Part 9: Libraries and Neckties
The time was later. Slender Man and Twilight were in Rarity’s dress-making shop. Rainbow Dash was not. She had gone off to put an ice pack on her head and sulk.
Twilight was feeling slightly guilty about Rainbow Dash’s head trauma, but only just. Rarity was under no such compunctions, and had been irate to say the least upon hearing the reason for their delay.
“Well, I can’t believe Rainbow Dash sometimes,” she exclaimed, angrily threading a needle through one of the dresses she was working on. “The nerve of some ponies. Time is of the utmost importance if I’m to get any proper work done tonight.”
“Well, it’s too late for regrets,” Twilight pointed out. “At least Slender is here now. What were you planning on show him?”
The Slender Man was indeed in Rarity’s shop, and seemed practically engrossed in observing as much as possible. Twilight thought she had become better at reading the Slender Man’s mood, and from what she could tell, he was extremely interested in the rows of fabric and pony mannequins decked out in elegant finery.
Actually, Twilight thought he fitted in quite well in the boutique. Slender Man looked like a mannequin himself, with his blank expression and business suit and tie. Maybe he was related to the pony mannequins on display.
Rarity tossed a curl of her mane back impatiently as she answered Twilight’s question. “Teach Slender Man, Twilight? Whatever gave you that idea? I am not a pony that simply spews out random bits of information. No, while I have this Slender character here, I intend to create.”
Twilight glanced at Rarity’s needle, and then at the Slender Man. “You’re going to dress him?” She asked incredulously.
“Of course dear.” Rarity gestured at the Slender Man, “just look at what he’s wearing. I know business suits and ties are considered acceptable among those dreary corporate businesses, but there is such a thing as basic style. A black suit with a red tie?” Rarity shuddered in horror. “How clichéd can you get? No, I’m going to spend my time transforming this Slender Man from a fashion failure into something he can be proud of.”
“Well…good.” That seemed about it, as far as Twilight was concerned. “Sounds like fun. I think.”
“Leave it to me, Twilight. Give me an hour or two and you won’t recognize him anymore. Once we get rid of that tacky suit, we’ll give him something that doesn’t make ponies’ eyes bleed when they look at him.”
“I’m pretty sure that was for other reasons, but good luck.” Twilight backed away towards the door of the shop. “Have fun, and uh, don’t get too carried away, alright?”
There was a jingle as Twilight exited the building, but Rarity had already forgotten about her friend. In one hoof, Rarity held a measuring tape, and the other a pencil. Behind Rarity was a blank canvas, ready for inspiration to be drawn upon it. To Rarity’s left and right, bolts of fabric lay ready to be cut and sew into masterpieces of design and style.
Rarity stood facing the Slender Man, and held up her pencil like a sword. Her eyes gleamed with excitement and anticipation. She looked at Slender Man and uttered the time-honored war cry of the designer in every reality:
“Let’s get fashionable.”
----
Twilight sat in her library, thinking. She was thinking of the Slender Man. More specifically, she was thinking about how much she did not know about the Slender Man. Her lack of knowledge was a serious problem, not least because she couldn’t think about Slender Man until she knew more about Slender Man. Thus, she thought about Slender Man.
Knowledge is power. Power corrupts. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. That is why absolute knowledge is so dangerous. But what Twilight would have loved was knowing, well, anything about this strange being that had invaded her world. So far she had a name, a rather vague description of his nature as some kind of reality-destroying monster, and a first-hand view of his powers, which were formidable to say the least. Not much to go on, in other words.
Pinkie Pie was no help at all in this matter. Twilight had talked to her friend, but Pinkie’s ability to communicate complex ideas was about as great as her ability to sit still. She could tell Twilight lots of things about the Slender Man, mostly having to do with urban mythology, but she couldn’t explain why she knew. It was like the Pinkie Sense – some things Pinkie Pie could just do.
But Twilight was a practical pony. She believed in logic, books, magic, friendship, and cold hard facts. This Slender Man may have been somehow pacified by the Elements of Harmony and Fluttershy’s stare, but who was to say he would remain so? And even if he was harmless (if still scary), would he leave after learning about ponies, or would he stay? And if tried to stay, how could Twilight force him out of Ponyville without a huge battle? What if he had…friends? What if they came looking for him?
Twilight didn’t know the answer to any of these questions, but she did know one thing: the Slender Man was not going to be an easy adversary to defeat, if it came to blows. Chrysalis had been one thing, but aside from her shape shifting abilities, her only main power came from her army. It had only been the strength of the love between Shining Armor and Cadence that had allowed her to defeat Celestia. If Chrysalis had tried to take Canterlot without that love to feed on, Princess Celestia would have hoof-stomped her into the dust.
Tirek was another example of power from planning. His power had come from absorbing the magic of countless ponies in secret until he was unbeatable; in his normal form, he was about as dangerous as Prince Blueblood.
Discord was different, but once again, limited in his danger to ponykind. He was powerful, more powerful than Celestia and Luna combined – at least without the Elements – but he wasn’t exactly malicious so much as annoying. While he had the ability to change rain into chocolate milk, that was about the extent of his ‘rain of terror’. But Slender? He was different.
Twilight was an alicorn. A new one to be sure, but she was nonetheless a member of the same race as Celestia, Luna, and Cadence. And young though she might be, Twilight knew that as the Element of Magic, she possessed magical power that even Celestia would acknowledge. Unfortunately, that also meant that if Twilight couldn’t do much against Slender, Princess Celestia was unlikely to do much better either.
It hurt Twilight to admit this fact, but she had to face reality. She had used every spell she knew – hitting the Slender Man with enough force to injure even a dragon.. But he hadn’t even seemed hurt, just annoyed. Even had Twilight twice, or even three times the magical power she had now, she doubted whether she would have been able to take him on. In short, not good at all if Slender turned hostile.
Thus, Twilight’s search for information. If the Slender Man was too strong to take on from the front, Twilight needed to find his weak spot, or at least learn more about him. However, the Slender Man wasn’t from this dimension, and Twilight knew that in her entire library, there would be not one book on anything pertaining to him.
All things being equal, Twilight would have either written to Princess Celestia to ask for help, or paid a visit to the Canterlot Royal Library to do some serious research. She refrained from doing either for several reasons. Firstly, a letter to her mentor about a strange man-creature that had nearly killed her and her friends would probably bring Celestia and all the Canterlot Guards here in the hour and Twilight didn’t relish their chances of victory. It might annoy the Slender Man at best.
Secondly, and this was more important, Twilight seriously doubted that Princess Celestia knew anything more that Twilight herself did. That went ditto for any books in the library. If the mirror to the alternate-Equestria was open, Twilight might have taken her chances in the human world to find more about the Slender Man, but it was closed for many more moons. In short, there was no knowledge to be found in all of Equestria that could help Twilight now.
That just left…outside of Equestria.
Twilight shivered. She was alone in her library, Spike having gone to watch over Applejack as she rested in the Apple’s house. She really wished she had some company, because the library felt cold and empty, vast without Spike’s comforting presence. She was normally at home in libraries, but the thought of her last remaining source of information made the library seem much, much more ominous.
Some ponies who disliked Twilight might make derogatory comments about how she was a freakishly obsessed bookworm who would read anything written down. Close friends of Twilight would confirm this without a shred of hesitation. But there were some sources of information that even Twilight would hesitate to explore. Sometimes, the reward of knowledge wasn’t worth the price of seeking. Some books were not meant to be read by normal eyes.
But surely, Twilight had no choice in this matter. This was a situation of life and death, and it had very nearly been death for Twilight and her friends already. Still, Twilight wasn’t sure. Death only came once, after all. What she was thinking of could be far worse than death. A whole lot worse.
Twilight glanced up, and into the darkest corner of her library. Beyond a curve of a bookcase lay darkness. And in that darkness…Twilight could find her answers. All she had to do was ask. But at what cost? Twilight knew the answers she sought could be found, no matter how strange or outlandish they might be. But they just might come at the cost of her life, sanity, and soul.
Sometimes, the risk had to be taken. Twilight got up slowly from her chair, and began to get ready. In truth, she didn’t need much. Just a ball of twine, something from her kitchen, a lantern, and she was set. Hesitantly, Twilight walked to the darkest part of her library, beyond the dusty shelves and forgotten piles of books, and further still, until she was swallowed by the darkness. In a few seconds, she was gone, and when Spike returned to look for Twilight, he found not a trace of her in the entire library.
But Twilight was still in her library, at least in one sense. She was just somewhere else at the same time. Somewhere where the answers she sought were waiting, if only she could reach them without dying horribly first. All things considered, she would rather have been fighting the Slender Man again.
----
“Look, it’s very simple,” Rarity said patiently to the Slender Man. “Your clothes are a disgrace. They’re simply drab, plain, and horribly out of fashion.” She was standing with her tape measure raised like a weapon, attempting to bully her way past the many tendrils that surrounded the Slender Man’s body. “I cannot allow you to walk around with such clothes on. In the name of fashion, I demand you let me undress you.”
Rarity attempted to dart forwards, but was caught by three tendrils and picked up gently, to be set down sans tape measure, which Slender then tossed out the window. With that, Slender’s tendrils returned to their ‘guard’ position around his body, positively cocooning him in a protective wall that Rarity had been unable to breach.
This state of affairs had been going on for quite some time now. Rarity had been at first very impressed with the Slender Man, who had let her measure him and made rough sketches of his build without moving a muscle. However, when she had tried to remove his clothes to get some more measurements, he had reacted quite violently, refusing all of Rarity’s efforts to get near him.
Rarity was used to fussy ponies, who squirmed and didn’t like to be measure of fitted, but in all her years as a dressmaker, she had never seen this. Slender resisted even removing his pants, and was willing to break all of Rarity’s scissors when she tried to cut them off her. He seemed to be embarrassed to be clothes-less, which Rarity regarded as plain silly.
Dresses could add to a pony’s style, but there was nothing wrong with going bare. Clothing was a happy optional, but hardly compulsory. But Slender seemed to regard being naked as some sort of crime, and so far Rarity hadn’t been able to even touch him.
Rarity briefly gave up on forcing her way through the web of tendrils that surrounded the Slender Man and tried reason instead. “Look, Mr. Slender Man. I fully appreciate that you’re hesitant about entrusting your wardrobe to me, but I can assure you that there is nopony more qualified to design an appropriate ensemble for you than me. I am, after all, one of the foremost designers in Equestria.”
This didn’t seem to impress the Slender Man, who remained stubbornly silent and still, refusing to move his tendrils. “In fact,” Rarity continued, trying to edge towards Slender through the mass of limbs, “I even recently designed a set of costumes for Sapphire Shores herself, and they were a masterpiece, if I do say so myself.”
A pair of tendrils picked Rarity up by her back hooves, and dropped her unceremoniously to the ground. Rarity gave an undignified whoomph, as the breath was knocked out of her. When she could stand, she noticed that her man, usually beautifully styled and curled, was now covered in bits of dust. That was bad enough, and Rarity was about to let loose an anguished scream, when she noticed that her hoof had developed a hair fracture from the fall.
Rarity tried to hold back her tears, and only barely succeeded. Don’t think of the hoof. Don’t think of the mane. She could use plaster and makeup to disguise the crack, and there she could wash and comb her hair. She had a job to do. Fashion was a duty, not a choice. She must soldier on.
Giving Slender her sweetest smile, Rarity tried to speak as pleasantly as possible. “Mr. Slender Man, I know you are uncomfortable with changing your apparel, but I really cannot accept leaving your wardrobe in the state it is. However, if you feel like you cannot bear to change your suit, perhaps we can compromise?”
Rarity pointed to the Slender Man’s red tie, a crimson piece the color of blood. “Your tie is a most excellent addition to your suit, but I can’t help but feel that you might be missing the variety a wider selection of ties would offer. If you would be so good as to remove that tie, we could try fitting on a few more to see the effect. Surely that would not be so hard, would it?”
The Slender Man seemed consider Rarity’s suggestion, as the unicorn held her breath. Then, one of the Slender Man’s tendrils moved slowly up to his tie. Rarity held her breath.
The tendril stopped just touching the tie, and seemed to caress it for a second. Then, moved back down to Rarity’s head height and poked Rarity hard on the forehead. Seemingly satisfied, the Slender Man pulled the tendril back towards his body, where it resumed its protective position.
Rarity calmly looked at the tendril, and then back at the Slender Man’s face. Then she looked back at the tie, the Slender Man’s face, and the tendril again.
Rarity snapped.
“Alright, mister,” Rarity growled, advancing on the Slender Man. “I’ve had about enough from you. I told Twilight I was going to improve your appearance, and I’m going to do just that, if I have to kill both of us to do it. You will hand over that tie right now, or I will make you regret the day you first looked in a mirror.”
There was a pause, and then a tendril slowly reached up to the Slender Man’s throat, and unfastened the red tie. Rarity practically snatched it from the tendril as it lowered towards her, and hurled it into a corner of her shop.
“Good, we are learning. Now, I’m going to show you a few more ties, and you are going to look at them and find one that you like. And we are going to keep looking at ties until you find one you like, understand?”
There was no reply from the Slender Man, but one of his tendrils bobbed up and down like a pony’s head.
“Most excellent, thank you,” Rarity said. “So glad for your cooperation, Mr. Slender Man. Shall we begin?”
----
At about roughly the same time as Slender was beginning to try a selection of ties prepared by Rarity, Twilight was moving through another dimension. She didn’t think of it as such, not being too familiar with extra-dimensional physics, but she was nevertheless aware that she was no longer in Equestria.
In fact, Twilight did not know much about the journey she was taking, except that it was dark, dusty, and so dangerous that the word itself could not describe the magnitude of danger Twilight was in. She was in a maze of books. More accurately, she was in what appeared to be a labyrinth of dusty bookshelves and darkness, where the only light came from her lantern, and the library shelves disappeared up into the darkness, forming endless walls of text and literature.
Twilight had no idea what the place she was in was, but she knew its name. She was in L-space, and that fact alone meant that she was in very serious trouble. One of the ways in which Twilight was in trouble was that she was not, in any sense of the word, supposed to be here.
Twilight was a librarian. This fact was roughly understood in Ponyville to mean that she had a library full of books, but however loosely the word was defined, the truth was that Twilight was the only librarian in Ponyville, even if practically no pony checked out a book from her library besides herself. And her status as a librarian meant that certain secrets had been made known to Twilight that even Princess Celestia wasn’t are of.
One of those facts was that librarians have secrets. Many people do not believe that librarians have any secrets, and merely exist as stern taskmasters of their collection of books, and sometimes as enforcers of library law in administering fines, collecting overdue books, and occasionally inflicting bodily harm on those who made loud noises in the library.
But librarians are more than simple shelvers of books. They are not custodians, but guardians of knowledge, and one of the things they guarded were people from books. Not books from people, as many would think, but the opposite. Librarians guarded the rest of the world from books that were so dangerous, so full of forbidden knowledge, that they had to be locked away from prying eyes.
Not all librarians are like this, of course. As always, there are the good and the bad librarians, those who use knowledge as a means to an end, and those who respect it and treat it as a living thing, which it is. And a few librarians, the best of the best, those who have saved books and faced down the greatest grimoires, those librarians are part of a select group. You have never heard of this order, and never will. Librarians are experts at keeping secrets.
However, Twilight was a librarian, however humble, and she had learned of the existence of this sacred order: The Librarians of Time and Space. The keepers of mysteries and that which baffled even mysteries. They were as legends among normal librarians, who spoke of them in hushed tones.
Twilight wasn’t one of them, of course. She was too young, too inexperienced, and had not performed any great feats of librarianship. She had even allowed her library to be destroyed by Tirek, a grave and terrible failure in the eyes of librarians. True, she had been battling to save Equestria, but librarians knew what really counted.
At any rate, Twilight may not have been part of that noble order, but she knew enough to know of L-Space. It was one of the domains of The Librarians of Time and Space, and a way in which they were able to travel between libraries. It was also exceptionally dangerous, but also a way in which to travel between dimensions if the need arose. The theory behind L-Space is quite simple, and outlined elsewhere, but bears repeating here.
Books are collections of Knowledge. And Knowledge = Power. And Power = (Force x Distance^2) ÷ Time. And enough power distorts time and space. Thus, large quantities of books can distort reality. Understanding this basic principle allows us to understand how L-space works. Libraries, collections of so many books are in fact sinkholes distorting the universe around each other. And because of this effect, it is possible to travel from one library to another, provided they are of a reasonable size. This is known among librarians as L-space.
Naturally, the physics of the entire business are much more complex, but the bottom line was that Twilight was able to cross between libraries if she so desired. This wasn’t often, or ever, if it came to that. While it sounds fascinating to travel to any library, and any time you could wish, this is only because you do not know the perils of L-space.
Twilight had been recently taught about L-space by the librarian of the Crystal Empire, and with it had come strict and graphic warnings about the dangers of L-space. No repetition of the warnings need be printed here, but suffice it to say that they were enough to keep even the naturally curious Twilight from ever considering a journey into L-space until now. Twilight had spent several sleepless months after hearing the tales of those librarians who had taken a wrong turn in L-space, and what had been found later by other librarians.
Things lived in libraries. Often, they were just small insects, the homeless man, or if worst came to the worst, a group of desperate people attempting to find refuge from the outside zombie apocalypse. However, that was only in human libraries, and only those which didn’t have magic at that. Anything could and did live in magical libraries, and they too could enter L-space. They couldn’t exit it, thankfully, and became lost in the endless maze, but that just added to the danger of any librarian crossing through L-space.
Twilight flattened herself against a bookshelf as she heard a rustling somewhere ahead of her. She didn’t know what the gargantuan shape was that seemed to pass at the edge of her lantern’s light, but it ignored her, and passed around a corner of the maze. After a moment, Twilight continued on, but always, always alert and listening hard for any sound other than the gentle rustle of pages.
She knew where she was going, in a general sense. As a librarian, even a junior one, Twilight had the librarian’s sense, and could locate other libraries based on their feel in her mind. The one she was headed to wasn’t hard to find, but Twilight wasn’t as much worried as finding her way there as getting back. She had brought a ball of twine, and had been unrolling it as she walked, but she was running out of string. She wasn’t about to keep walking in L-space without a way back, and she sure as tartarus wasn’t going to make this journey more than once. Twilght just had to pray that she reached her destination in time.
Twilight was just reaching the end of her string, and starting to despair, when she suddenly stumbled into the light. Well, not much light, but certainly brighter than the blackness of L-space. Twilight looked around her and gasped.
She was in a library, which was pretty much standard, but what caught Twilight’s breath was the scale of the library. Twilight had been in the Canterlot library, and even the Crystal Empire libraries, both bastions of knowledge over the millennia. They would have been swallowed easily by this library, which seemed to stretch on…forever. This library was a neanderthal giant compared to the thin, underfed things that Twilight knew of as libraries. It was in a place like this that you could believe research and the beginnings of history had begun.
Twilight could only stare and marvel. Part of her mind was urging her on, telling her to go and do what she had come here for, but it was only a small part. The rest of Twilight wanted nothing more than to sit and read here forever, to be lost in the tide of books, and to spend the rest of her days simply learning from a source that would never run dry.
This wonderful sensation filled Twilight up for approximately fifty-seven seconds, whereupon she was interrupted by a librarian. Not just any librarian in fact, but one of the librarians.
Twilight hastily dropped to one foreleg, and bowed. She wasn’t sure of the protocol between librarians, not having been considered ready for advanced instruction yet, but she certainly knew of this librarian. He was a legend even among The Librarians of Space and Time. Crazy, unpredictable, a rule-breaker and a proponent of an unorthodox shelving system. But he was the only…person who might help Twilight now.
Twilight remained on one leg, head bowed, until she felt gentle hands grasping her shoulders, and lifting her up. The librarian smiled at her, and Twilight was struck by just how kind a smile it was. She had been terrified of him when he had first been described – his rages and temper were another part of his fame among librarians, but he looked so much different from how Twilight had imagined him.
“Um, excuse me,” Twilight said. “I know I shouldn’t be here, but I had nowhere else to go, and I need answers badly.”
The librarian’s face didn’t change, and he continued to smile at her, inviting her to go on.
“I, uh, brought you a present.” Twilight said, proffering her gift to him. She hoped she had gotten it right. “I was told you liked them, so I brought one and…”
One hand grasped her gift, and brought it up to the eye-level as the librarian regarded it thoughtfully. It seemed to pass inspection, and he gently held it in one big hand as he continued to regard her.
Twilight felt slightly nervous under his stare, but tried to explain her purpose. “You see, I live in a place called Equestria, and it’s filled with ponies like me. And we had…a visitor recently.”
One eyebrow raised as the librarian regarded her.
“He wasn’t…normal and we didn’t know what he wanted. Me and my friends met him, and he tried to kill all of us, but we managed to stop him somehow with the help of magic.”
The librarian’s smile twisted a bit at that, and he rolled his shoulders, as if uncomfortable. Twilight hastened to explain.
“I know magic isn’t the best solution, but we had no choice. He was killing all of us, and magic…helped us communicate. At any rate, he stopped attacking us, and instead he’s really curious about ponies, and my friends and I are trying to teach him about our culture as we speak.”
Silence continued, but the librarian stroked his chin thoughtfully, listening to Twilight’s story.
“Anyways, I don’t know what to do,” Twilight said. “He seems harmless right now, but that could change in an instant. There’s nopony I know that could stop him; at least I don’t think so, anyways. And no one can tell me anything about him, because he’s not from our reality. So I came here.”
Twilight felt the librarian’s eyes on her, seeming to weigh her on invisible scales. For a long moment, she feared he would send her away, condemn her for failing to deal with the problem instead. But then he seemed to come to a decision, and nodded slowly. One leathery hand reached up and patted Twilight gently on the head.
“You mean you’ll help?” Twilight asked, scarcely daring to believe.
One hand made a gentle fist, and extended a thumb upwards, a human expression Twilight had come to understand.
“Oh, thank you so much! I can’t imagine what I would do if you hadn’t helped!”
The librarian gave her another big smile, and with one huge palm, mimed writing something down.
“Writing something down? Oh, I see, you want to know his name!” Twilight smacked her head with one hoof. “I’m so sorry, I forgot. He’s called the Slender Man, and—”
Twilight stopped. The smile on the librarian’s face seemed to freeze. His face still made a smile, but his lips curled away, making his smile far less friendly than before. A row of bared teeth gleamed at Twilight, making the pony shiver and tremble. Before she could stammer out an apology however, one rough hand gently patted her on the head, and the librarian disappeared back among the bookshelves.
Twilight hesitated, startled at the librarian’s sudden disappearance. Had she offended him somehow? All the stories said that he feared practically nothing, but when she had mentioned the Slender Man’s name—
The librarian reappeared, vaulting over the top of one enormous bookshelf and swinging himself to the ground in a fluid motion. He was carrying a large, black book in one hand, and was no longer smiling at all. Gravely, he handed Twilight the book, and she read the title.
The Eldritch: Tales of the Unknown by Edward Softly
Its cover was entirely black, and the lettering was faded silver that nevertheless seemed to glow in the dim light of the library. Twilight held it magically aloft, and studied it. It wasn’t small by any means, but seemed relatively short for a book explaining the mysteries of what the Slender Man was. Still, she was sure that this was it. Finally, she would be able to find out exactly what he was, without reference to some kind of crazy urban mythology Pinkie Pie made up.
Twilight turned to the librarian, and bowed. “Thank you again. I can’t tell you how much this means.” She hesitated as she turned to go. “I…don’t suppose you have any advice on how to deal with this? I mean, I’m sort of out of my league…”
The librarian looked at her, and smiled. He patted her on the head, and then he uttered one word.
“Ook.”
Twilight frowned. “Really? It’s that simple?”
“Ook.”
“Well, if you say so. I’ll do my best. Thank you for all your help.” And with that, she turned and vanished back into the depths of the library, carrying her book before her like a torch.
The Librarian of Unseen University watched the pony named Twilight vanish back into the maze of L-space. He held the banana she had given him in his hands and regarded it for a moment. Then he peeled back the banana and ate it. All things considered, he hoped she would be safe from the Slender Man. She had the makings of a good librarian, to survive her first journey through L-space. Hopefully they would meet again.
The Librarian finished the banana, and swung back into the main section of the Unseen University’s library. One fellow librarian assisted, a banana eaten, and a book checked out. It was time for a nap. He just hoped that this Twilight would learn from that book. It didn’t do well to cross the eldritch, the Librarian knew. Especially not the Slender Man. Anything that awoke his wrath would not live long. He could only hope that nothing had tried to provoke him while Twilight was gone.
----
Rarity hurled another tie at the Slender Man. “How about this one!?”
The Slender Man held up the tie and regarded it quizzically for a few seconds before tossing it to one side. It joined the now massive pile of fallen ties to his left and right, all rejections he had made over the last hour.
Any pony looking into Rarity’s shop would have been impressed with the variety of ties lying on the floor. Rarity wasn’t much of a tie-maker in truth, but she kept each prototype she made in her storerooms, and they were all here. Elegant ties of blended saffron and dusky yellows, odd-looking ties shaped like an exclamation mark; even ties with funny captions, like ‘Never say Neigh!’ Rarity was a bit ashamed of that last one.
There were ties for every occasion. Ties for the weather, ties symbolizing various holidays, ties that were uplifting, ties that were meant for sad occasions. There was even a sword-tie Rarity had made for a visiting Griffin ambassador, but that one had been too dangerous to sell. It kept trying to slice off the wearer’s neck, for one thing.
Rarity would quite have liked to slice off the Slender Man’s neck right now. Despite the deluge of wonderful ties, all made by her own two hooves, he had rejected each and every one. Rarity had to admit that he looked at all of them, but he tossed them aside each time, without even trying them on.
Rarity picked up another tie, this one a beautiful work in silk and silver, shining like a moonbeam. “How about this one, Mr. Slender Man? The silver effect would go wonderfully with your dark suit. Won’t you try it on?”
The Slender Man picked up the tie, studied it for a few seconds, and then tossed it over his shoulder. Rarity felt a blood vessel throbbing in her temple, and prayed it wouldn’t burst. “You don’t like it? No problem,” she said through gritted teeth, “I fully understand. Let me just get a few more ties.”
Rarity stomped over to the last box of ties she had dragged out, and upended it on the floor. A single tie fell out. Rarity looked at it. It was red, plain cotton, and very old. Rarity remembered this tie. It was the first one she had ever made. She could even see the stitching, where she had clumsily sewn cloth together before she had learned to disguise the weave. It was nostalgia, and fond memories rolled into one. It was also a fashion disaster.
Rarity was a huge fan of nostalgia, as it allowed her to reuse old styles in new dresses, and helped her sell many of her older creations. However, this tie had been made when Rarity had first gotten her cutie mark, and it showed. If Rarity had created a tie of this quality now, she would have hung herself with it. As it was, it certainly couldn’t be offered to the Slender Man.
Rarity tossed the tie back in the box, but it never landed. In a flash of movement too quick for her to follow, the Slender Man’s tendril had grabbed it, and brought it to eye level as he studied it.
“Ah, I see you’ve found my last tie,” Rarity said uncomfortably. “You needn’t bother, really. That tie was made years ago, and it’s very clumsily made. I was just a filly, you see, and totally neglected any sort of decorations—”
Rarity’s eyes bulged as the Slender Man suddenly fastened the red tie around his neck, giving it a professional knot and letting it fall against his chest. The vibrant red of the tie stood out like a splash of blood against the darkness of his suit. It wasn’t a bad effect, but that wasn’t what left Rarity speechless.
The Slender Man’s tie had been confiscated by Rarity, and she now brought it out, holding it up and comparing with the tie the Slender Man was wearing. The tie she had made was a vivid red of the sunset and fresh blood. Slender’s old tie was a darker crimson, as with blood that had dried or the last glimmers of the sun before it was swallowed into the dark of the night. In short, both ties were not only red, but a near-identical shade of it.
“That’s a…very interesting choice you’ve made, Mr. Slender Man,” Rarity said. “I wonder though, whether you might think that these ties are just the teensiest bit…identical?”
The Slender Man’s tendril moved from the tie on his chest to his old tie and back again, as if comparing the two. He seemed to consider Rarity’s question, and then slowly shook his tendril side to side, mimicking a pony’s head.
“I see,” Rarity said, forcing the words out through a strangled throat. “However, I really do think that that tie, that very old, badly sewn, unfashionable tie might not be the best choice.” She indicated the mountain of discarded ties. “You wouldn’t perhaps care to try any of the other hundreds of ties on, perchance?”
The Slender Man’s tendril shook back and forth again. No.
“And you really, really like that tie?”
The tendril bobbed up and down this time. Yes.
“You don’t want any other tie?”
No.
“You’re positively sure? They’re all free, you know. I’d even sew you up a new one, any style you like. But you want…that…tie?”
Yes.
Rarity considered this calmly. “Well then, I’m very glad for you Mr. Slender Man. It’s good that we could find a tie you liked. The customer is always right after all.” Rarity’s left eye twitched, and she laughed oddly. “Ha. Haha. So glad you’ve found what you’re looking for. If ever you need a suit made, please remember the Carousel Boutique for all your clothing needs.”
And with that, Rarity’s eyes rolled back into her head, and she collapsed onto the floor of her shop in a dead faint.
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This is THE most legit story I've ever seen make the Slender Man into a misunderstood being converted through friendship. The rest are either straight up eldritch horror stories or crack comedies about friendship, and even a crack romance here or there, but THIS is THE most seamless blending of horror, comedy, and friendshipping to make a friendly Slendy that's still true to its legend I have ever seen!
I've liked, faved, currently commenting, and even followed you, but I wish I could further give love to this story someho-
Wait, advertising blog. Be right back.
EDIT: Did it!
Everything that other reviewer just said. Doubly so! Again just awesome.
Glad people are liking it so much! Somehow managed to get another chapter written in a day -- thank yourself for the energy boost I got from the comments. Sleeping now. 'Night.
Twilight... Stop it. Just accept the fate that slender man is bringing you.
Very intriguing story. I enjoy how you've made Slender Man curious as I have often thought he should be. Glad to see someone else agrees. One thing however with this chapter; power is equal to (force × distance) / time, not distance^2. Other than that well done.
Awww I was hoping for the Librarain from The Pagemaster
Unseen university!