Krastos the Glue Maker

by Horse Voice

Chapter VII

Taller than the steeple of city hall, Krastos the Glue Maker towered over the edge of town, his sickle and shears poised to strike. He had appeared there all at once, and if someone had looked closely at just the right time, they might have seen a flash of magenta light. Twilight hovered around and around the illusion, adding details and concentrating to keep herself in the air as she worked.

Between the illusion's feet, Turner stood nearly head-to-head with Zecora, assisting her as she measured different fluids, borrowed from the chemist's market wagon, into a tall iron pot. Off to one side, six ponies stood together—three mares looking on, and three fillies behind them, trying to avert their eyes from the sight of the thing.

Among these, it was Rarity who spoke first, quietly enough that only those next to her could hear. "I hate to say it, but this plan does depend a bit too much on luck. The illusion is detailed enough to look genuine, yes. But for one thing, enough ponies need to look up and see it..."

Before she could say another word, Zecora nodded to the doctor, and he leapt back from the pot with a cry of "Everypony cover your ears!" before they both flattened themselves on the ground and took this exact advice.

No sooner had all those present done so than there was a mighty bang!, which echoed along the town's streets and over the fields about them. A great billow of crimson smoke erupted from the pot. It rose straight upward, not as a single puff, but as a columnous plume that ran among and over the details of the image of Krastos, casting some into contrast and hiding others from one second to the next. Even to those at the illusion's base, who had been watching the proceedings, the un-thing before them looked as though it had just emerged from the mouth of Tartarus.

As planned, Twilight propelled herself upward, surrounded herself with a brilliant horn-glow, and began flying around the illusion's head in broad circles. Finally, she added one more detail to the illusion: blasts of alicorn battle-magic, streaking from her horn to the head and body of Krastos. In seeming response, it raised its arms and tried, unsuccessfully of course, to strike its diminutive attacker.

"They'd have to be blind and deaf to miss that," Applejack said from Rarity's left.

"I... suppose," Rarity said, a little cautious optimism entering her voice. "I simply hope enough ponies see it so that awful tulpa thing really is weakened."

To Rarity's right, Pinkie made a shushing sound. "Weren't you listening? Belief makes tulpas stronger or weaker! We have to will this plan to work!" She glared at the mock battle above. "This is gonna work. This is gonna work. Come on, help me chant! This is gonna work..."

Gazing up, the others made to follow her advice, but were interrupted by a loud clang from the iron pot. They looked back down in time to see two objects roll from the top of the hillock. The first was the pot, which was now on its side, spilling a quantity of pale fluid across the ground. This produced a loud hiss, bubbled, released one last puff of smoke, and fizzled out. The second object—small, grey, vaguely oblong—bounced and rolled down the hillock, coming to a stop at the hooves of the three mares.

It was the severed head of the statue of Celestia.

Someone had thrown it and knocked over the pot.

As the three stood frozen at the sight, Turner, who had narrowly missed being struck by the head, reared up and wheeled about. "Who threw that? Who..."

Zecora lowered her head and kicked at the dirt. "It is him," she said.

All at once, there followed a flurry of action. Rarity cast the widest horn-glow she could, though it did not reach far. With sharp urging, she and Applejack formed an escort for the fillies, herding them with all speed toward the hillock where Zecora and Turner stood scanning the darkness beyond the glow. Pinkie leapt into the air and shouted as loud as she could: "Twilight, help! He's here!"

The illusion vanished, leaving only the last of the rising smoke. Through this came Twilight in a sheer dive, only slowing just in time to plant four hooves heavily upon the hillock. There followed a brief confusion of activity and exclamations—"Where is he?" "I can't see him!" "Keep looking!" "Mind the young 'uns!"—as the adults formed a circle around the fillies. They stood looking outward, so that no direction was not watched. Twilight and Rarity flooded as much ground as they could with hornglow, casting long shadows from objects in every direction. But hornglow could not replace sunlight, and everyone knew it would be easy to hide in the shadow of a tree, or a boulder, or the schoolhouse that stood on the next hillock over.

They waited, all straining eyes and ears, trying to calm the hammering of their pulses. One, two, three minutes passed.

It was Rarity who broke the silence. "Well, he's clearly outnumbered." She turned her head back to look at her companions. "I don't think he'll..."

Her statement ended with an abortive choking gasp. Everypony turned to see her trying in vain to brace against the turf while a lasso, thrown about her neck with unerring aim, dragged her fast toward the dark beyond. Zecora, Pinkie, and Turner rushed to grab the rope's near end, but Twilight, with a yell that was part war-cry and part terrified scream, flitted over the whole company and landed between them and rope's unseen owner, horn leveled to attack. There followed as fearsome a torrent of magical bolts as was ever seen on the battlefields of Equestrian history. As Twilight strafed her head from side to side, objects before her burst in flashes of red and orange light, super-heated in an instant: stones exploded, trees and bushes went up in smoke, and small craters pockmarked the soil.

The rope went slack, and the others pulled the lasso from Rarity's neck. As she sat panting and blinking, trying to regain her breath, they formed a three-point guard around her.

At last the fusillade of bolts ceased, and Twilight stood, panting from exertion and scanning the small field of smoldering embers before her.

"I think I got it," she said. "But just to be safe, we'll head back to my castle and look tomorrow..."

Beside Twilight, a shape moved.

Neither she nor anyone else had seen or heard this shape approach, and there was no time even to look toward it before a tremendous blow came down on her head, and she crumpled to the ground, stunned. But her companions saw the shape—tall, thin, two-legged, and dressed in a broad hat and long coat made of some unrecognizable material. Time slowed in their vision, and they froze, trapped between the instincts to fight or flee. The shape stooped down and seized Twilight by the horn, lifting her up as though she were a fresh kill. It raised its right hand, in which it held a fiendishly curved sickle. This it moved toward Twilight's exposed throat.

But it hesitated, for without warning the air was filled with a single long, brassy sound.

The air vibrated with it—a long whole note that sang of joy, and warmth, and light. The conscious minds of the ponies and zebra began to turn back from the abyss of animal terror, and as one they looked up toward the source of the music.

It was the bell in the schoolhouse's tower.

It rang out again, and this time both Twilight and the sickle fell as the shape pressed both hands to the sides of its head. A second sound joined the first—a high shrieking that was like a knife in the eardrums of those around it. It was a few seconds before they realized: This noise was coming from the shape.

At the third toll of the bell, the thing bent forward, contorting this way and that as its screaming grew louder. The brimmed hat fell from its head, and beneath was only darkness—a shadow, or perhaps a silhouette, made solid and marked only with two points of unblinking red light.

The fourth toll. The shape sank to one knee as a small figure broke from the trio who had been cowering on the hillock, weaving between the legs of the adults, galloping forth and stopping close enough to look straight into the lights.

"You're not real!" Fresh tears wetted Scootaloo's cheeks as she raised her small voice against the noise. "And... and I'm not afraid!"

The thing did not move to strike, but recoiled from her even as it writhed in agony. It was then that the small band of defenders saw they were not alone, for the figures of ponies began to emerge into the pool of light with cautious steps—the remaining townsfolk, drawn by the illusory sound and sight of their liege lord battling a gigantic monster.

The fifth toll. Apple Bloom and Sweetie Belle galloped to Scootaloo's side, and the three shouted as one: "You're not real, and I'm not afraid!"

From within its long coat, the shape produced three tails—two of ponies and one of a donkey. It brandished them about as it struggled to rise to its feet, and those close enough to see flinched back at the sight. But at the sound of the sixth toll, it spasmed, dropped its trophies, and fell back upon the ground.

The remaining defenders of the hillock, along with a few of the foremost townsfolk, rushed to the fillies' rescue. But then they saw the shape and realized the impossible: It had been hurt. One by one, they added their own voices to the chorus, which grew louder with each second as more and more arrived. In their midst, Twilight struggled to her hooves, shook herself, and joined them. Soon dozens of them surrounded it, and the killer had no more shadow to flee to. It recoiled inward, as if trying to hide within itself, at every repeated chant: "You are not real, and we are not afraid!"

The seventh toll rang out, a louder and clearer note than ever the bell had sang in years of existence. The shape's howl of pain and rage might have been heard from the heavens. Now from one place, then another and another, shafts of blood-light shone from jagged cracks in the body and limbs of the thing—multiplying, growing, joining together, until the shape was more crack than shadow, and the witnesses averted their eyes, for the light had grown too much. At last there came a flash of brilliant white light that banished the red, and for a moment lit the environs like the day. Then it was gone, and silence and night returned.

And behold: A burn upon the earth was all that remained of Krastos the Glue Maker.

But now, more sounds from the bell tower: A groan of pain, and hooves on roof tiles. Ponies looked up to see a silhouette leap from the roof's edge and glide unsteadily toward them on ragged wings. They made way for it as it approached, for it did not slow enough to keep from tumbling end over end upon its landing before sprawling flat on its back.

A few primary feathers were missing, the blue coat was marred by smears of dried glue, and the colorful mane was matted in rust-red patches of dried blood. But there was no mistaking the living, breathing image of Rainbow Dash.

With cries of relief, her friends fell upon her at once, hugging her, scolding her for scaring them, plying her with jumbled questions. Bit by bit, with many pauses for breath, Rainbow answered.

"It almost got me... Chased me all over... Hid in the bell tower... Passed out... Woke up, saw it was gonna kill ya... Tried to distract it." She tried to roll over, found she could not, and settled for raising her forehooves up and casting an imploring look at the ponies standing around her. "Little help?"

In spite of it all, somepony laughed.

Comments

[Ice Justice]

It's not over yet...

[Horse Voice]

7688977

I'm glad you bring this up, because the short chapters are something of an experiment, and if they don't work as well as longer ones, that's good to know. But now I'm reminded of three years ago, when you said something similar about the first two chapters of Biblical Monsters. I just wish I had a similarly shocking twist later on...

Well, we'll soon see whether I pulled it off this time.

[Csquared08]

Oh, neat. Dash didn't die.