The Mare Who Cried Monster.

by ChromeRegios

Chapter 11

The photo was clear and sharp. Mr. Warts’ large desk stood in the center in a burst of bright light. I could see papers on the desk, the pan of turtles at the far corner, a low pile of books. Behind the desk, I could see the top of Mr. Warts’ tall wooden stool and behind the stool, the shelves were in clear focus, even the glass jar of flies on the lower shelf.

But there was no monster.

No Mr. Warts.

No one.

No one in the snapshot all.

“He – he was standing right there!” I cried. “Behind the desk!”

“The room looks empty,” Applejack said, staring down over my shoulder at the snapshot in my quivering hoof.

“There’s no one there,” Fluttershy said, turning her gaze on me.

“He was there,” I insisted, unable to take my eyes off the photo. “Right there.” I pointed to where the monster had stood.”

Scootaloo laughed. “Let me see.” She pulled the photo from my hoof and examined it. “I see him!” she declared. “He’s invisible!”

“It’s not funny, Scoots… come on…” I said weakly. I took the photo from her and sighed unhappily. I felt so bad. I wanted to sink into a hole in the floor and never come out.

“He’s invisible!” Scootaloo repeated gleefully, enjoying her own joke. Fluttershy and Applejack were staring at me, looks of concern on their faces.

“Don’t you see?” I cried, waving the photo in one hoof. “Don’t you see? This proves it! This proves he’s a monster. He doesn’t show up in photographs!”

Applejack shook her head and frowned. “Rainbow, haven’t you carried this joke far enough?”

Fluttershy put a hoof on my shoulder. “I’m starting to get worried about you,” she said softly. “I think you’re really starting to believe in your own monster joke.”

“Can we get Icecream?” Scoots asked.

-----------------------------------------

“Uugghhh… I can’t believe we’re doing this,” Scootaloo complained.

“Just shut up, you owe me!” I snapped. It was the next evening. We were crouched low, hiding behind the low shrubs at the side of the library.

It was a crisp, cool day. It seems the Weather mares are doing less today since it’s our break. The sun was already lowering itself behind the trees. The shadows stretched long and blue over the library lawn. “I owe you?” Scootaloo protested. “Are you crazy?!”

“You owe me,” I repeated. “You were supposed to come to the library with me yesterday, remember? You let me down.”

She brushed off her nose. “Can I help it if I’m hungry?” She sounded funny. She seems to have a slight cold since she ate so much ice cream yesterday.

“Yes,” I insisted. “I counted on you, and you let me down – and you got me in all kinds of trouble.”

“What kind of trouble- ohh….” She dropped to the ground and sat on her haunches, keeping her head low behind the evergreen shrub.

“Those two said I’m never again allowed to mention Mr. Warts or the fact that he’s a monster,” I told her.

“Wait, why didn’t I remember that?” She asked confused. Obviously didn’t saw or hear what happened next once we got home.

“You fell asleep the moment you got in the sofa.” I said to her, looking really bitter.

“Well… that’s good.” She said.

“Not good. It means I really need you, Scoots. I need you to see that I’m telling the truth, and tell those two its real!” My voice broke. “They think I’m crazy. They really do!”

She started to reply, but she could see I was really upset. So she stopped herself. “Sorry about last night… I was just kidding around.” A cool breeze swept past, making the trees all seem to whisper at us.

I kept my eyes trained on the library door. It was past five-twenty, past closing time. Mr. Warts should be coming out any second. “So we’re going to follow Mr. Warts home?” Scoots asked, scratching the back of her neck. “And spy on him at his house? Why don’t we just watch him through the library window?”

“The window is too high,” I replied. “We have to follow him. He told me he walks home every evening. I want you to see him turn into a monster,” I said, staring straight ahead over the top of the bush. “I want you to believe me.”

“This again?” Scoots scratched her head even more. “What if I say I believe you instead?” Scoots asked, grinning. “Then could we go home?”

“Sssshh!!” I pressed a hoof over Scoots’ mouth. The library door was opening. Mr. Warts appeared on front of the steps. Scoots and I ducked down lower.

I peered through the branches of the shrub. The librarian turned to lock the front door. He was wearing a red-and-white-striped short-sleeved sport shirt. He had a red cap on his bald head.

“Stay far behind,” I whispered to Scoots. “Don’t let him see you.”

“Good advice,” Scoots said sarcastically.

We both shifted onto out knees and waited for Mr. Warts to head down the sidewalk. He hesitated on the steps, replacing the keys in his bag. Then, humming to himself, he walked down the road and turned away from us. “What’s he humming about?” Scoots whispered.

“He always hums,” I whispered back. Mr. Warts was more than half a block away. “Let’s go,” I said climbing quickly to my hooves.

Keeping in the shadows of the trees and shrubs, I began following the librarian, Scoots followed just behind me. “Do you know where he lives?” Scoots asked.

I turned back to him, frowning. “If I knew where he lived, we wouldn’t have to follow him – would we!”

“O-oh… right.” She grinned sheepishly.

Following someone was a lot harder than I thought. We had to cut through front yards. Some of them had barking dogs. Some had thorny bushes. Some had thick hedges we somehow had to duck through. At every street corner, Mr. Warts would stop and look both ways for oncoming carts. Each time, I was certain he was going to look over his shoulder too, and see Scoots and me creeping along behind him.

He lived farther from the library than I had thought. After several blocks, the houses ended, and a bare, flat field spread in front of us. Mr. Warts cut through the field, walking quickly, swinging his stubby hooves rhythmically which each step. We had no choice but to follow him across the field. There were no hiding places. No shrubs to duck behind or hedges to shield us. We were completely out in the open. We just had to pray to Celestia that he didn’t turn around in the middle of the field and see us.

A block of small, older houses stood beyond the field. Most of the houses were brick, set close to the street on tiny front yards.

Mr. Warts turned onto a block of these houses. Scoots and I crouched behind a mailbox and watched him walk up to a house near the middle of the block. He stepped onto the small front steps and fiddled in his pocket for the keys. “We’re here,” I whispered to Scoots. “We made it.”

“My friend Feather Weight lives on this block, I think.” Scoots said.

“Who cares?” I snapped. “Keep your mind in the current mission, okay?”

We waited until Mr. Warts had disappeared through the front door of his house, and then crept closer. His house was white clapboard, badly in need of a paint job. He had a small rectangle of a front yard, with recently cut grass boarded by a single row of tall, yellow tiger lilies. Scoots and I made out way quickly to the side of the house where there was a narrow strip of grass that led to the back. The window near the front of the house was high enough for us to stand under and not be seen. A light came on the window. “That must be his living room,” I whispered.

Scoots had a frightened expression. Her face seems a lot paler. “I don’t like this,” she said.

“The hard part was following him,” I assured Scoots. “This part is easy. We just watch him through the window.”

“But the window is too high,” Scoots pointed out. “We can’t see anything at all!”

I literally put a hoof into my face, ready to make a HUGE contradiction to her statement. “Look, Scoots. We have wings… We can hover over.”

“I can’t fly remember?” She snapped back at me.

“Gee whiz, kid… you still don’t know how to fly?”

“I’m trying my best here, give me a break!” She pouts.

“Alright, alright. no need to get stingy.” I said, as I try to figure out how she can look in as well while not blowing our cover. I could carry her, but that would mean a lot of time hovering with an almost a pound heavy little filly. Another light came on, this one in a back window. Probably the kitchen, I figured. It was also too high for the little one to see… especially when she can’t fly and all.

“Hmm…” I was thinking for a bit if I should bring alone Scoots while I peek, but she’s more than a dead giveaway because of her un-stealthy way of spying. “Look, I’ll go peek in instead, you stand watch, okay?”

“Aww, fine.” She pouts again, sitting down at the ground and puffing her left cheek.

I sighed and floated up a bit, then started peeking. Somewhere down the block a dog barked. I hoped he wasn’t barking because of Scoots and me. Another dog, closer to us, quickly joined in, and it became a barking conversation.

“Do you see anything?” Scoots whispered loudly.

One hoof was grabbing the window pane, while I raised my head and peered into the house through the bottom window. “Yeah. I can see some,” I called down. “There’s a big aquarium in front of the window, but I can see most of the living room.” And just as I said that, Mr. Warts’ face loomed inches away from mine. He was staring right at me!

I gasped and lost my fight pattern, I fell to the ground, knocking over a wheelbarrow and lands head first at the ground. “Ow!”

“What happened?” Scoots cried, alarmed.

“He saw me!” I choked out, waiting for the pain to stop throbbing.

“What?!” Scoots’ mouth dropped open we both gazed up at the window. I expected to see Mr. Warts staring down at us. But there’s no sign of him there.

I climbed quickly to my hooves. “Maybe he was looking at the aquarium,” I whispered, motioning Scoots to come closer. “Maybe he didn’t see me.”

“Wh-what are you gonna do?” Scoots stammered, in her squeaking voice.

“Get back up of course.” I told her. My legs were shaking as I float back up and grabbed the window ledge and looked back in.

The sun had nearly gone down. The darkness outside made it easier to see inside the house and I hoped, harder for Mr. Warts to see out. I didn’t have the best view in the world, I quickly realized. The aquarium, crowded with colorful fish, blocked my view of most of the room. If only I can go a little higher, but of course… also blowing my cover.

“What’s he doing?” Scoots asked in a trembling whisper.

“Nothing he’s… wait!” Mr. Warts was staring down at the fish. He stood only a few feet from me, on the other side of the aquarium, and a smile formed on his pudgy face. He had removed the red cap as his head looked yellow in the living room lamplight. His mouth moved. He was saying something to the tropical fish in the aquarium. I couldn’t hear him through the glass.

Then, he smiled down at his fish, he began to change. “He’s doing it,” I whispered to Scoots. “He’s turning into a monster.” As I watched Mr. Warts’ head inflate and his eyes bulge out, I was filled with all kinds of strange feelings. I was terrified, and I was fascinated at the same time. It was exciting to be so close, inches away from a real monster! I felt happy and relieved that Scoots would finally see for herself that I was telling the truth!

Then, as Mr. Warts’ mouth grew wider and began to gyrate, a twisting black home on his swollen, yellow face, fear overtook me. I froze there; my face was pressed against the window, not blinking, not moving.

I stared as he reached a hoof into the aquarium. His fat hooves wrapped around a slender blue fish. He pulled it up and flipped it into his mouth. I could see long, yellow teeth inside the enormous mouth, biting down, chewing the wriggling fish. Then, as I gaped in growing terror, Mr. Warts pulled a black snail off the side of the aquarium glass. Holding its shell between his hooves he stuffed the snail into his mouth. His teeth crunched down hard on its shell, cracking it – a crack so loud, that it can even rival Tank’s shell pounce. Oh, how Fluttershy would be furious if she sees this.

My stomach churned. I felt sick.

He swallowed the snail, and then reached to pull another one off the aquarium glass. “I think I’m going to toss my lunch,” I whispered down to Scoots.

Scoots!! I forgot all about her! I was so fascinated by the monster, so excited, so terrified to watch him close up, that I had forgotten the whole purpose of being here! “Scoots! Grab my hoof! You’ve got to see this! You got to see the monster!” I whispered still staring through the window. “Scoots! Hey! Didn’t you hear me?!” She didn’t reply… “Scoots? Scoots?!” I lowered my eyes from the window
Scoots had disappeared!!

Author's Note:

It's a long update, but here's the current one. Clearly I have tons of work to do, specially my other Light Novel coming up this december.