//------------------------------// // Chapter 4 // Story: The Rainbow Portal // by Thunder Quill //------------------------------// Jason continued his walk over to Carousel Boutique, a small smile on his face as he reached Ponyville’s dress boutique. “Hello? Rarity?” He asked, knocking at the door. Spike opened the door, allowing him to see into the building, where Rarity was busy throwing materials around as she made something, “Hey.” He said. “Oh hey Spike, I actually needed to speak to you.” Jason said, smiling. Spike sighed, “Does Twilight need me back at the library already?” Jason shook his head, “No, she just wanted to know if she has anything scheduled for this Friday at eight PM?” Spike took out a schedule from behind his back, and flipped through it, “She has something going on close to it...why, what else would she want to do then what's on her schedule?” He asked. Jason’s face blushed a bit red, “I got some tickets to Star Mares for that time, and I invited Twilight to go with me.” He said. Spike smirked, “I didn't understand why she scheduled to get her mane cut anyway, it looks fine,” He looked down at the schedule, “She has nothing going on then, so she can see that movie for once now.” He said. Jason sighed in relief, “Thanks mate, I owe you for this.” He said, holding out his fist for a bump. Spike hit his fist against Jason’s, “Its fine, maybe you can get me a ticket to see it at some point to. I need to get back to helping Rarity.” he stepped back into the building and closed the door. Jason began his walk back to The Library, walking at a leisurely pace, something he never had the chance to do back on his Earth, when the ground began to shake, “What the?” He said, stumbling slightly. “Is this a bloody earthquake!?” He yelled over the ponies rushing around. Rainbow Dash flew above him, looking at some dust cloud in the distance, “STAMPEDE!” She yelled, before floating down to Jason, “Can you help me get everypony out of the way?” She asked. Jason nodded, “I’ll start, you get your friends!” He yelled as Rainbow dashed away towards the library. “Yeehaw!!” He heard a familiar voice yell from where the stampede was coming from. “Hell yeah!” Jason smirked, “A cowgirl to stop a stampede, that fits.” He said as he started shepherding everyone into any building they could get into. Applejack got to the side of the stampeding cows, and looked at the brown collie near her, “Go ta tha other side Winona. Put em up girl.” her command was accompanied by Winona’s barks as she complied to her. Her friends had all come out to watch her, Pinkie eating some popcorn, as Twilight rolled her eyes, the stampede getting close to the bridge. Applejack hit a cows side, “Come on little doggies, turn!” she whistled, and looked back at Winona, “Put em up.” she commanded. Winona jumped off the ground onto a cows back, jumping from back to back as Applejack followed her once she got in front of the pack. Emily walked out the store, over to where Jason was watching, “This doesn't seem in any way safe.” she said, watching as Applejack got out a lasso and tie it around the front cows neck. Jason shrugged, “She’s a Cowgirl, she probably has more experience than any of us here combined, she know’s what she’s doing.” He said as Applejack began to drag the front cow away from the bridge, the rest of the herd following the leader. “And crisis averted.” He said, with a “Check-Mate” look on his face. Her friends cheered as she finally managed to stop the cows from running. She spit the lasso off and frowned at the cow she had stopped, “What was that all about?” she asked. The cow mooed, before clearing her throat, “Oh begging your pardon, Applejack but Moooriela here saw a snake, and it gave us all a fright don't ya know.” she said. Emily stared for a second, having been able to hear her speak from across the bridge, “I’m done, I can't eat anything I like anymore, everything can talk.” she said, putting her hands up in the air. “I don’t think chickens can talk here…” He whispered so only Emily can hear, “There are still species on this planet that do eat meat, Gryphons for example.” “Then lets go to a griffon restaurant or some sort of place griffons eat at so I can have some actual meat without every pony besides Fluttershy freaking out. I’m tired of her giving me fish after they all found out we are omnivores.” Emily said. “I hate fish…” Jason shuddered, “We can ask later.” Emily sighed, and looked back, seeing that the herd and Applejack were leaving. The mayor went over to her friends, talking about some sort of award for later. “Looks like she is going to get something out of that at least.” Jason let out a single chuckle, “She deserves it, she saved the town with only the help of her dog.” “The cows she saved it from, are sentient, and can speak. Why would they run toward a town in fear of a snake instead of somewhere else?” Emily asked, as the other elements started heading home. Jason frowned, “Some kind of plot?” He responded, “You think someone is targeting Ponyville?” Emily shrugged, “I don't know, don't you have a date or something?” She asked. Jason glared at her, “It’s on Friday, and yes, I just have to tell Twi that she’s free that night.” He glanced at her retreating form, “Catch you later.” He told Emily, before rushing off to catch up to Twilight as Emily went back to her work. Twilight ears swiveled back as she heard something behind her, the sound getting louder. She turned and saw Jason running towards her, and stopped walking to wait for him, “Hello, did you talk to Spike?” She asked. “Yeah,” Jason panted, trying to get his breath back, “He said you’re free at that time on Friday.” Twilight smiled, “Wonderful, I can’t wait to see the movie for the first time then.” Jason smiled back, “If it’s anything like my Earth’s Star Wars, then it’ll be a fun time.” He said, “Need any help back at the Library? The stampede must have messed up some books, and with Spike at Rarity’s…” He trailed off. Twilight nodded, “I suppose some help could be of use to me after that little issue.” she said, leading him back to the library. Jason’s smile morphed into a frown, “It’s a pretty inconvenient location for the herd to stampede towards, the town.” He said as they walked, “Cow’s need to graze in wide open fields, and they chose this one direction? Out of the many they could have chosen?” Twilight looked up at them, “Sometimes the cows come to Ponyville for food, they don't have to always eat grass. They were probably going in the direction they knew was safe, away from the snake one of them saw.” She said, frowning, “I’m guessing your basing this on cows from your world?” Jason nodded, “Yeah, cattle stampede on my world when they get spooked, but that’s only because they are little more than dumb beasts, not exactly sentient. Cow’s here can talk, which means they have some manner of intelligence, and not one of the entire herd didn’t think of either what could happen to the town, or realize that they are bigger than the snake, and just kill it?” He said, “Not buying it.” Twilight sighed, “Maybe the fact that their fight or flight instinct, much like ponies here, are stronger than our reason sometimes, making it hard for us to think clearly in a situation that scares us. Snakes, being one. They are still big and poisonous, they spook us and set off our instincts. I suppose it isnt the same with humans, but we have the basic need to survive stuck in our heads, and need to run if our opponent is better than us at something, and we could potentially lose something to us.” Jason’s frown deepened, “Maybe.” He muttered, “Still seems a bit fishy to me.” He sighed as they reached the door of the Library, “We’re here, anyway, best get started,” He opened the door to reveal the inside, which somehow had managed to avoid being disturbed. Twilight looked around, “Well, I’m not really that surprised, but there is still work that needs done.” Jason frowned again, “This doesn’t seem right…” He said, looking through the shelves, “It may be nothing, but help me see if anything is missing.” He asked Twilight. Twilight rolled her eyes, “I know my library like the back of my hoof, if a book or anything were missing I would...” Her eyes widened and she ran to a shelf in another room of the library. Her yell from the door was urgent, “One of the restricted books are missing!” Jason’s eyes widened, “That can’t be good.” He said as he rushed into the room, “What was the book about?” He asked, “Do you remember?” Twilights glare could be felt through a whole room, “Of course I do! I memorized every book in this library when I arrived! Its called The Necronomicon, otherwise known as the most forbidden spell book to ponykind! Nopony is even allowed in this room.” She said, running hurriedly out of the room herself. “Great…” Jason muttered, rushing after her, “Why do you even have that damned book!?” He yelled, “It’s the most evil book in every world!” Twilight sighed, “Same reason I have a whole room dedicated to forbidden spell books, because it was there before I got here!” she exclaimed, “I don't have a reason for it being there, other than it being one of the forbidden books in the bucking restricted room!” Jason sighed, “And it didn’t seem like a better idea to give them to Princess Celestia, who could seal them in some kind of magic vault?” He facepalmed, “You know what we do now, right?” “I begin to ask you how you know all of this, before I admit I should have done that in the first place instead of leave the books there because they are technically property of Golden Oaks Library.” Twilight stated. “How I realized about the book missing?” Jason asked, “Because when the stampede got close to town, I was at Rarity’s house, which is all the way across town, and I felt it from there. For the Library to not have any disturbance at all, when it is closer to the stampede then the Boutique, is absurd. This also leads me to believe that the stampede was used as a distraction for the thief stealing the book.” He explained. Twilight shrugged, “You would be surprised. The library is magically protected from fire and lighting and a few other things, I would have just assumed it is also magically protected from earthquakes or something close to it. No, I was not asking you how you knew a book was missing, I wanted to know how you knew what the book was. As far as I know, nopony had heard of the books name except for a select few ponies.” she clarified. “Ah,” Jason said, “There was a movie back home, called The Evil Dead. It was about a few couples who went out into the woods for a camping trip, found a cabin, the cabin had a strange book, idiotic couples read out of the book, and created a small zombie/demon apocalypse. Main character had to cut off his hand because it was infected, replaced it with a chainsaw.” He explained. Twilight stared at him, her face scrunched up in disgust, “Your movies sound more horrifying than you might think. Thats disgusting. Why would anypony read out of a forbidden book that uses dark magic? They should know not to read a creepy looking book in the middle of the forest, even foals know that is a bad thing to do!” She exclaimed. Jason nodded, “Yeah, but my world doesn’t have magic, or, at least not much. It was a horror movie with some stupid couples, who don’t believe in magic, they never heard of The Necronomicon, or anything else like that. I wouldn’t do anything like that, cause that’s how my mind works, I see a creepy book, I don’t read.” “Curious minds do curious things.” Twilight muttered, thinking, “Perhaps I could talk to Imloch. Hes a mage, and knows a lot about magic, maybe he would have a way of tracking it, since he thinks the spells in the book aren't ‘dark magic’ and would probably say that a good pony using it won't be affected or something.” She rolled her eyes. Jason smirked slightly, “Yeah, he probably would, but right now, you should probably send a letter to Princess Celestia when Spike gets back, then we should go back to business as usual.” He said. Twilight shook her head, “No, if whomever has the book is out there, I need to get my friends and go find that pony before it can do anything to anypony else. Our movie night will have to be put on hold as well, since we probably won't have time for that while searching.” Jason shook his head rapidly, “That is a really bad Idea. If you go out there looking for him, whoever stole it will be able to build up his defenses, set up an ambush, something. As well that you’ve handled yourselves before, The Necronomicon has the ability to create an undead army the size of Canterlot. Send a letter to Celestia, she has an extensive spy network, or so I assume, and she can have them go out covertly, sniff them out before striking.” Twilight frowned, “Or I could write a letter to Princess Celestia asking for the elements of harmony, and we can get to him before he even has a chance to build any sort of defence, we can wipe the undead army out with the elements, we will just have to find him, before he gets anything done.” She growled. “Do you have any proof that the Elements even work on Undead?!” Jason growled, “All we know is that they work on Nightmare Moon and Discord, if the history books are correct. You could go in there and have the elements not work, then guess what? You and your friends, dismembered and heads stuck on pikes!” He snarled, “I don’t want that to bloody happen.” Twilight glared at him for a minute, before she sighed, “Fine, you make a good point...I’ll write a letter to Princess Celestia about this and let her have somepony else handle it...” she said, looking defeated. Jason’s angry frown turned sad, “Don’t be like that.” He said, kneeling down and looking her in the eyes, “You and your friends are powerful, no doubt, but you need to know when to let someone else handle this, and this is definitely one of those times.” He smiled, wrapping his arms around her in a hug, “Celestia’ll get him, don’t worry.” Twilight hugged him back, “That sounds like a good friendship report I could write...” She said, humming. Jason laughed, releasing the hug, “I would definitely send it to Celestia, but right now we should probably talk to Imloch, see what he knows, cause I’ve never really seen Evil Dead, only commercials.” Twilight looked at him, “Ok.” She nodded, and headed out of the library, Jason right behind her. Imloch sighed, ”Are we really going to sit around doing nothing?” He asked Emily, who was sitting next to him. Emily looked at him, “You're not sitting, you're just leaning against a wall. And yeah, I am just going to sit doing nothing. I don't have any work right now, and the jog was tiring.” she lied down across the couch. ”It was a figure of speech, must you take everything so literally?” He sighed, ”It is times like this that I wish I had a actual flesh and blood body…” Emily rolled her eyes, “Yeah, thats what you get for being a mage in a time where witches were burned at the stake. You get turned into the thing you use, cause thats fair somehow.” she said. ”Burned at the stake? What are you talking about?” Imloch asked incredulously. Emily turned her head to look at him, “Ya know, medieval times and whatever. Any time someone was suspected of witchcraft they were burned alive.” If Imloch had eyes, he would be staring wide eyed, ”That has never happened to my knowledge, when was this!?” Emily shrugged, “I don't know. I just heard that it happened a lot in myths and legends about witches.” ”Maybe you’re thinking of a different time? Imloch asked, ”I’ve done some thinking lately, since that’s all I get to do, and I have come up with a rough estimate of 7000ish years for how long I was in the temple. Mages back then were revered as heroes, or hated and feared as evil sorcerers, no offense to sorcerers, some of my best friends were sorcerers.” Imloch said. Emily sat up and stared at him, “Alright...I'll ask about that later. I guess if you were from that long ago, things would change more then normal...I think the myths are from like more than three thousand years ago, but I don't really know any specifics other than that.” ”Ah, now I remember what time period you are speaking of… It wasn’t just medieval times, ever heard of the salem witch hunts?” He asked, ”No, I am far, far older than that.” Emily sighed, “Alright. Well, you can still use magic even as a staff and when i'm not using you, so...project yourself out or something like that.” ”What would that do?” Imloch asked, ”Even if I did, I could not move… but maybe…” He trailed off, the gem glowing. A bright flash emanated from his staff, and when it cleared, a eighteen year old man stood there, with a black mohawk. He wore a black robe with a silver skull embroidered on the front, and his right hand was covered by a glove, “So, still the age I began my adventures?” He said to no one in particular, “I do wish I could have been at least a bit older.” Emily stared at him, “You look like you could be in a biker gang of old wizard hippies.” Imloch glared back, “Excuse me, this form is eighteen years old.” He said, grumbling angrily. “Old wizard hippies.” He muttered, turning away from her, “What does that even mean!?” Emily laughed, “It means my very very old relative who should be dead but is actually a staff, is now an eighteen year old who looks like he decided he wanted to look like a hippy wizard and decided to form a biker gang by putting on a skull cape.” “I AM NOT A HIPPY!” Imloch roared, whipping around to face her as dark clouds forming outside, “I DEFEATED AN EVIL SORCERESS BENT ON RULING THE WORLD, A MEDUSA WHO WANTED TO RAISE AN AGE OLD EMPIRE TO DESTROY EVERYTHING, AND THE KING OF THE ARCH DEMONS WITH A SINGLE CANTRIP!” His eyes began to glow with a dark light as the room darkened, “I HAVE FACED EVILS YOU COULD NOT IMAGINE IN YOUR DARKEST NIGHTMARES, DO NOT TAKE ME FOR A STONER TREE-WORSHIPER!” The ground glowed as purple seals appeared, zombies appearing there. Emily climbed up the back of the couch, “Ok...” She said, shivering. Imloch’s eyes lost their dark glow as the zombies disappeared. “Do not take me for a wannabe druid,” He growled, “Do not forget that I am the most powerful mage in existence, and I could destroy everything this world has to throw at me.” He whipped around, “Leave now, I wish to be alone.” Emily jumped off the couch, and left the living room quickly. Jason burst through the door, halting at seeing Emily hastily retreating, “What happened!?” He asked frantically. “My many times great grandfather is terrifyingly creepy.” Emily said, leaving the house. Jason sighed, “What the hell did he do now!?” He grumbled as he entered the living room, stopping at seeing another human there. Twilight smiled, walking in after him, “Oh, interesting...” she muttered, looking him over. Imloch growled at Twilight, “If you do not stop that I shall call on the power of the banshee to steal your soul from your body.” Twilight backed up, “Sorry...” She said. Imloch sighed, “As am I…” He muttered, “Now before I say something else I regret, is there something you wanted?” Jason nodded, “Have you ever heard of a book called The Necronomicon?” He asked. Imloch stared at him, something that was unfamiliar to Jason and Twilight in his newly shown eyes, terror, pure unadulterated terror. “The Necronomicon? The ultimate spell book for summoning demons?” He whispered, “Please tell me you don’t mean that…” Twilight looked up at him nervously, “We do mean that, yes...” Imloch’s eye’s widened even more, “That is bad, that is so very very very very bad…” He muttered, “No spell is inherently evil, but thing’s they can summon...” He shuddered, “Are worse than the kings of hell… Demons will corrupt you to your soul, making it a black, shriveled husk of what it was, and they can grant power, power that would put Celestia’s to shame…” He shivered once more, “Whoever has it, now holds the most dangerous cursed magic object in the nine realms.” He shuddered, before starting to fade, “And it would appear that my time in this form is up…” He muttered, “Please tell Emily that I am sorry, I did not mean to cause her so much fear.” He sighed again as his human form vanished, replaced by his Swordstaff form, ”I forgot how much anger my human self had…” He fell silent. Twilight looked at him, before looking up at Jason, “I’m not completely sure that Celestia’s guard will find the pony now...” Jason leaned down, “All the more reason not to go after him.” He said, “You heard Imloch, summoning creatures worse than the kings of hell? I don’t want you getting hurt going after stuff like that.” Twilight sighed, “My friends probably wouldn't either...I guess...I'll have to let somepony else handle it for now, until it gets worse enough for the elements.” Jason nodded, “Thank you, now, we should help get everything ready for AppleJack’s award ceremony.” He began to walk out the door, before turning back, “You coming?” He said, smirking. Twilight nodded, her horn glowing as a bunch of flash cards appeared out of the air, “I have everything I need ready anyway.” she said, trotting out of the house.