Tartarus Raiser

by Moosetasm

Chapter Two

Fleur sprawled upon their satin-sheeted bed and sighed with the anticipation of contentment. Soon, Fancy would be done with his shower and they would be able to spend the remainder of the day enjoying each other’s company.

Something by the bathroom door caught her eye. She rolled over, fixing her gaze on the open trunk. It would indeed be fun to let Fancy watch her explore the puzzle-box, but her curiosity was already piqued. Sliding off the bed, she approached the trunk, and began fumbling around in its contents.

She let out a small gasp of excitement as she uncovered what must be the box. It was like something she would expect to see at a fancy pastry shop, with patterns and carvings bespeaking an artistry and design aesthetic that were many times more delicate and intricate than anything she had ever seen before.

Fleur’s stomach growled involuntarily as she began to run her hooves over the box. The feeling was surprisingly, yet indescribably, pleasurable.

One of her hooves caught on an unseen ridge.

---

The water was luxurious. Fancy hadn’t had a proper shower since he’d left Canterlot, though his outer coat didn’t show it, mostly due to his habit of brushing himself every morning. His undercoat was another story, however. As the water ran over him, dark grey ash stained what was washed down the drain.

After several minutes of scrubbing, he finally allowed himself a sigh of contentment as the water ran clear.

But in that moment of peace, his ears caught a vague hint of a haunting melody coming from the bedroom. It sounded a bit like the ancient song Entry of the Gladiators…

The water stopped.

Fancy grimaced at the showerhead in confusion, as he hadn’t turned it off—and just as suddenly, the room’s lighting dimmed. He stuck his head out past the shower curtain, panning his gaze around what should have been a glistening white bathroom, which was now quite difficult to see. “Odd,” he said to nopony in particular. He refrained from repeating himself as an eerie blue illumination began to cast everything in sharp relief.

There was a low rumbling sound, remenicient of an avalanche or earthquake.

Without warning, the bathroom sink spigot began spraying what appeared to be dirty brown water. The showerhead also sprayed him with the same dark liquid, and at an uncomfortably high pressure.

“What in the—” Some of the misted liquid landed inside Fancy’s mouth as he backed away from the erupting showerhead, and he paused as he recognized the flavor. “Chocolate milk?”

Fancy stumbled through his shower curtain, out of the stream of darkened dairy delight, and watched as the toilet began overflowing with brown liquid.

“I do hope that that is also chocolate milk.” Fancy raised his brows and grabbed a towel to attempt to partially dry his dripping coat as he moved to exit the sweetly befouled bathroom.

Caring less about the possible spots of damage to his pristine white carpeting, and more focused on swiftly contacting a plumber, Fancy pushed into his bedroom.

“Fleur dear,” he said, “there’s a problem with the—”

Fancy’s jaw fell open in silent shock, and his eyebrows rose high upon his head.

The eerily lit bedroom’s walls were covered in spatters of sparkling frosting, creating a mess that would likely take days to completely clean. One part of the wall had torn open to reveal a bizarre tunnel that appeared to be bricked with gingerbread, of all things. Most concerning to Fancy, however, was that Fleur—her forehooves hanging on for dear life to the edge of the cavernous entrance—was being dragged into that tasty tunnel by what looked like strands of strawberry licorice.

Reaching out a forehoof to Fleur, Fancy could only watch in horror as she was yanked bodily into the passage.

Fancy clenched his teeth and furrowed his brow in anger. Despite the fact that he knew that the other side of the wall should have been outside his house, he galloped through the mysterious opening, tearing past cotton candy cobwebs and stirring up pixie-stick dust in the wake of his swift pursuit. But soon he slowed to a halt as the tunnel deposited him onto a small ledge littered in coconut shavings. It overlooked a ceilingless expanse that was lit in the same cold blues that had permeated both his bath and bedrooms. The most ominous feature, however, were the enormous spires that towered in the air.

“Tartarus?” Fancy couldn’t help but loose the question upon the alien panorama laid out before him. Everypony had heard rumors of a twisted plane of torment filled with an endless maze and spires of rock… but the spires before him now appeared more like upside down waffle-cones, and the platforms at the hollow center of each spire looked like they were made of some kind of caramelized pudding. A labyrinth of spun-sugar walls spread out in all directions from the ledge which he stood upon.

Somewhere down below, Fleur shrieked.

Fancy made a manageable leap from the ledge to the sticky maze below. His progress was slowed by the fact that his hooves adhered slightly to the tacky floor as he galloped. Still, the sound of Fleur’s voice was a powerful motivator, spurring him to continue regardless of how much molten confection stuck to him. He followed the echoes of her voice as best he could, even as the popping sounds of his passage threatened to drown out all other noise.

Turning a corner, Fancy saw that he had reached one of the spires, with thick waffle-cone walls surrounding a tenuously-solid floor of caramel flan. Laid in the center was Fleur, still being dragged by a tangle of licorice. Charging forwards, Fancy lit his horn and blasted the chewy ropes beyond Fleur, causing them to snap and retract swiftly into the distance from whence they came.

Fancy wasted no time galloping to Fleur’s side. “Are you alright my dearest?” he asked.

Struggling to disentangle herself from the now-limp restraints, Fleur spit out a wad of frosting that had been shoved into her mouth. “Blech, too sweet,” she said.

“Come dearest,” Fancy said as he helped Fleur to her hooves. “This confectionary cavern is—”

“BORF?!”

Fancy and Fleur slowly turned to see the enormous three-headed dog that was Cerberus. The most notable difference to what Fancy remembered of legends about him was that his spiked collars had been replaced by donuts: one plain-cake, one powdered sugar, and one cinnamon sugar. The curious collars were studded with gumdrops of varying colors. There was also the cotton candy “fur,” which rendered him decidedly pink.

“Is that… Cerberus?” Fleur couldn’t keep the disbelief from her voice.

“Slowly back away dear,” Fancy said as he calmly followed his own advice. In an effort to not seem challenging, he kept his gaze on Cerberus, but away from the three pairs of borderline-zoomies eyes belonging to the colossal canine. “Good boy, stay… staaaaay.”

They’d almost backed up to the edge of the spire platform when one of Fleur’s hooves sank into the flan floor, tripping her and causing her to let out a small yelp of alarm.

Looking down, Fancy quickly struggled to get Fleur back to her hooves. But when he looked back up, he realized his mistake at taking his eyes off the excitable, oversized pup.

“BORF, BORF, BORF! WOOF, WOOF, WOOF!”.

Fleur froze at the sight of the charging mongrel monolith. Fancy grabbed her and dragged her back into the sugarspun maze, struggling to recollect the series of twists and turns that had led them into the very bowels of… well, he supposed it was Tartarus, at any rate.

The crashing sounds of Cerberus obliterating the labyrinth behind them filled their ears.

Thankfully, Fancy’s memory served him well, and both he and Fleur scrambled up to the gingerbread tunnel leading back to their bedroom. Yet as they approached, they could see that the opening was closing itself, forcing them to increase their speed or risk being entombed. They dove at the last second to make it through—

And landed on their improbably pristine bed.

“What,” Fleur asked between ragged breaths, “was that?”

“Tartarus, I think,” Fancy replied. “Although it was not as I ever imagined it—”

A sudden jet of edible confetti and rainbow sprinkles rocketed from the ground to the sounds of a bike horn, startling the couple and causing them to raise pillows to deflect the deluge of delectables. The resurgence of projectile sweets rendered the partially confection-coated room to be even more covered.

Standing at the explosion’s epicenter was a grey-frosted pony, whose head looked like a heavily iced cupcake with a crisscross of gelled icing. At regular intervals were fiendishly lit candles. He resembled a birthday cake supported by a pony body.

“Praytell,” Fancy said, “who are you?”

The malevolent “Cake Head” turned to face them.

“An explorer,” he said in an otherworldly voice, “in the farther realms of confectionary experience.” He stood up on his hind legs and spread his forelegs. “Preference decides: Devil's Food to some, Angel’s Food, to others!”

“Dear,” Fancy said, not daring to take his eyes off of the intruder. “Did you—”

“I may have opened the box!” Fleur blurted out.

“Yes,” Cake Head said, slowly approaching the bed. “The box.” He pointed an accusatory hoof. “You opened it. I came.”

“It’s just a pastry box!” Fleur shrieked.

“Oh no,” Cake Head said. “It is a means to summon me. You solved the box. Now you must come with me. Sample my assortment of cakes and danishes.”

“I’m watching my weight,” Fleur said through tears. “Just go away and leave us alone!”

Cake Head managed to look incredulous through layers of baked goodness. “Oh, no diets, please. It’s a waste of good flavoring!”

“I say,” Fancy said. “My good chap. It seems there must be a mistake. The dragons who gave me the box said nothing of this. Surely you would only desire ponies who opened the box while fully informed.”

“Perhaps I prefer her,” Cake Head said.

“Perhaps we could come to an arrangement,” Fancy said, finally lowering his pillow shield.

“Make your offer then,” Cake Head replied. “But cheat me, and I’ll tear your cakes apart!”

“But we don’t keep any in the house—”

“APART!”

“J—Just a moment, dear,” Fleur said, haltingly. Fancy turned to see a curious expression on her face. Though her muzzle pulled back in a rictus of fear, there was a glint in her eyes that Fancy knew all too well from their frequent walks down Bakery Row. It was one of… desire. “You… said… that you had… samples?”

“Oh yes,” Cake Head said with intensity. “Many, many samples.”

“My dear,” Fancy said.

But Fleur plowed on like a princess in a pastry shop: “I… I do try to watch my weight, though I confess the occasional… temptation.”

“And indulgence,” Cake Head said knowingly.

Fleur blushed and averted her gaze, but nodded.

“My dear, this is madness,” Fancy said.

Cake Head threw his forelegs wide. “Is it madness to deny one’s true desires? Especially when they are soaked with such flavor, just waiting to be sampled? Nibbled? Gorged-upon?!”

“I try,” Fleur said, tears continuing to run down her muzzle as she began to rock back and forth. “I try so hard…”

“No, dear!”

She raised her head, and Fancy’s heart fell as he saw that the glimmer in her eyes had gone black as licorice. “But I am done trying. Done waiting. I waited for you, my love… but you made me wait longer than my heart could bear.”

“But… the train!” Fancy sputtered. “The shower!” He gestured wildly at the brown streaks that discolored his coat. “I was filthy!”

Cake Head shook his head, a wan smile on his lips. “No more delays. It is my sweets she wishes to experience, not your skills at bargaining!”

“Fleur!” Fancy bellowed. “I love you as you are!”

“But not as she shall be!”

“No!”

“Celestia… ate,” Fleur whimpered.

“Go,” Cake Head said, turning to Fancy. “This is not for your eyes.”

The bedsheets erupted in tendrils of sticky taffy, throwing Fancy to the floor and blocking out his sight of Fleur and Cake Head. The crazy cuisinier’s laughter sliced through the cacophony of candy-sounds coming from the other side of the culinary curtain. Yet Fancy could also hear muffled vocalizations from Fleur—sounds that set his blood alight with jealousy, fear, and a hankering for cinnamon rolls.

Fancy lit his horn and blasted an opening. The candyfloss nightmare reeled back for a moment, then resurged. Again he fired, and again, and again. But his efforts were in vain; the sugarcoated surface advanced, pushing him backwards until he was forced through one of the bedroom’s windows.

Fortunately—for Fancy at least, much less so for his azaleas—he landed in the shrubs below. He rolled to his hooves, grunting in pain as he rose. Looking up to the window, he saw only a protruding mass of pulsating pastry. He turned toward the heart of the city, sparing one final glance back as he galloped away. “Stay strong, my love; I shall return with aid!”

Comments

[Jake The Army Guy]

Cake Head managed to look incredulous through layers of baked goodness. “Oh, no diets, please. It’s a waste of good flavoring!”

“Celestia… ate,” Fleur whimpered.

Dear Sweet Bald Baby Jesus of Fuck, I love you right now.