//------------------------------// // Community // Story: Fangs: The Order // by Sapphic //------------------------------// *~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*...Octavia...*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~* There is a very distinct feeling that comes with certain situations when you realize that, no matter what, you are screwed to the utmost highest calibre there is. A calibre which you thought impossible, where something that shouldn't happen, did happen. The kind of screwed where you think offing yourself would be a better alternative than facing what was about to come. That feeling, for a lack of any better words, is horrifically terrifying. This feeling came to me as I looked around at the growing number of grins coming from what I could only assume was a vampiric camp filled to the brim. When I focused too long on one specific group of them, the sound of another group of them rustling from behind me draw my attention, turning into a vicious cycle of yanking my head around as they slowly inched closer to me. In an attempt to rationalize the irrational, I decided to stop following the advancing hoofsteps with my eyes, and just close them. It had occurred to me that the sight was what was confusing me - and by extension, scaring me - so what better way to stop it than to just close your eyes? Previous talks with both Vinyl and her mother began to race through my head. Possibly the flashing of my life before my eyes, or some kind of message from my brain that I may have a fighting chance in this. One of them was going to pounce regardless, and since I was the only illuminated currently, they'd know which way to pounce on me if I was looking around spastically. The sounds from their hooves began to be slightly louder, allowing me to know which direction the sound came from, even if I didn't turn to look in the same direction. 'M-Maybe they're friendly?' I said to myself in a hopeless attempt to reassure myself. The sound of hooves rapidly approaching from behind me answered my question. I let out a shaky breath as the hooves grew closer, while the a scene from when Miss Scratch was attempting to kill me ran through my mind like a broken record. Knives slowing down to the point where I could adjust them mid flight to not hit me. Hopefully I could do it again. My eyes sprang wide open, the orange blaze of the bonfire in front of me now moving at the pace where I could watch each individual flame lick at the air before dissipating. I turned slowly, facing the sight of a vampire mid jump with his fangs glaring at me. He moved ever so slowly, as if to remind me that it wasn't time control I possessed, just good eyes. I began to move myself, going underneath the stallion and watching his eyes slowly follow me. I pressed my front legs into his torso, and my bottom ones firmly on the dirt before shutting my eyes and pushing him past me. I felt things begin to move around me, including the weight of the stallion now altering and heading right towards a blazing bonfire. I didn't have time to check too long, as the others took no hesitation in charging me. The first ones to come were two from both sides of me, each springing from the darkness and took nothing more than good timing to deal with - an easy feat as I opened my eyes again. One jumped high while the other did not, trying to mix it up for me. I chose to wait, namely because I didn't have an idea on how to deal with the one who didn't jump, but eventually my eyes kicked in again as I began to panic. after a few extra seconds of thought, I finally settled on an idea. The one on the ground slowed to a stop and raised his hoof to hit me, opening his soft belly up for me to punch. I had learned that, though vampires are much more durable, they still have similar weak spots to normal ponies. A gut was one such. I turned around quickly and planted my front hooves on the ground firmly as I watched the jumping vampire close in on me, a pair of unseen wings springing from his back and giving a sudden push towards the ground. It managed to send him upwards, out of the way of anything I might be able to throw at him. Instead, I dropped to the ground, turning my head backwards to see a hoof go past where my head had previously been. I took the opportunity of the one vampire missing to go for his two hooves on the ground, kicking at one and causing him to trip and begin to fall on top of me. As I was beginning to try and get out from under the falling stallion, a whistling sound got my attention, and I looked up. The vampire from before was dive bombing down towards me, apparently too honed in on me to notice his friend was beginning to fall on me. I smiled as an idea formed. A look back at the falling stallion confirmed what I needed, so now I had to only wait for things to unfold. I looked forwards at the darkened horizon and shut my eyes, waiting a few seconds before feeling the hefty body of the stallion fall on me. He was heavy, but nothing too bad. What followed though, was enough to knock the wind from my lungs. I gasped as the body of the stallion pressed into me to the point where I feared I'd pop, a sickening sound of two heads hitting marking the start of the impact. Suddenly, the weight lifted and I sucked in a breath of fresh air. I knew that the two of them had hit each other. And I also knew they were both unconscious because they had hit heads. I smirked a little at my cleverness before grunting as I tried to pull myself out from under the two of them. I closed my eyes as I pulled myself out, sighing pleasantly as I got back onto my hooves, and then opened my eyes just in time to see that another vampire had taken advantage of my recovery. He had gotten close, his body lifted up above me with both hooves aimed down. He was trying to stomp on me, that brute. He had gotten a bit too close to me to actually dodge thanks to the momentum I knew he had; though, I did notice his tongue sticking out ever so slightly, and a grin began to form on my face while my hoof began to snake its way up my side and hovered steady near my face. I waited it out as he began to fall down on me, and only when he was too far down to adjust his path did I suddenly step backwards, leaving my hoof outwards and watching as his jaw came crashing down onto it. Wide eyed hunger soon turned to tears as my hoof knocked his jaw - and by extension, teeth - up onto the tip of his poor tongue and he quickly backed away while his hooves shot to his mouth to offer his tongue sympathy. Well, until another vampire pushed him out of the way in another attempt to charge me. I was beginning to wonder if they were smart enough to try something new, until I noticed a purple flare out of the corner of my eye. I did manage to stumble back to avoid a bolt of magic, flying by me at walking speed even with my everything else moving at a snail's pace. Though I wanted to find who had shot it, I turned back to the advancing vampire who had himself ducked low as to not give me any way to alter his weight. As I began to panic, I did something I think any rational person would do. I looked for things to throw at him. At first all I felt was dirt, though I soon also felt the heat from the bonfire and got another devious idea. Grabbing one of the fiery logs, I pushed through the pain of the flames and wielded the ignited timber like a club. One swing was all I needed thanks to how slow he seemed to move, bringing the fiery log into his face and with enough force to cause it to shatter into bits of embers. As the vampire screeched to a stop and began to to retreat, I realized it was only a matter of time before they would pin me in place, even if I could see their every move before they made it. They were going to overwhelm me at this rate. I needed to go on the offensive, and to possibly push through them while they were still surprised that a mere earth pony was somehow holding her own against a horde of vampires who overpowered her easily. So, I moved. I shot up to my hooves, looking over my shoulder and back to the fire with a blaze in my own eyes that challenged its flames. 'I won't die here. Vinyl wouldn't be able to handle it.' I said to myself, looking at my already burned hoof before placing into the ground with a cringe of pain. I leaned forward, coiling my back two hooves before putting all I had into a buck that went straight into the bonfire. Once I hit the pile, flaming chunks of wood were sent skywards - my buck apparently coming out a lot stronger than I thought possible. A result of the lingering traces of vampiric fluid? Or just adrenaline? Probably both. I took quick advantage of the skyward bound, flaming, debris; and turned to run in the same direction of the flaming chunks of wood. It was a simple strategy: use a distraction and get away. Though, in this case the distraction was ignited logs. Oh well. I charged into the darkness. My target, a set of eyes that were aimed upwards at the distraction. Though the eyes quickly figured out my plan, and looked down to me as I ran towards them, going wide as I approached. The vampire that these eyes belonged to must have locked up at the sight of being charged, something they probably weren't used to, because I approached they gave me a "deer-in-headlights" as I came at them. There was no way around this one without potentially running into another vampire, so I figured a quick tackle and punch to the face would have to be enough before I would get off them and run for the forest. The forest: a dark area where vampires would most definitely have the advantage over me. Especially if they had been camping inside the forest for any significant amount of time and knew there way around it. Again, oh well. I clenched my eyes as I felt my body hit the vampire's - using my hooves to both push and latch onto them - and sending them sprawling onto the ground where I quickly straddled them. One of my front hooves went from their body over to the area beside their head to give me leverage while the other moved backwards as far as I could make it. If I was going to dispose of a vampire with a single blow, I needed to make sure my punch hit as hard as it could and make sure it hit a spot that was fatal to even them. My target was the nose. It was the closest, weakest, and most fatal spot on someone other than the neck. I had learned that from band class, after one of the students had the nose of a double bass fall on him and send him to the hospital. He had said that the doctor's said he was lucky, because if it had hit any harder on his, he would have died. I figured I could probably punch a bit harder than a falling double bass, even if I had been raised in the upper crust life style. I finally opened my eyes to make sure I couldn't miss. Though the time it took for me to set up that one look was all the time needed for the vampire to stop me. Time seemed to move forwards at its regular pace, the debris from the bonfire falling to the ground and hitting around me and the downed vampire, providing just enough light to make out the minor details of their face. Through the glinting light of the fire, I made out something in their eyes that I had seen perfectly when the debris was in the air; the thing that had brought me to a full stop. Tears. Tears were building in the corners of this vampire's eyes, something I hadn't seen from a vampire before. Not tears of pain, like the ones from the stallion I had made bite his tongue, but tears of genuine fear. 'Why...why is she crying?' I thought to myself, my hoof still cocked and coiled, ready to fire at the mare in a moments notice if this happened to just be a last ditch effort to trap me. Though if this was an act, she wasn't dropping it. My eyes went wide as the feeling of a slight weight hitting the back of my head, causing my head to dip forwards a little. At first, I was concerned this was the hoof of another vampire about to knock me out. Though the wiggling of whatever it was on the back of my head suggested that it wasn't attached to anything like a hoof was to a body. No, this was something else. A sudden feeling of nibbling came to my ear, nothing painful, just a gentle nibbling on the very edge of my ear along with the sound of light grumbling. It almost tickled. I looked up to find the head and tips of wings, suggesting it was a small pegasus, no older than maybe four at most, giving its best effort to chew on my ear. I moved my coiled up hoof over back over my head and to the small body, picking up the small filly and holding them up in front of me. I gave it a confused look, and it responded by giving me a squee, the efforts of its gnawing now gone and replaced with a happy grin as it must have found something enjoyable in my face. As I looked back down to the mare in front of me and saw that her tears were only coming out even heavier than before as she looked up. Though she didn't look at me, but at the child nibbling on my ear. And not only that, but there was a new addition to her face along with the tears in her eyes. A wavering smile. She leaned her head back, her tears and wavering smile following, and simply laid there. As if she was accepting her fate. Tears began to swell in my eyes as I realized something. I had just nearly punched a mother, with full intent to incapacitate at the least and kill her at the most, in front of her child that was trying to protect her; only to have its childish innocence betray it and smile at me as I hovered my hoof over its mother, a thought away from tossing the child and letting that hoof drop. I shakily set the child down on the mother's chest, unstraddled her with a stumble backwards, and could only stare at her with a lack of words as she took her child into her embrace. An embrace that only solidified my realization. Despite being surrounded by a hoard of people who gained sustenance by kidnapping and draining the blood of strangers, I was the only monster in this situation. She still had tears and a smile on her face as she hugged the happy filly. I felt horrid, worse than I did at the beginning of this whole fight when I felt as though I was going to die. It was as if I had already died somehow, and to the tears of a mother and smile of a her child. And on top of that, I was confused. I didn't want to die to a group of rogue vampires off in the forest and let Vinyl's fate be out of my influence, much less to never see Vinyl again. Though, at the same time, what had just happened had sapped all of my will to fight back out of me. I felt as if raising my hoof against them again would only hurt me. My throat began to swell, my heavy breathing turning into choked attempts to keep breathing; and as a result turning into this half sobbing, half choking sound. I must've looked like a monster now. I could feel how disheveled my mane was and how matted my fur was with dirt, soot and sweat. And a look down showed me that my bowtie was in no better shape than I was. I hadn't even considered the miracle that a vampire hadn't taken the time to kill me whilst I was on top of the mother, much less right now as I sat here helplessly lost in thought. And I also hadn't even considered that they might have all been just as shocked as I was. Though I was sure that there reason for being shocked were far different than my own. "Why's she crying?" "No clue. She was kicking our asses awhile ago, why'd she stop?" "Dunno. Did Breezy do something to her?" "I didn't see them too well, did she?" I heard the conversations spark up from behind and all around me. The we're circling me, or more likely I had just moved back towards the bonfire where they were already circled around me. I didn't care though. I thought I was willing to do anything to get Vinyl back to me safe and sound, but not this. I had never considered that they had families and such, and I felt horrible for that. I sat and sobbed for a few moments longer until hoofsteps drew closer to me, coming from behind. 'Vinyl...I'm sorry...' Was all I could think as I waited for the final blow. When it came, I was surprised; not by the fact that it came, but because of the surprisingly cozy and soft texture that came with it. And the fact that it wasn't final, or even a blow at all. More like a constant prodding in an attempt to gain my attention. I looked to my side to see a small pegasus filly, using its head to push into my side to get my attention. Only to look up and smile at me when it realized I had given it that attention. I was wordless, staring at it with tear ridden eyes as I could only stare at it. A hoof landed on my other shoulder, causing me to flinch and snap my head in the same direction, only to find myself looking up at a figure. Their hoof was close enough to be illuminated by the dwindling bonfire, though they were also far enough away that the upper half of their face was hidden in darkness, only enough to show their mouth. Their other hoof raised up into view, holding something that, after taking a look, I realized was a blanket. I looked back to the figure's face and I saw a fanged grin. Though this time, there was a different meaning in that grin. *~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*...Sweeps...*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~*~~~~* "Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap." "Would you quit saying that dear? It's getting annoying." "Annoying?! Octavia just got jacked by some vampires! Oh man, we're so dead..." I shouted, throwing my hooves up in the air. "Don't you mean her? She's in the more danger here is she not?" Vinyl's mom asked back, raising a brow. I'd expect her of all ponies to know why we were dead and not Octavia. "Of course not! She doesn't have to tell Vinyl that Octavia might have gotten killed by vampires!" I shouted back to her, dropping my shovel on the head on one of the vampires who kept trying to untie the ropes holding him together. We had managed to tie up all the vampires with rope. Though the rope had no chance in holding them back if they so wanted, it was still comforting to me. "You're...you're right." She said, finally seeing how horrible that was going to be, and getting up from the rock she had been sitting on for quite some time now. "I suppose we should start interrogating them for where Octavia has gone." She suggested, turning and looking at the vampires. I nodded, joining her in looking at the group of tied up ponies. They all seemed to stiffen at our gazes, realizing that we needed a location they didn't want to give up and that one of us was going to have to cave in. And with the potential situation of having to tell Vinyl about Octavia looming over my head, it sure as hell wasn't going to be me that gave up. Both me and Vinyl's mom turned away from the group and got our heads close together before speaking in a whisper. "So how should we do it?" I asked. "I say we kill one of them right of the bat to show them we mean business." She suggested, getting a bit excited when she said it. "Kill them? I can't do that!" I protested. "Not a problem, I can more than do it." She said with a shrug. "No way, we can't kill them. Killing one of them is only going to send the message that we're the bad guys, we need to find some other way to convince them to tell us." I said. Both of us turned back to the group of vampires, who had their ears perked up and their eyes wide as they looked at us with small traces of fear. It was understandable considering that, depending on which one of us got our way, some of them might be getting killed. They looked pretty innocent right now, despite being blood sucking monsters who had kidnapped our friend which was going to indirectly get us ourselves killed. They were rugged in a sort of "band of ragtag children" kind of way that, now that they were tied down, looked more cute than intimidating. We turned away from them once more. "You're right, we're going to need to kill at least three of them to get the point across." She said, scratching her hoof to her chin as if deciding to kill more of them was a hard calculation to make. "That's not what I meant!" I silently shouted at her. "Well what's your plan then?" She asked, both curious and annoyed. "I dunno, just asking them?" I suggested. "After killing the three, correct?" She asked again. What's with her and killing? "No! Just asking them." I corrected We both went silent as she gave me a deadpanned look for about five seconds before she sighed and crossed her hooves, looking the other way with her nose held high. "Fine, but if we don't have an answer in two minutes at most, I start killing." We broke our "huddle" and turned back to the group and began walking, myself in the lead while Vinyl's mom returned to her rock with a bit of sassiness. As I approached, all of them looked up at me with wide eyes that were really starting to grow on me. I felt like a parent right now, and all of them being the smaller-than-me children. "Alright guys, so I need to know where that one guy took-" "A half mile into the forest from where we jumped out!" One shouted. "Turn slightly left at the big oak, there should be a path from there that leads to the camp!" Shouted another. "Wait, there's a camp-" I began, only to be interrupted by another one shouting the directions at me. "He would have had to have taken her there!" Another said, getting the nods from all the others. "We'll even show you the way if you untie us!" More nods followed this one as they all looked back at me with eager and desperate eyes. I was too stunned to answer them, not expecting them to cave this quickly under any circumstance, and they seemed to take my silence as hesitation to accept their offer. But, since that was all they had to offer, the only thing left was simple begging. "Please don't kill us." One of them asked with a sheepish and nervous smile that was currently on all their faces.