local deity. But she had…changed into a larger pony, wearing battle armor and radiating darkness. She was a monster. She controlled dreams. That was it. But she drew her strength from fear as well as dreams. She was a being of terror, and she fought like one. The Slender Man had tried to attack her in the darkness, but even though she couldn’t see, she still fought back. She was used to the darkness. It was a part of her just as it was a part of the Slender Man. In the darkness of the nothing cloud, the Slender Man sent tendril after tendril at the goddess who called herself Nightmare Moon. She sensed his presence somehow, and blasted them with a spell that hurt even the Slender Man. Then she charged him, horn lowered. The Slender Man barely avoided the thrust, but swept a tendril down like a sword as she passed. Blood spurted in the darkness, falling to the ground in a pattering of drops. The Slender Man felt Nightmare Moon’s pain, sensed her wound. But she didn’t stop. She didn’t back down. She turned and charged again. The Slender Man dodged the horn again, but this time Nightmare Moon teleported behind him and stabbed him in the back. Her horn went through his body and out the other side, impaling the Slender Man. That hurt. The Slender Man felt the horn twist and then pull out as he sent a wave of tendrils at Nightmare Moon. But she was gone, circling already and lining up another charge. The Slender Man felt at the hole in his chest with one tendril. It was a neat, round hole. It hurt like fire and light. A unicorn or alicorn’s horn was so deeply magical that it was worse than being struck with an enchanted sword. The Slender Man felt the darkness rise in his soul with his anger and pain. This was more like it. True combat. No tricks, no deception. Just violence, and death. The only victor was the greater monster here. And he was truly a monster. Not a pretend friend, not a creature pretending to be nice and peaceful. An eldritch. A killer. The ender of all things. The alicorn charged. So did the chaos god. They came at him from two sides, seeking to spit his attention. The Slender Man would have laughed if he had a throat. He raised no tendrils. He didn’t move. He stood, letting both beings approach nearer, nearer. Then the Slender Man raised both of his arms in the darkness. They were unnaturally long; as long as his legs. He had never moved them before. But now they rose, and in the darkness they shot out and grabbed both moon goddess and chaos god and held them aloft. The Slender Man watched them struggle, his hands loosening their grip a bit even as both gods fought to get free. He merely tightened his hold until he felt their bones begin to crack and crunch. Then the pain truly began. ---- Scootaloo watched the darkness with bated breath. She couldn’t hold her breath for more than a minute, though, and decided to watch the darkness normally. Nothing moved. Nothing stirred. Yet, Scootaloo felt more nervous by the second. Surely, surely the Slender Man couldn’t defeat both Discord and Nightmare Moon. But that darkness seemed to be getting even darker… “And what are you doing here young filly?” Scootaloo nearly jumped out of her skin in fright. She whirled, her wings spread instinctively. And stopped. Before her was Princess Celestia. Scootaloo nearly fell off her seat of rubble, but one of Celestia’s hooves steadied her. It was only when Celestia touched Scootaloo that she realized how different Celestia looked from her normal appearance. Scootaloo had seen Celestia on several different occasions, from the Equestria Games to a visit to Canterlot or the numerous visits Celestia paid to Ponyville. But she had never looked like this. Something was wrong. Celestia’s coat was drenched in sweat, and Celestia herself looked unsteady. Her brow was dripping with beads of perspiration, and she looked unsteady on her feet. Mind you, it was a bit warm for Scootaloo’s taste, but that hardly explained her state. Regardless, Celestia radiated authority and command, and Scootaloo felt herself stammering out an explanation. “I see.” Princess Celestia did not frown, which was wise given that Scootaloo was on an emotional rollercoaster from recent events. “I would like to have you evacuate from Ponyville, Scootaloo. If there were any Wonderbolts nearby, I would send you with them at once, but there are none, and I would not draw the attention of that thing,” Celestia nodded at the cloud of darkness, “by calling for one. Besides,” Celestia looked grim, “if we fail here, there will be no safe place in all of Equestria. None in this entire reality, in fact.” “But you’re going to win, right?” Scootaloo’s voice really was cracking a lot today. “I mean, you’ve got a plan that’ll take care of him. Right?” “If only it were that simple,” Celestia sighed. “A plan? A thousand plans would crumble to dust in the face of that monster. It, or possible he is nothing like anything Equestria has ever seen. I would rather open the gates of Tartarus and face all that it contained alone than do battle with him. Plans? No. All we have is a chance, a chance to defeat him or hurt him enough that he flees.” Scootaloo felt her own brow start to bead with sweat. Or maybe it was the heat. It felt uncomfortably hot, now. “But Nightmare Mo—I mean, Princess Luna and Discord are fighting him,” she said. “They could beat him if they worked together, right?” Celestia was silent for a moment. “One can only hope,” she said at last. “But Discord offered me no reassurances on that point, and he is stronger than both Luna and I combined. If even he would not care for his success…” Scootaloo felt her heart sinking into her hooves. “But how can you beat him, then?” “With bravery. With luck. With courage.” “Isn’t bravery the same as courage?” “No. But we will need both to stop the Slender Man. In truth, Discord and Luna are only meant to stall him. Our true weapon is being prepared as we speak.” Celestia wiped another trickle of sweat from her forehead, “and we have one more line of defense to buy us time. Perhaps two.” “Well, I’ll help too.” Scootaloo’s legs felt shaky, but she tried to stand tall. “You can count on me Princess Celestia.” Celestia smiled, but it was a brief thing, much like the light of the sun before it was eclipsed by the moon. Scootaloo glanced up. The eclipse seemed brighter, for some reason. Was Princess Luna’s battle doing something to the moon? “I appreciate your willingness to fight, Scootaloo,” Princess Celestia said. “But I truly hope it does not come to that. We must simply trust that our plan works. Otherwise—” Celestia broke off, staring at a point over Scootaloo’s shoulder. Scootaloo turned to look. The darkness was gone. There stood the Slender Man. And there lay Discord, and Princess Luna. No longer Nightmare Moon. Both of them were bleeding from a thousand cuts on their bodies. Discord had holes in his flesh, but somehow still lived. Luna wasn’t able to stand. It looked like something had crushed her forelegs, leaving them bent and broken. The Slender Man was covered in blood. It spotted his suit, and covered the ground around him. But what drew Scootaloo’s eye were his hands. Those hands had never moved so long as Scootaloo had seen the Slender Man. But now they were covered in blood, which dripped to the ground, leaving crimson stains. The Slender Man wasn’t looking at Luna and Discord lying on the ground, however. Instead, he was facing towards where Scootaloo and Celestia stood. Scootaloo squeaked and flattened herself to the ground, but the Slender Man was not looking at her. All of his attention was on Princess Celestia. The white alicorn stood and met his sightless gaze with her own. A pair of violet pupils stared into a face with no features whatsoever. The silence between Princess Celestia and the Slender Man lengthened. Neither being looked away. Celestia didn’t blink, didn’t even waver despite the sweat pouring into her eyes. Then the Slender Man was covered in darkness again. It swept around his form, and then dissipated as suddenly. But he was no longer standing where he had been. Instead, he was right in front of Celestia, only separated by a distance of ten feet. The Slender Man sent a flurry of tendrils lancing towards Celestia. She didn’t blink even as silent death sped towards her. The tendrils were stopped in midair by a shimmering force field. Scootaloo looked up in amazement. A barrier, a wall stood between the Slender Man and Princess Celestia. It was a brilliant pink field of magic that stretched into the sky. Behind Celestia from a pile of rubble, Shining Armor emerged, and by his side was Princess Cadence. They stood next to Celestia and faced down the Slender Man. From her small hilltop, Scootaloo could see both sides staring at each other. Neither group moved. But the darkness around the Slender Man rose and deepened, and she felt his hatred like a real thing, making her want to empty her stomach and flee. She did not, because there was nowhere to flee. And besides, the Slender Man had already started his next assault. It was too late to run. ---- Always the magic. Always a barrier. Always a box. They thought they were so clever, mortals did. They truly believed that it was possible to seal beings such as the Slender Man away, to contain or even harness their power. Such folly. Such foolishness. Such arrogance. Perhaps it was possible to contain a lesser god or supernatural being inside a lamp. Maybe there were even beings capable to sealing demons or containing nightmares. But not the eldritch. Not the Slender Man. He could not be stopped. He would not be stopped. The Slender Man pushed against the barrier the white stallion had made. It resisted him, somehow. That was nearly impossible for any magic to accomplish. But there was something odd about that stallion. The magic shield he had formed was advanced spell casting; the work of a master. But even that wouldn’t have held back the Slender Man for more than a second. No, the barrier was being reinforced somehow. The Slender Man studied the white stallion, and then the pink alicorn next to him. She was giving him strength. They were connected. Some kind of relationship? Slender sensed a combination of power, but more than that, a sharing of the soul. Was this some trick of the ponies, some kind of ability they possessed? No matter. The Slender Man struck the barrier with a thousand tendrils and felt it weaken. He wouldn’t be stopped by a hundred magical protections. Not now. The sun goddess was staring at him. She hadn’t blinked yet, although she seemed exhausted for some reason. He wasn’t sure why. Aside from a few spells, she hadn’t engaged him at all until now. Perhaps it was the heat? The Slender Man could sense the ambient temperature rising to high levels for some reason. But why would a sun goddess suffer from the heat? The Slender Man really didn’t care. All that mattered as vengeance. The barrier, and then the sun goddess. Then he would come for Twilight Sparkle. She had much to answer for. The Slender Man struck the barrier again with all his might, and was pleased to see both stallion and pink alicorn stagger and fall to their knees. Serve them right. It looked like they were putting all they had into maintaining it. So foolish. So weak. So predictable. The Slender Man battered the shield again and again, an endless rain of blows that would have pulverized mountains. And still it held. But he could feel both ponies getting weaker and weaker. A few more minutes and he would break through. They were only delaying the inevitable. ---- Shining Armor and Cadence were slumped to the ground. Their horns glowed faintly, and they seemed unable to rise. Scootaloo watched in petrified horror. The shield still held, barely. But the Slender Man pounded on it relentlessly with his tendrils, striking it again and again like a gong. Princess Celestia wasn’t doing anything. She just stood there, next to Cadence and Shining Armor eyes closed, swaying slightly as if in a trance. Was she helping to hold the shield? Scootaloo didn’t know, but whatever she was doing it wasn’t working. As Scootaloo watched, Shining Armor’s horn flared once and went nearly completely dark. Only the barest glimmer of light showed that he was hanging on. Cadence was in little better shape. Scootaloo could see the Slender Man’s tendrils stop their attacking for just a second as he seemed to inspect the two fallen ponies. And the he resumed the assault, slamming at the shield with double the force, clearly intent on breaking through before Celestia came back to her senses. Shining Armor and Cadence slowly reached out towards one another. Every motion seemed to take forever, but they moved one hoof each, grasping towards the other. The shield was flickering, cracking, dying. The Slender Man stood outside it, promising death the instant it fell. Something was leaking from Shining Armor and Cadence’s horns. Blood welled up from the base of each’s horn and dripped down their face. The shield began to break apart at the seams. One of the Slender Man’s tendrils punched through the barrier, then another. And then the shield shattered into pieces. The Slender Man’s tendrils arced through the air and came to rest, hovering over Shining Armor and Cadence’s head. Celestia’s eyes were still closed, and she didn’t seem to notice what was going on. Scootaloo wanted to run, to grab both ponies and drag them to safety, but her legs wouldn’t move. The tendrils hovered as Cadence and Shining Armor slowly reached for each other’s hoof. Scootaloo knew that the instant they touched, the Slender Man would strike. Slowly, Shining Armor’s hoof rose from the ground. Cadence’s did likewise. They met in the air with a soft clop, and Cadence managed a small, weak smile. Shining Armor, blood running down his face, managed to return it. The Slender Man’s tendrils fell. They stabbed towards the heart of both ponies. They never made it. Shining Armor and Cadence’s horns glowed, one a bright pink, the other a soothing blue. A shining whirlwind of magic appeared out of nowhere. It flowed around Cadence and Shining Armor, and lifted them into the air. Scootaloo knew this sight. She had seen it once before. Suddenly, the light of Shining Armor and Cadence’s horns increased, and grew to a blinding white light. It was small at first, the merest glimmer of brightness. And then it expanded, and grew. And then it exploded into a blast of pure pink light that radiated outwards from both ponies. It swept over the Slender Man. It swept over Scootaloo. It was beauty and magic. It was love made incarnate, and it lifted Scootaloo’s spirits. It had even a more dramatic effect on the Slender Man. As the magic struck Slender, it blew away the darkness around him, and covered his body in pink light. Wisps of his body seemed to uncurl and disintegrate as the light covered him. He threw back his head and screamed. It wasn’t a terrible scream. It was a pitiful shriek of pain and fear. And Scootaloo watched the light push him back and further back, until it tossed him into the air. For one moment, Scootaloo hoped he would disintegrate, or at least be tossed over the horizon as Chrysalis had. The light did neither, but it dropped the Slender Man a hundred feet away before dissipating into the air. Shining Armor and Cadence slowly fell to the ground, where they collapsed, unconscious, both hooves still intertwined. Scootaloo’s heart sank. He still wasn’t dead. And…if the Slender Man had been angry before, then there were no words to describe this. He looked wrong. Parts of his body had flaked away in the light of Cadence and Shining Armor’s love, and he looked like a children’s drawing that had seen too much wear and tear. He looked frayed around the edges. And he was completely, utterly furious. Scootaloo looked to her left and to her right frantically. There was nopony able to fight besides Celestia, and she was just standing there, swaying, not opening her eyes. Luna and Discord were dragging themselves to hooves, but they were too far away, too weak. Shining Armor and Cadence were unconscious. And the Slender Man was mad. Scootaloo felt sweat running down her back like a flood. It was far, far too hot, yet she felt cold inside. Well, it looked like it was up to her now. She knew it would come to this. Well, not really. But she’d given Celestia her word, hadn’t she? Any cool pony kept their word. Rainbow Dash always kept her word. Well, most of the time. And she never ran away. Scootaloo took a step off her pile of rubble, tripped over a stone, and tumbled head over heels to land with a thump in front of Celestia. She scrambled to her feet, and there was the Slender Man. It took Scootaloo a while to work saliva into her suddenly dry mouth. “I’m…I’m not afraid of you,” she tried to say defiantly. “Not at all!” The Slender Man just stood in front of her. Scootaloo felt her voice trail off and stumble into nothingness. “Maybe just a bit,” she mumbled. “I—I’m not going to move, you know. I promised Princess Celestia I’d defend her. I’m not gonna move no matter what you do.” She couldn’t look at his face. She couldn’t even look up. The darkness around him was making her eyes hurt, so Scootaloo talked to the ground. “Rainbow Dash says only uncool ponies run away. And I’m not an uncool pony. In fact, I’m going to be…” Scootaloo’s voice wobbled and she gulped, “…I’m going to be the coolest pony of all time. Even cooler than Rainbow Dash. So just do what you want, because I’m not running away. No matter how much it hurts.” Scootaloo closed her eyes. She lay down and covered her eyes with both hooves. And waited. ---- Her name was Scootaloo. The Slender Man knew her name. She was one of the trio that called themselves the ‘Cutie Mark Crusaders.’ And she was a pegasus that could not fly. He had seen it in her wing structure. It was in her bones, in her musculature, in the very nature of her genetics. A cripple, born without the one advantage that defined her species. It always amazed the Slender Man of what so-called modern civilizations insisted upon. They let inferior species such as Scootaloo live, despite their obvious disadvantages. Could they not see how much of a drain such individuals were? Why would any group shelter and provide aid for the weak? It made no sense – it was a thing only a civilization with resources to spare could believe in. And she stood in his way. That was…Slender didn’t know what that was. Was it bravery or foolishness? Courage or recklessness? But she, an inferior member of an inferior species dared to stand in his way. He could almost admire that. Slender looked down at the orange filly in front of him. She would never fly. She would never amount to the same level of greatness as a pegasus such as Rainbow Dash. But Slender felt something for her, nevertheless. She had something she could never achieve, yet clearly dreamed of it, sought after it. The Slender Man could understand that. There was something he could never have as well. He raised one tendril. For her sake, for the briefest bond of kinship, he would make this quick. His tendril dropped like an axe. And stopped halfway down. The Slender Man felt something tingle at the back of his mind. His senses came alive, and spoke to him of magic, incredible sources of magic clustered around him. And he remembered that magic. He remembered what it had done to him. The Slender Man looked up, and saw the Elements of Harmony. ---- Scootaloo felt the warmth and glorious light and looked up. There they were, floating in radiant glory. Their hair was striped with multiple hues, not simply one color. Both tail and mane flowed behind each pony, blowing in an unseen wind. And their coats were no longer plain, but decorated with their cutie marks. And they glowed in beautiful radiance, floating in an orb of light filled with each color of the rainbow. But what Scootaloo had only eyes for was Rainbow Dash. Her mane flowed out life a lightning bolt, and the colors themselves shifted and raced along her mane and tail. Even her wings were colored like a rainbow. She had come to save Scootaloo. “Slender Man,” Twilight’s voice rang throughout Ponyville. “You will not harm another pony here. We called you friend, but what friend will stand to let another friend commit crimes? In the name of Equestria, we ask you to halt and make peace. Mistakes have been made, but we need not continue this conflict any longer.” Twilight’s eyes seemed to stare into the Slender Man’s empty sockets. “Please. Don’t make us stop you.” The Slender Man stood under the radiance shed by the Elements of Harmony and said not one word. He could say no words. But the darkness around him gathered slowly. And Scootaloo saw. Here stands the light. It is beauty, and love and harmony. It is friendship incarnate. And here he stands. The Slender Man. His presence sucked away the light, made it obscene and dirty. And Scootaloo knew in her bones, in her soul that he would not stop until the light was gone. From every world, from every heart. That was what he was. That was his purpose. To take the light and leave only darkness. The darkness rose around the Slender Man, a black flame in the light’s brightness. His answer. “Very well.” Twilight bowed her head. “Then you leave us no choice. I’m sorry.” The light from the Elements of Harmony grew to match the darkness. And then it flared, and shot out at the Slender Man. Not just light in fact, but a rainbow of colors. Just like when it had stopped Tirek. And the light struck the Slender Man. And stopped. The darkness around the Slender Man fought back. It engulfed the light, quenching it, eating it. Devouring it. And the darkness pushed back. Suddenly, the light from the Elements of Harmony was being obliterated in a stream of lightlessness. But Scootaloo saw each of the Elements grit their teeth and seem to push, and the darkness stopped, flowing against the light. They were equal. Darkness and light, straining against each other, neither the Slender Man nor the Elements giving an inch. Rivers of pure power clashed against each other as both sides fought for the slightest advantage and found none. They were deadlocked. Scootaloo could see sweat pouring down Rainbow Dash’s face. Her face was set in concentration, and she looked like she was straining with every fiber in her body. But the Slender Man seemed to be doing the same. He didn’t move, not in any way Scootaloo saw, but she could sense him pushing as hard as he could, fighting to destroy the light. How long did the Elements of Harmony and the Slender Man fight? Scootaloo had no way of knowing, as the sun was still eclipsed by the moon. But slowly, over the course of what seemed like hours, the balance shifted. The Slender Man was an eldritch monster. Scootaloo didn’t know what that word meant exactly, but she had seen his strength. His terrible power, his casual defeat of Princess Luna and Discord. But he was also capable of being hurt. Shining Armor and Cadence’s love had hurt him badly. But he might have prevailed against the Elements even so, save for one thing. He was one being. They were many. And they were united, and he was alone. What more needed to be said? The Slender Man had no friends, and somehow Scootaloo knew he had never had any. And the Elements of Harmony were the greatest of friends. When one faltered, the rest fought harder. They pushed beyond their limits because they didn’t fight merely for themselves. Slowly, the darkness was pushed back. It wavered, and fought harder in surges, but it was forced backwards at every turn. And at last, Scootaloo watched the light touch the Slender Man. The Slender Man did not scream. He did not shriek, or cringe, or even burn in the light from the Elements. Instead, he did something even more amazing. The Slender Man fell to his knees. He moved. He fell. Scootaloo watched it with her own two eyes. But he didn’t die. He still lived, although his form frayed and began to drift apart, slowly, piece by piece. And the light ceased. Scootaloo turned in horror. One by one, the Elements of Harmony sank to the ground. Still their transformations remained, but each was panting, covered in sweat, clearly drained from their battle. Twilight was struggling to her feet, like Rainbow Dash and the others, but they were weakened, tired. And the Slender Man was back on his feet. Scootaloo didn’t know the meaning of the word despair. She had never paid attention in school, and it was not an emotion she knew that well to begin with. But now she experienced the emotion and knew it to her core. He couldn’t die. He couldn’t be defeated. No matter what was thrown at him, not matter what powers were wielded in defense of life, he wouldn’t stop. That was what it meant to be eldritch. That was the nature of the Slender Man. It was so unfair. Scootaloo felt helpless tears being to gather in her eyes. She tried to brush them away, but they fell all the same. So unfair. She felt so helpless. When she opened her eyes again, the Slender Man was standing over Twilight. ---- So this was how it ended. Twilight could barely raise her head, but she did so anyways. How had she ever thought that he was a human? He was so much more than they could ever be, and yet he was less than them as well. And for all the flaws and imperfections of human and ponykind, neither race could match what he was. Eldritch. A thin tendril lifted Twilight’s head up and forced her to stare at his face. It roughly moved her head forward and back, and Twilight winced in agony as she felt tendons in her neck crackling. The Slender Man looked at Twilight, and she looked back. This was how it all ended. But Twilight could only feel sadness. They had been close. So close, and yet one mistake had cost everything. But he had responded to Celestia’s violence with even greater violence. Which side was fault for the escalation? Both? Neither? It mattered not. A tendril hovered in front of Twilight, and moved slowly towards her forehead. She felt it touch her skin, gently, and felt the Slender Man’s corruption wash over her. It hurt. For an instant, she knew pain beyond anything she had ever felt. She understood what Applebloom had suffered, felt her very soul begin to dissolve and warp as her body shifted to become like the Slender Man. For an instant, she suffered. And then the pain was gone. Twilight looked up, and saw the Slender Man. His tendril had withdrawn, and he was looking past Twilight. Behind her. Twilight fell to the ground as the Slender Man let her go. She weakly pulled herself away, and turned her head to see what he was looking at. Princess Celestia walked forwards. She was covered in sweat and grime, her perfect hair in disarray, her features drawn with exhaustion. But she stood in front of the Slender Man, and looked at him proudly and without fear. “Luna, sister. It is time.” Celestia said. Somehow, Luna and Discord had dragged themselves closer as the Elements had fought the Slender Man. They were covered in injuries, weak, half-dead, but alive. Luna’s coat was covered in blood, and one eye was swollen shut, but she still heard Celestia’ voice. She raised her head towards the sky and her horn glowed faintly. Above her, the moon in the sky moved and sank below the horizon. And behind it… Twilight looked up. The moon had shifted out of the way, revealing the sun in all its glory. But something was very wrong. The sun was normally a bright yellow disc in the sky, its warm rays illuminating and comforting the beings that lived beneath it. But now? The sun was a molten ball of fire. It was far larger than all of Equestria, and was in fact so large than a thousand Equestria’s would not equal a fraction of its size. This was a truth known to few scholarly ponies – it was not deemed appropriate knowledge for most ponies as it might scare them. It certainly scared Twilight when she thought of it. Her mentor, Princess Celestia moved this orb of fire around the sky every day, achieving a feat of magic in seconds that a billion earth ponies couldn’t achieve in thousands of years. But the sun way always thousands, hundreds of thousands, more than that, millions of miles away from Equestria. Yet its heat still warmed the earth every day, and was strong enough to bring light to the earth nonstop for thousands of years. It was a fire that could not die, the source of Princess Celestia’s power, and one of ponykind’s greatest mysteries. How could it burn so long? How could Princess Celestia move it with her magic so easily? What was it made of? Scholars such as Starswirl the Bearded had searched for clues, but no answer was known. And the only pony who did know – Princess Celestia – wasn’t giving out any hints. And now it was in the sky. Not just in the sky, in fact, but filling it. The sun was no longer a small yellow disc, but a giant boulder in the heavens. There was less sky than sun now. And the heat – the heat was intense. Twilight felt that the sun’s heat should have been roasting everypony in their juices at this range, but Celestia was holding back the worst of the sun’s heat somehow. It still burned. Twilight could smell her hair smoldering. It was like standing in an oven, and the light from the sun make ever surface shine with eye-blinding light. It was far too bright. “Sweet Celestia,” was all she could whisper. “It is time.” Princess Celestia’s voice cut through the heat haze and brought Twilight back to earth. She tore her eyes away from the sun, and found the world was suddenly so very dark. Everything seemed to be swimming underwater, and Twilight realized the sun’s light had nearly blinded her. She could still make out several shapes however. And what she saw was Princess Celestia standing in front of the Slender Man. “You have brought fear and destruction to my world,” Princess Celestia said to the Slender Man. “Such is your kind’s nature. And despite the efforts of many, you still persist. You cannot be defeated by mundane weapons. You cannot be slain by mortal hands. But I am no mortal. I am the immortal embodiment of the sun. And I give you one chance to flee from the pits from whence you came before I end you once and for all.” Twilight understood something of the Slender Man’s emotions now, and she felt his contempt. It was more than just a dismissal of Celestia’s power. It was a sneer expressed in pure emotions at the thought of a god, a mere god daring to challenge him. Princess Celestia must have felt something of the emotion too, for her eyes narrowed. “I do not make this threat lightly,” she said in a low, serious voice. “I will fight you until the very end, and it will be your end that comes.” “Please…” Twilight thought that voice came from somepony else until she realized she had moved her mouth. She felt the Slender Man’s attention shift to her. “Please don’t. Just go away.” For one moment he might have hesitated. There might have been a space of time where he thought about her words. But it was gone in an instant, and the Slender Man raised his tendrils and attacked Princess Celestia. They never made it to her. As one tendril flew within five feet of Celestia, it burst into flame and burned out into a tendril of smoke. The Slender Man screeched in agony, and suddenly all of his tendrils were erupting into flame, burning away before they even came close to Celestia’s body. Princess Celestia’s eyes turned white and glowed with magic. True magic. Twilight could sense magic. She was one of the greatest mages living, with the ability to create spells even Starswirl the Bearded could not. She understood magic, and could feel its ebb and pulse in the world around her. She had never felt anything like this. Magic vanished. All of it. The magic in the wind died. The magic of the earth retreated deep into the ground. Twilight felt her magical energies shrink and dwindle. Magic itself hid as one energy grew and shone like… The sun. Princess Celestia radiated magical energy like the sun. In fact, it was more than that. She was the sun. Its power flowed down from the heavens and into her, making her a beacon, an avatar of light and heat. It was too bright to look at; Twilight was forced to cover her eyes and look away. But she still sensed the magic building, not like a hurricane or a tornado, an earthquake or an avalanche. Celestia’s power grew and burned like the prelude towards a supernova. The ground began to rumble. Twilight felt the vibrations spread and throw her from her feet. Her friends fell to the ground. Rainbow Dash rolled and threw herself just in time to catch Scootaloo. The earth shook. The world shook. More than that; Twilight felt every hair on her body begin to rise. And that was not the only thing. Pebbles of dirt began to float. Grains of dust slowly lifted into the air. Smaller stones rose. Twilight’s body felt lighter. She began to feel gravity itself lose its hold over her. And still Celestia shone even brighter, drawing in more power from the sun. There she stood. An alicorn shining like the sun. There he stood. A nightmare surrounded by shadows. They stood in the center of a pillar of light. A beam of pure energy connected Princess Celestia to the heavens. And in that area all was white with purest light, save for where the Slender Man stood. Shadows danced along his body, the only source of darkness. And the rubble around him began to float upwards. A stone the size of Twilight’s head lifted off the ground. Small fragments of wood shot upwards like fireworks. Soon, even huge slabs of rock began to lift from the ground. The pull upwards spread outwards, lessening the further from Celestia it got. But by now, even Twilight felt herself beginning to rise off the ground. Desperately, she clung what remained of a lamp post stuck in the earth and hung on for dear life. Everything was rising into the air. Already, Twilight could see thousands of shapes flying into the sky, the rubble of what had been Ponyville. Celestia’s eyes were no longer shining with light. They were beacons of power that were brighter than stars, illuminating everything with a harsh white light. Something was cracking. Twilight heard a snap and suddenly, the ground around Princess Celestia and the Slender Man was moving. A huge plateau of earth on which Celestia and the Slender Man stood began to detach from the ground. It lifted both beings into the air, slowly at first but gaining momentum. Twilight couldn’t believe her eyes. She had seen spells capable of allowing a pony to fly, but this? Celestia was lifting all of Ponyville into the air. And it didn’t stop there. The ground upon which Celestia and the Slender Man stood began to fly higher and higher. Into the sky, a few feet at a time, and then faster, fast as a pony could run and then faster. As fast as Rainbow Dash could fly. Faster. And then they were a speck in the sky. Twilight’s eyes followed them, but they were a dot. A speck. Now…nothing. She couldn’t even see them, so high were they. With Celestia gone, the anti-gravitational effect ceased. Twilight heard the thump of countless objects landing back on the ground. She didn’t stop looking up, even when a rock smacked her on the forehead, drawing blood. She wouldn’t have looked away even if Starswirl himself had appeared and given her the opportunity to learn from him. She could still feel Celestia’s magic above her. And it wasn’t lessening. It was growing. ---- Celestia carried the Slender Man into the atmosphere, and then the stratosphere. The small piece of land she had lifted into the sky rotated slowly, creating a dizzying view for anyone looking at the world flashing by. Celestia had no eyes for the scenery. Her gaze remained locked on the Slender Man. ---- She was magic incarnate. It was nothing he had seen before. She wasn’t just a sun goddess, an immortal in control of the celestial body. She was the sun. He felt it flow through her, a river of fire, a sea of flame. Light given pure form. It scared him. For the first time, the Slender Man looked into eyes nearly as otherworldly as his own. An immortal’s eyes burning with the power of an elemental. The eyes of the sun. She was carrying him into the sky. Why? Into space? He needed no breath. Besides, he could always teleport away whenever her eyes left him. If they left him. The Slender Man told himself that there was nothing to fear. He was eldritch; she a mere god. How could she pose a threat to him? Even with the magic…the huge amount of magic she was channeling, it wouldn’t kill him. Right? But she wasn’t casting any spells. Spells were a foolish conception in any case. Forcing magic to take form and obey laws simply limited its power. Against the eldritch, it was too much akin to hitting them with a rule. And they ignored rules. No, pure raw power or something like light and silver was the only way to harm beings such as he. Was that was she intended? Suddenly, the Slender Man felt afraid. Truly afraid. He didn’t like not knowing what she was going to do. He tried to strike her with his tendrils, but they burned in the pillar of light. He could barely keep the darkness around him, let alone attack back. He didn’t like this. Not at all. He hated the light. He feared it. It was one of the few things that hurt him, and it took much of his power away. He always hunted in the darkness, or the dusk. He couldn’t deal with the light around Celestia. It simply hurt to get near to it. There was nothing she could have done that would have crippled him more than this light. It was pure light, the closest this reality could get to the origin of light besides the big bang. The only thing that was closer to the true nature of light was… The Slender Man felt the world drop away below him. And now he was in space. Space, where gravity did not exist, yes, but the sun goddess’s power kept him rooted to the chunk of earth he stood on. And before him. Was. The sun. It was too close. Too large, too massive. The Slender Man had always seen it as a small thing in the sky. But this. She had brought it close to the earth. Too close; it was before him, vast, merciless, and radiating light. And now the Slender Man understood what she was going to do. Desperately, he struck at her with everything he had, ignoring the pain. But the light surrounding Celestia burned away his tendrils, vanquished his shadows, and left him powerless. And she wouldn’t look away. Her gaze held his. Two eyes, shining with the light of a sun. They stared at him, and stared into his soul. And the Slender Man felt fear, and for the first time knew despair. ---- Celestia stared at the being known as the Slender Man. He was a blank, grey creature in a suit. He radiated darkness, and fear. And that much was what every being saw. Their eyes saw a horror they couldn’t understand, their minds told them of fear of what he was. But Celestia saw something different in the radiance of her light. She saw a nightmare. She saw a small, pitiful thing, made of bad dreams. Nothing more than that, just a fear born of the dark. An imagination gone wrong. A fright that spread from pony to pony, person to person. And that was all. It was so small. He was so weak. He had power, but only that. He was nothing without his reality-warping powers. There was no courage in his soul. No room for friendship, or innovation, or creativity. He didn’t change, and that was where his true weakness lay. All things must change in time, or pass into dust. But he would not change, could not change. Celestia knew it. All his kind was the same, and so eventually they would die. How could a static being hope to challenge reality’s every-changing, ever evolving glory? He could not. They could not. And now, Celestia would take one from the number of the eldritch. One, to counterbalance the countless of reality’s children that had died. It would never be enough. But it was a start. She brought him before the sun. Even in the chill of space, even separated by a hundred thousand miles, Celestia could feel its incredible heat. Most ponies knew nothing of the sun, although they thought they did. They saw only a small disc that warmed the earth. Even the beings that shifted planetary bodies through the sky knew nothing of the sun. Luna, for all that she was the embodiment of the moon, knew nothing of what the sun truly was. It was larger than the moon, than all of Equestria, something that made those places look like the tiniest specks. A pony could walk for their entire live along the surface of the sun and never cross more than half of its majesty. No pony knew the sun for its glory, save for Celestia. The day that she her Cutie Mark had appeared, she had felt the sun shining in her mind. And it was a fire that could never die. Celestia had woken every day and known it still burned among the stars, even if she could not see it. It was her one true friend among the ages, her one companion that had been by her side since she was small. And today, it was going to help her slay the Slender Man. She floated off the small fragment of Equestria that the Slender Man stood on, and looked at him. He couldn’t move. So long as a pair of eyes was on him, he was chained more thoroughly than any prison she could make. How pathetic. How sad. She let the Slender Man float out towards the sun. The gravitational pull was strong; strong enough to draw Equestria itself into the sun. But Celestia held the gravity of the sun in check, as well as its heat, allowing only a fraction to reach Equestria. She spared none of that for the Slender Man. Slowly, inexorably, the piece of earth the Slender Man stood on began to drift towards the sun. A thousand tendrils flowed from him, desperately struggling through space, reaching for Equestria, for her, anything to pull him away from the sun’s embrace. It didn’t work. There was nothing for him to grab in space, and the tendrils burned in the light of the sun before they could reach Celestia. She watched him, spinning slowly, pulled ever closer to the sun. She did not blink. Her gaze did not waver. Celestia watched the Slender Man. He drifted closer to the sun. It was pulling him closer, the gravity pulling at him increasing with every moment. The very ground he stood on began to catch fire. Minutes remained until the Slender Man met the sun. He spun now, a still figure shooting like a meteor towards the giant ball of flame. But still Celestia watched him, and she felt his invisible gaze upon her. She spoke across the void, in words that travelled between her and the Slender Man even without air to carry them. “It has come to this at last. You were offered the chance to flee, and you refused. But your kind will never retreat, just as we shall never abandon what we hold dear. And now it is over. I will not let you destroy Equestria while I still live.” The Slender Man began to burn, and she felt his soundless shriek echo in the void of space. Flames engulfed his body. Celestia spoke to him one last time. “So end all those who would destroy reality. While life remains, there shall be no retreat. Die in fire, Slender Man.” The Slender Man screamed one last time, and then the light of the sun consumed him, and he was drawn into the center of the fire. ---- Around the Slender Man was fire. The darkness that had surrounded him all his life fled at its touch, burning in the light. It consumed him. It stripped away all of his power, and left him helpless. The Slender Man fought to escape, but there was no escape, not anymore. The sun pulled him into its depths, scorching, purifying, stripping away all of his defenses. He felt the heat and the light on his skin and knew pain and death. The Slender Man looked out into the void of space through the endless molten fire. The white alicorn floated there, watching him. Then the Slender Man, destroyer of worlds, the Operator, Der Ritter, The Pale One, and The White King fell into the heart of the sun. All he saw was the endless burning flame, the fire of a star’s light. And he began to burn. ---- Celestia watched the sun for a long time, but there was no movement other than the dancing flames. At last, she turned back towards Equestria and flew through space down to earth. The Slender Man was dead. And the sun shone on, bringing light to the darkness. Celestia returned to Equestria, landing on the soft earth while her pupil and subjects flocked around her, her sister ran to embrace her and she shone in the warm light of the sun. Deep within the burning core of a fire so great that it had burned for millennia without wavering, something small and pitiful screamed in agony in a voice that no one heard.