Chapter 9: ...and a Shade Darker
Marilyn Susanna.
That had been my name.
My real name.
The moment He said it, it clicked.
I didn’t ask how He knew it when I didn’t, I didn’t need to. It was obvious by what He was, and what He was was obvious the moment He entered the room.
We could feel it. All of us. Me, most palpably, as I had to focus on keeping myself together, but I could see the ponies shuddering at the weight of what he was pressing into the physical world. Rarity, of course, staggered, grabbing her horn, while Applejack and Rainbow rushed to support Twilight, who nearly fell over in convulsions as her body, attuned to the magics that were the very foundations of this world, was overwhelmed by the new presence pushing them aside.
His presence was like a mountain had been suddenly dropped upon us all.
He was a being that was never meant to exist on a plane of reality.
A paradox from a place that could not truly exist, and thus, had no rules to govern it.
A real entity from outside of reality itself.
As I got a better view, it became clear that His form only seemed human at a glance.
It was at least seven feet tall, and incredibly thin. It had a long, gaunt face with sunken eyes and widened nostrils, and a long thin oily mustache which looked almost plastic. Age wise, it looked to be about 50, with white streaks in otherwise black hair, which was slicked back so thickly I could’ve sworn it was actually a mane of spines. It’s skin was off too: dry, cracked, like a painting left to the elements, looking almost like the scales of some sickly lizard.
It wore a full-on glittering cape, replacing the jacket in what was otherwise an 1800s three piece suit, like some high-class magician from post-revolutionary france. It’s thin, clawlike fingers gripped a black cane, atop which a golden set of talons clutched a glass ball which held the illusion of a galaxy swirling inside. The sheer amount of power it represented made a corona that would’ve been otherwise heavenly, and I shit you not, a golden circle of light, like a halo, hovered just above his head.
He scanned over us with slit pupils, set into emerald irises, but looked almost through us: mere mortal insects crawling on a ball of dirt and dung, beneath the concern of a creature such as Him.
“You know,” He mused, as much to Himself as anyone listening, “I had to have a new timeline shunted for this. Quite a costly thing. Quite a shame, considering what I’d intended has not come to pass.”
“What are you!?” Twilight demanded in a hiss, still shaking violently against her friends as the blood vessels in her eyes surged with red, eyes fixed upon His form, but unable to focus, “Wha-what the hell are you!?”
His brow furrowed as He looked at the two former humans sputtering on the floor, “You were supposed to last longer.” he noted, waving a hand in a vague gesture, “In fact, I told you two quite specifically that this grand confrontation was supposed to be dragged along for quite some time.”
“I am Princess Twilight Sparkle of Equestria!” Twilight’s voice was cracking, a drop of blood running from her nose, “Who are you and what the hell are you doing on Equestrian soil!? Answer me!!”
“I don’t suppose either of you are familiar with the story of David and Goliath... No, that would be beyond the pitiful scope of your reading: I assume only the hedge witch would be so educated.” He ran His eyes from the two would-be villains and over to me, “Although, I suppose when I left my fetch to recruit your adversary, I did not expect someone like her to stumble into the booth.”
“What are you talking about? What did I do?” I asked.
He turned back to the two humans He’d transformed, “And this was to be your penance for the sin you committed against me.”
“We didn’t know... We didn’t know who we were stealing from.” The hunter gasped, “
“It was just a trinket!” the dreadlord cried, “We didn’t think it was that big of a deal!”
He scowled, “It matters not what your sin was, what matters is that it was committed against me.”
“Please... we didn’t know she could do that...” the hunter begged, “Give us another chance!”
“You wouldn’t even know how to fight her.” He scoffed, turning to look around the room, “There’s no point. This whole timeline is a wash. I might as well erase it.”
The two former humans’ eyes widened as they pulled themselves closer to the wall, an act more instinct than tactic, as if any amount of distance could make one safe from such a being.
The hunter looked at me, eyes wide with terror, grasping at the last bit of hope left in the room. “Help...” he begged, “I’m sorry, we’re sorry, we’ll do whatever you ask, just... help.”
I stared back at them, unsure of what I could even do: simply being in the room with this projection of His power was overwhelming.
“Your begging annoys me.” He stated dismissively, waving His hand at them, “Be Gone.”
And in a moment, before I could even react to the feeling of a sudden shift in the energy, they were gone.
Not killed. Not vaporized. Not shifted out of place. Gone.
He had removed them from existence.
Twilight’s eyes widened, her tears beginning to turn red with blood, “What did you- how did you... you- you killed them.” she sputtered, “You killed your own servants.”
“I made them. They were mine to unmake.” He said offhandedly, the first and only acknowledgement He’d given of her presence.
“WHAT?!” she gasped, “How could you... Murder is still murder! You can’t just... just...”
He was done speaking to her, and instead narrowed His eyes at me, scanning over my form with the first real consternation we’d seen Him wear. “And you... how did you even manage this? You were never supposed to have this kind of magic. You weren’t even supposed to anything of use! You came as a normal human girl! You bought a stuffed toy of her!” He pointed at Twilight, “How could you have managed to surpass characters of that power level so quickly?!”
A few snappy comebacks went through my head, but I realized it wasn’t a good idea to antagonize Him right now. I could tell Twilight needed time to recover, and I needed information, and that meant I needed to keep Him talking while we pulled ourselves together. I needed to go along with whatever this was.
“I used magic.” I replied, not entirely sure how accurate my explanation was going to be, “Your spell killed me, and I used magic to bring myself back.”
His brow furrowed in annoyance, “That can only be a lie. The spell I left was never to kill, and no magic should have brought you back from your own unmaking. What did you do?”
“I don’t know! I don’t remember anything you’re talking about!” I protested, “I don’t even know who or what you are, let alone how you knew me!”
He rolled His eyes, “We have never met before. I no longer even manifest myself in your world. I merely know who you are because I am a god, and the gods see all.”
“That’s not an explanation: you just gave a reason with no mechanism.” I stated.
“I am a god. What more mechanism do you need than divine power?”
“Any mechanism. Everything has an explanation, even magic. There’s no such thing as gods.”
He scowled at me, “Absurd little mortal. I stand before you, a god in spectral flesh, and yet you still deny me?”
“I deny that a stable universe without causality can exist, and I deny that any being can claim the title. No one has greater right to power or existence than any other.”
He rolled his eyes, “Of course, this is your hubris, to elevate yourself to Our level. You claim that mortal beings, humans, have equal weight with the gods themselves. The absurdity of it astounds me! I would be insulted if the statement weren’t so ridiculous!”
“How can one person be more valuable than everyone else?” I countered, “No matter how much
He raised his arms, letting His power swirl around His projection, “I have walked between worlds, mortal, become ruler of some and destroyer of others as I see fit. While you roll in the mud and live your tiny, simple lives, I lead machinations whose very scope and nature is beyond your puny comprehension.”
“If you have that kind of power, what are you even doing here?” I asked, not even bringing up the logic that something so powerful shouldn’t have to justify himself to me, “Why did you kidnap humans and make them fight each other?”
He scoffed, “I just told you, mortal, I do not need to justify the acts I deign necessary. You wouldn’t even begin to comprehend my designs.”
“Try me!” I said, “Just tell me what you even gain from doing this? Was this all for your amusement?”
He shook His head, “I do not need mortals to ‘amuse’ me. Your actions are beneath me.”
“Then why did you need us to do this?” I pressed, hoping to get literally anything out of Him.
“There is power in a story, and power in destruction.” He stated, “The conflict I had intended you to have would have escalated far beyond this, it would’ve created a world so mired in violence, so rich in emotion and turmoil, that its very turning would’ve been able to power spells beyond your understanding in a war beyond your imagination.”
“Wait... you were going to use this planet as a power source?” I was begging for more information at this point. I could vaguely understand what He meant, but I had no idea what mechanism He was going to use, and the scope He was talking about was literally beyond astronomical.
He narrowed his eyes, “Of course you would like to know how to do such a thing, usurper. I was willing to humor you, but I won’t give someone who rolls in the blood of her own kind any more ideas for how to lead her insane war against nature itself.” He raised His hand, “Your sins end here.”
Before He could do anything, I felt a burst of magic from Twilight, her position in reality being shifted in an instant. In a flash of light, she stood before me, facing Him down, standing firmly on her own now, despite the blood dripping from her eyes.
“Stop it!” she shouted, “I won’t let you hurt anyone else!”
He stared at her, His hand lowering halfway as a sneer appeared on His face, “I see her petulance has rubbed off on this world’s chosen guardian.”
Twilight gritted her teeth, “I don’t care what you are, and I don’t know where you took them from, but I won’t let you use my world to torment them anymore!”
“Oh you naive little pony. If you knew the truth about her kind, you'd be terrified of them...”
Suddenly, the perception of everyone in the room shifted, the walls shifting to a grisly scene of limitless gore. Bleeding corpses hung from hooks all around us, eyes and mouths open wide in a terror that didn’t die with them. There were pigs, goats, sheep, cows... even horses. In endless lines, endless rows, they were ferried along, from the slaughter they’d been raised for, to their butchering, and eventual consumption of their flesh.
I could hear the girls retching where they’d been moving to join Twilight, unable to even give some near comparison to what they were seeing.
“What... what are you showing us...?” Twilight gasped, “What have you done?”
“Me? Nothing.” He sounded almost smug, “Factory farming is an invention entirely of the humans you beg mercy for, as if they are not just as capable with the lesser beings of their own world.” He even let out a brief chuckle at it, “...I suppose that’s what I intended to create here: a factory farm.”
“You monster....” she whimpered, “How could you even live with doing such a thing... Meta would never...”
“Marilyn Susanna?” He let out a mocking laugh, “Your so-called ‘friend’ was one of the most vicious criminals in New England!”
In the center of it all, the image of a human woman, of the human woman I used to be, standing atop a mountain of corpses, most of them human, or at least wearing the guises of them.
I tried to process them all, checked each and every face, trying desperately to find any reference to a single one in my remaining memories. But I couldn’t... either the memories were lost, or they hadn’t mattered enough for me to remember in the first place... assuming anything He was showing us was even real.
“I don’t know what this is...” I finally said, “I don’t remember killing any of these people!”
He scoffed again, seemingly amused by the reaction He was getting, “You don't even remember your crimes, but based on the abomination you've made of yourself, I can see that your depravity, your hubris, knows no bounds. How did you even do this? What are you even supposed to be? How did you even convince these fae creatures that you were anything but a monster with a form like that? And why is it that the moment one of them tells you not to kill someone is the first time you so much as hesitate?”
“I don’t know! I don’t remember anything before I woke up here!” I finally admitted, “I don’t know who that person was, or why she did what she did, but I don’t remember being her!”
He paused. “Perhaps I already did kill you... Perhaps you are merely a shadow of the beast I captured... No matter though, clearly you’re found some way to cling to the living world, even in death, and in doing so you’ve become the monster you always were. Even death cannot redeem you for what you have done in the eyes of the gods...“ He began to raise that clawed hand, “...it's time I end your foolish tantrum.”
In an instant, the force upon me was lifted, and the miasma around us was shattered, our perception of the destroyed altar room flooding back in as the false world was cut away with literal swords, flying through the air under the propulsion of powerful magics. Rushing in from the door was the mare whose dark image had been all over the walls.
Luna was pulling all her power at once, roaring with full fury as her entire body strained to bring in everything she could bear. As her massive crystal greatswords came together in an attempt to slice through the projection of the entity who was trying to kill us...
...and made Him flinch.
She gave him no time to recover, grabbing the hilts of her swords in her forehooves, whipping them around in a powerful yet fluid motion, grinding them repeatedly against the false-skin of the entity which was attacking her world. Each blow chipped away at the facade, that skin coming away to reveal what looked like twisted scales just beneath it, whose shine and pattern was marred by every scratch Luna’s blades left on it.
He growled, holding up a hand to block the blades, having it batted about as the false-flesh fell away in tatters as He held up the other, trying to summon some sort of conjuration to blast her with. The light of her horn surged as she met it with her own, filling the area with bright searing power which left scorch marks on the floor beneath them.
He brought His hand down, shoving through the blades and moving to strike her, something she only reacted fast enough to avoid the full force of. Still, He left a bloody gash on the side of her barrel, the spikes on His fist having caught upon her and torn it away with the sheer speed of the attack.
Still, she pressed her attack, despite her visible strain, hitting Him with every ounce of strength she could muster, both magical and muscular. Any moment of reprieve she gave was another opportunity for Him to counter her, and it was slowly becoming clear that His counters were wearing her down, while her assault was merely delaying His advance.
Meanwhile, Twilight was at my side, “Meta... Meta, can you recover? What do we do?”
“I don’t... I don’t know.” I brought myself to say, “This isn’t even his true form and he’s just...” I couldn’t bring up the words to describe it.
Beside us, a pair of thestrals, both in the armor of high-ranking night guards, fell in with salutes.
“Princess Twilight,” one of them said, “We can’t fight that thing. What are your orders?”
Twilight blinked up at them, confusion in her bloody eyes, “Where did you even come from? Does Luna know what that thing is?”
Crowley ran up beside them, the unicorn’s voice raspy from his heavy breathing, “An interloper from the broader Dream Realm. Possibly a Deep One. She wasn’t sure when she engaged. We only knew you were here because Nocturne was watching you” he looked at Twilight again, “Again, if you have a plan, we’re ready to assist.”
I looked at Luna’s ongoing resistance, blasting through all the options as I tried to come up with some solution before she went down, “That’s not even the entirety of the entity. This is just some sort of projection it’s created as a conduit for its power. The only reason it hasn’t just killed her is leverage: it can’t really manifest in this reality because it’s not made to be part of it.
“So she’s not even actually hitting it?” he asked, eyes widening.
“No, it’s the equivalent of pushing its hoof away.” I said.
"What... What can we even do against something that powerful? If it's not even really here?"
Suddenly, I remembered something Discord had said... the Elements of Harmony were tied to some sort of entity which existed inherently as part of this reality, a guardian against incursions like this. They had the ability to summon its power.
“Twilight,” I said quickly, “The Rainbow! Use the Rainbow on him!”
“Wha? I can’t! Do you have any idea what being this close to that kind of power can do to you!?"
Before I could respond, the entity's projection laid a fist on Luna's chest, knocking her back with a sickening crunch as her fourth and fifth ribs gave way. She snarled more as she kept swinging, trying frantically to not give Him any more openings.
“Twilight, if she goes down before you stop that thing, we all die!” I shouted, already feeling my grip on this reality loosen as the interloper managed to shove more of its power into this reality. “Get the girls together and use the damn rainbow!!”
After another moment's hesitation, Twilight nodded, whipping around to her friends behind her. “Alright girls...” she reluctantly declared, “...you know what to do.”
With that, she lit her horn, connecting herself to the others, and connecting them all to the very force of nature which governed magic among their kind, turning them into conduits for it to manifest itself. The whole process, by its very nature, involved the sudden transference of so much energy, that it bled off in other ways, producing light, anti-gravitational waves, and transformative effects brought on by the fact that it was pure magic rolling through their bodies, which took on new colors in response.
It happened in a matter of seconds, more power than I’d even thought possible flooding into one space, and once enough had gathered, it erupted into a manifestation of pure will and power.
The Rainbow Of Light isn’t just a colorful effect: when it’s happening, everyone in the room can feel it, even non-magical creatures. It’s impossible not to feel a primary facet of the world’s magic bringing that much raw power to bare. To be in its presence is to be in the presence of Harmony itself, a force so thoroughly aligned with the natural order of the world, it applies an insurmountable pressure to return everything to the way it should be. For any creature which belongs in Equestria, to behold it is a moment of absolute awe and infinite beauty...
...except for the two things that didn’t belong in the room - the Displacer and me - it only left us screaming.
Even though it was pointed away from me, simply being in the vicinity of the Rainbow Of Light was enough to make every section of my being light up in a cacophony of screaming, the force of harmony willing my abomination of existence towards its more natural state of non-existence. Reality was now determined to reassert itself in this place where it had been so thoroughly twisted, and it was rejecting my very existence as unreal.
In the milliseconds it took for the actual mass of the Rainbow Of Light to cross the room, the walls themselves disintegrated. The flesh that had made up so much of them near-instantly evaporated directly into non-existence, and I suspect the same was true for everything else in the building: it had been totally and utterly defiled by darkness and demonic magic, but no amount of mere defilation could withstand the awesome power of the Rainbow Of Light.
It went straight through Luna, not only leaving her unphased, but immediately erasing her wounds, bolstering with the strength to keep fighting, though she had no more need for it.
It was a terrifying testament to the Displacer’s power that He had time to react, roaring in pain and anger as He held up his hands, reflexively trying to block the oncoming ocean of power. His flesh held no resistance, instantly erased by the Rainbow Of Light, leaving the projection to show a truer form...
...He had become some sort of reptilian creature,
The ponies in the room all shuddered in the few seconds before it ended, the Displacer’s screaming rattling through their very souls as He was forcibly shunted from the plane he’d trespassed upon.
And then, just as abruptly as it had been summoned, the Rainbow Of Light was no longer needed, and released all hold of its man ifestation upon physical reality, that massive concen tration of energy suddenly rushing outwards, the sheer a mount of it cre ating enough light to momen tarily blind all see seeing crea tures in the ro o m.
I strained the laast
of my my will to keeep myself
to g et he rrrr
...There was nothing I could do.
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Wow. I didn't know you could do the text like that. That's really cool, also I thought this story was dead. It's nice that it came back. Good chapter as always.
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Yes. There's an update for you.
It's also an update for these guys...
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...sorry this took so long to get out, and I hope I get the rest out by year's end... I hope you all enjoy this enough to make it at least somewhat worth the time you've had to wait!
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Yeah, I've actually been sitting on the "Make the text go crazy" idea since I first outlined the story. It seemed like such a wild idea, and I LOVE the way it turned out! I'm definitely going to use that again somewhere else in the future!
Anyway, glad you liked it, and I'm glad you came back to keep reading! I'm so happy to be back on top of this!
An update cool, always happy to see a story update.
amazing chapter the images of the words distorting very unique, my hat of for you bravo
The first part of that is accurate, but ironically enough, that means that a God must exist to begin Cause and Effect.
Of course, the actual One True God is omnipotent, which includes omniscience... so this joker who was surprised by something clearly isn't Him.
Nice to see this story back on its feet, it's a nice little take on eldrich horror and powers beyond our comprehension that's it's always a treat to see more of.
Sorry you've been dealing with long covid, even the vaccines knocked me out for a couple of days. Good luck with everything!
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Glad people are enjoying it! I missed writing it and was super bummed at the idea I might never get the last couple chapters out. And yeah, hopefully they figure out something for post-COVID people: I saw the Biden administration was putting out a bunch of memos about it, so that's something...
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Fun fact: the name of one of the fonts I was using there is called "Nothing You Could Do". IDK if that influenced me or not...
This looks like something is missing from the paragraph?
A memory divorced of context flashed through my mind. A man, a god, a monster, wizened and callous, certainly this entity's peer...
"So what you're saying with all your talk of machinations beyond mortal ken," I said without really understanding the message, "is that you need a really high IQ to understand Rick & Morty."
In any case, good to see more of this. Very nice stuff with the typeface degeneration, especially how it actually differs between the different erasure attempts. I do have to wonder where it can all go from here. Looking forward to finding out.
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Oh wow, that's a glaring typo. Thanks for pointing it out, I guess I'll need to go back and figure out what should be there as soon as I get a moment to go back... :V
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I kept thinking "this is a bit like Madoka" when I was writing that part out, but sure.
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There are definitely some parallels between the self-proclaimed god and the Incubators. I just went with the most disrespectful case of Kardashev I energy harvesting I could think of.
Is this story actually „Incomplete“ (as marked)?
Because this Chapter could be the ending.
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If you check my blog, I've had to suspend a lot of stuff that I planned to complete by the end of the year, because my house was destroyed by Hurricane Ian and I will be spending what would've been free time recovering.