Penn and Stone: Dynamic Duo

by Pennington Inkwell

A Tribute to the Blood God

Author's Note:

A minor note: This is where the Gore tag really comes into play. I was originally going to write this to be much more explicitly gory, but I realized I would have to raise the story to a Mature rating. Still, consider this a warning, this chapter does contain some disturbing imagery that skirts the mature. Proceed with caution.

"Each of you have persevered through the harshest obstacles we could LEGALLY throw at you, some with more grace and dignity than others!"

Pennington puffed out his chest somewhat, wanting to believe Quick Strike was talking about him. However, a quick glare from his superior officer quickly squashed that notion.

"And SOME of you skated by on the barest of minimums! This class of graduates has suffered the highest dropout rate of any on record! Meaning that you were once the elite of a generation of PANSIES!" There was a brief pause as Quick Strike glared down all of the ponies present. No one wavered under the pressure, though Pennington wondered if the ceremonial armor was helping all of them keep their nerve. Personally, he would rather be out of the clunky metal plates, it made it easier to dodge her "pop quizzes." Quick Strike had personally beaten the tar (and, supposedly, the "weakness") out of every mare and stallion present.

"However, that is no longer the case! You now belong to a greater good, and answer to a higher cause!" Quick Strike declared. Pennington stood a little straighter as she turned to face them all, a fierce fire behind her eyes. He could sense the transition to a more formal, rehearsed speech. This was the New Lunar Republic's final swearing in. "You are part of the best and greatest, and there is NO ROOM for failure! You will leave behind all weakness, and you are no longer a mortal! You are now all, each and every one of you, indestructible soldiers of the night!"

Another pony stepped forward and Quick Strike fell back. It was Miss Yearling. Pennington resisted the urge to flash a smile at his mentor, keeping the terse expression that was expected of him. Yearling's only acknowledgement was that her eyes lingered on him for an extra second, but in that second, Pennington could feel her pride in him as her student... and the disappointment both of them felt in the empty space beside him: the place Full Sails would have stood. But Sails had disappeared after Mozun Akai, and was listed as "missing in action" in the New Lunar Republic's files. Every pony who knew the truth of what had happened was assembled in this room.

"Do you swear to protect Equestria from all threats, foreign and domestic? To serve faithfully the Princesses of Equestria, and to seek out all those who would conspire against them, no matter how deep or dark their hiding place?" Yearling asked, narrowing her eyes. Her scrutinizing glaze raced over the assembled graduates.

"MA'AM, YES, MA'AM!" the graduates barked together, Pennington's voice among them. It felt strange to address Miss Yearling as his superior officer after all of this time of working together. In all of the time they were out on digs and expeditions, it was either "Miss Yearling" or "Professor Yearling." "Ma'am" was only for when they needed to be brief. If there was an absolute emergency, her students had permission to simply call her "A.K.," but even then, such a casual address was punishable by a week of pack mule duty.

"Do you swear to serve Equestria? To uphold its laws and to, at all times, serve as a paragon of its virtues? To keep always in your heart the elements of kindness, honesty, loyalty, generosity and laughter, even in the smallest portion, and to never be without them?"

"MA'AM, YES, MA'AM!"

Her portion finished, Yearling stepped back, making room for the next pony: a tall bat-pony with gleaming yellow eyes. Pennington hadn't spoken with him, but he knew the reason: he was their representative of the Canterlot Night Guard. Once graduation was finished, all the ponies planning on joining the night guard would leave with him for magical augmentation before receiving their assignments in Canterlot. He was tall and narrow, as if he had spent too long sleeping from the ceiling and been stretched out by gravity. While thin, he was by no means weak, and he had something most guards would never achieve: a powerful aura of intimidation. He scrutinized the new recruits, and as his eyes passed over Pennington, he couldn't help shifting slightly. It was like the stallion's gaze stared straight through him.

"Do you swear to serve the New Lunar Republic and protect it? To, with every faculty of your being, uphold and serve the values for which this organization stands: to fight for the right, even in the darkest places where no eye may reach? Will you swear to fight back the nightmares of Equestria with no mercy, giving them no quarter or safe haven, all so that Equestria's inhabitants may sleep soundly and safely under Luna's watchful moon? Do you swear to protect the princesses at all costs, to your release from your charge or your dying breath?"

All of the graduates snapped to a salute, but for a nanosecond Pennington hesitated. The words "no mercy" felt like they struck an off-chord in him. However, he knew that there were true nightmares out there. It was an unfortunate fact that the world was home to some vile creatures and nasty magic, things that would prey upon ponies and truly deserved the title of "nightmares." They used the cover of night to hide their atrocities. They were the reason WHY ponies were unjustly afraid of the dark.

His mind traveled back home, to his friends. He thought of Lily, likely hard at work trying to get her business in Canterlot started. He thought of Whipstitch and that... thing living in her walls. He thought of Ponyville, his home, and the ponies who lived there, blissfully unaware of how often they came close to total disaster. Those were the things worth protecting. If doing so meant that he needed to put away mercy for a moment to fight monsters, then... it was worth it.

"SIR, YES, SIR!" the graduates replied, now in perfect unison.

Pennington noticed the bat-pony's eyes linger on him for a second, and he wondered if his hesitation had been that obvious. If it had, the superior officer said nothing, simply falling back into line beside Yearling and Quick Strike. The final pony was one that seemed wildly out of place, even if the graduation required a royal witness.

"I understand that many of you likely did not come here in order to work under MY jurisdiction," Princess Celestia stated. "However, in my sister's extended absence, I sanctioned the creation of this organization to work in her name so that, should she someday return, she may return to an Equestria better than she left it: with ponies who love and watch over her nights just as fervently as she once- as she does." She looked over each and every one of them with a smile as bright and warm as a sunbeam, and none of them pointed out her small slip of the tongue. "Just like my sister, none of you fear the dark, and you choose to use that understanding to help others. Each and every one of you can look into the darkness and see the evil that tries to hide there, and you choose to fight it!" Celestia looked practically ready to burst with pride, though the more keen-eyed among them would have caught a tear brimming in one of her eyes.

"Each and every one of you are the reasons that I am not afraid of the dark. Take pride, my little ponies. Today, you stem the tide of nightmares, and ensure that every pony can sleep safely and soundly in Equestria!"

"MA'AM, YES, MA'AM!"

"It is my great honor and privilege, by the power vested in me and the authority of your superior officers, to declare you fully-fledged members of the New Lunar Republic!" Celestia stamped her hoof, finalizing the statement. "You are all dismissed, to report to your respective assignments at the next moonrise!"

The effect was immediate, with all of the new recruits finally relaxing, some even noisily celebrating and cheering. Within seconds, a line had formed of ponies wanting to shake Celestia's hoof, while another, smaller line led to the bat-pony captain, likely with questions about their future assignments. Pennington made his way across the auditorium to Miss Yearling. His mentor regarded him with a smile and a raised eyebrow, extending him a hoof.

"Good job, Penny, you made it. You're going to make a great field agent, I'd stake my reputation on it!"

Pennington smiled, giving her hoof a firm shake. "I couldn't have done it without you, Miss Yearling!"

"You've got that right!" Yearling chuckled. "But YOU still did it, don't forget that."

Pennington paused, a question on his lips.

"Miss Yearling, can I ask you something?"

The pegasus raised an eyebrow. "Not having permission never stopped you before, did it?"

"W-well no, but-" Pennington sputtered for a moment. "The oath, it mentioned 'no mercy' for the nightmares of Equestria... I wanted to know if- if you've ever had to-"

Yearling reached out, putting her hoof on his shoulder.

"Remember what I always said the best thing about being a Field Agent is? We make our own rules. If you don't want to kill, that's your prerogative. But, I'll say this much, after what happened at Mo-" She cut herself off as Pennington flinched away. Even just the name of the place brought back too many awful memories. "After what happened to Sails, I have no doubts about one thing:"

"You'll always have the strength to do what needs to be done."

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One second Pennington was there, and the next, he was gone. The relics he had been holding all clattered to the ground, his magic vanished along with him. Moonstone hadn't even been able to process the blow until she saw his crumpled and mangled body against the far wall. When she turned around and saw Scorch back on his feet, her brain finally seemed to put the pieces together.

"PENN!" She sprinted as fast as she could across the room, the pain in her side forgotten in her panic. "NononononononononoNO!"

Even a cursory glance could tell her that Pennington was as good as dead. Scorch's tail had hit him like a brick wall moving at breakneck speed. Three of his legs were twisted and bent beyond recognition, while the fourth stuck out at an awkward angle. His lower body was twisted far beyond what she knew a pony's spine was capable of, and just looking at the unnatural bend in his neck told her that was broken, too.

"No... NO!" She rushed to another angle, trying to get a look at his face. Pennington's expression was blank, not a shred of emotion present, and the light in his eyes was quickly dimming. "Penn! PENNINGTON! Don't you die on me, don't you DARE!"

And just like that, Pennington was gone. Moonstone could tell, though she didn't know how. She didn't question it, she simply sunk to her knees. She knelt beside the bundle of broken bones and internal bleeding she had once called her friend, the Tidal Wand slipping from her grasp as she began to go numb with shock.

This wasn't right.

They had gone through so much, overcome so many obstacles and trials, tested their friendship to its absolute limits. They had planned and improvised, tried to negotiate and rightfully won the fight by every measure she could think of.

The good guys were supposed to win. Scorch was supposed to run off and lick his wounds, maybe to return later on a vendetta, but never the same threat he once was. That was how the stories went, all those stories Penn had written. All the stories she'd read. The heroes were supposed to win, right?

"Why... why?" Moonstone whispered. She tore her eyes away from Pennington's lifeless body, turning and looking Scorch in the eye. "WHY WOULD YOU DO THIS?"

"Because ..." Scorch's voice rumbled like the cracking of distant thunder. "The Scribe must be made to pay for his-"

"HE ISN'T THE SCRIBE!" Moonstone screamed, her voice cracking and failing under the strain. "HE NEVER WAS, YOU MANIAC!"

Scorch dismissed her words with a small hum, and the lightning across his body began to grow more intense.

"You are as naive as I once was, little one. Consider this a mercy..."

Moonstone's heart clenched as she realized that Scorch was about to follow through on his promise. There was no time to fly away, no safe radius from Scorch's power. She could only throw her arms up in front of her face as the bolts of lightning tore through the air, cracking and blackening the stone beneath it with an ear-shattering thunderclap.

Everything went white. The white of sun-bleached bones.

The lightning never touched her, not a single spine on her head.

Moonstone realized that the whiteness was not the pale oblivion of death, but a pale hoof being held protectively in front of her, directing the lightning into itself. As she turned to look at her rescuer, her blood curdled in her veins. It was grotesque. It was a pony, but... not. It was tall, possibly as tall as Celestia, but gaunt and spindly. It was like someone had taken a skeleton and stretched it like taffy. It was starved and sickly, as if it hadn't been fed in years. Its entire body was covered in scale-like plates of pale bone, covered in lines and seams that made the thing look as though it had been assembled from pieces, rather than grown as an organic creature. Even the thing's face was made of bone, an eternal expression of rage on its twisted features and its head sporting a pale white horn with a bloodstained tip. What truly unsettled her, however, was the fangs. Long fangs filled its jaw, all stained with blood, but they didn't stop there. The fangs continued down the monster's neck and through its body, stopping just below the midpoint of its stomach. Slowly, painfully, the thing parted its lips, releasing a raspy breath. As it did, the teeth parted slightly all of the way down its body, peeling it nearly in half lengthwise and allowing Moonstone a peek at a pulsating, blood-red mass inside.

Consciously she would never have spoken the name out loud, she would have refused to believe what she was seeing. Still, the sheer aura of the thing was enough to force it out of her, a breathless whisper of horror.

"Cha'Qued?"

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In Canterlot, Celestia had her hooves full trying to keep a mass exodus organized. The killer weather had finally stopped, and many ponies were already cheering and planning their celebrations as they walked out the front doors of the castle. It had taken both the Day and Night Guards to prevent a full stampede of stir-crazy ponies rushing for the exits. She, Luna, and even Cadence had each taken up positions to direct ponies the right way, and a quick chat with Spitfire had ensured that the Wonderbolts were already flying across Equestria to determine which railway lines were still usable to start bringing ponies home.

Even Eclipse was helping, in his own way. When Celestia had asked him to join her, the mere thought of exposing himself to so many ponies had frozen him in place... So Celestia had set him in the corner, one arm pointing to the way out. It was kind of funny that his instinctive fear response was to freeze up, considering his worst fear had been being turned to stone like Discord. Celestia could only smile at the thought. She could add it to the lengthy list of draconequus contradictions.

The first sign that something was wrong was when Eclipse moved. In full view of a significant portion of Equestria's population, Eclipse clapped both hands over his mouth and sprinted for the nearest open window. Celestia couldn't see exactly what was happening as he hung half of his noodle-shaped body out the window, but she could tell from his heavy shaking and small cloud of parasprites that he had likely just begun violently vomiting into the garden.

Perhaps bringing him out WAS a mistake... she thought to herself. She turned to the guard standing beside her. "Would you please go check on-"

She was cut off by a commotion on the far end of the Great Hall. She couldn't see what was happening as crystal guardsponies all huddled around Cadence, but she could hear her niece crying out in pain. Celestia's eyes widened as she realized that there was more happening than a simple case of chaotic anxiety. Just as she spread her wings to fly over to her, she fell victim, as well.

It was like the ground had buckled and kicked underneath her, destroying any sense of balance she had. Celestia's knees buckled and her head spun, and it took every ounce of concentration in her body not to collapse right in front of her beloved subjects. A splitting headache ripped through her skull and she felt her skin crawl beneath her fur, bringing on a wave of nausea that made her regret every meal she'd ever had. She took a deep, shuddering breath, trying to keep control as she felt herself breaking out into a cold sweat.

"Princess! Princess, are you alright?" she heard one of her guards asking.

Through all of the pain, Celestia forced herself to smile and nod, widening her stance to combat her wooziness as the worst of the symptoms reached their peak and then began to fade.

"Just- just a little tired..." she lied. "I suppose keeping that barrier up for several days straight took more out of me than I thought. I should be fine, thank you. Go and check on Cadence, her symptoms seem much worse."

As she straightened her posture, however, she shared a glance with Luna. Her sister seemed to be doing a much better job keeping her composure, but eons of dreamwalking tended to make one rather resistant to vertigo. Luna's expression was dark, a glower of aggression. Celestia nodded, each wordlessly agreeing that the other had sensed it.

Something was very, very wrong. She could feel it in her bones.

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Moonstone was too frightened to move. She was caught between two nightmares, with Scorch on one hand and Cha'Qued on the left. She could only tear her eyes off of one to look at the other, only to be so afraid of not seeing what the other was doing that she would shift back.

"Another TRICK, Quill?" Scorch growled, one foreleg gripping the severed gauntlet from the outside. Moonstone watched as pinpricks of red light emerged from Cha'Qued's darkened eye sockets. His gaze looked down, lingering on the gauntlet and, more prominently on the pool of blood being squeezed out of the severed limb inside. When he opened his mouth to speak, Moonstone had to suppress the urge to vomit. The bottom of the jaw didn't move, but the entire top half of its head rose up slightly, bisecting it completely.

"A pound of flesh to protect the little one..."

Cha'Qued's voice made Moonstone's skin crawl, it was as if someone had tried to recreate a deep male voice, but the only material they had to work with was the sounds of grinding boulders and nails on a chalkboard. His gaze traveled upwards, to look Scorch in the eye... and he smiled. He smiled a wicked grin that pulled upwards and ripped him in half by the seam of his teeth.

"And the rest... a tribute: for the boon of a successful hunt."

Scorch reared back, readying another blast of emerald fire. The wind in the cave began to pick up in intensity, forcing Moonstone to pull her wings tight against her body.

"Time to feast."

As Scorch lunged forward, Cha'Qued vanished from the corner of Moonstone's eye. There was only a brief flash of flames before Scorch slammed his mouth shut. His stump of a foreleg instinctively reached up towards his throat and his expression shifted to one of confusion, then a satisfied smile.

"Is THIS your great plan, Quill? You think you can-" Scorch's expression shifted again, this time to one of genuine fear. "Wh- What are you DOING? Stop!" Scorch's face changed again, now grimacing in pain. "STOP!" Scorch reared back on his hind legs, releasing his grip on the gauntlet to scratch frantically at his underbelly.

"GET... OUT... OF... ME! GRAAAAAH!"

The titanic dragon began to violently convulse on top of his pile of gold, seizing and screaming at volumes that threatened to destroy Moonstone's eardrums, even with her hands covering them. Moonstone finally tore her eyes away from her uncle just as she began to make out alien movement beneath his skin, an unfamiliar shape rising out of the scales. Eventually, Scorch's screaming petered out, and Moonstone pulled her claws away from her ears. She immediately wished she hadn't.

The sound would haunt her nightmares. It was the sound of something FEEDING. Not eating, no, eating was civilized. Eating was controlled. This was FEEDING. It was slurping and lapping and crunching and gluttonous CONSUMING. She instantly had covered her ears again, but it was too late. That sound was in her head, in her memory, and there was no getting it out.

With her back turned to whatever gory scene was playing out behind her, however, she found herself staring directly at a bloody smear on the wall. It took time for a realization to make itself known through the fear dominating her mind, but it came all the same.

That's where Penn's body was.

It isn't there.

Moonstone ran. She sprinted for the exit as fast as her legs would carry her, running face-first into the dark tunnel that she knew led back to the entrance. The entire time, her brain was dominated by visions of what could happen to her in the dark, visions of teeth, a poor imitation of a pony's body torn in half to swallow her whole.

Penn had sworn over and over, to everyone who had ever asked, that he would never put on the mask. That meant one of two things had happened: either Pennington had gone back on every moral he had and willfully allowed Cha'Qued to possess him, or Cha'Qued had taken his dying body by force. Either way, this was the nightmare scenario. This was the thing they had no way to protect against.

As Moonstone burst from the entrance and out into the open air, she could hardly believe her eyes.

"Moonstone! Over here!" Twilight shouted, waving her hoof.

"NO! NO, TWILIGHT!" Moonstone made a beeline for the unicorn, pointing in the direction she and Spike seemed to be coming from. "GO! YOU HAVE TO RUN AWAY!"

Twilight balked at her words, the shock causing her to stop, but not turn. Her eyes widened as Moonstone closed the distance between them.

"Moonstone, is- is that BLOOD? Oh my Celestia, what HAPPENED?"

Moonstone jumped up onto Twilight's back, unceremoniously shoving Spike back so that she could ride just behind Twilight's head. "YouneedtorunawayRIGHTNOW!"

"But... where's Pennington?" Spike asked.

Just in front of them, there was a loud thud. Moonstone didn't need to peek from behind Twilight's head to know what it was, her shriek of horror was more than enough confirmation.

"R-right there..."

Not enough... Not NEARLY enough... Still HUNGRY...

Comments

[AltGrendel]

Wow!!!!!!!

By Celesta that is by far the best yet!!!!

[Pennington Inkwell]

9611886
Thanks! I'm really glad you're enjoying it! I'm trying to take my time with these next few chapters, I really want a climax to top "Inkwell's Demons" and the end of the second act, so I'm writing a bit more carefully and consulting with a good friend about it a lot.