The Thing
Scootaloo stretched her hooves. The train to Ponyville was about to arrive at the Canterlot station and she was already thinking about getting into the carriage and catching some sleep before visiting Twilight Sparkle. There were only a few other ponies on the platform with her, all of them walking around groggily.
Suddenly, Scootaloo felt a cold breeze on her back and heard a sound of hooves touching the ground. She turned around quickly and saw Schwalbe, who sat on the concrete, panting heavily.
Scootaloo’s eyes widened when she looked at Schwalbe more exactly. The bat mare had a black eye and she was clutching her chest with her hoof. Blood in her fur around that place was giving disturbing clues of what was underneath.
“Don’t worry,” Schwalbe said, making a grimace that was probably supposed to be smile. “Had a knife. Looks worse.” She leaned closer to Scootaloo and whispered, “Drowned her in the toilet.”
“Who?” Scootaloo asked, shuddering.
“Some mare Icewind went to,” Schwalbe replied. “Gave her this.” She produced a bloodied piece of paper with encrypted text. “Still plotting something.”
“We observe her, from what I know...” Scootaloo muttered. “But if she really tried to give somepony the message...” She heard the sound of the train. “Listen, I’m going to Ponyville. Can you find a guard called Boysenberry? She has a violet mane, usually a braid...”
“This one. Yeah.” Schwalbe nodded. “Saw her a few times. Doesn’t like you. Where does she live?”
Scootaloo shrugged. Suddenly, a thought came to her mind. “How does the place where you, umm... got this message look like?”
Schwalbe’s face became red. “Could be worse,” she replied. “Cleaned the blood. Wasn’t much, you know. But there’s the body... Couldn’t get it out.”
“She’ll be there,” Scootaloo said, trying to keep her voice steady. She and Archer were one thing, but if Boysenberry got enough evidence to arrest Schwalbe...
Schwalbe scratched her mane. “Don’t worry,” she said. “Hung ‘out of order’ sign on the door. It’ll take a while before somepony finds her.”
“So?” Scootaloo asked and sighed. “What does it change?”
Schwalbe smirked. “Oh, officer,” she said in a high-pitched voice, with a distinctive accent from the north of Great Bridletain. “I went inside and I saw that washroom attendant in the stall number three... I tried to help but it was too late... She held that in her hoof, some kind of message... I tried not to touch anything but I may have left–”
“Nice,” Scootaloo muttered, seeing that her train arrived. “But Boysenberry knows how you look like. Also, you’re wounded...”
“No problem,” Schwalbe said. “Do you have a thread and needle?”
“Go to the doctor, Schwalbe...” Scootaloo muttered, stepping into the carriage.
“Don’t worry about me...” Schwalbe blinked.
Boysenberry groaned. Not only the first thing she had to do in the morning was going to some sordid public toilet to get the corpse out of the stall, but also the pony who found the body happened to be an old earth mare wearing a baggy dress, a hat, and a pair of glasses with lenses so thick that they looked like bottle bottoms. The old lady also had a weird accent and an obnoxious speech impediment, as if she was trying to speak without opening her mouth.
Boysenberry looked at the old mare and finished deciphering the message. “They’ll hide me from you. Guessed the key. Gonna find the filly,” she read and tore the page from her notebook.
“Give it to Charge,” she said to Riot Shield, giving him the note. “Try to talk with him for a while. I have something to say to our witness in private.”
“Okay,” Riot replied.
Boysenberry approached the old mare who was eyeing the guards curiously. “Okay,” she said. “So, you just came here and saw the body in the stall, right?”
“Exactly,” the mare replied. “I jutht had to, you know... My bladder ithn’t ath good ath it uthed to be...”
“And you’re completely sure that you weren’t here in the evening?” Boysenberry trotted closer to the mare.
“Where did you get that idea?”
“Schwalbe, or whatever your name is...” Boysenberry whispered. “If you want to hide the fact that you’re a bat pony, don’t lower your glasses when looking at my badge...”
“Okay, you got me,” Schwalbe muttered, dropping her accent and lisp. “What do you want?”
“Put you in the cuffs and get you to the station,” Boysenberry replied. “You’re a fucking idiot, you know? If you want to play the guard, you should’ve watched this place instead of killing that crapper manager... Sooner or later, she’d give that message to someone else. Now they know that something’s wrong...”
“That’s the point,” Schwalbe said. “They’ll now do something stupid.”
“So far, the only stupid ones here are you and Archer.” Boysenberry sighed. “I’ll give you one last chance. I’ll let you go, but if I ever see you with Scootaloo, or anywhere outside your district, you’re going to prison. Who knows how many unsolved murders will be explained...”
“You won’t do that,” Schwalbe said, taking off her glasses and staring into Boysenberry’s eyes. “Defeated stronger guys than you.”
Boysenberry didn’t even blink. Instead of a reply, she smacked Schwalbe’s side, causing her to hiss and lean against the wall, panting. “You’re unconsciously protecting that place,” Boysenberry said. “Also, we found your blood on the floor. I can add one to one too...”
Schwalbe said nothing, getting her bearings.
“Get out,” Boysenberry said. “Leave finding those ponies to the guards.”
Schwalbe glared at her angrily and walked out of the toilet. Boysenberry smirked, seeing her getting rid of her disguise and flying away in an errant manner.
“Now, let’s see what you’ll tell us...” she muttered, staring at the body lying on the stretcher.
Scootaloo got out of the train and stood on the platform. The town didn’t change much since she was a filly. A new layer of paint had been put on the walls of the station. Some new houses were built near it, and Scootaloo didn’t know most of the children running around her. She trotted down the street, heading to Twilight’s castle.
“Scootaloo!”
Scootaloo turned to see a young, yellow filly with orange mane and blue eyes. “Hello, Pumpkin,” she said. “How’s Pinkie?”
“Great,” Pumpkin replied. “She’s helping Rarity and Fluttershy with the kids. Pound is helping mom and dad in the bakery and I’m going to Twilight. Midsummer is soon and Pinkie is preparing a party.”
“Actually, I’m going to Twilight too,” Scootaloo said. She smirked, seeing Sweet Apple Acres in the distance. Apple Bloom was probably busy, but she made a mental note to visit her after her talk with Twilight.
“Is it something about that dungeon?” Pumpkin asked, crossing the street. Scootaloo realised that they were walking by Lyra and Bon Bon’s house. She thought of Babs Seed and shuddered.
“How do you know?” Scootaloo looked at Pumpkin unsurely.
“Oh, come on.” Pumpkin sighed. “All kids read that story. When I was, like, ten, we were telling it during the sleepovers.”
Scootaloo shook her head. “I much preferred the Headless Horse...”
“Pound once said that there was a filly who dared to go to Twilight and ask her how it really was.” Pumpkin looked back at Lyra and Bon Bon’s house. “Twilight told her and later that filly went insane and killed several ponies, including Bon Bon’s sister and that filly with glasses who haunts the cemetery. But I think he made this up. And I’ve never seen any ghost at the cemetery.”
“Yeah...” Scootaloo muttered. “It was three years earlier...”
“Really? So it happened for real?” Pumpkin asked.
“Well, not the Twilight part,” Scootaloo said. “And I’m pretty sure ghosts aren’t real.”
They walked to the gate of Twilight’s castle. Pumpkin raised her hoof and knocked.
After a while, they heard steps and the door opened. “Hello, Pumpkin,” Spike said. “Scootaloo! I didn’t recognise you...”
“Yeah,” Scootaloo muttered. “I guess it’s the mane. Is Twilight home?”
“Sure,” Spike replied. “She’s upstairs, reading.”
Scootaloo and Pumpkin walked inside the castle. Pumpkin went with Spike to the kitchen to talk about the party preparations and Scootaloo trotted upstairs.
“Hello, Twilight,” she said.
Twilight moved slightly. Despite the sunny weather outside, the curtains were closed and the room was dim. Twilight seemed to be napping and Scootaloo thought that maybe she should retreat and come back later.
“Scootaloo?” Twilight asked. She opened the curtains with her magic and the room was flooded with sunlight. “What brings you here?”
“Nothing good, I’m afraid,” Scootaloo replied. “I guess you’ve heard about what happens in Canterlot now?”
Twilight nodded. “I’ve read about it in the newspapers. Some guard was shot recently.”
“My cousin,” Scootaloo said. “She’ll be okay,” she added, seeing Twilight opening her mouth. “The thing is, those who shot her, also killed a filly and tried to kidnap the other one. We suspect that it may have something to do with what happened twelve years ago...”
“I’ve never told anypony about what happened there,” Twilight said in a monotone, avoiding Scootaloo’s gaze. “I did some research, of course... but it can’t–”
“Those who killed that filly are probably trying to bring that thing back,” Scootaloo said. “I need to know what’s going on.”
“There was a book there.” Twilight looked at Scootaloo, but her eyes seemed to focus on something distant; an event from the past she’d tried to forget. “Dr. Stable mentioned it in his story.”
“I don’t remember that part,” Scootaloo muttered.
“It wasn’t exactly a book, just the cover and some remains of the pages,” Twilight whispered, as if she was afraid to speak louder. “What I saw there was... blasphemous. It was just remains of some formula, but... Well, a moment later I saw it working.”
“What exactly was that?” Scootaloo asked.
For a moment, Twilight was silent. “I researched it. Some of the books on the early Equestrian history are hard to find, but after I had to... k-kill Berry, I needed to know why. Shortly after the Princesses defeated King Sombra, a group of wizards managed to summon this thing. It wouldn’t be wise to speak its name.”
“Summon?” Scootaloo asked. “From where?”
“It is mentioned that it came from the very distant part of space, where it lived with similar creatures surrounding–” Twilight winced. “The book called them ‘gods’ or ‘spirits’, but they’re nothing like Discord or other such beings. Well, maybe a bit.”
“I’m pretty sure that I’ll recognise it when I see it,” Scootaloo said. “What did it do?”
Twilight’s eye twitched. “After summoning, it killed half of the unicorns who did that on the spot. Clover the Clever mentions that many of the others went insane. Some of them were disfigured... It stayed in the mines beneath Canterlot and soon the miners started to disappear.
“After some time, they managed to find the culprit. One of the unicorns, long presumed dead, was caught red-hoofed, trying to attack a daughter of one of the miners. His friends saved her and bludgeoned him to death.”
“Nice guys,” Scootaloo muttered. “What happened later?”
“Soon after, two miners went crazy and attacked their co-workers,” Twilight replied. “The rest checked in which tunnel they were working and collapsed it. For some time, it calmed down.”
“I guess it wasn’t long,” Scootaloo said. “That whole thing reminds me of Berry.”
“Indeed.” Twilight sighed. “The former leader of the cultists started to gather new allies. He wrote a manuscript which was a compilation of some old magic books, myths, and his own theories, stating that this... creature could be controlled. He said that it needed food and that was why it was making ponies aggressive. He thought that if he sacrificed a pony to it, a pony who was earlier ‘chosen’ by it, he’d be able to control it. This is, of course, rubbish. Those things don’t care about ponies at all.”
“And what did he do?” Scootaloo asked.
“There are not many records,” Twilight replied. “He apparently tried to abduct that miner’s daughter. There’s also a very vivid depiction of him being hanged, drawn, and quartered.”
“Too bad his ideas survived,” Scootaloo said. “Someone in Canterlot tries to do exactly that – Moonwing and her sister lived next to the cave where this thing is, and those guys tried to kidnap Dr. Stable’s daughter...” She thought for a moment. “What was this guy’s name?”
“Rosier,” Twilight replied. “Rosier the Ignominious.”
Scootaloo scratched her mane. “I guess I’ll check the libraries of Canterlot,” she said. “If anypony read his works... Thank you, Twilight.”
“Good luck, Scootaloo,” Twilight said. “We’ll need it...”
Stats
Page generated in 0.017 seconds
Total duration
805 users online
1,226,492 hits today, 2,280,440 yesterday
FIMFiction
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic Fanfiction
Designed and coded by knighty & Xaquseg - © 2011-2024
Follow & Support Us
Support us
SubStar
Chat!
Discord
Follow us
Twitter
MLP: Friendship is Magic® - © 2024 Hasbro Inc.®
Fimfiction is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Hasbro Inc.®
Drowned in the toilet...
That's as undignified as it gets.
And Twilight's explanation about the creature is so Lovecraftian, which makes sense of course.
*Looks at chapter title.*
And whatever's down there, it's weird and pissed off.
5832571
Well, that death kinda matched her job... Also, I'm not sure if that thing is pissed (or can it be pissed at all), but it's surely hungry.
*Diamond Tiara has entered the chat.*