2986 Steps

by Verlax

Chapter Fourteen - The Writer

Twilight froze in place, her every senses straining to the brink of madness, focusing on the soft sound. It echoed behind her in a slow, monotonous rhythm, like a grotesque pendulum heralding the coming of an unspeakable evil. Every nerve in her body tensed, every hair on the back of her neck stood on end as she waited for what was to come.

*crunch*

She slowly turned around, her eyes wide open in fear. The door behind her was unlocked, Twilight completely forgot about it in her haste.

*crunch*

There was no exit apart from the one leading to the stairs.

*crunch*

She had no weapon, she had no means to protect herself.

*crunch*

And she had hope.

*crunch*

There was a little pause. After several silent seconds the door creaked open and her eyes fell on the grotesque form of the wraith in its full putrid splendor.

From this distance she could see all of its terrifying features. The broad leather hat bathed most of its face in shadows, but the Messiah’s glowing eyes were still visible, glaring at her with pure hatred. A single glance at its rotting form was enough to send sharp needles through her brain, the powerful stench it emanated stunningly disgusting, almost making her vomit. His skin was covered with grievous wounds, but none of them were bleeding, instead pus slowly seeped from them in yellow rivers.

Twilight’s mind screamed at her to get out of there, to teleport as far away as she could, to run for her life, but she didn’t move an inch. She was frozen in place, paralyzed from fear this eldritch abomination was inducing in her, reducing her brilliant mind into a jumble of half-formed thoughts she couldn’t understand. The terrifying form was too much for her to comprehend and for the first time in her life she didn’t know what to do.

The Leper Messiah slowly approached her, the stink getting even more overwhelming with each step it took. It was at that moment her legs decided to work again. In pure panic she started to back away, never leaving her gaze from the horror in front of her. But she couldn’t back up forever; Twilight’s rump hit the bookshelf behind her, making her gasp in surprise.

“No, no, no, don’t touch me, don’t touch me, don’t touch me!” she cried, rising her hoof to her eyes to block the terrifying visage, a futile attempt to protect herself. She was going to die, she knew it.

Nothing happened.

“With all due respect Miss; what are you doing in my basement?” a droning, monotone voice asked.

Wait, what?

She looked again, and where once stood the grotesque figure of the Messiah now was the tiny, gray form of a colt. Lovecraft looked at her disapprovingly. Twilight blinked several times, almost expecting the eldritch apparition to sprout in front of her, but no, it was only the owner of this library. Despite the awkwardness of the situation, the librarian still possessed the same blank expression painted on his face.

Twilight’s mind sprung back to life and was frantically looking for a plausible explanation what she was doing here. She seriously doubted the colt would take kindly to her trespassing in his basement. But before she could come up with any way to “omit the truth” (Twilight didn’t like word “lie”), Lovecraft inhaled deeply, his face twisting into a disgusted frown. He spotted the completely degenerated book lying on the desk.

“Wait… did you really… did you really touch this!?” he finally snapped, for the first time showing any kind of emotion.

“Ehm, what exa-” Twilight tried to shakily say something, but Lovecraft almost immediately bolted out of the basement. He came back after a moment with the bucket full of… oil!?

“Stand back” he said as he kicked the book into the far corner. He poured the contents of the bucket onto the tome. With that accomplished his hoof traveled towards one of the oil lamps which he then promptly threw at the corrupted book. The tome almost exploded, coloring the flames with a deep, red hue, like the flames of Tartarus itself. Lovecraft kept an eye on the sizzling grimoire, making sure the fire would not spread. After a few moments, there was nothing left but dust.

“I believe that entering other ponies’ basements is not socially acceptable.” Lovecraft spoke softly after the flames died down. “Especially in case of this basement. And I lost an incredibly valuable tome because of you.

“I’m sorry.” Twilight said, bowing her head

“Don’t be. I believe that your arrival here has set into motion a new series of events.” he spoke. “You came here in search of answers and I think I can deliver some of them…

---

“Here, take this.” Lovecraft passed Twilight a cup of hot, steaming tea.“You look like somepony who saw a ghost.”

Twilight accepted the cup with silent gratitude, sitting in one of two chairs. Even though it was several minutes since the incident in the basement she still couldn’t concentrate enough to use her magic, and her hooves were still shaking, as evident by the loud rattling of the china. She tried to recall every single moment from that situation. How it was possible? She thought that she saw this thing in the corner of her eye when she was walking through the streets of Flankfurt, but to appear in the middle of somepony’s home? That was unthinkable!

Twilight also tried to think what should she do next, especially with Lovecraft. She wasn’t sure she could be completely honest with him. Twilight was pretty sure half of the books in the basements were strictly forbidden. How in the name of Celestia was he even able to obtain them?! Then again, this was a perfect opportunity to finally get some information.

They were in Lovecraft’s personal study. It was a small room with several wooden, ancient pieces of furniture. It was probably also the only room here that wasn’t filled with books stacked to the very roof. The only paper here was in the form of several notes and small tomes stacked into a small tower on a rickety desktop. The only decoration was a portrait of an elderly pony wearing a monocle on the wall, glaring at her from the darkness. A single oil lamp was illuminating the chamber, making the furniture cast spindly, flickering shadows on the walls.

“I would like to ask the first question if you do not mind. It is something that was troubling me for some time now.” Lovecraft started, clearing his desktop a bit and sitting on the opposite chair. “Could you explain to me why you started to behave so strange when I found you in the basement?”

Her mind was set: collector of forbidden texts or not, she was going to be honest with him.

“I think I had some sort of hallucination.” Twilight said slowly. “I thought you were the Leper Messiah. Gosh, it was so real that I could even smell the decay of a leper’s body.

Lovecraft silently mulled over those words.

“Interesting. So you were sure that this “thing” was the Leper Messiah?”

“Certainly.”

Again, silence. Lovecraft propped his head on a hoof.

“If that is the case then before we continue I suppose some apologies are in place.” he spoke, his gaze shifting guiltily to the floor. “I should not have ignored you like some sort of mischievous ruffian back during our first meeting. I am deeply sorry.”

Twilight was surprised to say at least. “Oh. Ehm, thank you. “

“Back to the matter at hoof: you still need answers, correct?”

Twilight nodded.

“Yes, indeed. In 587 Anno Celesis there was an epidemic of leprosy in Coltcutta, right?”

“Correct.” It was Lovecraft’s turn to nod.

“Has the epidemic been countered? What happened with the city?”

“Fire happened.” Lovecraft stated flatly. “In the apogeum of the panic and complete madness somepony set the slums ablaze. The conflagration was incredibly powerful, most of the city has been turned to ash. The fire purified the entire city, killing thousands of ponies yet also halting the spread of the disease.”

A strange thought invaded Twilight’s mind as she realized something. Isolated, poor city. Leprosy. Complete panic. Entire city built out of wood… in the name of Celestia, is the fire the next step!? No… wait… conditions are quite similar, but not that similar. I’m freaking out, I have to calm down. Besides, it’s so cold, there is no way fire can spread… right?

“And what happened with Nostramane?” she asked, shaking her head to clear her thoughts.

“Who? Nostramane? You mean the apothecary?” Lovecraft said confused. “Well, I am not really sure, but I do not recall if there are any sources that speaks of it. Actually, I am not really sure if it is known when she died. The only thing that is sure is that she vanished after the destruction of Coltkutta.”

“Huh.”

There was a short break, a dozen or so seconds of silence. Twilight was drinking her tea while Lovecraft was busy inspecting the notes that littered his desktop.

“Is life hard here?” Twilight suddenly asked, completely out of the blue.

“Nah, it’s not that bad I guess.” Lovecraft turned his face and regarded her, a shadow of a smile on his lips. “I did not eat a good meal in over a month, but I have a stable job and I am proud of it. Of course, the pay I get from the Council is getting lower and lower, so I had to start proof-reading other writers works just to make a living.”

“Are you a writer?” she asked, her eyes suddenly sparkling with interest.

“Well… yes. But I do not have any of them published in the form of books.” Lovecraft admitted a bit embarrassed. “I published three of my short tales in a local Manezette, but besides that, nothing. Everything I wrote lies on this desktop.”

With curiosity Twilight lifted one of the first pages with her magic and began reading.

“I am writing this under an appreciable mental strain, for as of this night, I shall be no more…” Twilight read. “It seems that you don’t live up to your name.” she smiled and put it away.

Lovecraft chuckled, a tiny smile gracing his lips.

“Yes, I guess my name should be Hatecraft. More fitting.” he laughed.

“Yhm.” Twilight nodded and took another sip from the cup.

Lovecraft cleaned the desk with one swift move. He leaned forward a bit.

“So, what are you going to do next?”

Well, that was a good question. She had nothing more to do here, maybe expect chatting with the librarian for a bit more. She also didn’t have any particular idea what to do in Mareggen. Maybe she should go back to the hospital? Yes, she probably should do just that...

“Well, I guess I’m going back to work.” Twilight said while standing from her chair. “There are a few ponies waiting for me back at the hospital.”

“Fine by me.” Lovecraft nodded with understanding. “If you’ll ever find yourself with some free time to spare, please come and visit. Maybe we could talk about literature a bit more.”

“Thanks, I’ll try.” she promised smiling. “Bye!”

---

Meanwhile

Dostoyevsky trotted through the snow-covered streets, searching for the last house from his list, but he couldn’t for the love of Faust find it. He was out on yet another search for infected ponies that could’ve skipped an earlier search and hid somewhere in town. He already visited two houses and thankfully he didn’t found any signs of leprosy. This was the last house for the day, and as if Lightbringer himself decided to play a cruel joke on him it hid from his gaze.

Today was far warmer than yesterday, and the elder pony was mostly used to the cold by now. It was almost like walking in the middle of summer, that is Flankfurt summer of course. Maybe the wind was slightly stronger than usual, but his noble apparel blocked out the worst of it.

Dostoyevsky turned into another street, this one leading to the noble district. The residences here were built with skill far beyond that of the rest of the city, the buildings neater in comparison to the ones in other districts and far more decorative. Reading through his notes Dostoyevsky realized that this was the street she should have been looking through the whole time. Feeling stupid he search for “the third house on the right side” as per his notes.

He found the house quite quickly, if it could be called a mere house. “More like a palace” Dostoyevsky muttered under his breath as he gazed upon the oaken building swept from all sides by sparkling snow. It was fairly old, and maybe not the best looking of all residences on this street, but still, it was fairly impressive.

He looked on the wooden plate nailed to the front doors just before knocking.

Quicksilver Manor

We do not welcome visitors!

“Huh, they seems to be vere vere friendly.” Dostoyevsky hummed to himself as he knocked.