Equestria Girls and The Black Cat

by EquineAvenger

Chapter 3

Werdegast and Hjalmar Poelzig had left the girls in the bedroom with their recovering friend and were now alone together in a dimly lit office room. Poelzig sat in his chair behind his desk while Werdegast stood in front of it talking face-to-face with him. The cordial appearance Werdegast had used when they met in front of the girls had dropped and was now speaking to Poelzig in a very angrily hostile tone.

“You sold every man in this fort to the enemy!” Werdegast accused Poelzig. “Scurried away in the night and left us to die! Is it to be wondered that you should choose this place to build your house?” He looked around at the interior of the room. “A masterpiece of construction built upon the ruins of the masterpiece of destruction. The masterpiece of murder!” Then he gave a little chuckle at the irony of the idea. Poelzig’s face still had the serious and unfriendly expression it had when he introduced himself. “The murderer of ten thousand men returns to the place of his crime! Those who died were fortunate. I was taken prisoner, to Kurgaal! Kurgaal were the soul is killed slowly! Fifteen years I rotted in the darkness, waiting! Not to kill you, to kill your soul, slowly! Where is my wife, Karen, and my daughter, Kathrine?!”

“Karen?” Poelzig asked in an emotionless tone. “What do you mean?”

“I mean you told Karen I had been killed. I found out that much in Budapest. I mean you always wanted her. In the days at Salzburg before the war, always from the first time you saw her! I mean that after you saved your own hide and left us all to die, you went to Karen, induced her to go to America with you. I traced the two of you there, and to Spain, and to South America, and finally here! Where is she?”

Poelzig rose from his chair and looked Werdegast straight in the eye. “Vitus, you are mad!”

“Where is she?” Werdegast asked again, but their heated conversation was cut short by a knocking on the door.

"Come in." Poelzig called to whoever was behind the door. The door opened to reveal the seven teenage girls, including Sunset Shimmer, who had arrived with Werdegast and Thamal. Poelzig put on a welcoming smile when he saw them.

"Sorry for any interruption." Applejack apologized.

“Are we intruding on something personal?” Fluttershy asked.

“Not at all, do come in.” Poelzig said humbly. “We were just going to have something to drink. Would any of you like to join us?”

“Just to let you know, we don’t really drink any alcoholic beverages.” Rarity said.

“No problem, what would you like?” Poelzig said understandingly.

“Ya’ll got any apple cider?” Applejack asked.

“Cider.” Poelzig said to his majordomo, the man who answered the door, and the servant left for the kitchen.

“You are looking much better, Miss Shimmer.” Werdegast said nicely to Sunset. “How are you feeling?”

“I feel fine thanks to you.” Sunset replied gratefully.

“It was very fortunate that you were a skilled doctor when we met you.” Twilight said putting Spike on the floor and wagged his tail happily.

“Yeah, if we hadn’t met you Sunset probably might not be standing here tonight.” Pinkie said with a big smile at the end of her sentence.

“It is always good to know that there are some good doctors out there in the world.” Poelzig said.

“You must be our host.” Sunset greeted Poelzig.

“At your service, my dear.” Poelzig said giving her hand a small kiss.

“This is a very interesting house you have here, Poelzig.” Rarity said examining the interior. “Has an atmosphere… kind of a…”

“Creepy?” Rainbow said jokingly trying to help finish Rarity’s train of thought.

“No, a…” Rarity said.

“Dark?” Pinkie suggested.

“No, not that, a…”

“It is indeed hard to describe.” Werdegast said. “It’s hard to describe his life – or death? It may well be an atmosphere of death.”

“That’s a grim thought.” Spike whispered but Twilight quietly shushed him.

“This place was built on the ruins of that same fort that our unfortunate friend, the driver, described so vividly.” Werdegast continued. “Poelzig commanded this fort during the last years of the war. He is perhaps sentimental about this spot.” Poelzig shot Werdegast a sly smile. “And as for the house being interesting, architectural shaped curve. It could not be otherwise. Engineer Poelzig is one of the world’s greatest architects.”

Poelzig gave a small flattered chuckle. “Dr. Werdegast is one of the world’s greatest psychiatrists.”

“Well allow me to introduce myself.” Rarity said. “I’m Rarity, one of the world’s greatest fashion designers.”

“I’m Pinkie Pie.” Pinkie introduced herself. “One of the world’s greatest party planners.”

“And I’m Rainbow Dash.” Rainbow said. “I’m just great.” Everyone laughed alittle at this boast from the rainbow-haired athlete. Then the majordomo came in with a tray of glasses of cider and handed one to each person before leaving.

“Well, to you my friends.” Werdegast said raising his glass to the girls. “To your health.” He said to Sunset. “To your fashion career.” He said to Rarity. “To your parties.” He said to Pinkie. “To you.” He said to Rainbow. “And to your lovely friendship.”

MEOW! A noise came from outside the door and in walked a cat with black fur and bright green eyes.

“Oh, you have a cat.” Fluttershy said happily to Poelzig. “I just love animals.”

Spike growled at the cat. Being a dog, he had a natural hostility toward cats. Twilight held him in her arms to make sure he wouldn’t get into to trouble. While all her friends were fawning over the cat, Twilight noticed something strange about Werdegast. His face was etched with fear and took a few steps back when he saw the creature. He looked as if he saw a hidious monster. “Doctor, is something wrong?” Twilight asked him. Werdegast dropped his glass which shattered on the floor catching everyone’s attention. Then he grabbed a letter opener from Poelzig’s desk and threw it at the creature impaling it. The animal let out a terrible shriek as it collapsed on the floor. Werdegast then convulsively buried his face in his hands as if he had been scared out of his mind. All the girls were shocked by what he just did. But what was even more disturbing was that Poelzig didn’t look at all surprised or disturbed by the fact that his friend had just killed his pet. In fact, he actually looked satisfied by his reaction. Pinkie held Fluttershy tightly in her arms as the yellow-skinned, pink-haired girl trembled, she had just seen an animal violently killed.

“Are you alright?” Sunset concernly asked coming to Werdegast’s side.

"Why did you do that?" Fluttershy asked the doctor visibly upset.

“You must be indulgent with Dr. Werdegast’s weakness.” Poelzig told her. “He is the unfortunate victim of one of the commoner phobias, but in an extreme form. He has intense and all-consuming horror of cats.”

“Remind me to keep him away from Opal.” Rarity whispered to Fluttershy who was still trembling.

“Well, ah think we’d better be getting’ some shut-eye.” Applejack told her friends feeling that the mood had changed for the worst.

“You still need to sleep in order to fully heal, Sunset.” Twilight told her friend.

“She’s quite right, you must get a goodnight’s rest.” Werdegast agreed.

“Goodnight, gentlemen.” Rarity said to the two men.

“Goodnight.” Fluttershy said still in shock.

“Nighty-night.” Pinkie waved bye to them and the seven friends retreated to their rooms. As they left, Poelzig kept an obsessive watch on Sunset as she left the room.

Comments

[TheFreedDragon]

This is a good story and it is going well so far. I love Edgar Allan Poe. And I'm excited to see how this story goes along with his.
You use a good amount of descriptive words - not so many that it is overwhelming, but enough that I feel the place is real.
Some slight criticism: Fluttershy's reaction in this chapter to an animal being killed was completely out of character. Also slow down the plot a little. It feels as though you are rushing to get somewhere without letting us adjust to each setting. Another thing, consider your setting a bit more - a heated argument would be loud - so did the girls overhear what happened? Because realistically in that setting the would have.
I do live your story and look forward to reading more.

[EquineAvenger]

7256212 I've made a few adjustments to the chapter. Please let me know what you think. Thank you for your comment.

[Discordigan]

You're so brilliant in your storytelling.