//------------------------------// // Chapter 5 - The Darker Sins of Shadows(unedited) // Story: Shadow Men: Where Light Can't Touch // by DragonsHeart //------------------------------// The chimes of midnight ring through the dark town of Ponyville. Everypony lays asleep in their houses, wrapped up in their sheets, feeling safe from the darkness of the moonless night… ignorant to the changes that the darkness brings. For in the basement of Twilight’s palace, it moves. Sorrow steps out of the cage and stands on her hind legs, her body growing, becoming longer and thinner, until she stands at nearly three metres tall, her front hooves split and grow, morphing into claws, longer and sharper than knives, her hands now almost reaches the floor, her back hooves become feet shaped, but without toes, her masks changes from white to black and the blue begins to glow, faintly. Long black tentacles sprout out of her back and grow until they hit the floor, where they hang, and her body seems to absorb the robes, leaving her as a tall hunched humanoid figure, with a black seamless body. She turns her head scanning the room, her eyes able to see through any darkness. She soon finds the door and the many traps Twilight left on the stairs leading up to it. She bends down and leaps upward, landing at the top of the stairs and in front of the door, avoiding the traps. Her tentacles surge forward and slip through the door’s keyhole, undoing the trap on the other side and unlocking the door. The door quickly swings open and she dashes through, closing it behind her. She runs to the front door, taking leaping strides to avoid touching the floor as much as possible. She soon reaches the front door, opening and stepping outside, she then looks back. She sees that every step she took left a dark patch on the crystal floor, marking where her foot touched, feeling relieved when she sees the colour slowly return. The magic is returning, as it should. She then notices something else on the floor. A small purple and green dragon is staring at her with a shocked expression on his face. He drops the glass of water he is carrying, causing it to shatter, spilling glass and water on the floor. The two stare at each other for a good while until Sorrow raises a long claw in front of her sad shaped mouth in a gesture of silence. Spike unfreezes, terrified of the long claws he screams for Twilight. “TWILIGHT, IT’S ESC…” Before Spike can scream anymore a hidden tentacles smack against his head and sends him into the wall. The impact knocks him unconscious. The tentacles checks on the dragon and after making sure he is asleep, it returns to hang limply on Sorrow’s back. After waiting awhile, incase the dragon woke the pony, Sorrow leaves, closing the door behind her. The Shadow Man dashes across the ground, almost gliding as her feet never seem to touch the floor for long. She soon reaches her destination, a entrance Everfree Forest. She stops right in front of it, looking deep within it. This is the forest that her other half foolishly feared, but she has no fear for while her other half argued with the mask Sorrow sensed something faint within the forest, something she has been looking for. She leaps up into a branch, before jumping to another, soon she is leaping tree to tree, deeper into the forest. “I will find you murderers and complete the deal… for you can’t escape a Shadow Man!” She is by now pretty deep in the forest, she can sense that she is now close. She then sees a fire up ahead and heads for it. She lands on a tree near the fire and looks down, careful not to make a noise. Two of the winged pony males are gathered around a fire, looking none to happy to be here. Sorrow glares at them, they are not the ones she is looking for, but they have a faint feeling of one of their magic energies. They must have been close to them or at least one of them. They start to speak and Sorrow listens carefully. “I can’t believe we are stuck in the middle of the most dangerous forest in Equestria to watch the most deadend of a town,” grumbles the first one, throwing another log on the fire, “I mean why would it turn up here of all places?.” “Don’t be so sure,” says the other one, holding a spear, “A lot of things turn up in this town.” “Whatever,” grumbles the first one, “You know, I hate towns like this.” “I think I heard this before,” sighs the other one. “I mean it is so carefree and annoying,” number one says, standing up and pacing, “It is like most of them don’t even know what a day’s hard work is and just goof around, having fun. To them it is a non-stop party, and the foals, don’t get me started on them, bunch of spoiled brats! When I was a colt I had to work for my own keep and things like earning cutie marks and having fun were a waste of time. I hope when Catalyst takes control he fixes places like this and gets rid of such useless celebrations like that pink mare keep throwing.” Sorrow narrows her sad shaped eyes at the first one. They knows Catalyst, he is the one who needs to pay the most! Also despite what Sorrow did before she approves of the pink pony, she wishes that there were more ponies like her, cause if they were… Shadow Men like her wouldn’t be needed, and that would be a good thing. Sorrow can see that many Shadow Men follow the first one, mostly ones of Burning. “Yeah, can you now please shut up,” says number 2, angrily, “You have told me this many times already and if you say it one more time I will gut you! Got it! Now shut up and go to sleep, you will be taking watch in a few hours.” Sorrow eyes fall on the second one, unlike the first one he is wearing armour of some sort, and is holding a spear. Unlike the other one, only one Shadow Man follows him. One of Force, Greed! “Whatever,” replies number 1, not caring, “Let me just take a piss first.” “Take it elsewhere,” says number 2, looking disgusted. Number 1 walks away from camp, grumbling. He heads for a tree to take care of business. Not knowing that Shadow Man is up it. Sorrow looks down at the pissing stallion, and starts to scale down, like a spider. She has nearly reached him when she accidentally knocks down a loose piece of bark, which falls on the stallion’s head. He looks up and sees the faint glowing face of Sorrow, less than a metre away. “What the hell…” Is all he gets to say before Sorrow drops on him. He doesn’t even get to scream as her claws stab right through his skull and out the other side. He slumps on the ground, dead. Sorrow draws her claws out of his skull and lets the blood drip off them. She then summons the Shadow Men that once followed the now dead stallions. Seven Shadow Men appear. “Where is the one called Catalyst?” The Shadow Men do not move. They do not know, for this Catalyst was never a source of this man’s negative emotions before, or at least the ones that feed the Shadow Men that follow him. Sorrow send them back and they disappear back into the Shadow Realm. No answers there. “Where the hell are you!” yells the voice of the other stallion, “It can’t take this long to take a piss!” “Ah, the other one…” “Fucking hell, don’t tell me that idiot got eaten by Timberwolves!” says the last stallion, getting to his hooves. Suddenly something shoots out of the bush and hits the fire, scattering it. The stallion covers his face so not to be hit by any flying bits of burning wood. He uncovers his face to see that the fire is extinguished and he is now in the dark. This is bad. The fire is the only that makes the Timberwolves keep their distance. He looks for the object that had destroyed the fire and gasps. It was his companion, he has a massive hole right through his head where blood freely flows out. He hears a rustling from the bush where his companion was thrown, he quickly turns toward it and raises his spear. “Come on out you bastard!” he challenges, “I am ready for you!” But how wrong he is. The figure slips through the bushes and walks towards him. It’s steps are slow and deliberate, it’s long arms swaying to and fro. It’s head is hanging down and swaying with it’s arms. It steps over the body of the dead pony and is now less than two metres away from him. Only now does it raise its head and he looks into the sad face of Sorrow. Only now does he realize that he has forgotten to breath. He readies the spear and jabs it forward, stabbing it right into the approaching figure chest, causing it to stop. “TAKE THAT MONSTER!!” he yells. His triumph is short lived though. The figure grabs the spear and suddenly jerks it sideways. He is knocked sideways and is sent rolling into a tree. He lets out a silent screams as he hits the tree, the wind knocked out of him, it also feels like a few ribs are broken. He now lies on his back, groaning. The figure pulls the spear out of it’s chest, the hole disappearing as soon as the spear is removed. It walks over to the fallen figure, dragging the spear behind it. It now towers above the groaning pony. It notices that his two wings are spread out, most likely happened when he hit the tree. Sorrow raises the spear and snaps it in two. Suddenly she plunges a piece through each wing! Effectively pinning him to the ground. His unheard scream echoes through the forest. There he lays now, with a spear part through each wing and his blood pouring onto the ground. “You bastard…” he manages to croak. He is tough, Sorrow will give him that. She gets down on her knees and wraps her hand around his neck, and applies enough pressure not to hurt him but to feel the sharpness of her claws. “Where are your masters… tell me…” Sorrow asks, applying a bit more pressure. “What so you can kill them like you killed me and that idiot over there? Get real,” he says, spitting at her, “And what do I get even if I told you? You won’t kill me? For even if you don’t the Timberwolves will, so I ain’t telling you shit!” “How… unfortunate…” Sorrow sighs. She suddenly applies the full pressure, cutting his head right off. He died instantly. Sorrow stands up and looks at her hands which now drips with the blood of two more ponies. “More death, when only three will do…” A sound catches Sorrow attention and she turns towards a pack of Timberwolves approaching one of the dead bodies. “Keep back!” Sorrow yells at the Timberwolves, one of tentacles smacking the ground in front of them. The Timberwolves back off, growling at the Shadow Man but not daring to approach it. She reaches down and grabs something from each of the fallen’s ponies neck. It is a necklace with a X hanging off it. This is where the magical energies she was following came from, this must have been made by Catalyst! But this is no trail to follow, and the magic in them is already fading from her touch. She crushes them in her hand and drops them, leaving behind a scrunched up ball of metal on the ground. She then head back to the town, leaving the wolves to start their feast. This trail may be empty, but she can wait, they will turn up sooner or later, and she will be there, for… “For you can’t escape a Shadow Man forever...” Pinkie Pie lays in bed awake. She might actually be the only pony still awake on a night like this. A lot happened today (or is it yesterday?), especially to the pink pony. She and two of came back from some strangers funerals, she found the monster and helped chase/capture it, only to find out that it is the missing member of the dead family… or isn’t it, Pinkie is still kinda confused by the whole Sorrow/Joy thing. Pinkie is then forced to remember one of the worst moment of her life only a hundred percent more painful! And then she was… kissed. Pinkie blushes as she remembers that. That was her first kiss! On the lips anyway. Even though she knows it was just to make her feel better, she knows she will never be able to forget it, for she was crying and after it was over Joy was in her place. She remembers Joy’s face afterward, her pale and colourless crying face. A face that Pinkie really wants to see a smile on, so much in fact that it hurts her chest, which weird for while it is upsetting for her when ponies aren’t happy it has never hurt her physically… well not in this way anyway. Just thinking about how under that sad mask is an equally sad face cause a painful throbbing in her chest. Actually imagining Joy happy also causes a weird less painful throbbing. “Weird… maybe she did something to me…” Pinkie says to herself. She gets out of bed and walks to the window, looking out into the dark night. “Wow, it is dark tonight. The moon must be hiding,” Pinkie says, giggling. Suddenly Pinkie thinks she can see something silhouetted by starlight on a nearby roof. A tall and slim figure, just standing there. Pinkie suddenly feels the need to go outside. She rushes downstairs, careful not to wake up the Cakes. She exits the shop and shivers in the nighttime’s air. She looks up and sees the figure is still there, and is looking at her. She can tell for she can see the familiar sad face glowing slightly and looking at her. “Are you Sorrow?” Pinkie asks, slightly afraid of the Shadow Man, which is weird I mean she is the whole Giggle at the Ghost thing, but in the end Sorrow is no ghost, she is real and dangerous. Sorrow stays quiet for awhile before answering, “Yes…” “Are you escaping?” Pinkie replies, instantly. Another pause, “It is possibility...” Pinkie isn’t sure what to think about this, but says, “Don’t run away, Twilight will be upset.” Sorrow leaps down and lands in front of Pinkie. Pinkie backs away and cowers, fearful for her life. “Have you recovered” Sorrow asks, out of the blue. “What?” Pinkie replies, confused, looking back at Sorrow. “Do you still feel sadness?” “What… no, I am fine now,” Pinkie says, getting Sorrow means when she was sad before. “Good.” Another pause, “I am sorry, I made a mistake. I never meant to make you feel sad, it was accident and I apologise.” “Well apology accepted,” Pinkie says, smiling slightly. She then thinks she sees something drip from Sorrow hands, something red. “I am glad I was forgiven…” then Sorrow turns around and starts walking away. “Wait! Where are you going?” Pinkie says, panicking and grabbing hold of one of Sorrow legs. It feels as cold as stone. “Away,” Sorrow says, stopping. “Don’t escape! Let us help you!” Pinkie says, trying to convince Sorrow. “I do not require help.” “What about Joy, huh. I bet she needs help, she need help smiling again,” Pinkie says, bravely glaring at Sorrow. “You wish to help Joy?” Sorrow asks, slowly. “Yes I do, it is my job to make Ponies smile… actually it is baking and that is more of a hobby but my point still stands!” yells Pinkie. Pinkie then whispers the next part, “I don’t like ponies to be sad.” Sorrow stays quiet for a long while before saying, “Yes, you and me share this opinion... you and your friends may help Joy. I won’t run away.” “You won’t!” Pinkie says, happy that Twilight won’t get in trouble for this. “But you can’t tell anypony we met tonight.” “I can’t,” Pinkie says, worried. “Yes, you must promise.” “I promise,” Pinkie says, unhappy about this. “No, you must Pinkie Promise.” Pinkie gasps, not a Pinkie promise! But Pinkie does the actions and says the words. “Good.” And like that Sorrow disappears. Pinkie hopes that she is found back in Twilight’s basement. Pinkie is about to head back inside when she remembers the red liquid dripping from Sorrow claw. With dread Pinkie pulls a torch out of her mane and shines it on the ground. It is what she thought it was… blood! What has she got herself into. “This is going to be one hard Pinkie Promise to keep…”