Ophidiophobia; the Slithering Terror

by charyoshi


Slithering Terror


Twilight’s eyes flicked back and forth slowly, her eyelids only half open, to shield from the blinding late-morning sun. She was approaching the middle of a large, grassy meadow, where her friends were picnicking on the usual checkered blanket. Quite the assortment of food was laid out; several bowls of fruit were carefully stacked around a large plate filled with sandwiches and cupcakes. Twilight’s friends were all talking, eating, and laughing with each other--except for Pinkie Pie. She was sitting unusually still, her eyes fixed on the skies above.

“Oh... Twilight!” Fluttershy smiled cheerfully but awkwardly as her eyes darted from Rarity to her. “I wasn’t sure you’d make it.”

“Yes, Darling. You said you had pressing matters to attend. We were wondering if you were really planning to join us at all,” Rarity said as she took a petite nibble of her sandwich.

“Always good ta see ya, Twi!” Grinned Applejack as she tilted her hat towards the sunlight.

Twilight smiled and had to look around the group before she noticed that somepony was missing. “Where’s Rainbow Dash?”

Pinkie pointed her hoof up at a stout, rounded cloud almost directly overhead. “She’s been up there the whole time!”

Twilight scanned the skies, looking for a fast-moving, rainbow-colored speck among the sea of blue overhead. Twilight frowned and turned back to Pinkie.

“What--is she taking a nap?”

“Give her a second...” Pinkie’s tail began to violently twitch back and forth just as Rainbow Dash burst down through the cloud they were watching.

Pinkie nearly jumped out of her skin in sudden excitement: “Here she comes!!! That was so cool!”

Rainbow Dash kept falling slowly toward the ground, hooves and wings spread out flat and wide, thin trails of cloud vapor streaking off of the sides of her body. She carefully waited until the last moment before tilting her wings, slowing her descent just before landing next to the picnic blanket.

“Hey, Twi. Glad you could make it!”

Twilight smiled. “Thank you, and thanks for clearing the sky too!”

Rainbow cocked an eyebrow in a moment of confusion. “What? …oh, right, you haven’t seen it yet! Wait there!”

 Rainbow zoomed back up to the cloud she had just fallen through and carefully lowered it to the ground. Twilight’s eyes widened at the perfectly Rainbow-Dash-shaped hole through the center of the cloud. In fact, it was better than perfect. The shape of Rainbow Dash’s body was portrayed like a painting in every detail: the curvature of each feather, the shapes of her ears poking through the top of her mane--even the split ends of her tail were perfectly preserved in the fluffy pillows of the cloud.

Rainbow let the cloud go--and it floated gently back up into the sky among the others like it was in a Rainbow-Dash-themed exhibit at the art gallery--before the pony herself touched down lightly next to Twilight and struck the same pose she’d left in the cloud.

“Whaddya think? Did it capture my good side or my awesome side?”

Twilight blinked and rubbed at the back of her head nervously, unsure of how best to answer.

“Ahhm… both…?” Twilight gave an anxious smile, hoping that would satisfy.

Rainbow turned to inspect her handiwork once more, rubbing at her chin with a hoof.

“Heck yeah! How could anypony go wrong with this form? Artistic genius!” Rainbow stomped her hoof into the ground triumphantly. Then: “Thanks, Twilight.” She smiled warmly at her friend.

Twilight giggled and sat down on the picnic blanket. “Honest. I’m surprised the cloud didn’t just fall apart.”

Rainbow’s ears perked up even more, eager to show off her knowledge. “True! Most clouds do just fall apart once somepony bucks them, but these are a bit tougher than usual. I rolled them up to make a heavier cloud, and I’d say I’ve finally got the technique down!”

Applejack tossed an apple core over her shoulder and grinned from across the blanket. “Rainbow, we know. You’ve been doin’ it all day! I’m surprised there’s even any clouds left!”

Twilight glanced up at the skies once more. Now that Applejack mentioned it, the sky above them did seem unusually clear.

Rainbow scoffed. “I guess nopony would expects a farm filly to have an appreciation for the fine arts. I, on the other hoof-”

In the background, Rarity brought a hoof to her mouth and coughed lightly, covering up her growing urge to laugh.

        Applejack tapped her chin thoughtfully before responding. “Now that yah mention it, it reminds me of the snow angels me an’ Applebloom wer makin’ last winter.”

        “Eh, snow angels are alright, I guess… though I’ll bet it didn’t have wings like my cloud- angel- Dash!”

        Rarity lowered her hoof from her mouth and spoke sternly with recently regained composure. “Ladies, please. Twilight has arrived at last; let’s not ruin our picnic with petty squabbles.” Her demeanour brightened, and she turned to Twilight with a warm smile. “It really is wonderful that you could take a break from your studies to join us, Twilight.”

Twilight smiled awkwardly and rubbed at the back of her head with a hoof. “Well... I’m just glad I could be here with my friends after all!”

“Picnics are always better with more friends!” exclaimed Pinkie as she flung the cherry on her nose high into the air and caught it in her mouth on the way down. “And now that the show’s over; lets eat!” Pinkie swallowed the cherry whole before tossing another cherry even higher into the air, wavering carefully back and forth underneath it, and letting out a short whine after it bounced off the side of her mouth. She quickly snatched it up and threw it in her mouth, looking back and forth, shifty eyed.

“Mmmn…” Pinkie savored the small fruit for a long time. “Cherry-ey!”

Applejack raised an eyebrow at Pinkie. “Uh, Pinkie? You do know that’cher not supposed’ta eat the seeds right?”

“Well, duh! I’m not eating them, Silly. I’m saving them!”

Applejack’s expression deadpanned as she tried to make sense of what she had just heard. “...whut?”

“Yeah! You eat a bunch of cherries, save the seeds in the corner of your mouth aaaaaaaaand….” Pinkie spun around and braced herself in the dirt, spreading her hind legs. Her tail and usually poofy mane rose and straightened out as though she were a hound on a scent. Then she took a deep breath and spat out a surprising number of cherry seeds in a row like a gatling gun, pelting a dandelion about ten feet away with amazing accuracy. Its seeds blew freely away in the breeze as proof of the remarkable deed.

Applejack sat dumbfounded. “Well, I’ll be. That was some fine shootin’, Pinkie!”

Pinkie sat proudly on her haunches and responded with a put-on drawl of her own. “Ah learned it o’er the good ol’ days back on the farm!” Pinkie and Applejack shared a chuckle as a loud crunch came from Twilight’s side.

“Dig in, Twi! Everything’s great!” Spike said as he crudely gnawed on the side of a sapphire the size of his arm.

“Huh? Spike? Where’d you come from?”

Spike pulled the oversized gem from his mouth and wiped his mouth off with his arm, leaving a trail of drool. “What--you didn’t think I’d miss a picnic, did you? Why aren’t you eating, anyway?”

“I... think it’s a little rude to show up at a picnic and eat without adding to the party a bit… isn’t it?”

Pinkie Pie’s crosseyed gaze, locked intently on the cherry tenuously balanced on her nose, shifted over to Twilight as soon as she’d cutely rolled it down into her mouth with her tongue. “Take whatever you want, Silly! It’s your dream.” She started playing with yet another cherry from the bowl, rolling it around the edges of her hoof without letting it fall.

“Well... alright…” Twilight giggled nervously, “I mean, after all, it’s a picnic, right?” She reached out for the plate on front of her, snatched a cupcake, and bit in.

“Oh! Eww! Pinkie! What happened to these cupcakes!? Did you get Applejack to help you again or something?”

Instead of giggling as expected, Pinkie tilted her head, looking honestly confused. “Cupcakes? What cupcakes?”

“Oh, I don’t know, the ones right in front of you?! They’re the most bland tast- AUUGH!”

The odd lump of cupcake suddenly sprang to life it in Twilight’s mouth, thrashing around violently. Twilight gagged and spat as hard as she could. The color faded from her face as she realized she had just spat out the head off of a snake, the body of which was coiled on the blanket in front of her. Twilight suppressed a sudden urge to vomit. She wiped her mouth with the side of her hoof, smearing it with a bloody red stain. She could only stare in horror, panting, trying to catch her breath.

The decapitated snake’s body writhed back and forth unnaturally, spattering blood everywhere, all over itself and the picnic blanket. For whatever reason, Twilight felt more tense and disgusted than frightened. Her gasps for breath were interrupted by Pinkie’s familiar bubbly, infectious, giggle. Twilight turned gawked at her.

“Pinkie! How could you even think of laughing at me like that!?”

Twilight’s pained indignance only made Pinkie laugh harder. Before long, she was doubled over in joy and pain. Tears began to form in the corners of her eyes while she began gasping for breath. “Snake! What are you talking about? It’s just a muffin, Silly!” Pinkie fell on her side, curled up in laughter.

As Twilight stared, horrified, at the dead snake coiling and  uncoiling right in front of her, Pinkie dropped her muffin, going wide eyed and making loud, choking gulps for air. Pinkie reached to Twilight for help, her eyes desperate and pleading. Twilight tried to get to her and help her spit out the muffin stuck in her throat, but she couldn’t move a muscle. The snake had bitten her while in her throat, causing paralysis. Twilight stared in terror and disbelief while Pinkie gagged loudly and collapsed on the picnic blanket, no longer breathing. Pinkie’s dead eyes stared up at Twilight as if still trying to ask for help. The sound of her laughter from only moments before echoed in Twilight’s ears.

Twilight could barely let out a sob before a monstrous crash erupted all around her and daylight turned to smoky, roiling shadows. The food on the blanket was replaced by emptiness. The rest of her friends were soullessly staring off into the distance with expressionless faces. Nothing moved except for the writhing snake. The blanket had lost all color, and the grass around it--what little she could still see of it--looked sparse and dead. Shadow closed into a near solid wall around them.

When the snake stopped writhing and died, Twilight could move again. She shook her head, tears pouring out of her eyes. “Pinkie!” She crawled to her friend and shook her. She knew it wouldn’t work, and it didn’t. So she dashed around the blanket from pony to pony, shaking them. “Rainbow Dash? Rarity? This isn’t funny! I don’t like this!” Her voice got higher and more desperate with each one. Fluttershy was last, her face covered by her mane. She started reaching a hoof towards her friend but stopped and tensed when she heard a soft, sobbing whimper from her side.

“T- Twilight… don’t leave me alone…”

“Spike!” Twilight gasped happily and turned to her assistant, glad there was someone left. But when she saw him…

Spike crawled to her inch by inch slowly from the other end of the blanket, leaving a dark stain from the fatal gash across the front of his neck. The color faded from his body as he bled out--from its usual purple and green to dull grey before crumbling to ashes at her feet. Twilight instinctively pulled her hoof back as the pile of dust that used to be her best friend dissipated in the wind. She screamed, choking out his name over and over as she tried to gather up his ashes, but not even her magic could get a hold of any of them.

“No!!! Spike! Pinkie! I didn’t want them dead!” She cried out, sobbing uncontrollably as the spiraling clouds of shadow closed in around Twilight herself. Tears poured out of her eyes as she just stared at the spot where her best friend had just collapsed. “Oh, Celestia… Spik-!” She fell to her haunches and covered her mouth with a hoof, swallowing her vomit.

Two sickle-like fangs bored their way into the side of Twilights rear right hoof. The decapitated snake’s head firmly attached itself to her leg. This time, a tingling, warm sensation spread from the bite as the snake’s venom began to course through her veins. Twilight beat the snake head with her front hooves and tried to rip it off of her leg, but it remained firmly attached. She screamed uncontrollably until she suddenly had a brilliant moment of clarity:

Fluttershy! Fluttershy can talk to it and get it off!”

Twilight pulled herself along the blanket back to Fluttershy, grabbed as high as she could reach on her flanks, and shook her, trying to wake her. Twilight screamed at her friend to save her.

“Fluttershy! Help me! Fluttershy, please! PLEASE! Wake up, Fluttershy! Fluttershy, help me; I’M GOING TO DIE!”

Fluttershy finally turned to Twilight, the faint glistening of tears rolling down her cheeks under her hair when she lifted her head to speak. Instead of words, a long, forked tongue shot out of Fluttershy’s mouth followed by one large, brown snake slithering from her throat. Forgetting her pain, Twilight gasped and scrambled back, and Fluttershy opened her eyelids to reveal the twisted, mangled heap of snakes that had balled up in her eye sockets. Fluttershy’s skin wriggled and squirmed before snakes were ejected from every orifice. They slithered off in every direction once they hit the ground, leaving her body an empty husk, digested from the inside out.

Twilight’s mind went absolutely blank; she jumped up despite her fear and pain and ran as hard as she could. Her body moved almost on its own accord like it was willing itself to escape death. She pummeled her way through the wall of black fog surrounding what used to be her picnic and ended up on a dusky but straight cobbled road. The darkness loomed on either side of the road, determining her path for her. The hospital shone in the distance at the end of the road; she before she took off toward it.

Ghostly silhouettes of buildings, the remains of Ponyville, phased in and out of existence in the surrounding darkness as Twilight ran along the road. Nondescript pony figures stood in front of the houses chatting noncommittally, but their colors were listless. Her panic-fueled dash brought her no closer to the hospital. Twilight slowed to a dull trot, dripping sweat, the venom starting to overcome her. She reached her shaking hooves toward the blurring vision of the hospital.

The same wall of black smoke or shadow that had surrounded the picnic always followed the same distance behind her, extending up to the now midnight sky, rolling over Luna’s bust in the silver moon watching her. Twilight had almost slowed to a stop when she saw she was leaving a trail of light-purple liquid. Her eyes widened in horror as she followed it along the ground to the bite mark. It had turned into a giant, festering hole with a light-purple liquid seeping down her leg.

“The poison...! No! NO!”

She felt so weak, she almost gave in, dropped to the ground, and wept as the end approached. But she wanted to live. She summoned the last of her strength and ran at the hospital harder than she’d ever run. The tears she was trying to hold back welled in her eyes as she ran. Rain began to fall from the black sky above, soaking everything with a murky, black liquid. The wind whipped at her face, making her wince, making her struggle to keep her eyes open, fixed on the hospital. But she knew she wasn’t going to make it. The harder she ran, the more desperate she became, the more it faded into the murky distance, growing grayer and less real. In the end, she tripped and landed hard. She shakily stood back up--only to tilt and immediately fall again, slipping in what she thought at first was mud. But when she looked behind to her right back hoof, the one the snake jaws had attached themselves to, it had melted up to her flank into a pile of lavender goo.

“No!!! Help me! Somepony! I… I can’t… do… it...”

Twilight’s calls for help turned into quiet sobs as she dragged what was left of her along the ground with her front hooves. With one last panicked look, she turned around to find that the whole lower half of her body was a purple pile of mush. Crying hard now, she pulled herself forward--hoof after hoof--as more of her body liquefied. The ground began to rise to Twilight’s eye level; her upper body was liquefying as well. The sound of rainfall and the dull roar of thunder echoed around Twilight as the dark rainwater fell around her, melting all but her head and turning her surroundings to pure, empty blackness.

Next thing she knew, she was whole again. She gasped in relief to see her body intact. The sound of rushing air whipped past Twilight’s ears. She couldn’t be sure, but it felt like she was falling. Her surroundings were completely dark; nothingness surrounded her from all sides. Twilight mentally braced herself for an impact she hoped wouldn’t come. The deafening whoosh of air raced up past her faster and faster. She could feel her mane and tail whipping around violently as she fell. She flailed her hooves around wildly, trying to grab at anything that might slow her fall.

“If only I could be back home… in my bed with Spike, reading him a good book…”

Twilight closed her eyes and felt a single tear fall down her cheek.

“Spike… My friends…”

The dark walls of the shadowy tunnel closed around her, constricting to the point where she wasn’t falling anymore. Instead, she could hardly move. She struggled, kicking the walls of the tunnel, which gave against her kicks momentarily but then tightened back in place around her. They got smaller and smaller…

Twilight sat straight up in bed, heaving for air. The covers were so tangled and knotted around her she could barely move. Before she realized where she was, her blankets were strewn on the floor from her flailing her hooves wildly in every direction. But she soon came fully around to a gust of icy air in her face.

The window across from her bed had blown violently open in the storm; the crack of the round, wooden window frame against her wall had thankfully woken Twilight up before the situation had gotten any more dire. The regular echoes of thunderclaps against the hills pounded in her ears like the strange crashing sounds from her dream. She threw off her remaining blankets as hard as she could and climbed down off her moist, chill mattress.

Twilight shivered, blinking her heavy eyelids. “Ugh… so that’s why I couldn’t move at the end… must have been tossing and turning really hard… …Can’t see a thing, but I’ve got to get that window shut… I hope I’m really awake and this isn’t another dumb nightmare… Wow, the storm’s right on top of us. Good thing I remembered to enhance the magical ground for the lightning rod. This night could have been a big disaster already.” Twilight gently pressed a hoof against the side of her temple and stumbled, feeling physically exhausted. “To top things off, that was anything but a deep sleep.”

She gulped, having reminded herself of her nightmare--then took a deep breath and let out a sigh of relief that she wasn’t really melted or falling forever. She silently thanked Luna for lending her the strength to see her through it all. She had managed to catch a glimpse of Luna in the moon, had she not?

Regardless, now that her eyes had more or less adjusted to the dark, she was going to try to get across the room quietly enough that she didn’t wake Spike. Then she halted as the realization hit her.

“Wait, shouldn’t the window blowing open have woken him up too?”

“...Spike?” She called out quietly, hoping to hear him groggily reply--nothing came.

Maybe she wasn’t fully awake yet. She started to feel nervous again, the anxieties from her dream creeping slowly back up on her in the dark. Taking a slight, shaky breath and focusing a tiny surge of magic up her horn, she bathed the room in a pale, pink-purple glow. Spike’s bed--and the Spike that should have been in it--were both missing. Twilight tensed up, gritting her teeth. But first things first. She crossed the room with quick, loud, worried hoofclops to shut the window, looking around the rest of the room for her baby dragon as she did so.

“Spike…?!” Twilight called, loudly enough that he’d be able to hear her downstairs in the study bathroom just in case. When no reply came still, she felt a shiver run through her.

“Oh no…” Twilight whispered to herself, “maybe this really is the start of another nightmare…”

Twilight ran down the stairs from her loft to her study, scanning the area, almost tripping because of the dim lighting. "Spike! Spike!!! Where are you?" She needed his voice to make her feel secure again. “Am I having another nightmare?!” She gulped, brought a hoof to the side of her head, and smacked herself firmly across the cheek. Nothing. No pain whatsoever. She stared at her hoof under her dim horn light, confirming that it was still solid. She started to freak out.

The sight of her desk made a chill run down her spine. That snake! If yesterday really happened, there should be a jar with a snake in it on her desk. She grit her teeth and slowly walked closer to the desk so her light would reach, scared to reveal the answer.

There was indeed a jar on it. She squinted at the jar, trying to make out the shape of the snake beyond the refraction grain of her table in the glass. In the minimal light, she couldn’t tell if the snake was in it or not.

“It’s got to be in there,” Twilight reassured herself nervously. “It’s pretty small. Even if it could climb up glass, it wouldn’t be able to get past the lid… that’s… gone?!”

She felt her whole body tightening as she stared at the top of the jar. There was definitely no more lid. “This is real, and there’s a snake loose in the library!

She let out a piercing scream and fought back the sting of tears in the corners of her eyes. But it was far and away too late. Breathing hard, she tried to talk herself down from an anxiety attack:

“Okay. Just think, Twilight. Spike and the snake are both missing. Maybe Spike took the snake. Find Spike. Where would he be..? He’s not in the bathroom. Maybe the kitchen getting a midnight snack? No, no, those don’t make sense anyway! What would he want with a snake in those places!? And where did his bed go? Is this some kind of prank?! Relax, Twilight… you don’t know if they’re even in the library. What if Spike released it outside? Yeah! That- good job, Twilight! That makes sense!”

She did relax a little at that possibility--then tensed back up two seconds later, her irrational mind taking an unusually large amount of control. “But, if he didn’t, then that means he could be right behind me and I wouldn’t even know!”

Twilight reflexively whipped her head around and glanced at the ground behind her. The ground--as far as she could see--was bare.

“No, no…” she continued shakily, “just because there could be a snake loose somewhere in the house doesn’t mean that it will hurt me. ...unless it’s mad that I’ve been keeping it in the jar!”

Her eyes darted back and forth across the room even though she couldn’t see for more than a couple feet in any direction.

“Okay… okay… you can do this, Twilight. If the snake is loose in the library, all you need to do is find it and put it back in this jar. That’s all.” She was just going to pick it up when a flash of lightning and an immediate, deafening roar of thunder made her shriek and lose control of her magic as if stepping on a tack and dropping a stack of dishes.

The purple glow jumped off her horn and danced all around her desk, knocking everything off--flinging the heavier items across the room, including the snake jar. The thick glass smashed magnificently against the wall to the right of the doorway leading downstairs, sending shards of glass exploding in every direction, rendering her floor a minefield.

Twilight grit her teeth, literally about to collapse under the pressure, her legs shaking and her stomach in knots. She gulped and weakly sat down, placing a hoof over her racing heart as she tried to gather her composure. She mentally lectured herself for her lapse in control, recalling one of the most basic magic-kindergarten lessons.

“Come on Twilight, get a grip! If you can’t even control your emotions then how are you supposed to control your magic?” Her ears and tail drooped as she looked from the raging storm outside her windows to the glinting shards of glass scattered across the floor.

“I usually have no problem with that. There’s a snake loose, I must have gotten no sleep at all… This isn’t a normal situation, so maybe I should just try to use as little magic as possible instead. It’ll be hard to get around, but a magic surge like that on the main floor of the library could… really… destroy everything. Thank goodness it didn’t catch on a book and start a fire this time.”

A little calmer now after talking with herself--after she’d made up her mind about something and counted her blessings--she carefully stood back up and levitated the larger glass shards into a neat pile on her desk, only using the glow from the levitation to navigate.

After a couple minutes, she gave a louder sigh than before--this time about the mess rather than the situation. Mindless, repetitive tasks did often help her focus, she remembered. “It’s probably not perfect, but it’s enough that I shouldn’t step on any if I’m careful. I’ll get Spike to finish it up tomorrow. Can’t get through that scale armor,” she chuckled, fondly picturing her friend recklessly stepping all over the glass while sweeping it up.

Twilight nodded to herself. “Okay, I can do this. I’ll need to find another jar to seal the snake when I find it, but the goal now is to get downstairs. Cross bridges as you come to them, Twilight.” She carefully, slowly stepped across the dark, oak floor in the dim moonlight from her upstairs windows. After a few tentative paces, she reached the staircase leading down to the main floor, only identifiable by the step down and the deeper shade of black threatening to swallow her up. She gulped once. Never before had her own house seemed so alien. She was straining to see anything at all.

In the end, she found herself feeling her way down the stairs, going down each step slowly, getting all four hooves down on each step then feeling her way along the wall with one hoof to make sure she didn’t lose her balance before stepping down again.

Though relieved that at least the walls of her own library hadn’t shifted around her, she still felt, at the least, apprehensive. She took one last look behind at her room before she descended so far as to lose sight of it. Everything was still as she left it, bathed in the dim illumination of her windows with the muffled roars of the wind and rain above.

She nervously started up talking to herself again, inspiring confidence with a lecture.

“You’re not in a dream, Twilight; everything’s okay. Nothing’s going to jump out at you. It’s just the library. My library! I like my library, it’s safe and calm and quiet. I’ve got friends here--like Spike! Spike can take care of himself. He’ll be completely fine when I find him, and we’ll be able to find that snake together if he doesn’t already have it with him. And then we’ll release it, and it can live its happy snake life far, farfarfarfarfaaaaaaar away from me.”

She ran out of breath from how far away she wanted the snake to live. The moment she stopped talking, she realized how much louder it had gotten even halfway down the stairs; the bulk of the storm’s noise was blocked by the tree’s canopy, which only surrounded the upper floors. The sound of the rain slapping the ground was loud enough that it might as well be raining indoors all around her. The ambient glow caused by the light through the windows was also getting brighter, as the few streetlamps around the library shone proudly in spite of  the storm. She relaxed her hoof against the wall a little now that she could see better, letting the tension of of her shoulders.

She suddenly jerked her hoof off the wall. “Snakes can climb!”

Twilight shook, her teeth actually chattering as cold chills ran up and down her spine with the realization that she could have been bitten several times over by now.

“I… can have just a little more light, can’t I?” Twilight focused onto her horn once more and increased the illumination around her. Dim outlines of shelves desks and book stands began to stand out from the darkness and throw long, dancing shadows. Letting loose a small sigh of relief upon seeing the familiar details of the downstairs main room, Twilight brought her hoof down to the second-lowest stair before a long, brown snake slithered up the wall next to her.

Twilight screamed and jumped away from the serpent but tottered and lost her balance without her hoof on the wall. Her back right hoof went off the edge of the step she was standing on, sending her crashing down into the floor below headfirst. She didn’t even stop screaming as she scrambled to her hooves and tried to levitate it off the wall and capture it, teeth grit, desperate, eyes wide. No! How could I have missed it?! she panicked when she saw the snake was not inside her magic field.

Freaking out, Twilight charged a surge of magic into her horn and fired the huge bolt of magic, aiming at where she thought the wall was, eyes shut tight. She missed, of course. With a huge crash, the second-lowest stair blew to pieces. Realizing a moment too late that perhaps that hadn’t been the best way to deal with even something so dangerous as a snake,Twilight shielded her eyes with a hoof as wood fragments flew everywhere. The second stair to the bottom, where she had been standing when she saw the snake, had been blasted in two. More precisely, a little under one half of the stair was now a smoking, splintery board on the floor. The stair above and the stair below it had received deep scorch marks. And there was no sign of the snake.

“Did I hit it? Did I miss? There’s no way that could have missed! I can’t have been seeing things… right? Oh, Celestia! So much for holding off on the magic! It’s going to take a whole day to prepare the spell to fix that!” As if adding insult to injury, she spied her target still on the wall: a brown striation in the wood that she had hastily mistaken for a snake.

Twilight groaned and pressed a hoof against her forehead for but a moment before ripping it back away due to a sharp jolt of pain. The left side of her head was now home to a sizable, tender bump.

“Eugh… that’s going to swell even more unless I get ice on it right away,” she said to herself, coming back to her senses again--which, unfortunately, always seemed to require some small disaster.

Twilight carefully set her hoof back on the side of her head, pressing gently against the bump, trying to ignore the throbs of her pulse in her temples.

“Calm down, Twilight… The snake, the storm, Spike missing: it’s all getting to you. You’re letting it get to you. First you broke that bottle because of the lightning; now you’re destroying your own library because of a snake you thought you saw… It’s just a Garter snake; it can’t even hurt you. I’m just… instinctively so afraid of it. Even the way it moves is just… eugh.” Twilight shuddered unable to finish her thought.

Twilight sighed, looking at her newly cracked and smoking stairs, and lowered her shoulders. “I’ll just have to leave this all here until tomorrow. There’s nothing I can really do about it now. ...it’s not like anypony but me and Spike goes up there anyway, and he’s gone. I’ll just set it back in place so I don’t trip over it on accident.”

Twilight carefully used levitation to replace the step as best as she could, giving up on the failed idea of getting by without magic. In this situation, she was clearly very much prone to letting her magic go out of control whether she was trying to avoid using it or not--and, if that was the case, there was no reason to struggle to survive without it. The chunk of stairboard lay crooked, its left end almost rising to the level of the next step up; but it was the best she could manage, as she was starting to contract a splitting headache from the bump. She quickly headed for the kitchen to get herself an ice pack.

The moaning gales outside of the Golden Oak Library grew louder as Twilight neared the kitchen. The sound was reassuring, actually: an element of regularity in what felt like unfamiliar circumstances. To help matters, the faint rustle of feathers rose from the ground as she passed through the doorframe.

“Owlowiscious! I almost forgot about you!” Twilight let out, relieved.

Between her horn and the window, Twilight could indeed make out the round feathered silhouette of her pet owl flying back up to his perch, occasionally nipping at his talons and tilting his head back and forth. Her horn light didn’t reach up that far, but she could still tell it was his shape concealed in those shadows.

“Owlowiscious, am I glad to see you! Spike and the snake went missing; did you see what happened to them?”

Owlowiscious clacked his beak in a way that she had never heard before then stood silent and still, not even answering with his characteristic hoot.

“Owlowiscious? Are you ok...?”

Twilight paused nervously for a moment, giving her pet a longer chance to respond, but the screech owl remained silent. As Twilight crept closer the dim illumination of her horn crept up the wall.

The darkness outside lit up with a blinding flash, illuminating just enough of Owlowiscious to show his beak and talons dripping with blood. Twilight let out a piercing, tense scream at what she saw and clumsily floundered backwards away to the slow, eerie roll of thunder.

She stopped, shivering, when her rump met the wall. She could barely see a thing; the world around her was a shadowy blur as her eyes tried to adjust to the sudden flash of light--and her head was sore and spinning. She grit her teeth as the shock of what she’d seen turned slowly into deep, biting fear. …Was the roof leaking in the storm…? No… The decapitated head of the snake, propped up by bits of its own carcass, stared up at her from the middle of the pool of blood was standing in.

Twilight’s breath left her the moment she tried to scream. All she could do was back up against the wall on her hind legs, as high as she could. She could feel her own heartbeat over the hammering rain. The mental image of Spike from her dream, the gash across his neck, about to die in a pool of his own blood flashed through her mind. As it all went wrong again, as Twilight shook, her eyes trailed back up to her blood-stained owl, his dim form bent over and pulling at whatever was between his talons. She froze up, back stuck to the wall, her eyes going wide, her breath coming short, shrieking. She knew what he had in his talons, and she didn’t want to see it.

She tried to run, but dropping back down on all fours caused her to nearly step on the snake’s head. She shifted hard at the last second and slipped in blood instead, falling to the ground on top of the head. Her body froze up as a twinge of sharp pain shot up her spine from her belly. Adrenaline and fear coursed through her veins as she tried to make sense of what she was experiencing. The dead snake had bitten her?! Maybe it wasn’t dead! No, the very concept was absurd! Impossible! She could see, hear Owlowiscious eating it! But the impossible was happening to her!

The next thing she knew, Twilight’s instincts had kicked in, focusing a powerful surge of magic into her horn and teleporting her to the main room of the library. The force of her adrenaline-fueled teleportation sent her careening backwards into a bookshelf. A small avalanche of literature rained down on Twilight, burying her. Twilight immediately shot up out of the pile, shaking around like mad, sending books flying to and fro across the room. “Get it off! GET IT OFF!”

Not realizing it wasn’t even attached to her anymore, Twilight charged her horn with a great deal of magic; enough to bathe the library in a bright pink glow. She raced out of the pile of books towards the exit. She grabbed the handle of the door and shoved it as hard as she could--with enough force practically pushing it off of its hinges. Even so, the door barely budged more than a few inches. Another shove, and the wind caught it, making it fly open and slam into the side of her house. Twilight realized just a moment too late how harsh the storm had really gotten.

Like the blast of cold air from her window when she’d just woken up, the cold rain shocked some sense back into her, and she brought up a hoof to shield her eyes from the torrential rainfall while it soaked her and everything within a few feet of the door. In a sudden flash of lightning, she could see the shadow of the canopy of her house violently swaying. Thunder followed immediately after.

Twilight stepped back from her door just in time; the wind quickly changed direction and slammed the door shut a mere inch from the tip of her snout. And that was it. Something inside her snapped under the pressure. Like a filly afraid of the dark, she started running back up to her room to hide under the covers until everything wasn’t scary anymore. She had barely run two steps up the stairs, however, when she heard an ominous crack. Her front left hoof predictably dropped through the board she had blasted before, tripping her and sending her facefirst into the front of the fourth stair up. She shrieked, watching the stair get closer, and closed her eyes. Smack. Twilight groaned in agony as a warm stream of liquid began flowing down her nostril over her lips.

Twilight covered her nose as best as she could with a hoof and desperately hobbled her way up the rest of the stairs to her room as fast as she could, nearly crying with frustration, fatigue, and pain from her two injuries now. Her desperate eyes locked on her good old bed.

There it is! No, wait! She froze up again, anxiety taking over and making her totally forget that she wasn’t in any real danger--not from the dead snake or the storm. Covers aren’t good enough. Bathroom? Maybe…! ...no. Nonono. Too many places for a snake to hide. It’s gotta be small and secure and… yes! Closet!

        * * * *

“Mmmn...ahhhhh!”

Spike hopped out of bed after a good night’s sleep. He reached his arms way up in the air and puffed his chest out, taking a long and much needed stretch.

“I gotta say, the basement was even quieter than I thought it’d be! No storm, no Twilight snoring… I should sleep down here more often. I wonder what time it is? Heh, I hope Twilight didn’t need me for anything important, heheh.”

Spike grabbed his bed under an arm and awkwardly walked up the stairs to the kitchen while counting his usual tasks on his fingers.

“There shouldn’t be too many books to reshelve… I hope. Unless Twilight went on one of her late-night learning benders. Let’s see… There weren’t too many dishes yet either, I think. Maybe the floor could use a sweep, or... wait, Twilight brought home that snake, didn’t she? Maybe needed help studying it! Oh, no.”

He began running up the stairs. Then, reconsidering, he stopped in place when he reached the top of the stairs and started to drag his bed behind him lazily with one claw as he walked to the door.

“Spike, Spike, Spike, what are you talking about? Since when does Twi need help studying? She gets so into it sometimes she forgets to eat, which means I really won’t need to do dishes for a while. Wait, I’ll make her breakfast to make up for sleeping in!” Spike skillfully tossed his bed up in the air and stretched out his neck, smirking to himself. The edge of his bed caught on the tip of his spikes for easy carrying.

“I guess I should ask her if she’s hungry first, though. Then, if she doesn’t need me for anything, I can visit Rarity!”

Spike paused with his claw on the handle of the door as he dreamily pictured Rarity. It didn’t matter what she was doing; from relaxing at the spa to working on her dresses, she always managed to maintain an air of grace and beauty. Truly, Spike thought to himself, he must be a lucky dragon to be allowed the privilege of her presence.

A happy sigh escaped the young dragon’s lips as he walked into the kitchen. Bright morning sunshine was beaming in from the window. Almost immediately, he was greeted by a loud “Whooo” from Owlowiscious.

“It’s just me, Owlowiscious. Crazy weather we had last night, huh? I almost can’t believe you’re still awake. How bad does it look out there?”

Owlowiscious didn’t make a sound; just watched as Spike set his bed on the floor and climbed up a stool in front of the kitchen window.

“Wow, look at all those branches! I hope the library wasn’t damaged too badly. At least everything looks ok for the most part.”

Owlowiscious turned his head completely around on his perch, giving a few small hoots, awaiting the inevitable as Spike shuffled across the kitchen.

Spike gasped and ran to the bright crimson stain on the floor. The smudged imprints of hooves were clearly visible in the pool of blood.

Spike gulped and looked back to Owlowiscious looking slightly pale. “Owlowiscious, is this what I think this is?”

“Whooo who.” Owlowiscious slowly turned his head back to Spike and nodded.

“You don’t know whose blood this is? What happened last night? Where’s Twilight? Is she ok?”

“Whoo.” Owlowiscious extended a brown feathered wing to the main study, probably thankful that he couldn’t explain his role in Twilight’s mishaps.

Spike responded, worriedly looking at the hoofprints instead of Owlowiscious. “Twilight! Is she ok? What happened in here!? Was there a fight?!”

Spike gaped as his eyes moved from one side of the study to the other. Each detail that he noticed looked worse than the one before. A swarm of books peppered the floor and an entire shelf got knocked loose! There was a huge puddle of water on the floor in front of the door. There was no way she’d gone out in last night’s storm, right? Maybe she was forced! As he reached for the handle on the door, he saw it was indeed adorned with a bloody smear partially washed away in the rain.

“The attacker tried to cover up his hoofprint as he ran out! Wait, no! Did he just forget about the blood in the kitchen? And where are the hoofprints leading out into this room, anyway?” Spike gulped and continued his investigation at the stairs. The second stair from the bottom had been blasted clean off!

“Oh no… whatever Twilight was fighting had to have been really strong!” Spike marveled at it for a split second before getting even more worried. “Oh no... I hope she’s ok… wait, is that more blood!?”

There was a huge smack of it on the fourth stair from the bottom and then several unmistakable drops of it on each next stair up--as well as faded, bloody hoofprints on all the stairs. Tears welled in Spike’s eyes as he ran back to Owlowiscious.

“Owlowiscious... i-is Twilight ok? Where is she!? Help me find her, please!”

Owlowiscious leapt from his perch and flew up the stairs to Twilight’s room with a series of quick, short hoots. Spike followed as fast as he could, doing his best to not step on any of the blood on the stairs along the way.

Twilight’s study was only slightly better than the main room below. An entire wall was littered with glass shards, launched at the wood and books with such force that they stuck in them. Owlowiscious had perched himself on a bookshelf next to the broom closet on that level. The floor in front of it was littered with several brooms, mops, and a bucket--all of which were thrown on the ground in a heap. Once again, Owlowiscious attempted to point Spike in the right direction with his wing. Spike tentatively marched himself up to the door and grabbed the handle, cowering in fear at what he might find on the other side.

Crrreeeeaaaaaaaaak.

The smell of blood immediately washed over Spike, making him flinch even harder. Spike eventually brought himself to open his eyes, gasping in horror at what he saw.

“T...Twilight?” Spike uttered, barely louder than a whisper.

Twilight’s lavender coat was stained dark red with multiple, snaking streaks of dried blood under her nose. She sat hunched over herself in a corner. Her mane and tail were a damp mess only made scarier by the slightly awkward angle her head was laying at. Her face and hooves were coated with blood and she had a painful looking bump on the side of her head. She looked like a corpse--all except for her fluttering eyelids.

Tears of relief welled in the corners of Spike’s eyes when he realized that Twilight’s chest was rising and falling. She was still alive! He gasped as that tremendous weight was lifted from his heart.

“Oh, thank Celestia! Twilight, It’s me! Wake up!”

“Uuugh… where am I…” Twilight moaned as she slowly opened her bloodshot eyes. “Oww... I’m sore all over...”

Twilight turned her head sluggishly toward the sound of Spike’s voice, slowly opening her eyes--before turning away and shutting them again from the pain throbbing in her head from her injuries. Groaning, she curled up in a tight ball.

“Twilight? Are you ok? Sh-should I get help?”

“Rrgh! No! I’m fine!” she let out irritably, still hunched over, “...just… just give me a minute.” Twilight lifted her head and rubbed her eyes as they gradually adjusted to the light. Then she held her head with both hooves, moaning, as her movements brought on the pain again. Spike awkwardly watched Twilight slowly roll out of the closet on her side, making more pained moans as she stretched out her back, trying to stand up.

“Twi! What in the world happened?!” Spike asked anxiously, watching Twilight rise to her hooves in what looked like the most painful way possible.

Twilight opened an eye partially at Spike before answering as best as she could. “Therwus a snage an…” Twilight lowered her head in what looked like deep thought.

Spike blinked as an awkward moment of silence passed between them. Twilight’s head remained low to the ground in deep contemplation as Spike’s eyes trailed over the massive, swollen bruise on the side of her head. He winced slightly. Could that be what that splat of blood on the stairs was from?

Finally, Spike spoke up. “Twilight, were you attacked? Are you ok? If there’s something really bad going on, I can write a letter to the princess asking for help or-”

Spike’s inquiries were interrupted by a loud snore from Twilight as she stood in front of him, head still tilted down to the ground. Spike blinked in disbelief.

“You’re asleep?

Spike’s jaw dropped as Twilight’s breathing became slow and rhythmic. He quickly shook off the disbelief and cupped his hands around the sides of his mouth.

“Twilight! Wake up!”

        Spike’s shout was immediately answered with a brief, incoherent mumble. He glanced to Owlowiscious for help, hoping in vain that the owl would be able to give him some clue. Owlowiscious merely shrugged his wings and tilted his head back and forth.

        Spike grit his teeth and took a step forward. Cupping his claws around his mouth, Spike shouted as loud as he could.

“TWIIIIIIIIILIIIIIIIIGHT!”

“Wuah!”

Twilight jolted backwards from where she was standing with startling speed, wobbling a bit on her feet as she stopped herself from crashing into the side of the broom closet she had been sleeping in. Twilight blinked, trying to remove the haziness from her eyes.

“S-Spike? Is that you...? Oh, thank goodness you’re okay!”

Spike was unamused. “You just now figured out it was me? ...What do you mean, ‘I’m ok?’ You’re the one who’s-”

Twilight squinted at him, taking a step towards Spike. Spike nervously held his claws out towards her, ready to catch her if she were to fall on him.

“Spike! I’m so glad you’re okay!” Twilight rushed forward to Spike, quickly overcoming his defenses and wrapping him in a tight hug. Spike smiled awkwardly and blushed, returning Twilight’s affections as best as he could, though he was confused and a little nervous about Twilight’s condition. Just as Spike finally got comfortable in Twilight’s embrace, Twilight shoved him away to hoof’s length and kept her front hooves on his chest, staring straight into his eyes with a mixed look of fear, fatigue, and desperation.

“Where did you go last night!? I was so worried about you!”

Spike winced at the pressure Twi was putting on his chest and gently grabbed onto the sides of Twilight’s hooves, moving them to his shoulders. “I... just couldn’t sleep last night because of the storm, so I took my bed to the basement… And why are you worried about me, anyway? What about you? Why’s the library torn apart? What happened to your head? And your nose?”

        Twilight gulped and shifted her eyes away from Spike as she tried to piece together the nightmare she’d managed to live through last night. “I… I woke up from a nightmare. You… and the snake… were both missing, so I went looking for you and… things… just… happened! Or I happened to them… or…”

        Spike raised an eyebrow as he gently helped Twilight take her hooves off of his shoulders and put them around his back. “You… beat yourself up or something? On purpose?”

        Twilight flung an accusing hoof towards the stairs. “No, it wasn’t on purpose! It was dark and scary, and I was worried about you! But then Owlowiscious ate the snake, and the snake’s head attacked me, and… Spike! Oh, Spike! I’m so sorry I let you turn into dust. I’m so sorry!” Twilight grabbed Spike and pulled him into another tight hug. Twilight sniffled loudly and held back tears as Spike awkwardly returned the hug, not sure what to think or do.

        “Whoa… Twilight, what? I’m not dust. Are you sure that bump on your head isn’t serious…?”

        Twilight mumbled against the side of his head. “No, but in my nightmare you were! You died, and I couldn’t save you… And all my friends died too, and then I did… And it was all because the snake…”

        “Twilight…” Spike smiled. “It was just a dream. I’m not gonna die!”

        “Thank you Spike.” Twilight looked him in the eyes and smiled.

        Spike chuckled. “You really need a good night’s sleep.”

        “No, I… um, think I’m okay now.”

        “Yes you do, Twilight. I’ll help you get to bed.”

        Spike turned around in Twilight’s embrace and walked her forward carefully, holding her front hooves against his chest. They slowly managed up the stairs together, going one step at a time. Twilight smiled to herself; Spike was so dependable and loving. She awkwardly followed him halfway across the loft before climbing off of Spike’s back and onto her bed.

        “Spike… when I wake up, you’ve gotta remind me… Snakes! I’ve gotta…  study ‘em! There’s still lots more to learn!”

Spike would have responded, but Twilight’s sudden snoring alerted him to her already somnolent state. He chuckled at her instead, shut the curtains, and got all the way down the stairs from the loft before he buried his head in his claws at the sight of the glass-shard minefield. He’d almost forgotten he would have to spend the rest of the day picking up broken glass and mopping up bloodstains.

Still, Twilight’s words “thanks, Spike” kept echoing in his ears. He grabbed a broom from the floor and started sweeping up the glass with a big smile on his face.

* * * *

When Twilight opened her eyes again, she was sitting at her desk on the second floor of the library. She gasped and looked around. Everything was where she remembered: Spike sleeping soundly in his bed upstairs in her loft, the snake in its jar on her desk, her study books splayed out in front of her. She heaved a sigh of relief then rubbed her eyes.

“Did I… fall asleep here after studying too late? Oh, thank goodness it was all a dream. A nightmare, mostly, sure… but at least it had a happy ending! Oh, Spike,” she smiled, ”I don’t know what I’d do without you. …In fact,” she yawned, “I think it’s about time I joined you.”

Before Twilight could even get up, she spied an odd book partially buried under the notes she had been taking earlier. “What’s this? I don’t remember ever seeing this one…” she said to herself as she brushed her notes to one side. The title brazenly announced itself: Spikescales.

“Wait, I thought we didn’t have any books on specific breeds of snake...” Twilight narrowed her eyes at the detailed calligraphy on its cover. The more she stared at it, the more alluring it was. “Spike must have found it while I was sleeping and stuck it in here!” She put out her hoof to open the cover but drew it back as a bead of sweat rolled down the side of her head. She stared at it again. It drew her in with a strange, intense lure. The rest of her world faded away into shadow, the only remaining light coming from the candle on her desk. She put both her front hooves on the book.

Twilight opened straight into the middle of the book where the pages were thicker due to a color insert. It was a two-page spread, an anatomical diagram of the Spikescale. The snake in the picture was lifting the first few feet of its body straight up in a striking position with its jaws open. There were annotations to both sides of the drawing. Twilight skimmed over the left one, reciting the facts it bore for memorization.

“12 feet long… sharp, spiked back… extremely territorial, carnivorous, easily agitated, a threat to both ponies and animals.” Twilight grit her teeth; something was watching her. She looked back and forth, seeing only the calm shadows outside the reach of the glow of her reading candle. She turned back to her book, still on edge. Something just wasn’t right… She closed her eyes, trying to ease her mind through the anxiety. The bookcase behind her formed the open, hissing jaws of the snake. The giant Spikescale lunged out from behind her and coiled itself around her.

Twilight’s desk was knocked over, tipping forward and hitting the floor with a crash. Her books and notes went everywhere, and her candle lay on its side unextinguished on the floor. Twilight stomach suddenly tightly constricted, a twelve-foot-long slab of living muscle wrapped around her with deadly pressure. It was already too late by the time she’d recovered from the shock and started struggling. She beat at it with her hooves, arching her back, her eyes closed in fear; but it only tightened its embrace, squeezing the air from her lungs, while the candle’s flame spread to her notes, her books, and the desk itself.

The next time Twilight opened her eyes, she found herself face to face with the green, beady, slitted eyes of the gargantuan Spikescale snake from the textbook. Its thin row of tall, green, smooth spikes protruded out of the back of its head, trailing halfway down its neck. Its back was adorned with tiny purple scales while its underbelly was made of large, segmented, light-green, armor-like scales. It’s tail was barbed like the end of a spear.

Twilight managed to get out a single scream. “Spike! Help! Where are you…?! Help me! Please…” But the glimpse she managed to catch of her loft, shadows dancing in the flames of her burning library, revealed that his bed was empty. He must have escaped on his own. Even though she knew that was what he was taught to do in a fire, she still felt in her heart that he’d betrayed her as she faced her own death.

The snake slowly, deliberately opened its maw, revealing a long pink tongue flicking rapidly in the air between its rows of needle-sharp, curved fangs. It lowered its head toward hers, seeming to grin in terrible triumph. A drop of clear poison liquid accumulated and hung from each fang, glinting in the light of the fire. Twilight gasped for breath as the massive coils tightened around her, her heart pounding. She couldn’t move at all anymore; she could only watch herself about to be consumed. Her heart echoed louder and louder in her ears before everything came to an end.

* * * *

Twilight shot up in her bed, breathing hard and sweating. Midday sun pooled under the curtains.

“Spike… That snake… looked like… was… Spike…”