Enforced Inactivity
Uncle was doing his best not to laugh at his nephew's misfortune, but he wasn't doing a very good job. Only the girls' worried expressions kept him from truly voicing his amusement. Still, as he stared at Jackie in the hospital bed, his leg in a cast and elevated, he had to say something. "Run down the side of an exploding building, no problem. But step on a child's toy, break your bones!" Though he wanted to laugh, the look of absolute guilt and mortification on Scootaloo's face dampened his amusement. "Sounds like a Chinese proverb," he contented himself with saying.
"I...I'm so sorry, Jackie," Scootaloo whimpered, the panda that had been stepped on clutched tight to her chest. "I never meant for you to..."
"Pfft!" Uncle dismissed her concerns, eager to get her smiling again. "Jackie is young and strong. He will heal quickly!" To prove his point, he gently knocked his knuckles against Jackie's cast. Jackie was sturdy enough to hide his wince.
"It is not your fault, Scootaloo," Jackie reassured her. "I was so focused on how proud I was of you all keeping the place so clean and neat, I did not see the one toy that hadn't been properly put away. Between that and my exhaustion from the trip..." He shrugged his shoulders. "Sometimes, bad things happen even when we do everything right. That doesn't make it anyone's fault." He paused as he heard Apple Bloom sniffle loudly. "Apple Bloom?"
"It's...it's my fault," she whimpered. "At the mall...I think I accidentally wished for ya to be able to stay home with us for a while instead of having to go after another Talisman right away. Stupid fountain pulled a monkey's paw..."
Jackie started to open his mouth to dismiss the idea entirely, only for a glare from Uncle and Audrey to remind him of the last time he dismissed something magical out of hand, the night Jade first arrived. Instead, he took a different approach. "Apple Bloom, if you did make an accidental wish, you did it with the best of intentions. It is not your fault. As I said, sometimes these things happen."
"Well, ah'm still gonna make it up ta you," Apple Bloom promised. "Audrey and I are gonna take care of ya until yer back on both feet!"
Jackie sighed at that declaration, feeling somewhat torn. On the one hand, he personally preferred to recuperate on his own, taking care of himself as much as possible. On the other, he did want to encourage all the girls to take more responsibility. On the one foot, he didn't want the girls feeling they had to take on more than was good for them. On the broken foot - shooting straight to his heart - he couldn't say no to that face when she looked at him like that, lower lip pooched and quivering with dewy eyes. "Alright, Apple Bloom," he relented. "Just don't push yourself too hard."
"Promise!" Apple Bloom responded immediately.
Back in the Section 13 apartment, Jackie and Jade were both surprised at just how thorough Apple Bloom was at tending to Jackie. First, she ensured the place was completely tidy, even going so far as to scour the walls and ceiling with cleaning agents with Audrey's help. She made sure to stay well out of the way of Jackie's workstation, where Uncle had insisted he spend his inactive time in intellectually stimulating activities...by helping research the Rat Talisman. As such, Jackie found himself turned to the side in his wheelchair as his immobilized leg was propped up on the rest with a pillow under it, reading through ancient tomes.
What truly unnerved him was just how efficient Apple Bloom was in tending to him. The instant his teacup was empty or started to cool, fresh hot tea found its way into the cup unless he said he didn't want any. The moment the pillow under his leg started to feel flat, Audrey was lifting his leg up gently with vines so Apple Bloom could fluff or replace it. If he needed a tome that wasn't on his desk, Apple Bloom and Audrey had the entire shelf beside him to select from before he could even reach the wheels. He wasn't entirely sure what to do about that, especially since she did it so quietly. He made a mental note to ask Uncle if the trio had studied ninjitsu at any point. There was that cultural project they did on Japan, after all...
"Any luck?" Jade asked, hopping over to look at the Talisman over his shoulder.
Jackie shrugged his shoulders. "Not yet. Maybe I'll get lucky, and this will be the 'heal a broken leg' Talisman."
"Unlikely," Apple Bloom spoke up. "I know all the ancient language characters for 'healing', and while I don't recognize all the runes on the back of that Talisman, 'healing's nowhere on there."
Sighing, Jackie looked at the translation he'd found so far. "The power of the Rat brings motion to the motionless..."
"Can I take a look at it?" Apple Bloom asked hopefully. "Maybe ah can put somethin' together?"
Jackie smiled softly. "Alright," he replied, lightly tossing the Talisman to the filly.
Apple Bloom lifted her hooves to catch the Talisman, but mistimed the grab, sending the Talisman bouncing across the room, where it landed in the open book Jade had been reading, though plainly more out of amusement than taking the contents seriously. "I got it!" Apple Bloom insisted, rushing over. However, in her eagerness to help, she forgot that the wooden floor of the apartment was not protected from her magic as the floors of the Antique Shop were. A sudden sprouting in response to her approach caused the book to slam shut on the Talisman.
A blaze of light erupted from the Talisman, as the strong spiritual magic contained within reacted with the powerful psychic energy that surrounded the book, as imbued by both the author and those who believed too strongly in what was written within, causing the Rat Talisman to instead turn its magic to activate a spell that the fillies had once attempted before, using the book as material to bring life to a character within. As the light blazed, the author's name was briefly illuminated.
Lovecraft.
As the light faded, the book turned into a pool of black ooze, twisting on the ground before lunging out the door of the apartment, trashing everything it came across as it grew, sprouting tentacles as it started to grow bigger and bigger as it raced for the surface, screams and shouts echoing in its passage as guttural snarls followed its wake, eldritch runes being etched into the very walls and floors by its acidic substance.
Jackie blinked, staring after it. "...bad day..." he finally brought himself to say.
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....Oh s#!t...
nice twist
: 
Well....there fucked
Yes finally the time has come for the old ones return!
Truer words have never been spoken.
Better than that dumb Gnomekop...
unless this connects to the My Name is Twaith series... well um? Gir better start singing the doom song now...
Well darn.
Oh fantastic, they've summoned Cthulhu...
RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!!! IT'S THE ATTACK OF THE OLD ONES!!
7597931 As you ask so you shall receive.
7597931
Does it go like:
MUCKLE DAMRED CULTI 'AIR EH NAMBLIES BE KEEPIN' ME WEE MEN!?!?
Another enjoyable chapter. Good job.
....now excuse me while I run away screaming.
[youtube=V_AvJzkPqQ8]
Oh my God...
7597967 perfect! that matches so well! thanks for putting that video.
Things are about to get out of hand once again, and I absolutely love it as I continue to enjoy every twist and turn that comes.
I've never read any of the Lovecraft stories. I had to Google it. But seeing some of the possible stories......
.......Who am I kidding. They're screwed.
7597997 One of the stories he wrote?
...
...
"The Rats In The Walls".
How appropriate for that talisman. :D
Why was Uncle allowing Jade to read that book if it had a magical signature? So how will they stop this I wonder?
7598007
The book itself didn't have a magical signature. The mental component was from Lovecraft himself and everyone who believe in the Elder Gods.
Please just let it be the fish people from Shadow over Insmouth...
Please don't let it be one of the big ones...
I gotta say I'm at a bit of a conundrum here. On one hand, I love this story. It's great, the characters are well-developed, and the flow is excellent. On the other hand, I've been watching the show (for the first time, mind you) episodically as the story covers it. And... I don't like it. Most of the main characters are annoying, the "art style" is painful to try and watch, and the plot is pretty predictable from the get-go. Hopefully it'll get better in later seasons, but for now I'll just accept this story as official canon and forget the show exists.
In my head I have this image of Shendu feeling a shock then shouting at Valmont that they are leaving town ASAP and not coming back.
Yeah Augustus is going to love this one.
Had to be Lovecraft. Couldn't have been Lewis Carrol or something more innocuous like a children's book. At least with Lewis Carrol you only have the Queen and Mad Hatters to worry running about.
Lovecraft though you could face the Faceless Horror, The King in Yellow, He who is Key and Lock, or any metaphysical horror of a Elder God.
The only thing that even defeats such horrors is usually putting it out of mind or fighting insanity with insanity. We need Discord or Pinkie to fight these things.
....I was actually wondering when you were going to bring Lovecraft into one of your stories.
Bad day doesn't even begin to describe the bad time they're about to have. I think even C.S, Lewis would have been preferable to Lovercraft. At least the White Witch is predictable.
Way to go Inkheart on this spin girls...
Hmmmmmm anyone else picturing Shendu having Valmont destroy his stone just to escape to the demon realm so not to deal with the Great Old Ones. I also am picturing Cthulhu coming out like this orig02.deviantart.net/f098/f/2014/151/0/f/cthulhu_oil_painting_by_tentaclesandteeth-d7khm57.jpg only to see the girls and become all chibi s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/564x/7c/8a/66/7c8a6606504675d270930df252ccb017.jpg and going you are sooooo cute.
So, uh, yeah. Is this going to be like when they ran into Pachamama or more like when Tokyo was visited by Godzilla? Looking forward to more.
Keep up the great work. Deus tecum.
Hit it with a boat.
7598041 Quick into the Eldritch bunker I built in preparation for something on this LVL of chaos or when Shendu returned.
Applebloom...You had...one. ONE JOB. How hard is it to do!?
I've been longing to share this song again. Didn't think it would be on this fic, though.
"Not yet. "Maybe I'll
1. Extra quotation mark.
Yeah... I'd Love to Craft some puns here but the situation is... quite ridiculous.
Seems they are out of their depth.
Way to bring a flood of trouble, AppleDoom.
Ho, boy. Talk about up the creek without a saddle.
Saw a bumper sticker
Cthulhu For President
Why Settle For The
LESSER Evil?
The Hounds of Tindalos were time travelers capable of mentally possessing the entire human race. They have utterly exterminated more than one race
ICR who it was that were a giant whirling dervish capable of Quicksilver speed levels (IIRC not quite the Flash). They drove people insane by tickling you with flexible razors. This gets my vote -They would like the idea of being tickled
That or one of the dimension traveling races.
Mr Lovecraft had problems.
Sounds like a job for Old Man Henderson. He'd have a field day against Lovecraftian horrors...
(For those who haven't heard of this insane awesome guy, HAVE FUN. You'll be at it for a few hours)
7598041 or the Doom Guy.
Yu Mo Gui Gwai Fai Di Zao
Yu Mo Gui Gwai Fai Di Zao
Yu Mo Gui Gwai Fai Di Zao
Excuse me, let me clear my throat for a moment.
*ahem*...
7598516
No, but you don't really need eyes to glare.
Ohhhhhhhhh, that ain't good.
As much as I love these stories this is stretching the way the Talisman works along with my suspension of disbelief. I think it would require at least one or two more mystical coincedence for this to make sense.
Well, I believe everyone will agree with me on this.
I'm not sure if I should congratulate you for getting rid of this stupid toy, or cry in the corner from the insanity of the Old Ones.
7598773
7598783
I hope the both of you will wait for the next chapter. It'll make what's going on more clear.