Seeing Monsters

by Hopefullygoodgrammar

First published 24th of June, 2014

Daring Do visits and old enemy in the Hoofington Asylum and discovers a horrific truth.

Daring Do visits her oldest foe, Ahuizotl, in the Hoofington Insane Asylum after receiving a letter from the administrator telling her that he was found a gibbering wreck.

She was prepared for a ruse, or something of the like.

She wasn't prepared for what she found in his cell, or the gruesome story that he told her.

A story of an ancient ruin and a nightmare that has been unleashed onto the world.

Inspired by the works of H. P Lovecraft, Amnesia: the Dark Descent and the series Penny Dreadful.

The Sundered Veil.

Seeing Monsters

*************************************************

Daring Do looked out the window of the train: the sky was swollen with dark, gray clouds that vomited torrents of rain down upon the dreary countryside.

She was glad that she had decided not to fly to her destination; she wouldn’t have lasted long in this weather.

The weather pegasi had better have a good reason for all this. she thought as a jagged spear of lightning sliced through the dark sky, followed by the roar of a thunder clap. Daring shivered, she had always been fine with storms, she even used to sleep through them when she was a filly, but this storm was… different somehow: it seemed to her that night had come early and would be lasting a good while.

Sighing, the tan pegasus glanced down at the neatly-folded note in her hooves, it had arrived the previous day and its contents had been enough to call her away from writing her newest book. The note had come from Hoofington, and read:

To Miss. Daring Do

My name is Dr. Helping Hoof and I am the administrator of the Hoofington Insane Asylum.

Three weeks ago a new and rather… unique patient was brought to us, The authorities said that he had been spotted wandering the marketplace in one of the outlying villages in Saddle Arabia. They told me that he had been nearly dead from dehydration and malnourishment, I agreed to take him and found him to be of a very unique and somewhat infamous race: an Ahuizotl.

I’m sure that name brings up some bad memories, but it is true. You may also be thinking “Maybe it isn’t the Ahuizotl that I’ve met, maybe it’s a different one.”

But this particular specimen IS the one that you’ve encountered so often: his physical description is matches the one which you’ve given in each of your books and he seems to know who you are.

We’ve tried all that we can for him, he’s in very bad shape at the moment, but he’s refused all treatment and says that he wants to talk to you and you alone.

It’s gotten to the point where he screams out his demands and slams his head into the walls and floor. I’ve tried everything I can, but I’m afraid for his life as he’s already given himself a minor concussion and has managed to bite off several of his fingers.

I know that you’re enemies, but Mr. Ahuizotl is my patient and I must uphold my hippocratic oath and care for him as best I can. Please, Miss. Do, help him, help him for my sake as well as his own.

I’ve enclosed a map to the Asylum, I hope that you can respond as soon as possible.

Respectfully yours

Dr. Helping Hoof.

Daring had read the note several times over, searching for any sign of Ahuizotl’s trickery, but the more she read it, the more she became convinced that the note was legitimate.

She had known Ahuizotl for as long as she had been adventuring and she knew him as well as he knew her.

Ahuizotl was physically powerful, as the many times in which she had been punched, kicked, or introduced to a wall, could attest and, although he was quite the brilliant mind, subtlety was not his forte.

It was like he had been overtaken by the spirit of a comic book villain. He got himself a posse of felines, abandoned his scientist garb for… nothing, constantly tried to show her up even though he was perfectly capable of finding his own ancient ruins, and he always, always monologued when he could have just killed her or knocked her out.

It had become so cliched, so tiring to her over the past years. She often found herself wondering if her “arch-nemesis” had similar thoughts to hers, but she often dismissed that notion, thinking that he had delved far too deep into the role of super-villain to have any real, intelligent thoughts beyond plots for world domination and the care of cats.

Daring leaned her head against the window, letting the cold glass numb her cheek. She was feeling tired again and there were no distractions for her outside of looking at the storm raging outside.

I still have an hour or two, so I might as well get some sleep. she thought as she closed her eyes and drifted off into Nod.

An hour later she awoke with a gasp, her body soaked with cold sweat.

She couldn’t remember most of the nightmare that had invaded her mind, she could only recall glimpses of darkened tunnels and deep pools of crimson.

She shivered and rubbed her hooves across her shoulders, trying to get some warmth back into her limbs. She had never been much of a dreamer (a fact that she was sure annoyed Princess Luna to no end), so the nightmare had caught her completely off guard and, what was stranger, Luna hadn’t come to stop it.

Daring was jolted out of the stupor that she hadn’t realized she had fallen into by the shrill screech of the train wheels coming to a halt; she had arrived in Hoofington.

---

The rain froze Daring to her very core, but she still refused to take a cab. The Hoofington Insane Asylum wasn’t too far away from the train station, after all.

Kinda weird that they’d build an asylum a few blocks away from a train station. she thought, I mean, isn’t that asking for trouble?

She tried to muster a smile at her own joke, but the oppressive atmosphere of the town was far too distracting. She had thought that the countryside had been dreary, but Hoofington, with its slimy cobblestones, grimy buildings, potholes and seemingly perpetual state of fogginess had proved her wrong.

The tan pegasus pulled her cloak tighter around her lithe body as the tendrils of fog reached out for her like the tentacles of some ancient sea monster.

This place feels… wrong. she thought to herself as she trudged onwards, This place feels like- like some of the old tombs that I’ve raided.

She was so caught up in her own thoughts that she didn’t realize that she had come under the heavy shadow of the asylum until she had gone halfway up the steep road that led to the massive, wrought-iron gates.

She blinked and then let the image in front of her wash over her like flood waters.

The Hoofington Insane Asylum was massive, almost the size of a castle. It had many turrets which rose towards the sky like jagged teeth, the many windows that dotted the facade were all glowing with a sickly yellow light and the grounds were a tangle of weeds and odd-looking plants.

It looks like the kind of place that Dr. Frankenstallion would live in…. I wonder if I’ll find this Dr. Hoof hunched over some hulking thing underneath a bloody sheet. thought Daring snidely as she made her way towards the building.

She trotted up to the heavy-looking iron door and tentatively knocked with a soaked wing. A second later the door was opened by a lanky, blue-furred unicorn stallion wearing a rumpled doctor’s uniform. When he saw her, his face- which bore the tell-tale signs of extreme exhaustion- brightened up.

“Miss. Do!” he said with a smile, “I’m so glad that you actually came!”

“Thank you.” she replied with a smile of her own.

“Oh, where are my manners, I’m Dr. Helping Hoof, at your service.” he said, sticking a hoof out.

“Daring Do, but you already knew that.” said Daring, returning the shake.

She stepped in and allowed the unicorn to levitate her coat off and hang it up on a wall of pegs that were really no more than large nails that had been crudely hammered into the wooden walls.

The doctor turned to her, “I know, I know: this place is a ruin, but it’s home… at least for me and my patients.”

Daring gave him a knowing look “I understand, times are getting tougher in these parts.”

Dr. Hoof gave her a wan smile, “Yes, quite. Ahuizotl is on the third floor, I’ll escort you there.”

Daring nodded and followed the doctor down the dimly-lit hallways of the first floor. As they walked the adventurer took the time to take in her surroundings.

The asylum was old, of that fact there could be no doubt: the walls were stained with brownish spots, the tiles of the floor were chipped and framed by lines of black grime, the ceiling was dusty and every little nook was filled with thick, silvery spiderwebs. On top of that, the whole place reeked of mildew and disinfectant.

I’ve seen hostels in third-world countries that were better-looking than this. thought Daring as Dr. Hoof led her up a flight of dirty steps that led to the second floor.

“I’m afraid the elevator is out at the moment, so we have to take the stairs at the other end of this wing.” said Dr. Hoof, “I’d also advise that you stay close to me, we’ll be passing some of the patient’s rooms and although the second wing has the least violent patients, they can be unpredictable at times.”

“Alright, whatever you say, doc.” said Daring, moving closer to the haggard doctor.

---

Their walk down the second wing and their trek up the stairs that led to the third wing were uneventful, much to Daring’s relief.

Her relief was short-lived, however, when they actually entered into the third wing.

The lights overhead flickered in a steady rhythm as they made their way down the long hallway, the doors that flanked them were thick, made of iron, and locked with padlocks.

At first there were no noises from the rooms, They must all be asleep, or drugged out of their warped minds, or something like that. thought Daring as she passed the first few doors.

She was just starting to adjust to the creepiness of the place when the first scream rang out from the room exactly to her right.

It was a long, shrill scream, filled with raw anger and maybe even pain. Daring leaped back out of sheer reflex and bumped into Dr. Hoof, the sound sound of their collision drew even more screams from the patient in the room.

Then the other patients began to add their own sounds to the mix, making the hallway ring with a cacophony of roars, bellows, barks, caterwauls, incoherent gibbering, agonized shrieks and insane laughter.

It took all of Daring’s willpower not to flinch at the sudden flood of mad sound. I’ve faced far worse than a few crazies, damn it! she scolded, Besides, they’re all locked up. Though I’m sure I could take ‘em if they got out.

That thought calmed her, though she knew that it was very unlikely that she’d be able to fight Celestia-knows how many psychotic asylum inmates.

“We’re here.” said Dr. Hoof, startling her.

She looked at the door that he was pointing to; it was the same as the other doors, the faded, black numbers that had been painted onto it read: 357.

Dr. Hoof levitated a large set of keys from a pocket and placed one in its corresponding hole, but, before he turned the key he turned to her.

“I must warn you that his physical condition is…. abnormal to say the least.”

“I know.” said Daring, “You mentioned it in your note.”

Dr. Hoof shook his head, “I only mentioned a small portion of his physical state. It’s much, much worse than some missing fingers and the outlines of a few ribs.”

“I understand.”

“And you still wish to see him?”

Daring shot the doctor a look, “Do you even need to ask?”

Dr. Hoof nodded, then he turned the key and opened the door.

The smell was the first thing that caught her attention: it was a suffocating mixture of sweat, disinfectant, burning dust and barely-concealed excrement. Daring pulled a wry face as she stepped into the room.

There were only three pieces of furniture in the room: a rusty metal bed frame that housed a stained mattress, a grungy toilet and a small desk with pieces of yellowed parchment strewn about haphazardly.

Her eyes scanned the room, looking for any sign of Ahuizotl and not seeing him. She started to turn- thinking that she may have fallen into a trap- when she saw it: something shifting slightly under the bed, something that was a shade darker than the rest of that space.

“I see you, Ahuizotl!” she declared, momentarily slipping back into her adventurer persona.

Silence.

Daring sighed and crouched down to get a better look, her mind going through different scenarios that would fit the way her long time enemy was acting; any possibility of him tricking her withered into nothingness when she saw him.

Her mind selected four physical traits of Ahuizotl’s ruined body: the raised lumps of his spine, the missing ear, the raised and raw-looking scars, and the stump at the end of his whip-like tail.

“Ahuizotl?” she asked, not sure if it was really him that she was seeing.

The figure under the bed reached out and a thin hand- a hand that was missing a finger- came into the light with the rest of his maimed body following.

Ahuizotl stood up shakily, his joins popped and cracked as he lowered himself onto all fours, Daring noticed, with some grim fascination, that he didn’t wince when he puts pressure on his mangled hands.

He turned to Daring, his cut lips pulling back over jagged teeth in a hollow facsimile of his usual evil grin. Daring looked away from the smile and gasped when her eyes met his: his eyes, which had been a sickly greenish yellow color, where now as white as snow, with no pupils or sclera to be seen.

He’s blind. she thought, But why do I get the feeling that he can see me?

“I can see you, Daring Do.” he said, his accent made all the more obvious by his raspy voice, “I can see the being that you truly are. Would you like to know what your true self looks like?”

Daring felt like her lungs had been filled with gaseous ice; every breath was cold against her tongue and she found herself unable to speak.

“You’re smaller than this facade around you, you’re almost like… a scrawny little mousey in the gut of a hollow tiger. You have wings of bone, hair like rose petals and the teeth of a chimera in heat; yet your little eyes blaze like Celestia’s fiery soul.”

That’s…. poetic.” said Daring, running her eyes over his wretched body and noticing something that she hadn’t previously noticed before.

His scars, which had been merely a small part of some terrible whole to her the first time that she looked at him, now came into better view in the dim light. Some of his scars were straight or slightly curved like normal scars, but others were full curves, or deep gouges that almost looked like dots, when her turned her head a certain way, she could see crescent moons and stars framed by smaller cuts that formed-

Runes…. he has runes carved into his flesh. she thought breathlessly.

Ahuizotl seemed to notice that she was gazing at the scars, because he smiled and winked at her.

“I’ve been preparing, my dear Daring Do.” he said.

“For what?” asked the adventurer.

“For darkness.” replied he, smiling at her as if she knew exactly what he was talking about.

Daring swallowed hard, then asked, “What happened to you?”

Ahuizotl furrowed his brow, “I was…. somewhere- Saddle Arabia, I think, I was with Dr. Cabelleron and his group.” his voice became monotonous as he continued, as if he were slipping into a trance, “We found a place in the sand, a deep, dark place made from the blackest stone, stone like a starless night.”

He pointed to a piece of parchment that had been tacked to the wall. Daring cantered over and looked at it: it was a detailed drawing of a twisting, black spire emerging from the desert floor like a tombstone.

It’s so detailed. she thought, But why didn’t he add a shadow around the spire?

She turned back to Ahuizotl as he resumed talking.

“We dug and dug and dug for days, but we had water, lots of water, and food aplenty. Though I doubt that It would have let us stop. Not after it had felt us in its land.”

He began to sway back and forth like a living pendulum. “After forever had fallen we entered into It’s belly and began our dark descent through its mangled, twisted guts. The place smelled like rot and silk and wormy death and water from deep below…. below…. I like that word, it’s a perfect match for It, like lovers intertwined.”

He paused to let out a long cackle that set Daring’s teeth on edge before he continued.

“We walked until out hooves and paws bled, but we didn’t stop, we couldn’t because IT wanted us to move, so we did. We saw lots of things down there: living shadows with teeth that ate tumors with birds wings, which in turn ate little heads with too many eyes and no mouths. We saw worlds of scorched earth and things drinking blood from the dead and devouring them and we saw the heads of loved ones on spikes and-”

He stopped suddenly and began to shake like a leaf, he held up his hands and pressed them to his thin face as he began to whimper.

“W-we were pulled into an altar room that was floating in another galaxy, then IT spoke to me and it’s voice- oh sweet Celestia it’s voice!”

He broke down completely after that, his shoulders and back heaved with the force of his sobbing. Daring was stunned speechless, she didn’t know whether or not to comfort him. It was true that he was her enemy, but he just sounded so… traumatized by what had happened to him.

It must have been awful to get him to replace those memories with something so ridiculous as the things that he’s saying.

But Ahuizotl wasn’t done talking.

“IT told me that I was going to be a witness, t-then Dr. Cabelleron and the others started to get thirsty. The water was gone, but there was this- this pool of green liquid at the center of the altar, I tried to stop them, I really did, but they all drank from it and… and…”

He raised himself up and gave a bone chilling howl before finishing, “They fell to the ground as their blood pumped out of every orifice in their body! Their bones snapped and tore through their flesh! Their teeth sharpened and they gnashed their lips to bits! They grew wings and extra eyes and new legs and tails and chitin, and skin! They became monsters!”

He fell to his knees and clasped his head, “They tore my cats apart in front of me and I couldn’t do anything because…. for the first time in my miserable life… I was scared. I was drowning in pure, unfettered Fear.”

“Then they came for me, but I ran, I let the Fear lead me out, lead me back to the wonderful sun.”

Then he turned to her and she could see tears running from those white eyes of his.

“But something happened when we entered that room. The veil between this world and the Other was ripped, gashed open; a wound in the universe. Now They have returned, do you understand? They have returned!!”. He leaped forward and came inches from her before Dr. Hoof conjured a force field around him.

Daring looked into Ahuizotl’s milky, tearful eyes and asked, in a trembling voice, “What has returned?”

Ahuizotl released a shuddering breath, then said: “The Children of Darkness.”

Then he fell forward in a dead faint.

---

It took Daring Do a few hours to properly recuperate from her ordeal.

It had all been so utterly terrifying: the creepy asylum, the crazed patients and the state of her former arch-enemy all weighed heavily on her mind.

What do I do? she thought to herself as she drained another mug of hard cider. The bar that she was in was quiet and peaceful, the sound of the rain striking the roof made her feel a bit more at peace.

But only a bit.

Everything that he said is far beyond me. she thought as she called for another glass, There’s just too much weird- weird shit for me to handle alone. I’m gonna need some help with this.

She finished her drink, paid her tab and then hopped off the bar stool. She walked to the front door, pressed a hoof to its cool, glass surface to push it open, and then stopped.

There were five ponies walking past the bar, five very familiar ponies.

That’s Dr. Cabelleron and his little posse. she thought as she watched the dark-brown earth pony and his cohorts pass a small apple cart. So Ahuizotl WAS lying about them turning into monsters, that’s one issue out of my mind. Maybe I should go say “Hello”.

She thought this last part with a small smirk. She reached out again... and then stopped.

Dr. Cabelleron was looking right at her from across the way.

And his eyes were pure red, like orbs of congealed blood set in too-small sockets.

Daring felt her blood turn to ice as the monster wearing the thug’s face winked at her coyly before it turned and disappeared into the shadows if a nearby alleyway.

Daring fell onto her rump, feeling like she had been punched in the gut. For a second she wondered if her mind had been playing tricks on her, but she hadn’t drank enough for that to be possible.

And there’s no way that a trick of the light could be responsible for that. she thought as she gazed at the dark alleyway.

It was then that she realized fully that she would need help. But, at the moment, she didn’t feel like leaving for a good while.

So Daring Do stayed in that bar for a full 9 hours as the rain fell outside and the sky stayed as black as it had been a few hours previously.

Author's Notes:

Here is the "Gateway Story" to what is hopefully going to be a very cool, horror-based 'Verse.

After watching the show, Penny Dreadful and seeing a marathon of horror video game Let's Plays I finally worked up a full story. I wrote the entire thing whilst listening to Nox Arcana's albums Necronomicon and Blackgate Asylum. So those are your soundtracks, should you choose to use them.

I hope you enjoyed the story and, if this 'Verse kicks off, the others that follow.

If you want to contact me about doing a story for this 'verse: the Pony Dreadful 'Verse. then please, by all means, message me.

Bye for now :D

The Thrall Of Nightmares

By the time Daring managed to work up the nerve to leave the bar, Luna’s night had fallen across the land.

She hadn’t planned on staying the night, but she had enough bits to rent a small, dimly-lit motel room for one night. She tried to get some rest, but she couldn't close her eyes for more than a few minutes before the image of Dr. Cabellron- no, the thing that had been wearing the guise of Dr. Cabellron’s blood-red eyes forced her back into the waking world.

In her many years as an adventurer she had encountered many monsters, from chimeras to giant spiders, but she had never once encountered something that made her this uneasy. It hadn’t even tried to attack her for Celestia’s sake! But that look that it gave her had been enough to reduce her to a little filly hiding under the covers in the hopes that the monster under the bed wouldn’t claim her.

Oh. My. Celestia… that’s what its eyes reminded me of: the Monster Under the Bed. she thought, letting the realization wash over her like cold water.

When she was young, long before she discovered her love of adventuring, she had been into drawing, letting her imagination run rampant in the form of crayon scribbles. Her imagination had come in handy years later when solving the many puzzles and traps in the ruins that she entered, but that imagination had often been an issue when it came to the monsters in her nightmares.

One of the only images that she had drawn that she could remember where of the Monster Under the Bed: who she had given a shadowy, panther-like body, a mouth with jutting fangs not unlike a venus flytrap, a barbed tail and pure red eyes that pierced the darkness it prowled in.

Daring suddenly got the impression that, if she had looked at those eyes closer, they would have looked more like crayon scribbles than actual eyes.

Sweet Luna, if I keep thinking like that I’ll never get a good night’s sleep! she thought, trying to distract herself from the awful mental image that she’d given herself.

She turned over on her bed and glanced at the door.

The lock was firmly locked and a heavy chair had been placed against it. Had she been facing a normal pony, Daring wouldn’t have taken as many precautions, knowing that her physical prowess was at its peak, but she was certain that she wasn’t up against anything that even came close to “Normal”.

I wish that I had brought a weapon that was better than my whip. she thought as she stared at the door.

She sighed and turned away from the door, she reached out with a wing to turn the lamp that sat on the nightstand next to her off, but thought better of it.

She closed her eyes and thought about all of the beautiful and grand vistas that she had visited, trying desperately to keep those red eyes out of her mind.

KNOCK-KNOCK-KNOCK!!

Daring shot upright and fluttered off the bed, going into a fighting stance as she did.

“Who's there?” she called, not wanting to go near the door.

“I-it’s me, Dr. Hoof.” said a familiar, shaky voice.

Daring let out a sigh of relief, but tensed back up just as quickly when the image of The Monster Wearing Dr. Cabelleron’s Face standing outside the door and imitating the good doctor flashed through her mind.

The tan pegasus crept to the shuttered window that lay opposite the door and peeked out: Dr. Hoof was waiting outside the door, looking around nervously and fidgeting with his hooves.

Daring rushed to the door, moved the chair, undid the lock, opened the door and yanked the startled doctor in before he could so much as open his mouth to protest; then she slammed door shut.

“Miss. Do!” shouted Dr. Hoof, looking flummoxed, “What on Equus is wrong?”

Daring shot him a tired look before slumping to the floor, “I think I’m going crazy.” she said softly.

“Excuse me?”

“I said ‘I think I’m going crazy’.” she said in a louder voice.

“Why would you think that?” asked Dr. Hoof, gazing at her with concern etched across his face, “Did what Ahuizotl said yesterday get to you, or-”

“No.” said Daring, cutting him off with a shake of her head.

“Well…. what is it, then?” asked Dr. Hoof, walking up to her and sitting beside her.

Should I tell him? she wondered, her imagination supplying her with several scenarios, most of which ended in her being hauled to the asylum in a straightjacket.

“I won’t think you’re crazy if you tell me.” said the doctor, interrupting her thoughts, “I just came here to warn you.”

“Warn me?” asked Daring, suddenly very interested in what he had to say.

“Yes, y’see…. Ahuizotl got out last night.”

“What?!” asked the tan pegasus, her voice coming out a little louder than she had expected.

Dr. Hoof wilted under her intense gaze and nodded, “Y-yes, he-he escaped a few hours after you left.”

“How?” pressed Daring, getting closer to him.

The doctor, who was looking closer to fainting by the second, gulped and put his hooves up in a placating gesture, “I-I’m not sure, I left him alone for about an hour to go check up on some of the patients and when I got back his cell door was wide open.”

Daring sighed and leaned back, she placed her hooves to her head and began to massage her temples. “So you came to see if I was okay?” she asked after short silence.

Dr, Hoof nodded slowly, “Yes, I was concerned that Ahuizotl might come looking for you, considering you’re the only living pony he knows and could recognize and, if what he told me and what your books say is true, his sense of smell is perfect for tracking.”

“I wasn’t lying about the smell thing.” said Daring tiredly.

“Oh…. well…. should we leave or-or set some traps?” asked the unicorn.

Daring shook her head, “No, There are only two places that he can enter from and we’ve got our backs to both of them.”

She turned and saw Dr. Hoof turn his head to look behind himself, then he paled and backed away as fast as he could. Daring chuckled dryly and got up, stretching her back as she did.

“Welp, if Ahuizotl’s picked up my scent- which he probably did while I was in his cell- it’s almost definite that he’ll be showing up soon.”

She saw that Dr. Hoof had begun to shake, “Don’t worry, doctor. I’ve dealt with him enough times to know his tricks.”

“I wouldn’t get too cocky.” said Dr. Hoof, “The mentally unstable tend to be unpredictable in the worst ways.”

Daring went silent for several seconds before saying, in a voice that lacked its previous confidence, “I don’t suppose you brought any tranquilizers with you?”

The doctor gave a small smile before he levitated a small, capped syringe full of blue liquid out of his suit pocket.

Daring graced him with the first genuine smile that she had given ever since she stepped beyond the asylum’s threshold.

---

Outside the rain continued to fall as a fog slithered up from the sea shore and began to creep over the town, muting the light cast by the street lamps and blackening the gutters.

Most of the ponies that had been going about their daily business had long since retreated from the chill rain and any that were left now sought solace in the many still-open bars and shelters.

Ahuizotl paced down the mist-enshrouded main street, his milky eyes staring straight ahead. He knew that nopony would halt him, his friends had made sure that the streets would be clear and they had called up the mist to conceal him from anypony who might happen to look out their windows.

“She’s so close.” he muttered to himself, “I can smell her, I can smell that doctor with her as well. Maybe he left to warn her about me, or maybe he’s getting…. intimate with my dear Daring Do.”

He let out a sharp, wheezing giggle at the thought of finding the two sharing a lovers embrace.

“If I find them making the Beast with Two Backs, then I’ll wrap my tail around both their necks and crush their heads until they are reduced to a single ball of flesh.”

He giggled again as he wandered through the distorted nightmare world that his eyes saw.

Some would say that he was blind if they were to lay eyes on the white orbs that lay within his sunken sockets, but they’d be only partially right. He had lost his ability to see things as other perceived them, but that didn’t mean that he was blind.

They’re all blind. he thought as he sloshed through the river of blood that flowed down the street. He gazed up at the sky and saw a pulsing, blue heart instead of a moon and staring, bleeding eyes instead of stars.

“The night is so beautiful.” he murmured, “But even Princess Luna cannot see its true splendor.”

The thought brought sadness to his heart and he looked away from the eyes and the heart. As he passed the buildings seemed to quiver and pulse like organs, the street lamps went out and the shadows that lurked in every nook and cranny writhed and grew bolder as he got close to them.

Overhead thunder split the sky and in it Ahuizotl could hear the melodious voices of many beings chanting, chanting for him.

He turned a corner and heard Daring Do’s heart beating a soft, steady pattern that momentarily calmed him and made him notice how hot his skin was and how unnaturally cold his innards were.

But then the feelings stopped and the world made sense once more.

I’m So Glad thaT all Those Tempting Feelings are Gone. The World’S so SCARY When They COme to Me. he thought feverishly, When I DeAl with Do and Doctor I’Ll feeL EVen Better.

Ahuizotl giggled again and licked his lips; he could almost taste the blood that he was sure to spill.

The Silenced Scream

Daring Do lay on the bed, her eyes were closed and her wings were splayed out behind her. To the less observant, the pegasus mare appeared to be completely at ease, but she was anything but.

She was as tense as a taut bowstring, and the feeling of being unable to do anything but wait was had very nearly evolved into a form of physical pain. But she knew that it would be utterly pointless to run, not when Ahuizotl had their scent.

And what’s worse is that I have to protect the doc, who I’m pretty sure is going to need my help in order to tranq him. Though why he didn’t contact the police to help him i-

Her eyes shot open and she turned to look at Dr. Hoof, who was rolling the syringe between his hooves.

“Doctor, can I ask you a question?” asked Daring, trying to keep the suspicion from her voice.

“Y-yes?”, said the doctor, giving her a weak smile.

“Why, pray tell, didn’t you contact the authorities and bring them here with you?”, she asked sweetly.

“Wh-who says I didn’t?” stammered the unicorn.

“If you had, you would have come here with an escort, police are like that.” said Daring, matter-of-factly.

Dr. Hoof started to stammer a reply, but Daring was on him before he could form a single word. She grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and slammed him into the wall, hard.

“Are you working with the things that Ahuizotl works for?” she asked in a low, dangerous voice.

Dr. Hoof whimpered, “N-no, I just-I just…. I don’t get along well with the police, okay!!”, he shouted these last words so loudly it made Daring’s ears ring.

When the harsh ringing faded she asked, “What the hay do you mean, ‘don’t get along with the police’?”

Dr. Hoof sighed and slumped against her hooves dejectedly, “When I was younger, before I took this job, me and my wife were both rather unlikable ponies- No, we were the biggest bullies this side of the entire eastern lands. I was a prodigious surgeon and my wife was an actress, we were both far too different to ever really form any sort of intimate bond outside of the bedroom-which resulted in a daughter that I didn’t want to look after.”

“Besides being a surgeon I was also a drunkard and a damn mean one at that, I got into more high-speed chariot chases than anypony else and I always, always used my magic and my wealth to get out of any trouble.”

Here he stopped and raised a trembling hoof to his bloodshot eyes, which had begun to water.

“Then one day I… I made a m-mistake, I gave a patient the w-wrong m-medicine and she… died right in front of me, choking on her own vomit, while I just sat there like a statue.”

He was sobbing freely now, his tears staining Daring’s hooves.

“I-I let another pony d-die!” he wailed, “And the l-look on her face, I knew that she was trying to ask ‘why?’.... I didn’t answer her, WHY DIDN’T I ANSWER HER??!”

He collapsed into a heap, his whole body heaving with the force of his sobs. Daring felt a pang of pity stab her heart as she watched the miserable stallion utterly breakdown. Now I really feel guilty. she thought, crouching down and placing a hoof on his shoulder.

“After that my life was ruined.” he said once his sobbing had calmed somewhat, Daring was surprised that he was even capable of speech after a breakdown of that magnitude, but it seemed that the poor unicorn needed to get everything off his chest; so she let him.

“Everypony looked at me differently, like I was some kind of plague rat, though I didn’t blame them and I still don’t. I deserved every single insult that they threw my way, every thrown stone and every back alley beating. Eventually I quit my job and fell out of high society. My wife was… less than pleased and she left me and took my poor daughter with her. I even had to change my name to Helping Hoof to avoid the pain that went with my old name.”

He let out a shaky sigh and rested his head on Daring’s shoulder.

“I’m so sorry for getting all up in your face like that,” whispered Daring, “and I’m sorry that all of that happened to you. I won’t say that it wasn’t your fault, but it seems to me that you’ve become a far better stallion. I mean, you still care for sick ponies, just ones that have a different sort of sickness. You fell hard and managed to pick yourself up, which is pretty awesome.”

Dr. Hoof gave a hoarse chuckle, “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”

Daring smiled at him, then held a hoof to her chin, “You said that Helping Hoof isn’t your real name… what is it?”

The good doctor smiled and had just opened his mouth to reply when a maimed, blue and black furred form crashed through the window.

Daring rolled out of the way with Dr. Hoof just as Ahuizotl’s first blow connected with the spot on the floor where they had been sitting, reducing the area to a mess of splinters.

“Won’t you lend your lungs to me, mine are collapsin’, breath I’ll take and breath I’ll give, hope the day’s not poised.” he sang in a creaky voice as he withdrew his fist from the hole in the floor.

Daring got into her fighting stance and flared her wings, “Well, I’ll say this: you’re timing’s gotten way worse now that you’re crazy.”

She expected Ahuizotl to give her an angry retort, but he only giggled and said, “Time? Time is nothing to me anymore, just an ant made from clockwork that I can step on.”

Daring gave him an incredulous look, “If I ever had any doubts about you being crazy, then I don’t now.”

Ahuizotl merely grinned and whipped his tail towards her.

Daring raised her hoof to grab the hand out of sheer reflex, only to realize too late that the hand had been severed, allowing the tail to wrap around her forelimb with ease. Daring stood on her back limbs and raised her remaining forelimb to stomp on the tail, but Ahuizotl was quicker, he yanked hard and added a slight upward flick to his tail’s tip, which sent Daring spinning into the air.

She fell hard on her wings, the air exiting her lungs with a WHOOSH. Ahuizotl straddled her and wrapped his hands around her neck.

Daring grasped his wrists and managed to alleviate enough pressure to call out, “Doc, tranq him!!” .

Dr. Hoof nodded, removed the cap from the syringe and started to move towards the struggling duo. Ahuizotl snapped his head up and shot the doctor a hateful glare, Daring used her foe’s momentary distraction to her advantage and drove her hind limbs into his taut stomach with enough force to knock him off her.

The adventurer sprang onto her hooves, grabbed her whip from its spot on the nightstand, and unfurled it with a cracking sound that meant that she had evened the playing field.

Ahuizotl snarled at her and lunged forwards with his mouth open, clearly intending to bite her, Daring casually flicked the whip and wrapped it around his gaping jaws, then she pulled tight and forced his teeth together with an audible click.

“Now, doc!” she roared.

Dr. Hoof raced forward with the syringe held in his magical aura. Ahuizotl saw the gleam of the needle and grabbed at the whip. Daring realized what he was trying to do and undid the whip from about his jaws, only to cast it around his thick neck and pull hard, bringing the psychopathic cryptid to his knees.

Dr. Hoof raced the two and raised the needle up, Ahuizotl looked at the needle with wide eyes and started to rise to his feet, but it was too late, the needle swung downwards and buried itself in the back of Ahuizotl’s neck.

The blue-furred former-evil mastermind gasped, then slumped to the floor as the drugs began to take effect. Just before he succumbed to the tranquilizer he looked Daring in the eyes and said, in a voice that oozed insanity, “You’ve not yet experienced fear, but fear is coming…. and it’s coming for you.”

Then his milky eyes closed and he fell gracelessly to the floor.

Daring wordlessly untangled the whip from his neck, then she went to the bed, tanked off the sheets and began to tear thim into thick strips.

“Uh… what are you doing?” asked Dr. Hoof, eyeing her suspiciously.

“I’m gonna tie him up and bring him back to the asylum.” she said in a low voice.

Dr. Hoof nodded and watched as she bound Ahuizotl’s hands and paws together. When she was done she looked up at him and raised a brow.

“What?” asked the doctor.

“Usually, when someone ends up working with me on one of my adventures, they ask me if I need help any time I do something even remotely hard-looking.”

“Do you… want me to help you?” he asked uncertainly.

“No… it’s actually nice to have a partner who doesn't try to interfere in everything that I do.” said Daring with a small smile.

Dr. Hoof blinked owlishly, then said, “Well it looked like you had everything under control.”

“I do.” said Daring with a wolfish grin.

Dr. Hoof opened his mouth to reply, but the door to their room slammed open and the manager, a burly earth pony with a thick mustache and greased back hair, barged in. Both ponies could practically see the steam leaking from his ears.

“What. The. Tartarus is goin’ on here!!” he bellowed, letting his bulging eyes rove around the destroyed room before finally settling on Daring and the bound Ahuizotl.

“What the hay are you two doing?!” he screamed, “This is a respectable establishment, damn it!”

Daring snorted, the manager growled and advanced on her, “I want you three out of here, now!”, he reached out to grab Daring’s chin, but the past few days had made Daring’s far less patient than she usually was and she swatted his hoof away and grabbed him by the scruff of the neck.

“Listen, flankhole” she growled dangerously, “I’ve had a seriously bad day and you’re not making it any better. So shove off and we’ll be outta your hair in a moment.”

She let him go and pushed him back to the doorway.

None of them noticed that the fog was swirling around the doorstep or the dark figures that were slithering through it like black snakes.

The manager opened his mouth to scream at her some more, but the sounds never reached his lips, because at that very second a twisted, sharp talon erupted from his throat. The manager gurgled as blood began to dribble out from his snout and mouth, then the talon jerked out and more blood gushed out of the wound.

Daring and Dr. Hoof screamed in unison as the body fell forward like a marionette with cut strings.

Then the figures of Dr. Cabelleron and his posse rose up from the fog, their red eyes alight with sadistic mirth.

Daring, reacting out of pure fear, grabbed Ahuizotl and hoisted him onto her back. Daring shot Dr. Hoof a pleading look and mouthed, “Make a door.”

The unicorn doctor nodded and turned to the opposing wall, he fired a concussive blast that tore through the brick and mortar like it was nothing, then he and Daring leaped through the hole with the unconscious Ahuizotl in tow.

The six creatures in pony form watched them leave with large smiles plastered over their falsified features.

The hunt was on.

Author's Notes:

I'll be going on a trip, so I won't be posting a new chapter for a few days. Sorry.

The Mangled Mask

Daring Do and Dr. Hoof sat in the small kitchen of the latter’s large and somewhat-decrepit house.

Both bore dark circles under their eyes and both of them were cradling their coffee cups like they contained the Nectar of Life.

It had taken their combined efforts to restrain Ahuizotl, Daring had to sit on him while Dr. Hoof tied his wrists and ankles to the thick, wooden posts of his former-wife’s bed. She had also helped him secure his tail using a pair of fuzzy, pink handcuffs that had induced a massive blush from the good doctor when she had found it in her closet.

In the time from his awakening to the present-some 4 hours-Ahuizotl’s screaming had reached a pitch and intensity that made the adventurer and the good doctor cringe; Daring was starting to wonder how long it would take before his vocal chords burned themselves out.

Finally she couldn’t take it anymore and she got up from her position and stormed out of the large bedroom, down the dusty and winding hallway, past the massive iron crescent-moon-and-wand family crest that hung over a large fireplace, past the collection of odd knick-knacks that had been ensconced behind dusty glass shelves.

She turned a right and found herself in front of the door that held Ahuizotl.

I can’t believe his screams carried all the way from here. she thought with no small amount of annoyance.

She opened the door and walked inside, pinning her ears flat against her skull to avoid getting ruptured eardrums. Ahuizotl was writhing in the bed, the sheets had been thoroughly soaked with sweat and there were several bloodstains were the binds had torn his skin.

When Daring slammed the door behind her, her former archenemy stiffened and went silent. The tan pegasus trotted closer and eyed him warily as he averted his white eyes.

Daring opened her mouth to speak, but Ahuizotl beat her to the punch.

“I feel…. different, I feel like my head… my head is clearer. All that blood has faded a-a little and I can see you like you were when we met.”

He looked her in the eyes and Daring saw-much to her surprise- that there were tears leaking from them.

“I was under that thing’s shadow. It showed my what it thought the world should look like, not what it really was, and I believed It with all my heart and mind. But my soul was restless… I-I started to wake up after you tied me down.”

“Are you asking me to untie you?” queried Daring.

Ahuizotl clenched his jaw and spoke through gritted fangs, as though the words hurt him. “Yes-no...I don’t know.”

He looked away and whispered, “I’m so afraid.”

Daring perked her ears, “What are you afraid of?” she asked in a soft voice, trying to use a more comforting tactic to get him to open up.

He whimpered, “I’m afraid that…. that I’ll go crazy once I get untied and that I’ll hurt you.”

That last bit took Daring completely off guard and rendered her speechless.

Ahuizotl seemed to catch on to her current emotions, because he looked at her again and said, in a clear tone that held none of the fervent psychosis from before, “I may be your arch-nemesis, but I would never, ever want what has happened to me to happen to you.”

“You seem like you’ve gotten over your crazy-ness.” said Daring evenly.

Ahuizotl shook his head, “No… it’s still inside me, like a worm in my guts. It’s sleeping now, but it might wake up at any time.”

Daring nodded, “I see, that’s…. interesting.”

“No it’s not!” hissed Ahuizotl, “I can feel it burrowing through my mind…. but I think it was worse when He was near.”

“He? D’you mean Dr. Cabelleron?” asked Daring.

Ahuizotl let out a high-pitched giggle, “No, no, no. Dr. Cabelleron, along with his posse, died in agony back in that infernal place! This-this thing is merely using his face as a mask to walk amongst the normal ponies without being detected.”

“What are they?” asked Daring, intently.

“They are some of the Children of Darkness” said Ahuizotl, growing solemn, like a professor giving a lecture, “They have been lying dormant in the dark corners of the world, awaiting the day when something gives them the incentive to reveal themselves to the world.”

“And what happens then?” asked Daring, already guessing the answer.

Ahuizotl seemed to know what she was thinking, because he scoffed and said, “You know what’ll happen: the whole world will be plunged into everlasting darkness. The Children of Darkness will rise again and annihilate every living creature, then they will rule in shadows forever.”

He said this with such conviction in his voice that Daring had little choice but to believe him.

“So how do we stop them?” was her next question.

Ahuizotl shook his head, “You can’t.”

“Don’t give me that!” growled Daring, “I’ve heard that stuff hundreds of times before and I’ve always found a way to beat it, so don’t tell me that there is no way to stop this!”

Ahuizotl shot forward his his fangs bared, “Don’t be a fool, Daring Do!” he bellowed, “The Children have already started to return to this world and they will rule it.”

“Oh come on! I’m sure that me and some others can deal with them, I mean Princess Celestia could-”

“No, Daring!” Ahuizotl snarled, “Those creatures that you saw are not the only ones out there. There are many, many more: things that drink blood, things that burrow beneath the graves to gnaw upon the bones of the dead, things that can resurrect the dead with dark magic, beasts of fog and icy mist. They are the true kings of this world and they shall inherit this world.”

Daring had backed up and was now tense for a fight, in his fervor, Ahuizotl had freed himself.

She fully expected the crazed villain to take the opportunity to try and escape, but Ahuizotl merely gazed unblinking at his broken bonds, then he sank to the floor and buried his scarred face in his maimed hands; a moment later his shoulders began to shake with silent sobs.

Daring blinked, then shook her head, chalking his reaction up to him being crazy. She turned and started to the door, intent on getting Dr. Hoof to tranq Ahuizotl again, but she was stopped by a hand on her wing.

She turned and brought her hoof up to defend herself, but stopped short when she saw the look of absolute dread on his face.

“Daring, they’re-”

His next words were drowned out by a cacophonous crash that came from downstairs. Daring turned and bolted down the hallway with Ahuizotl in tow.

They had found the house.

---

Daring charged into the bedroom, grabbing her whip and a large satchel before Dr. Hoof could so much as open his mouth.

The poor doctor became even more confused- and afraid- when Ahuizotl entered, looking behind his back and fidgeting nervously.

“W-what’s going on?” he asked.

“They’re here.” said Daring.

Dr. Hoof went as pale as a sheet and held a now-trembling hoof to his mouth, she could hear him mutter “Oh no.” in a voice that sounded close to tears.

Daring opened a nearby drawer and pulled out a few bits, as well as a pocketknife. Once she was finished with that she turned to Dr. Hoof and asked, “ How good are you with teleportation spells?”

The doctor rubbed the back of his neck with a hoof, “I’m… good enough, I guess.”

Daring huffed, “Can you get us all out of here?”

He nodded and Daring felt relief flood through her body. Good, now I just need to-

Then Daring felt the air in the room go cold. The others felt it too and they hugged themselves as their breath began to form icy mist. The very air seemed to grow heavier and colder with each passing second, each of the trio wanted to move, to run, but their limbs were feeling leaden.

Daring was starting to relive the time when she had been partially paralyzed by a cockatrice; the feeling of that same numbness cascading up her limbs made her shudder.

Everything fell silent as Daring’s lids began to grow heavy. The cold slithered into her lungs, the dread weighed her guts down and time seemed to stretch out to an eternity.

It would be nice to get some sleep… she thought through the have that was creeping up on her mind.

Yes… sleep…. sleep…. sleep forever…. sleep while we make you our puppet… sleep so we can feast on you…. so we can devour you…. so we can become you…

Daring’s eyes, which had closed from fatigue, snapped open and she gasped as air returned to her lungs.

I’ve got to get myself moving. Daring thought as she began to struggle against whatever was affecting her. She slowly began to move, first one leg, then the other.

Then the silence which had fallen was broken by the sound of the floorboards outside of the door creaking and groaning.

Daring broke free of whatever dark spell had bound her and grabbed a heavy lamp from a nearby nightstand. The feeling of the hard, smooth marble of the lamp’s base against her hoof brought her fully back to reality.

The door buckled inwards, groaning like a dying beast as it did. It bulged out until it cracked, then it split down the middle and fell inwards.

Daring saw the twin halves of the door fall away to reveal the hallway outside. She saw the Creature that was imitating Dr. Cabellron standing there with its red eyes glowing faintly in the soft light.

The facsimile Cabelleron opened his mouth to speak and Daring knew- she knew- that, if he were to utter a word, she and the others would be lost forever.

Daring felt rage, hot and acidic, bubble up within her gut. She had fought against evil for so long : she had stopped Quatzequatel from bathing the earth in everlasting light, she had defeated the last faction of the Coltstappo and driven them back into their hiding holes, she had destroyed countless unholy artifacts across the globe and had foiled every single one of Ahuizotl’s plans, no matter how many obstacles she had faced.

With a primal roar Daring sprang forward and swung the lamp as hard as she could.

The base of the lamp was a square and the edges were only moderately sharp, but- with the force that she swung- it was enough. The edge sheared through the Facsimile’s brown fur and tore a divot on the flesh; the force of the blow was enough to split its cheek wide open and break its jaw at a sharp angle.

Daring dropped the lamp and stepped back, her heart racing from adrenaline and fear.

The Facsimile raised its head and snarled at her, giving Daring a good look at what lurked beneath its false skin,

There was no blood, no gore, no exposed bone, there was only a mass of writhing, oily tendrils that resembled muscles.

Daring turned to Dr. Hoof and slapped him across the face. The blow did its job and the doctor gasped as if he had been doused with cold water.

“Wh-what’s happening?” he stammered.

“Now isn’t the time for questions, now is the time for teleporting.” said Daring as she dragged Ahuizotl closer.

Daring grabbed him and Ahuizotl just as the Facsimile realigned its jaw with a dry CRACK!

Daring turned to the doctor and shouted “Teleport now!”

Dr. Hoof nodded and lit his horn. Daring saw the Facsimile start towards them just as the world went white.

The Silent Sands

The trio reappeared in a flash of bright, blue light.

Daring blinked and looked around, expecting to see the outside of the house, or the inside of the asylum, or some place in Hoofington. But instead she saw yellow sand, darkened stone tenements and several abandoned carts.

“Where are we?” asked Dr. Hoof from behind her.

Daring opened her mouth to reply, but she was cut off by a low moan. She turned and saw Ahuizotl gazing at his surroundings with terrified eyes.

“What’s wrong?” asked Daring, moving closer.

Ahuizotl moaned again, “It’s the village.” he whimpered.

“What village?” asked Dr. Hoof.

Ahuizotl turned to him as tears began to leak down his furry cheeks, “It’s the village where they found me, the last village before the desert, the town that sits on the shadow of those ruins.”

Daring felt her heart stop as the words cut through the still air like a knife.

“A-are you serious?” asked Dr. Hoof, looking significantly paler.

Ahuizotl nodded miserably, “This place had been burned into my mind; I’ll never forget it.”

Daring sighed and took another quick look around: the silence was deafening and there wasn’t a soul in sight.

“Where is everypony?” asked Dr. Hoof.

“Dead, dead, they’re all dead.” said Ahuizotl, giving a choked giggle that abruptly became a tearful whimper halfway through.

“Don’t say that!” growled Daring, trying to get the sudden image of dead ponies lying in their own blood out of her mind. She didn’t see the exhaustion on Dr. Hoof’s face gradually change into anger and frustration until he finally snapped.

“I’ve had enough of this!” screamed Dr. Hoof, his unexpected outburst startling his companions, “I have been chased, attacked by some kind of unholy shadow beast, I had to violate several laws by not returning Ahuizotl to the asylum and I bet I’ll lose my job because of that. And now I’ve been transported to some village in Saddle-bucking-Arabia!”

The doctor fell on his plot and pressed his hooves to his eyes as his limbs began to tremble.

Daring sighed and trotted to him. The unicorn doctor looked up, obviously expecting her to offer some words of comfort, instead she reached out and delivered a harsh slap to his face.

“Get a freakin’ hold of yourself, damn it!” she snarled, getting in his face, “We can bitch and moan when we get out of this place, so please stop your whining for now.”

Dr. Hoof looked stunned, he didn’t even seem to notice the red mark on his cheek, he just gave her a look that wasn’t unlike a foal wondering why it was getting punished.

Daring felt a pang of regret at that expression, but she knew that she couldn’t allow the good doctor to fall apart on her now.

Sighing, the adventurer pegasus turned back to Ahuizotl to tell him that she expected him to stay sane, but he wasn’t even looking at her, he was looking ahead of them.

“There’s something in the marketplace.” he said in a low voice, pointing a finger.

Daring turned and looked to where he was pointing: the street that they were in continued on for a few yards before widening into a vast marketplace, full of dozens of stalls, carts, storefronts and restaurants, all of which were abandoned and desolate.

And right at the center of the marketplace was a strange object, tall, but heavily shadowed.

Daring felt the familiar high-powered curiosity that had led her into so many adventures take hold once again and she began to gallop forwards; a second later Dr. Hoof and Ahuizotl followed her as best they could.

---

Dr. Hoof and Ahuizotl caught up with Daring just as she stopped in front of the shadowy object, so they all saw what it was at the same time and each of them reacted the exact same way: with silent horror.

The object- now in clearer light, was an effigy of some sort. It was tall, far taller than any pony. It sat on four legs that shot out of a spiral-shaped base that was connected to a long pole, the pole ended in a large circle that held many different figures and patterns within its robust shape.

The object’s shape wasn’t what caused the trio to feel the cold claw of dread to grasp their hearts, it was the materials that made the object.

They were bones: bleached white and carved with innumerable runes.

The four legs were made from forelimbs, the spiral base from what looked like shoulder blades and pelvises, the pole was constructed from several spines wrapped around each other and bound with dark red string, the circle had been made from ribs and the patterns and shapes therein were horns, wing joints, teeth, jawbones and, sitting at the very center, was a small unicorn skull.

---

Daring turned just in time for the meager breakfast that she’d had to come back up with a vengeance.

As she was wiping her mouth and tongue clean of the vile sludge she happened to look up and see a pair of bright, blue eyes peering at her from the window of a nearby house.

Daring blinked and ran a hoof across her eyes, then she looked back at the window: the eyes were still looking at her, and they were filled with tears of fear.

The tan pegasus felt her sense of heroism, which had been the farthest thing from her mind in the past two days, kick in. and she went to the door and pushed it open.

The first thing that she noticed was the massive hole in the roof that let in the yellow sunlight, the second thing that she noticed was that the floor and most of the furniture were completely submerged beneath sand.

This place must’ve been hit by a sandstrom. thought Daring as she stepped past the threshold.

Once she was inside she raised a hoof to the side of her mouth and called, “Hello?! Is anypony there?”

The only sound that answered her was the low whistling of the wind through the desolate house.

Daring paced forward and began searching the ruined main room, looking under the few non-submerged items of furniture and inside the few rooms in the small abode, but all she found was dust-laden furniture and dead silence.

She walked back to the main room and surveyed the area, looking for anything she might have missed, a second later her roving eyes landed on something that was half-buried in the sand. Daring walked to it and bent down to examine it, then, when she realized what it was, she grasped it and pulled it free.

It was a raggedy patchwork doll with a mop of brown string hair and mismatched button eyes; there was a long gash across its stomach that leaked stuffing.

“Well… that’s not creepy at all.” she said wryly, feeling a bit better to be using her wit.

I guess it was just a mirage. she thought as she cast the dall aside, That, or this whole place is playing tricks on me. I’m hoping that its the first one, but it’s probably the other, considering the crap that happened to Ahuizotl.

The adventurer turned and started for the door, hoping that she could get Dr. Hoof to teleport them away.

She stopped short when she heard something behind her: it sounded like…. a high-pitched giggle, a foal’s giggle.

What the flying freak? she thought as she searched the area again. “Hello?” she called, “Are you hurt? What happened to everypony?”

Silence was her only answer.

Then she felt something shift under her hoof.

She looked down and lifted her hoof up, then watched in silent horror as the imprint that her hoof had made slowly expanded as the sand began to move. Daring moved away as the hoof-print widened into a shallow pit.

What the hay is going on?! she thought as the pit grew and grew.

Then she felt something- a sort of tingling sensation on her legs. She looked down and saw that her fur was swarming with small, yellow and gold mites.

The realization and revulsion hit her at the same time: she wasn’t standing on sand, she was standing on a massive carpet of small insects that had been well-camouflaged to look like the individual grains of sand.

Daring leaped back with a scream as the mite swarm advanced on her, pulsing outwards, creating deep ripples that slowly revealed the bleached bones of the rest of the villagers.

Then the tide of mites was on her and she was smothered under a tide of biting, skittering insects.

Then Daring blinked.

She was back in the town square, still looking at the bone effigy.

Daring felt her mind reel as she tried and failed to process what had just happened. She looked down at her legs and saw that there was no trace of the camouflaged insects, she looked back at the house and saw that the door was firmly shut.

She felt the weight of what had just happened hit her fully and she slumped to the ground as a massive headache hit her like a sledgehammer to the skull.

What was that? What the Tartarus happened? Was that real? Is this real? Am I going crazy? Did stuff like this happen to Ahuizotl when he was here?

All these thoughts crowded her head, creating pressure that made her headache worse, then one question in particular took center place in her mind: What am I getting into?

After several minutes the headache died down and Daring managed to get back up, albeit with some difficulty.

It was then that she realized that she hadn’t heard a peep from either Dr. Hoof or Ahuizotl, no questions about her health, no movement, nothing. Daring turned to look at her comrades and saw that they were staring at the effigy.

Oh no… she thought as she saw the tears leaking from Ahuizotl’s white eyes and the trembling in Dr. Hoof’s limbs.

Daring sped towards them and started shaking them vigorously, hoping to wake them from whatever spell the effigy had them under.

“Come on!” she screamed desperately, “Snap out of it!”

She went from Dr. Hoof to Ahuizotl, who was now whimpering in a way that made her cringe.

“Come on, Ahuizotl. You can get through this!” she said as she grabbed her former-foe’s head and turned it to face her. The second that she did, the whimpering stopped and Ahuizotl let out a small gasp as his eyes widened in recognition.

“D-daring?” he asked in a small voice.

Daring opened her mouth to reply, but she was stopped from doing so by Ahuizotl, who wrapped her in a powerful hug.

“Daring Do! Y-you’re alive…. oh, sweet Celestia, you’re alive!” he devolved into tears. Leaving his former enemy stunned beyond words. After a second she reached up and gently patted his scarred back.

A second later she pulled him off her and asked, “What the hay did that thing show you?”

Ahuizotl opened his mouth to respond, but, before he could so much as utter the first syllable, Dr. Hoof shot forward with a scream of “NO!”

Daring turned to him and started to go to him when a familiar magical aura surrounded his horn.

Ahuizotl, who was still holding Daring, reached out and grasped his horn in an attempt to stop the spell, but it was futile, and the teleportation spell went off, taking the two with the doctor.

The Blackened Spire

The teleportation was far more painful than the last one, and it deposited the trio several feet above the ground.

Daring was, as per the norm, the first one to get to her hooves. They were surrounded on all sides by desert, with not a single sign of life to be seen.

“Great, just great.” growled Daring, turning to Dr. Hoof, who was rubbing his head and looking at his surroundings with a face drawn up in confusion and pain.

“Where are we?” he asked, staggering to his hooves and shaking his head, presumably to rid himself of the aftereffects of the teleportation spell.

“I have no clue.” said Daring with an annoyed huff, she turned around and addressed the third member of their party, “Ahuizotl, do you know where we are?”

Ahuizotl, who had been lying in the sand with his tail wrapped around his deflated stomach, sat up with a sharp gasp and his milky eyes bulged out. He pressed his scarred hands to his head and began to moan low in his throat.

Daring went to him and crouched to his level, “What’s wrong now?”

Ahuizotl looked at her and said, “We are close, Daring.”

“Close to what?” asked Dr. Hoof, managing to sound both annoyed, curious and worried at the same time.

“The ruins, you dummy.” snapped Daring.

“Oh…” was all that the doctor could say as he pinned his ears.

“Yes, the ruins.” said Ahuizotl, looking off into the horizon, which was slowly swallowing the sun.

“It’s alright” said Daring, gently turning his head so that his eyes met hers, “we can leave once Dr. Hoof recovers.”

Ahuizotl snorted and shook his head miserably, “It won’t let you leave now that you’re here.”

Dr. Hoof let out a bark of derisive laughter that Daring silenced with a glare. She turned back and said, “You make it seem like these ruins are… alive somehow. But that’s impossible, ruins are nothing but collections of old and weathered stone, they can’t think or breath or anything that we ponies can do.”

Ahuizotl looked at her, “But these ruins aren’t just ancient stone, Daring Do. They are not made from stone, they’re made from… something else, something that doesn’t belong here and its wrongness pollutes the sands. The ruins watch you, they breathe, they bleed, Daring, they bleed when you strike the stuff that it’s made of, bleed in yellow and in gray.”

He shuddered and Daring frowned. She didn’t want to believe what her ex-foe had said, but the conviction in his voice gave her pause.

“So what do we do?” asked Dr. Hoof, “If we can’t leave, then do we just accept our fate and go to these ruins? Can’t you fly us out?”

Daring shook her head, “I could only carry one person and I’m not leaving Ahuizotl behind.”

The doctor sighed, “I understand. But why can’t we just, y’know, walk the other way? Will something stop us? And, if so, what is it?”

Ahuizotl bit his lip, then said, “It’s hard to explain, but the place sort of…. loops back.”

Dr. Hoof cocked his head, “What?”

The unicorn doctor looked around, then he wandered a few feet, looking at his surroundings intently. Finally he turned back to Ahuizotl and asked, “Will I get killed if I try to test your theory?”

Ahuizotl shook his head, “No, but it will make your eyes and head hurt.”

“Because the normal pony’s mind isn’t accustomed to seeing… the universe looping?” asked Dr. Hoof, sounding interested.

Ahuizotl nodded and, without another word, Dr. Hoof turned and walked up and over a nearby sand dune, vanishing completely a second later.

Daring watched the dune intently, hoping that Ahuizotl was just exaggerating or suffering from a very vivid delusion. She held her breath and prayed to any deity that would listen for Dr. Hoof to return and happily debunk what Ahuizotl had said.

A minute passed, then two, then three.

The minutes stretched on and Daring felt herself start to sweat. Why hasn’t he come back? she thought worriedly. The tan pegasus looked over to Ahuizotl and saw him gazing off into the distance with an uncertain look on his face.

Oh, sweet Celestia, he isn’t certain himself. she realized.

“Ahuizotl.” she began, drawing his attention with her now-cold tone, “You said that Dr. Hoof wouldn’t get hurt if he tested out what you said… were you lying?”

Ahuizotl shook his head, “I don’t know.”

“What d’you mean you don't know?!” she roared, fed up with his vagueness.

“I don’t know because the Ruins could’ve changed things!” he bellowed, getting to his paws, “Whatever lurks inside doesn’t operate by our reality, it isn’t alive and it isn’t dead, it can control so much and it is so powerful that it could change the rules if it wanted to!”

He stalked closer to Daring as tears leaked from his eyes, “You don’t know what it’s like to have that sort of knowledge burning your brain, Daring Do. If you escape this then you’ll only have some nightmares and some ideas for your next book, but I’ll never get the voices and the images and the knowledge out of my head!”

He slumped down at her hooves, buried his head in his hands, and whispered, “I’ll only be free when I die.”

Daring sat stunned for a moment before reaching down and yanking Ahuizotl to his paws, then she addressed him.

“Listen to me very carefully. I may not know what you’re going through, and it must be utter Tartarus for you, and you are being so, so strong for me and Dr. Hoof and yourself. But Dr. Hoof might be in danger and you need to tell me how to get him back.”

Ahuizotl whimpered, “I don’t know what these new rules are. I’m sorry.”

Daring growled and pressed a hoof to her temples, “So what, we just give up and die?”, she noticed that Ahuizotl wasn’t looking at her anymore.

She started to get angry, then she realized that, although he wasn’t looking at her, he wasn’t ignoring her: he was looking behind her.

Daring whirled and saw, to her immense relief, Dr. Hoof coming towards them at a slow pace.

He relief died when she saw his pale skin and his wide, terrified eyes.

Daring raced towards him and managed to catch him just as he fell forward. The tan pegasus turned him over and lifted his head up, “Doctor Hoof! Can you hear me?”

The unicorn doctor nodded weakly, then said in a weak voice, “He was right: I went beyond the dune and got as far as a couple of yards before something happened, I cannot even begin to describe it, it was like-like time froze and the desert got very long and then it-it-just… looped back.”

Daring started to speak, but Dr. Hoof cut her off.

“But there was something else, Daring. I…. I saw it.”

“You saw the ruins?” asked the adventurer.

The doctor nodded, then shuddered.

Daring placed a hoof to her chin, “So these ruins are just over that dune?” she asked.

“Yes, of course” said Dr. Hoof, giving her a confused look, “I called out to you and told you, didn’t you hear me?”

Daring shook her head, “No I didn’t, but, from what Ahuizotl’s told me, this place isn’t really into the whole ‘Laws of Reality’ stuff. So it’s very likely that this place just sort of…. carried away on the wind or something like that.”

Dr. Hoof let out a pitiful moan, “We’re going to die here, aren’t we?”

Daring shook her head fervently, “No we won’t, doc. We’re going to live, I promise you that.”, then she sighed and said, in a more hesitant tone, “But we’re going to have to go back over the dune and see these ruins.”

“Why?” asked Dr. Hoof, now rising back to his hooves with Daring’s aid.

“Because” said Daring, gently releasing pressure on Dr. Hoof’s body to allow him to gain his hooves, “I think that these ruins might hold the key to getting out. Because if there’s one thing that I know about cursed temples and artifacts, it’s that they lose their power when their heart or their vital bits get destroyed.”

Ahuizotl, who had remained silent up until this point, let out a braying laugh when she said these words. Daring turned towards him, “I’m serious, Ahuizotl, we have to go inside and end this.”

“And if you fail?” asked Ahuizotl, switching emotions from hysterical to serious in a flash.

Daring looked him in the eyes and said, with all of her confidence, “We will.”

Then she turned to Dr. Hoof, who was gazing at her with slightly starry eyes, and said, “Take us to the ruins.”

---

Daring Do looked at the ruins, and the desert that surrounded it, and felt her confidence take a nosedive.

The sand, which lay around and blanketed the massive ruins, was as black as coal, like an infected scab on the earth.

The sky had changed as well: the cloudless, evening sky had become dark and shrouded heavy clouds that grew thicker the closer they got to the ruins. Daring thought that she saw something retreat into one of the clouds: something large and spindly, like a spider’s limb.

The most unsettling, though, were the trees, at least, that’s what they resembled in silhouette with their spindly limbs and lengthy trunks, but upon closer inspection, their bark was revealed to be an oily, fleshy covering shot through with oozing cracks.

“This place is like a festering wound.” said Dr. Hoof as he took all of the ghastly sights in.

“More like a cancer.” said Ahuizotl, passing him by and approaching the ruins that jutted out of the blackened sand like shattered bones.

Daring followed him and Dr. Hoof followed after.

As they got closer they could see more of the ruins. Ahuizotl had been right, the materials that had been used to create the unnatural architecture weren’t like any mineral that she had ever seen: they seemed unbelievably smooth, yet they were rough to the touch, and they shone slightly with an inner phosphorescence that reminded her of some types of fungi.

Yet nothing, save for the imitation-trees, grew in the blackened sands.

Daring pulled herself away from the odd stones and focused on the overall designs of the facades and half-buried turrets and battlements.

The tan pegasus surmised that the ruins were those of an ancient castle, not unlike the one in Canterlot.

No. she mentally corrected, It’s nothing like the castle of the princesses, this is the exact opposite.

She heard a gasp and turned to find Dr. Hoof sitting on his rump with his jaw hanging slack and his eyes bulging.

Daring followed his line of vision, wondering what could have made him react the way he did, the she saw It and understood.

It jutted out from the center of the corruption like a pike tip exiting a corpse, it was tall enough to be lost in the swirling gray clouds that loomed high above and it was so utterly black that it seemed to pull all of the light and shadows in the area towards it, creating odd and unnerving patterns of light and darkness around its base.

It’s shape was also unnatural. When Daring looked at it head on the spire seemed to be pointed and four-sided, but, when she looked at it sideways, it seemed to have two extra sides as well as a slight curve of the base.

Daring blinked several times and tried to understand what she was seeing, but she failed to do so.

“Don’t bother trying to see it right. You’ll only make your eyes bleed.” said Ahuizotl, who had come up to her.

Daring was startled out of a revere that she didn’t even know that she had fallen into. She turned and tried to stammer her reply out, but Ahuizotl held a hand up to silence her.

“Yes, Daring, this is the entrance to the place below.” he said, gesturing to the base.

Daring looked there and saw a large, darkened opening in the unnameable material from which the spire was constructed. To Daring’s eyes it looked like the toothless maw of a hungry predator, waiting for her to enter.

And, although fulfilling its unspoken wish was the last thing that she wanted to do, she knew in her heart that it was the only way to escape their predicament.

So, knowing that every step that she took from thereon out would be one step closer to danger, she said, “Alright, gang. Let’s go stop a curse.”

Then she and her companions began their descent into the dark ruins.

Author's Notes:

I bet you all can guess which stories I got my inspiration from :P

The Hungering Dark

The trio crossed the threshold and felt simultaneous bursts of dread sweep through their bodies and fill their minds.

Each of them felt the same thing: they each felt that they had stepped beyond the boundaries of Equestria and into a new place, a place of hungry shadows and terrors that had only been hinted at by Ahuizotl’s insane ramblings.

Before them lay a set of steep, stone stairs that led down at a sharp incline. Daring and her companions slowly made their dark descent, feeling the air grow colder with every step and letting the small pinprick of light that the door provided grow smaller and smaller.

Just before the light was swallowed completely, Daring stopped, opened her bag, and produced a large flashlight.

“I’m glad that I brought this.” she said , feeling a bit of comfort when she switched it on and let the thick beam of artificial light slice through the darkness.

“Oh, thank Celestia.” said Dr. Hoof, letting out a breath that he had been holding.

“The funny thing is I actually forgot that I had this.” she said, trying to force some humor into their situation, but her weak laugh failed utterly to dispel the shifting darkness that lay just beyond the boundaries of the flashlight’s glow.

Soon the air grew colder as they descended deeper, and soon the cold bit at their skin and filled their lungs with stinging, chilled pain as the stairs grew damp and mossy.

And all around them the darkness only seemed to grow and become something other than normal shadow, something thicker, like liquid.

Daring, Ahuizotl and Dr. Hoof found themselves drawing closer to each other to share what little warmth that each had left in their cold bodies.

“C-can’t you do a warming s-spell?” asked Daring as a forceful gust of icy air ruffled her short hair and stung her eyes.

“I-I can t-t-try.” stammered the blue unicorn, now looking significantly more blue than he had a few seconds before. He lit his horn and his aura wrapped around all three of them, pouring a significant amount of energy into the magical constructs.

Daring sighed in relief as a pleasant warmth spread through her body and cleared away the icy chill that had enveloped her.

“Thanks, doc.” she said, giving the good doctor a smile.

“You’re welcome.” he replied with a nod.

Daring turned back just as the ground suddenly and unexpectedly leveled out, sending her tumbling to the cold stone with a gasp.

She heard someone come to her side and raised her head to find Ahuizotl staring at her intently, his eyes were filled with worry.

“Are you alright, Daring?” he asked.

The adventurer was taken aback, she had realized that they had been slowly cutting their bonds as hero and villain over the course of this disturbing endeavor of theirs, but the serious concern in his voice made her wonder if a different type of bond had been formed.

At least, by him.

Daring shook her head to clear the unwanted thoughts from her mind before saying, “Yeah, I’m fine, Ahuizotl.”

The cryptid sighed relievedly and gently helped Daring to her hooves. Daring dusted herself off and then checked the flashlight, which had fallen with her, hoping that it wasn’t damaged.

There was a large crack that ran across the plastic lense, but the light was as bright as ever.

“Thank Celestia.” said Daring, pointing the beam ahead of her.

And so the trio continued on their way, each of them happy that there were no more stairs to traverse, but each also dreading what was to come.

---

Daring felt like she was being watched from the darkness.

This feeling wasn’t new to her, she had felt eyes on her many times before, it just came with the territory. But this feeling was different, more potent somehow.

It’s like this whole place amplifies every fear-related feeling. she thought, then she stopped and her eyes widened, That’s what this place is doing, isn’t it?

“Oh, I am such an idiot!” she said aloud.

“Excuse me?” asked Dr. Hoof.

Daring drew in a breath to start speaking, knowing that what she said would upset the good doctor, but she stopped when she saw- not far up ahead- a green, flickering light.

Evidently Dr. Hoof and Ahuizotl saw it too, because they stopped on either side of her.

“Is that… torch light?” asked Dr. Hoof.

“I think so.” said Daring.

“Should we…. should we got to the light?” asked Dr. Hoof.

Daring didn’t speak, she just looked at the flickering lights. She felt a certain relief at looking at them, a relief that felt… off somehow, almost like it didn’t belong in her mind. But, when she turned the beam of light to either side of her she saw only an endless stretch of shining black floor and empty air.

Wait… what?!

Daring drew a few feet closer to the odd anomaly and then gazed at the reflective tiling that made up the floor.

At first glance the entire floor seemed to be made of these tiles, arranged in a standard grid pattern, but, as she looked closer, she saw that wasn’t the case at all: the lines of the tile seemed to be far more complex than a simple grid, full of triangles and circles and hexagons and other shapes that held far too many sides to be physically impossible.

Parallel lines aren’t supposed to intersect! she thought, feeling like she was about to leave her body.

Suddenly she was wrenched back to reality by Ahuizotl, who wrapped his hands around her shoulders, turned her to face him, and shouted, “Do not look at the floor!”

Daring gasped and felt her consciousness slam back into her body with a sharp jolt.

“How did you-?”

“One of Cabellaron’s men looked at the floor” said Ahuizotl, “He fell through the cracks in the world and was taken.”

“Taken by what?” asked Daring, fearing that she already knew the answer.

“Taken by the Darkness.” said Ahuizotl matter-of-factly.

Daring shuddered.

“We should go back!” said Dr. Hoof, sounding near to a mental breakdown.

Ahuizotl shook his head, “We can’t.”

“And why the buck not!!” roared Dr. Hoof, turning on Ahuizotl and baring his teeth in a snarl.

“Because now the darkness knows that we’re here.” said the cryptid, a sick smile slithering across his face, “It’s alive, you see, and it will tear our bones from out flesh, flay our skin and devour our organs before we can make it to the staircase!”

He let out a giggle, “One of my cats-it was my panther, I think, ran off when things went wrong… and there wasn’t even a single unbroken bone left when I found her.”

He laughed, even as a few tears trickled down his cheeks.

Daring and Dr. Hoof exchanged worried looks, then turned to address their less-than-sane companion, only to find him looking as serious and in control as he had a few minutes previously.

Daring furrowed her brow and went up to him, “Listen, Ahuizotl, I need to know if you’re gonna be okay for all this.”

“Pardon?” asked Ahuizotl with a tilt of his head.

“Are you gonna go crazy on us in the near future?” clarified Daring.

Ahuizotl’s face fell, “I…. I’m not sure…. but I can’t go back now. Even if the darkness wasn’t so alive, I’d still want to face my fears.”

He bowed his head, Dr. Hoof approached him and laid a hoof on his hand, “You just want to be normal again, don’t you?”

Ahuizotl chuckled and shook his head, “I can never be ‘normal’ again. You can’t fix what’s been so broken.”

Daring joined Dr. Hoof and gently placed a hoof under his chin, tilting his head up to look him in the eyes.

“It’ll take time, but I think that you can recover.” she said, not even flinching when she looked into those white orbs of his.

“Now” said the adventurer after clearing her throat, “lets go and stop whatever’s happening.”

---

As they neared the lights the air grew warmer to the point where Dr. Hoof was able to remove the heating spell.

The green light was revealed to be coming from not one, but several sources, all of which were large, ornately -carved sconces which held massive torches that were roughly the size of a pony limb.

The harsh, sickly green light overpowered the beam from her flashlight, so she turned it off and stowed it in her bag.

The light also revealed most of their surroundings, and the company gazed in wonder at the massive stone pillars that shot up high into the darkness above them, as well as the walls that were connected to them, each wall was covered in gaudily-painted hieroglyphs whose color had not been diminished in the passage of time.

Daring felt her curiosity grip her again and she approached the nearest section of hieroglyphs to examine them.

The scene that was etched onto the wall depicted a colorful land of bright green grass and a shining, pink sun that sat in a rainbow sky. The next part showed a group of crudely-drawn ponies cavorting with a group of odd creatures the likes of which Daring had never seen, but their oddly proportioned limbs and the chimeric nature of their bodies made her uneasy.

The scene after that showed both groups bowing in reverence to a creature that sat atop a gilded throne, a creature that was both familiar in body and alien in expression.

It had the body of a ram or goat, with bright blue fur and curling horns and cloven hooves that held a spear and a scepter.

It looked like most other depictions of worship that she had seen in her travels with one glaring exception: in most of the depictions of great kings of old, the king wore an expression of pure benevolence, with a smile and rosy cheeks, but this king bore no such expression, instead he was sneering down at his subjects, showing off his sharpened teeth as he did.

Daring’s eyes were drawn to those of the painting and she found that they were pure red, like orbs of fresh blood set in hollowed sockets.

The sight was enough to make her shudder, but she looked to the next portrait regardless, feeling the need to sate her curiosity.

The following scene showed both groups clustered together in what appeared to be a large orgy, as the ram-like king watched them from an altar that looked like it was carved out of bones. Then Daring noticed the blood and the scars that had been painted on the revelers.

Next the ram-like king was standing over a massive pool of shimmering liquid, holding aloft a dripping dagger in one hoof and the head of a pony foal in the other as his subjects bowed around him and the pool.

Daring felt her gorge rise at the look of agony on the foal's mutilated face and the sadistic mirth that was etched in bas-relief onto the king's cruel face, she averted her eyes to the bottom of the scene, where the hieroglyphs lay.

To her immense surprise they were not in some indecipherable script from eons past, but in Saddle Arabian. She leaned closer and was able to pick out the first few lines:

And so the cruel king

Committed the ultimate act of evil

And plunged the world into eternal darkness

Thus King Grogar became a dark god amongst his people

And Tambelon fell to wickedness

And the land around became corrupt.

Daring’s ears perked up and she felt herself drawn to the next scene, and when she saw what was shown, she gasped audibly.

The scene showed two very familiar alicorns, one white and one dark blue, engaged in combat with the creature known as Grogar. The text underneath read:

The Lunar Princess and the Solar Princess

Rose against Grogar.

They drove seven silver spears through him

And cut off his head

Then they tore the cancerous world apart

And saved what goodness remained.

And out of that goodness was born Equestria.

But the shadow of Tambelon remains

And one day it shall stretch forth and claim the land again

For no shadow can be destroyed forever.

Daring fell to her rump, her head was spinning and her hooves were shaking as the realization washed over her and filled her guts and weighed her very bones down.

The princesses are connected to this place? she thought, And… and the hieroglyphs said that- they told the… they told the founding of Equestria itself! A question which has never been answered by the Princesses and has never even been focused on.

“Sweet Celestia..” she breathed, feeling a headache take rook in her skull.

“Daring?” asked a voice from behind her, causing her to jump a foot in the air with a shrill scream.

“Daring?! What’s wrong?” asked Dr. Hoof, coming around to face her as the tan pegasus placed a hoof to her heart to calm herself.

“Th-the paintings and the w-w-words” she stammered, “I-I think that I’ve just f-found out how Equestria was made!”

“What?!” shouted Dr. Hoof.

Daring smiled shakily, “I think… if we make it out of here… the princesses are gonna have a LOT of explaining to do!”

Dr. Hoof stammered incomprehensibly for a moment before Ahuizotl, who had been watching the exchange solemnly, slapped him hard, sending him onto his back.

“We don’t have time for this.” he said evenly.

“Oh yes we do.” said Daring, feeling a kind of giddy mania fill her.

“No, we don’t.” reaffirmed Ahuizotl sternly, “Look” he said, pointing behind them.

Daring turned and saw the green lights of the torches start to snuff out.

“If we don’t run now the darkness will catch us and we will die a million deaths.” he said.

Daring looked at the oncoming darkness, then at the most important find of her life, then back to the darkness.

Finally she got to her hooves, turned, and galloped down the corridor before her, with Ahuizotl and Dr. Hoof following a moment later.

Behind them the darkness, now filled with a furious hunger, devoured the light.

Author's Notes:

I got such a rush writing the last part :D. I hope you enjoyed the chapter, because there are only two left.

The Unnatural Vista

Daring, Ahuizotl and Dr. Hoof ran until their muscles screamed and their lungs burned painfully, but they dared not stop or even pause until they knew that they had left the terrifying, unnaturally intelligent shadow behind.

They ran until the walls around them lost their gaudy hieroglyphs and became pocked with large, arched doorways occupied by ornate iron doors.

Daring and the others would have kept running, but a sudden and painful cramp in her left forelimb caused her to fall heavily to the cold floor.

Daring started to scramble to her hooves, but Ahuizotl placed a hand on her back and said, “I think that we can rest for a moment, Daring.”

“How do you know?” asked Daring as she caught her breath.

“We were chased by that same darkness when me and my men came here and it only pursued us so far.” explained the cryptid.

“Why didn’t you tell us this before?” asked Dr. Hoof accusingly.

Ahuizotl shrugged, “I forgot” he blushed lightly, “I’m sorry.”

Daring waved him off, noticing the dark look that came over Dr. Hoof’s face as she did.

He’s suspicious of Ahuizotl. she realized, But then again, why wouldn't he be? Ahuizotl’s been pretty tight-lipped about this whole thing… maybe he’s been luring us into a trap!

Her heart began to beat faster as she turned her gaze on her former arch nemesis, He could still be working for them, he could have suckered me and the doctor with his little ‘broken bird’ gambit. I haven’t been in the best mindset as of late.

Daring stretched out and then cantered up to Dr. Hoof just as Ahuizotl was leaning in to examine one of the doors.

“Keep an eye on him.” she whispered. Dr. Hoof nodded and Daring turned back to Ahuizotl, who was gazing at the tiny, intricate runes that were carved into the door’s surface.

“Watcha’ lookin’ at?” she asked with a false smile, the suddenness of her appearance causing Ahuizotl to jump.

“I don’t remember this place.” he said, looking at her with a terrified expression.

Daring’s false smile fell and was replaced by a look of horror.

“You-you can’t be serious!” she stammered.

Ahuizotl clasped his hands to his forehead and dug his jagged nails into his skin, “Stupid, stupid, stupid, Stupid!!!” he punctuated each ‘stupid’ by slicing through a small portion of his skin, Daring reached out and pulled his hands away, but only after he had managed to create 7 short tears in his skin that dripped blood.

“Get ahold of yourself!” bellowed the adventurer, trying not to wince when the force at which she shook him dislodged several drops of blood, several of which spattered across her face,

“I shouldn’t have underestimated this place.” he whimpered, “This place is as alive as you and I and-of course- it would shift around; there’s no point in letting your prey learn the layout of your hunting ground.”

Daring heard Dr. Hoof let out a choked, shuddering laugh behind her and she turned to see tears streaming from his magenta eyes.

“We-we’re gonna die in here…. aren’t we?” he asked in a choked voice.

Daring felt pity well up within her and she released Ahuizotl to go and comfort the poor doctor. She wrapped her hooves around him, pulled him close, and let him cry softly into her fur.

“I swear it’s like I have two kids here.” she teased gently, eliciting a watering chuckle from the doctor.

Dr. Hoof withdrew from the embrace a moment later and wiped his eyes.

“Feeling better?” asked Daring.

Dr., Hoof sighed, “Kind of, it felt good to let some of my anxiety go, but I still don’t really… favor our chances, I mean, we’re trapped in an alien temple that apparently shifts and we’re being chased by a living shadow that wants to eat us!”

Then the good doctor looked off to the side and promptly facehoofed, “Oh, sweet Celestia! Why don’t we just try these doors? Maybe one’ll lead to an exit!”

He raced towards one of the doors, but Daring grabbed him and roughly pulled him back.

“We can’t afford to be reckless right now.” she chided, “I’ll look at the runes and then we’ll see about using one.”

Dr. Hoof sighed, but nodded his agreement, and Daring walked over to the door and leaned in to examine the runes better.

Alright…. looks like Saddle Arabian, just like the other hieroglyphs… wait, wait a second, the characters changed, now they look like Neighponese-wait, now they’re Prussian, what the hay?!

Daring shook her head, utterly bewildered at the sudden change in language. She blinked and took a deep breath, trying to calm her frayed nerves and assess the situation properly.

Then she looked back to the door and found it completely blank.

Y’know what? Screw it! she thought angrily, This place is fucking with me and it’s pissing me off!

She felt her vision go red and she decided, then and there, to open the door to spite the cruel, unearthly temple.

I bet this door DOES lead to an exit and this place is just trying to deter me… yeah, that’s it… she thought with a giggle. She placed a hoof to the door, wincing as its smooth surface burned her.

She didn’t hear Ahuizotl shout for her not to open the door, nor did she see him and Dr. Hoof rush towards her, she was numb to the burning pain that shot through her hoof; all she could see was the opening door and the dull light that lay beyond.

Then the door was open fully and she was looking out over an unnatural vista.

The earth that lay far below her might have been green and teeming with kind and gentle life once, but now the grass was as long as most trees and a shade of yellow normally found in pus. The trees were like tall, chitinous skyscrapers, and they twitched and writhed even though the air was still and heavy and stinking.

A large, tumor-covered bird dropped down from a nest of bones in one of the “branches”, obviously going to get food, but it was swatted out of the sky by an oily, dirty tentacle that Daring realized served as the tree’s roots.

She heard a rustling in the tall grass and she looked down to see several pairs of glowing green eyes watching her with the sort of intelligence that animals did not have.

Are they… ponies? She thought.

Then she saw one of them move into a shaft of pale sunlight and she clearly made out the coarse, red fur and the great, raw gashes that covered an inequine skeletal structure that included six legs and a row of membranous dorsal fins that sliced through the fur.

As she watched the creatures came out of the grass and stalked into a clearing where a crude bonfire had been lit. The Not-Ponies were dragging something furry and multi-limbed behind them wrapped in a net that Daring could swore had been made with barbed wire.

The Not-Ponies hauled the thing up to the bonfire, then they pulled it loose and bucked it into the flames.

The instant it’s fuzz body hit the embers it let out a cacophonous wail that reminded Daring of a crying newborn.

The Not-Ponies exchanged hungry looks with one another, then they began to draw in, each licking black lips with long, purple tongues.

Daring shuddered and then looked up at the sky, feeling her heart stop when she laid eyes on it.

The sky was vast and multi-hued like a rainbow, only the colors were all wrong, they weren’t bright or vibrant, they were the darkest, dingiest versions of the rainbow. Like a dark rainbow, an anti-rainbow. Daring mused as she saw a large, white sun slowly fall under a shroud of smoggy clouds.

“What kind of place is this?” she asked herself, wincing when as her voice echoed through the sprawling, pus-colored plains.

At least nothing’s tried to attack me. she thought.

Then something shot out of the smog and flew towards her on massive, leathery wings.

Daring balked at its draconic visage which, although familiar to her, was distorted and unpleasant, and it’s bulbous, yellow eyes and slavering, fang-filled maw held no intelligence, only predatory hunger.

The adventurer tried to scream, but her throat felt like it was filled with hardened molasses, so all that came out was a burbling whine.

The Not-Dragon let out a roar that shook her to the core, it opened its mouth and let out a burst of speed that sent it hurtling at her like a ravenous comet.

I’m dead. she thought, feeling intense sadness fill her heart, I’m dead because of my stupidity and this damned place. But I won’t close my eyes, I’ll look death in the eye just like I had always known I would… I just hope the others get out safely.

Daring steeled herself as the teeth of the Not-Dragon loomed before her.

Then she was falling backwards as two strong hands pulled her away from the door’s threshold.

---

“-aring!”

Uhhggh… my head…

“Daring!”

Whaaa-? Whassat?

“Daring Do! Can you hear me?”

Who is that? Is that-

“Ahuizotl?” asked Daring, wincing as the syllables grated against her throat like sandpaper.

She heard the cryptid heave a relieved sigh, “Yes, I’m here, Daring. What were you thinking, opening that door?”

Daring felt heat blossom in her cheeks, “I-I don’t know, I… I just felt so angry and I wanted to spite you and the doctor, it was like I had tunnel vision.”

The tan pegasus slowly got to her hooves,wincing in pain when she put pressure on her burn. She straightened her shirt and cracked her wing joints, letting out a groan of relief when she did.

Ahuizotl growled, “I was wondering when this place would start pulling out all the stops.”

Daring gave her wings a few test flaps, then the opened her bag and retrieved some burn cream. She hissed as she slowly applied the stinging stuff to her hoof-sole. She briefly considered putting some gauze on the burn, but she thought better of it, knowing that it would probably come off if she had to run.

When she was finished she turned to Ahuizotl, who was looking at the door intently, and said, “Thanks.”

Ahuizotl turned to her with a confused look on his face.

“For saving me.” clarified Daring.

The cryptid waved a hand, “It was nothing, really.”

“What’s wrong, Ahuizotl? Being heroic leave a bat taste in your mouth?” she teased.

Ahuizotl snorted, but didn't retort, much to Daring’s amusement.

Daring turned back to Dr. Hoof and found him gazing at the door that she went through.

“Hey, doc, what are you doing?” she asked, noting the unblinking intensity that darkened the good doctor’s eyes.

He didn't give a verbal reply, instead he reached out and, before she or Ahuizotl could do anything to stop him, opened the door. They rushed to him with the intent of pulling him away, thinking that they’d be confronted by the same unnatural other world.

But, to their surprise, the only thing that lay beyond the doorway was a long, darkened corridor made from the same materials as the rest of the temple.

“Well… that’s… freaky.” said Daring, blinking slowly and wondering if they weren’t all hallucinating.

She turned to the doctor to ask him why he had opened the door, but stopped when she saw the look of pure anger on his face. It was unnerving, seeing the good doctor take on such an expression; it was almost like he was someone else.

Then she saw the red tint in his eyes and her blood went cold.

“How did you do it?” asked the Facsimile of Dr. Hoof in a low and dangerous voice.

“How did I do what?” asked Daring, tensing as her fight or flight response kicked in.

“Don’t play dumb with me.” warned the Facsimile, “How did you open the doorway to Tambelon?”

“I don’t know.” said Daring evenly, using her wings to slowly reach for the whip in her bag. Ahuizotl, who was next to her, bared his fangs and hissed like an angry viper.

The Facsimile turned his attention to the cryptid, “Aw, what’s the matter, Ahuizotl?” it asked with false worry, “Did you, the most intelligent and cunning villain of our time, not see this coming?”, Ahuizotl’s fur bristled and his hiss became a guttural snarl that only brought a sneer to the false face of the Child of Darkness.

“What did you do to the doctor?” growled Daring, turning the creature’s attention back to her and letting him see the whip clutched in her wing.”

The Facsimile smiled, “We caught your little friend when you were teleporting away, you never thought to check the shadows. You were so busy worrying about Ahuizotl that you didn't even entertain the possibility that I was one of them.”

“What did you do to him, you bastard?!” spat Daring.

The Facsimile smiled, “You’ll see soon enough, my dear Daring Do.”

“No, I think you’ll tell us right now” said Daring coolly, “unless you want to taste my whip.”

The Facsimile let out a bark of guttural laughter “You think a piece of leather and rope will hurt me? I’m not a weakling mortal mule like yourself, Daring, I am a Child Of Darkness… and I am not alone.”

Daring heard the sound of something move behind her a fraction of a second before she saw Ahuizotl slump to the floor as a dark shadow stood over him.

Then she felt a powerful blow connect with the back of her skull and all went dark.

Author's Notes:

I finished this chapter listening to this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XlUM7GTL2iA

It was surprisingly helpful :P

But, in all seriousness, the next chapter is the darkest chapter in the story, you've been warned.

The Circle Of Agony

Over the course of her many years as an adventurer, Daring Do had awoken to some very hairy situations: she had awoken in the web of a giant spider, strapped to an altar in some ancient ruins, freefalling out of an airship and many more things besides.

But she had never once awoken to such a ghastly and horrific situation as this.

The first thing that she noticed upon her awakening was the smell. It assaulted her nostrils and immediately made her want to retch.

It was a foul, cloying stink that reminded her of the butcher shops in the Griffon Lands; it was the stench of fresh and not-so-fresh blood and viscera.

She tried to move, but, as was expected, she was restrained. The choice of restrain this time around felt like thick chains and sturdy wire; the cold metal forced a shudder up her spine and made her poor wings ache.

Finally, after calming herself, she opened her eyes... and immediately wished that she hadn’t.

She was in a massive, circular room made entirely out of rusted metal, the support beams that held up the grated ceiling were pitted and wrapped with wires and chains from which hung the skulls of countless animals; Daring realized to her horror that the skulls had been bronzed.

The object that she was bound to, which she realized was a thick sheet of metal riveted to a thin frame, hung from a thick, barbed chain that was, in turn, connected to the ceiling by a system of pulleys.

Daring heard a low groan to her right and turned to see that Ahuizotl was in a similar state of restraint and both were only a few inches apart from each other.

Daring examined him and gasped when she saw that the Facsimiles had hammered iron spikes through his tail to keep it from moving. As she watched, Ahuizotl whimpered and turned his head to look at her with tear-filled eyes that silently begged her for help.

The sight of her former foe-turned friend in such an agonized state brought tears to her eyes and filled her heart with anger.

She began to pull and tug at her bonds, trying to use sheer muscle to break them, but that, of course, didn’t work in the slightest.

Daring slumped back and exhaled loudly, trying to calm herself and assess the situation properly.

She reopened her eyes and began to examine the room more carefully, looking for any structural weakness. She looked down and caught a faint glimmer through the grating of the floor, Daring narrowed her eyes and strained them to get a better look.

There’s water below us. she realized as she saw the glimmer shift and ripple the light hit it. What’s illuminating it? she wondered, looking up at the ceiling, but not seeing any light source.

“Why was I expecting this place to make sense now?” she asked herself, growling in annoyance.

“D-Daring?”

The adventurer turned back to Ahuizotl and tried her best not to look at his tail, “I’m here, Ahuizotl.” she said as calmly as she could,

“Daring… I-I’ve hurt you… I’ve tried to kill you and your friends so many times. I know I’m a monster, I’ve suffered for my stupidity, but-” his voice began to get teary, “but I know that my suffering will never, ever make up for what I’ve d-done to you.”

Ahuizotl began to let out whimpering breaths as he continued.

“I-I’m a m-menace…. a freak…. I don’t even have friends, all I had were my cats and they were r-ripped to p-pieces. Dr. Cabelleron was a-always talking about me behind me back, pl-plotting to kill m-me and take my w-wealth.”

Big, fat tears began roll down his cheeks and he heaved a shuddering sigh.

“Even when I was younger I didn’t have friends and my parents couldn’t have cared less… all th-they ever did was h-hit me.”

“Ahuizotl…” whispered Daring.

“I am so, so, so sorry, Daring!” he wept, “I’ve done so much evil in my life, now I’m paying for it, but -but I’m scared!”

He raised his head and let out a high, miserable wail.

Daring felt the last shreds of animosity fade away as she watched her former enemy break down utterly.

“Oh, Ahuizotl” said Daring, her voice full of empathy, “I forgave you a while ago.”

She could tell that her words reached Ahuizotl, because his wail slowly died out and was replaced by low sniffling. After a few minutes he asked, “R-really?”

“Really.” confirmed Daring, directing a small smile his way.

There was silence from his end for a moment, then he whispered, “Thank you, Daring Do.”

‘What are friends for?” asked Daring.

She heard him gasp lightly, then he scoffed and said, “You’re only saying that because we’re going to die soon.”

Daring shook her head, “We’re not gonna die, Ahuizotl. We’re going to make it out alive, I promise you that.”

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” replied Ahuizotl hollowly.

Daring sighed and began to look around again, but all she could see was metal, rust and the glimmering pool below her.

She heard Ahuizotl shift on his restraints, then let out a yelp of pain as he agitated his poor, impaled tail. Daring turned back to him and glanced at his wounds, which were leaking blood and had grown slightly inflamed as infection was beginning to set in.

Oh, no, I bet he’s gonna need to get that amputated. she thought sadly, When this is all over I’m gonna give him a hug… he needs one.

She was about to return to her search when something caught her eye: one of the spikes had been torn loose from its fleshy mooring and now stood at a crooked angle.

Daring gazed at the gory spike as an idea formed in her head.

“Ahuizotl.” she said softly.

“Yes?” came the weak reply.

“I think I have a way to get us out of here, but I need you to hold still for me, okay?”

There was silence, then “O-okay.”

Daring slowly arched her back, wincing as her vertebrae popped, and slowly extended her wing, hissing in pain as the soft flesh scraped the hard steel. She reached out towards the crooked spike with her feathers, but, to her frustration, the distance was a few inches to great.

“Damn.” she snarled.

‘What is it?” asked Ahuizotl.

“Hold on a second.” said Daring as she started to think, “I need a second.”

Ahuizotl quieted and Daring began to go through solutions in her mind: She could dislocate the wing, but that would mean sacrificing control of her feathers, which would make grabbing the spike impossible. She could use her whip if she had it with her, but it was gone along with her bag. She couldn’t use her hooves and she couldn’t see any bits of metal that could be used to get at the spike.

Sighing in frustration, Daring slumped back, making the slab swing slightly on its chains.

Daring felt the stirred wind on her fur and smiled when she realized what she could do. Daring readied her limbs, then she hurled herself violently to the left, causing the frame to swing on its chains.

Smiling smugly to herself, Daring Do threw all of her weight to the right and swung the frame towards Ahuizotl. Just as her frame struck Ahuizotl’s she reached out with her feathers and grasped the loose spike tightly, hoping against hope that the blood covering it wouldn’t make it too slippery.

Her frame swung back to the right and the spike came out in her feathers with a sickening wet splatter.

Ahuizotl let out a gasp and Daring began apologizing profusely.

“I’m so, so sorry, but I needed to get that spike in your tail. I’m sorry.”

Ahuizotl clenched his hands into fists and said, through gritted fangs, “It’s alright. Are you going to pick the locks to your cuffs with that?”

Daring nodded and Ahuizotl burst into a peal of laughter.

“What?” asked Daring, not liking the hysterical, weepy tone of the laugh.

“Heeheehehehehe...Those cuffs don’t have keyholes!” he giggled.

Daring blinked, then she looked at the cuffs around Ahuizotl’s wrists and saw that he was right.

“Are you kidding me?!” she bellowed angrily, feeling the urge to abandon herself to her fury and the utter hopelessness of the situation.

Her anger died out and was replaced with fear when she heard something moving towards them in the darkness and she slipped the spike into the folds of her feathers just as the thing entered into her field of vision.

Daring assumed that the creature that stood before her was a Facsimile, but it had removed its disguise and now stood before her in all of its repulsive glory.

It was tall and thin-limbed, with pure red compound eyes, like those of a fly, set in a bulbous head. It’s skin was furless and oily, and shot through with a latticework of thick blue veins that pulsated and squirmed like eels. Upon its back lay a set of four wings that were folded tightly across its protruding ribs and in place of a tail there was a barbed tentacle.

Daring narrowed her eyes when she saw her bag slung across its back.

“Hello, Daring Do and AHuizotl.” it said through a lipless maw filled with fangs that were begrimed with black bile.

“Hello yourself, fugly.” said Daring.

The Facsimile chuckled wetly, “Flattery will get you everywhere, like a grave or my belly.”

“I doubt I’d taste very good.” she said with a smirk, “I bet my wings would choke you.”

“I’ve eaten far bigger than you, pegasus.” it hissed.

“What… what are you going to do to us?” asked Ahuizotl, gaining the Facsimile’s attention.

“First we’re going to saw your limbs off, then we’ll insert tubes into your wounds, followed by a round of hot pokers, well-placed needles, whips, hooks and several types of spells that are so potent you’ll wish for death by fire over the agony that you’ll feel-”

“Is that what you did to Dr. Hoof?” asked Daring in a low voice.

The Facsimile giggled girlishly, “No, no, no. He’s a unicorn, so he gets ‘special privileges’.”

“What do you mean?” asked the tan pegasus.

“Maybe I’ll show you.” said the creature as it moved close enough for Daring to smell its vile-smelling breath, “That is, after I’m finished having my fun with you, Daring Do.”

Daring felt anger rise up in her gut like hot bile at those words, the insinuation of such an unspeakable act was enough to make what she was about to do almost enjoyable.

Over the course of her adventures Daring had picked up a few useful traits: lock-picking, how to box, how to move silently and be stealthy, advanced puzzle-solving.

And knife-throwing.

With a yell, Daring let the bloody spike drop into her feathertips, then she raised her wing and through the spike in one fluid motion.

The spike flew through the air and struck the Facsimile dead in the eye, sliding in up to the top and splitting the eye down the middle.

The Facsimile howled in pain and fell to its knobby knees, the split in its eyes leaking rancid yellow blood and gray vitreous humor. The thing’s tail whipped around frantically as it tried to pull the spike out.

Daring sucked in her gut just as the dagger-like tip of the tail came within a few inches of disemboweling her, cutting the wire across her gut as instead, then she ducked her head as the tail whipped back and sliced the air where her ears had been… as well as severing the cuffs on her hooves.

Daring fell to the floor, wincing at the grating sliced into her hooves. She got up, cracked her wing joints, and sprinted at the Facsimile just as it started to rise to its hooves.

With a furious yell, Daring twisted her body and bucked the insectoid monstrosity in the face, sending it flying backwards into one of the skull-encrusted pillars with a loud BANG!

The vile creature started to rise, but Daring was on it before it could fully do so, grabbing her bag and pulling the straps over its scrawny neck, then pulling as hard as she could. The Facsimile gagged and choked as it continued its attempt to get up, but Daring increased the pressure and pressed one of her back hooves into its back for leverage.

“I’ve got you now, you ugly son of a mule!” she snarled into the hole that served as its ear.

Then the strap snapped and the Facsimile fell to the floor.

Daring tossed the bag to the ground and started to open it, hoping to get to her whip, but the Facsimile was quicker, pinning her to the pillar in a flash of slimy black skin and rank breath.

“I’ll eat your soul, you worthless roach!” it roared.

Daring’s hooves scrambled over the pillar as the creature’s teeth began to descend towards her face. Her hooves brushed against something hard and smooth, and she yanked whatever it was free, bringing it up over her head and slamming it down in the creature’s skull.

The Facsimile groaned and fell back to its knees. Daring looked at the object and immediately dropped it when she saw that it was a large feline skull.

The distraction caused by the skull gave the Facsimile enough time to regain its hooves and charge. Daring turned and caught the attack full in the shoulder, sending her to the ground with a cry of pain.

Then the Facsimile was upon her once again, its four wings buffeting her and its hooves pummeling her stomach.

Oh no you don’t! she thought as she warded off several blows, I refuse to be killed *ummph!* by a giant bug!

Daring coiled her fore and back limbs, then she drove all four hooves into the creature’s fleshy stomach, feeling disgust fill her gut at how squishy and slippery its skin was. But the hit did the trick and the Facsimile was launched off of her.

Daring seized her opportunity and grabbed the skull, then she strode up to the fallen Facsimile, raised the heavy piece of bronze over her head, and brought it down in its head with all her might.

There was a sickening CRUNCH! and the Facsimile’s head split open like a ripe melon, sending yellow blood and clumps of wet tissue everywhere.

Daring backed off and then fell to her rump. She gazed at the still-twitching body of the abomination for a full minute, then she turned her head and vomited.

---

After she had pulled herself together, Daring used a different skull to bask Ahuizotl’s cuffs off, then she used a small switchblade that she had in her bag to slice the wires off and leverage the remaining spikes out.

After that was done, the duo left the metal chamber and found themselves in a very different setting.

They were in another large room, but this one was made of stone, rather than metal, and it was barren, save for several glowing torches and a large design carved into the center that, upon closer inspection, was revealed to be a very complex transmutation circle.

There was only one other door, so their choice was easy.

The next place that the entered into had a more sinister air to it. It was another spacious room, but this one was made from the same odd, shimmering black stone that composed the outer portion of the ruins and the torches within glowed a light blue that made the shadows dance and writhe.

This time they were faced with two doors. Daring started for the left and Ahuizotl went for the right, bit of them opened their doors at the same time and peered out.

“I see another corridor.” said Daring.

“I see a room full of spikes.” said Ahuizotl flatly.

“Left it is, then.” said Daring with a small smile, a smile which Ahuizotl actually returned.

The duo entered into the corridor and immediately stopped when they realized that the corridor was made of glass, but the only thing that they could see was a mass of swirling, red fog.

Shaking their heads, the duo walked straight to the door, not looking directly at the fog for fear of alerting whatever unspeaking thing lurked beyond its smoky veil to their presence.

They got to the door, opened it, and were greeted by a gust of frigid air and set their fur on end. Daring took the lead and entered into the next room with Ahuizotl following behind.

This room was shrouded in darkness, save for a cluster of small braisers that held blue fire. Daring immediately noticed how utterly silent it was, the only sounds that she could hear was the light scuffing sounds of her hooves and Ahuizotl’s paws on the stone floor and their hearts beating slightly out of sync.

The next thing that she noticed, as they moved towards the blue light, was the smell. It wasn’t like the room that she had woken up in, but there was something… off about it all the same: it was sweet, too sweet, like sugar and vanilla and every other pleasant smell mixed into a slightly nauseating potpourri.

Something about this smell is familiar… and not in a good way. thought Daring.

“This place smells of dark magic.” said Ahuizotl.

“I thought I recognized it.” said Daring turned to him and seeing that his eyes were wide and his hands were trembling slightly.

“Don’t worry, Ahuizotl, we’ll-”

She cut herself off as her ears detected a small sound that came from outside the blue glow of the flames.

Daring moved forwards, pulling out her flashlight as she did, wondering what had caused the sound and readying herself for another fight.

She stepped fully into the ring of blue light and began to move closer to the darkness, which was made far darker by the light as they cast shadows that were swallowed up and assimilated to form a kind of blackness rarely found outside of the cold depths of space.

“Daring, wait!” called Ahuizotl, rushing up to her side.

“What is it? What’s wrong?” asked the adventurer, her hoof going for her whip.

“Just… don’t go into the shadows, please.” pleaded the cryptid, gazing fearfully at the darkness that lay not ten feet from them.

“Alright.” said Daring, feeling that her friend was probably not gibbering and was able to sense something that she couldn’t.

“Look!” said Ahuizotl, pointing at something, “There’s another light over there!”

Daring looked to where he was indicating and saw that there was indeed another, much larger set of blue lights that mixed with a pale, greenish light.

The tan pegasus looked around in her bag before pulling out a large book. Ahuizotl gave her a curious look, but then exclaimed in understanding when she placed the top end into the fire, creating a makeshift torch.

“I think that this fire has some kind of special property” said Daring “probably an enchantment that will keep the darkness at bay… y’know, more so than normal torches.”

Ahuizotl nodded silently and followed Daring as she walked into the darkness, surrounded by a medium-sized circle of blue light.

All around them the darkness pulsed and quavered like an animal being teased by a morsal. The soft sounds that Daring had heard were no omnipresent, echoing from the black all around them, yet she still couldn’t figure out what it was.

And it made her very uneasy.

Daring and Ahuizotl finally reached the large circle of light just as the book had started scorching her hoof. The instant they stepped into the light Daring was able to get a good look at the source of the green glow.

It was a large, deep-looking pool filled with murky green liquid that bore no smell and didn’t give off any fumes. The surface of the pool was still, save for the small ripples created by several dozen sets of clear tubes that were dripping red liquid into its depths.

Red liquid? thought Daring, What the hay is…. that?

“Oh…. my Faust!” exclaimed Ahuizotl in a voice that was positively dripping with unmitigated terror and disgust.

“What is it?” said Daring, staring into the darkness.

“Don’t look, Daring… p-please don’t look.” he whimpered, covering his white eyes with his hands.

“C’mon, Ahuizotl, I’ve seen plenty of nasty stuff today.” said Daring, reaching for her flashlight.

She stopped, however, when she saw the pleading look in her friend’s eyes.

Daring sighed, “Alright, I won’t look okay-”

There was a massive Whoosh and the blue flames shot up into blinding columns that illuminated what lay beyond.

Almost like the fire knew what we were saying… thought Daring, turning away from the glaring, blue light.

And came face-to-face with Tartarus itself.

They were everywhere, laid out along the stone walls, strapped down in what looked like glass coffins from which tubes ran to the green pool. Their raw, red flesh glistened in the pale light and the only movements that came from them were their chests rising and falling slowly.

They were all ponies, that much Daring could tell from their hooves and muzzles, but other than that they were completely unrecognizable as equines.

And that was because they were all flayed.

There was no fur or skin, just dripping muscle and exposed nerves.

And they were Alive.

Every. Single. One

Daring wanted to vomit, she wanted to pass out, to run, to die, ANYTHING but be a witness to the monstrosity that lay before her. It was unimaginable, unnatural and unprecedented in the world of dark deeds and vile exploits.

“Sweet Faust.” said Daring, feeling tears well up in her eyes as her gorge rose. She sank to her knees, unable to look away, unable to take her eyes off of the breathing bodies.

“Who could do something like this?” she sobbed, “Why are they still alive? How can we help them?!”

She pressed her hooves to her eyes, then felt a pair of thin, but warm arms wrap around her. She looked up into Ahuizotl’s weeping face and abandoned herself to tears.

They sat like that for what felt like an eternity before Daring was ready to face the horrible sight again.

Drying her reddened and puffy eyes, the adventurer walked closer to the flayed ponies and looked at the tubes that fed into the pool.

“I’m so, so sorry.” she said to the nearest one, whose thick jaw and limbs made him out to be an earth pony. She reached in, but stopped, then she retracted her hooves and said, “I can’t break his neck, Ahuizotl. We need to find another way.”

The cryptid nodded grimly, “I think that we can kill them if we erase those runes on the sides of their coffins, there.” he pointed and Daring saw a smaller replica of the transmutation circle that they had stumbled across.

Daring nodded, reiterated her apology, and then cracked the glass where the rune was, creating a deep split through the circle.

The skinless earth pony gave a gasp, then slumped forwards, dead at last.

Daring heaved a shuddering sigh, pushed her tears back, and kept going. She cracked each transmutation circle, watched each of them die, and apologized to them each time.

Finally Daring had only one left.

She approached the skinless form, noticing, to her disgust and horror, the severed horn lying in a jar of the same green liquid as the pool.

“I’m so, so sorry.” she said, meaning it as much as she had the first time.

Then the eyes of the unicorn opened.

“Daaaaarrrrrinnngggg…..” it moaned in a very familiar voice.

“D-Dr. H-H-Hoof?!” asked Daring, feeling like she had been punched in the gut.

“Daarringg…” repeated the shell of the good doctor, “l-l-lissten to… me.”

“A-alright.” said Daring, letting the tears leak down her eyes.

Dr. Hoof’s last words were labored and pained, but Daring never once interrupted him, knowing that she had to respect him in his last moments.

“I’m… sorry… I was greedy… I was a t-t-terrible doctor...I was a terrible husband… I even c-changed m-my last name to-to run away… like a coward…. my real last name issss….. Lulamoon… Benvolio Lulamoon.”

He took a deep, shuddering breath, then continued in a far steadier tone. Daring felt her a faint sting of admiration at his willpower.

“Listen to me, Daring… when you get out, go to my house… there is a box under m-my bed that has everything that I once was. There is a locket… a locket with a pi-picture of my wife, Edna, and my daughter…. Trixie…. I want you to give the locket to Trixie, she’ll a-appreciate it more than Edna will.”

He took another breath, but Daring could tell that the end was near.

“But there is something that Edna would like… the ticket stubs to the first real play that she was ever in.” his mangled mouth turned up in a faint smile, “Just… just tell her that I’m sorry… I’m so… so sorry.”

“I will.” said Daring solemnly, trying not to fall apart when her friend needed her the most, “I swear to Celestia and Luna and Faust that I will do everything that you asked me.”

The smile widened, “Th-thank you…. Daring… Do…”

Then Benvolio Lulamoon died as the transmutation circle was broken.

---

Daring didn’t realize that something dangerous and grand was happening until Ahuizotl shook her out of her mourning-induced stupor and showed her what was happening.

The pool of green liquid was bubbling and boiling. The glue fires had become waves of flame that were crashing over the stone and turning it to ash and, in the distance, Daring swore she heard something large and malicious cry out in agony.

Daring Do and Ahuizotl exchanged frightened glances, then they ran as fast as they could as the temple began to fall apart.

They ran down the glass corridor, watched by evil eyes from the fog.

They ran past the large transmutation circle, which bled in streams.

They ran past their prison as it fell apart in a symphony of crashing metal.

They ran through the doors into the long hallway, which was cracking and groaning like an ancient beast.

They ran and ran and ran.

Letting the Fear guide them.

And then they were out, free from the ruins of Tambelon, but they still ran as the howling of the wind behind them became angry screams and the blackened sands rose up against them in wrath.

They ran until they were out from Tambelon’s sphere of wicked influence.

They ran until Celestia’s sun rose in the sky, and then they fell into deep sleeps that were plagued by nightmares that didn’t phase them.

For the true nightmare was over.

Author's Notes:

Yeah... there's going to be another chapter before the Epilogue.

But I hope you liked this.

The Mourning Bells

Daring Do awoke to the sun on her face and the warm sand on her back.

She sat up, groaning as all of the injuries that she had sustained, the burned hoof, the bruised ribs, the raw neck and the sore wings, all came back to her in a painful rush.

But the physical pain was nothing compared to the mental pain.

The eldritch ruins with their physics-defying architecture and materials, the hungry and beastial shadow, the door to another world and the fate of Dr. Hoof and dozens of others. The memories welled out from within the slumbering depths of her mind like blood from a punctured artery.

Daring fell back to the ground as the tears poured out from between her clenched eyelids and whetted her cheeks.

She had never felt more terrified in all her time spent adventuring. She had fought genocidal madmen who had gotten their hooves or paws on ancient artifacts, giant insects and arachnids, even full grown dragons for Celestia’s sake!

She had plumbed the darkest depths of the earth and had developed a will of iron in the process.

Or so she had thought.

Now she felt like someone had hollowed her out and replaced her innards with molten metal. Her mind was on fire and she wished that something, anything, would put an end to it.

She didn’t even realize that Ahuizotl was shaking her and calling her name until he roared into her face.

She sat up quickly, almost butting heads with the cryptid as she did. Ahuizotl scrambled backwards on his hands and paws.

“It’s alright, Daring.” he said, “We got out, we’re alright.”

Daring sighed and hung her head, “The doctor didn’t.”

Ahuizotl nuzzled her, “I know, but you ended his misery. You did the right thing.”

“Did I?” asked Daring, looking at the cryptid with eyes that were taking on a certain hollowness. A hollowness that made Ahuizotl shudder inside. He almost opened his mouth to respond, but thought better of it, thinking that Daring might need to talk some more.

He was right.

“I….killed a pony, Ahuizotl.” she said softly, averting her eyes, “I killed a dozen ponies… a-and I know that they were suffering, but-”, the tears began anew, “-but I wish that I couldn’t have saved them!”

Ahuizotl wrapped her in a tight hug as she began to sob with such force that the cryptid worried that she might tear her vocal chords.

He sat there for a a while, gently rubbing Daring’s heaving back and feeling her hot, tear-soaked face burrow deeper into his fur for comfort. Ahuizotl ran his remaining fingers through Daring’s silky, short hair and whispered that it would be okay.

After a few more hours had passed, the adventurer fell asleep in the warm embrace of her former enemy, and Ahuizotl picked her up and began his trek back to civilization.

---

They arrived at the nearest inhabited village just as twilight had fallen.

Daring still hadn’t woken up and Ahuizotl felt his heart break a little every time she whimpered in the throes of some nightmare.

Ahuizotl ignored the fearful or curious stares of the locals and sat down on a bench that lay before the train station. he didn’t have any money, but he did have very good stealth skills and had snuck aboard more than a few trains in his lifetime; when you’re a villain it comes with the territory.

But, can I really call myself a villain after all that’s happened? thought Ahuizotl, looking down at the sleeping pegasus in his lap.

A part of him, however small and feeble it was at this moment, demanded that he leave her and go back to his home to plan out more schemes.

But he ignored that part and let it fade away into obscurity.

I doubt that a life of villainy would suit me now. he reasoned, Now that I’ve seen how true evil operates, most of my little schemes would be completely pointless and would only serve to add to the misery of the world…. and Faust knows there’s enough of that already.

He sighed and stared up at the tapestry of twinkling stars above him.

“It’s weird, isn’t it?” said a voice from his lap. Ahuizotl looked down and saw Daring looking at him with tired, but less hollow, eyes.

“What’s weird?” he asked, genuinely not knowing.

“That, even after all of the horror and all of the unpleasant stuff that’s happened in the past few days, the day and night are still so beautiful. But then again, what do they care about us? They’re so far away…” she stared up at the moon with longing.

“I see that you’re well enough to be philosophizing.” said Ahuizotl with a slight snicker.

Daring snorted, “Yeah, right. I’m just sayin’ what I think.”

Ahuizotl nodded and leaned back on the bench, expecting Daring to vacate her spot on his lap, but, to his shock, she only nuzzled his stomach and stayed put.

The cryptid blushed furiously, partially because the nuzzle had really tickled, but mostly because Daring seemed so… beautiful-looking in the moonlight.

Was she always like that?

Ahuizotl shook his head frantically, trying to dislodge the thought from his mind.

“Do you know how we can find this… Trixie pony?” asked Daring suddenly, managing to provide a distraction that Ahuizotl was wordlessly grateful for.

‘I heard about some pony named Trixie in the news.” said Ahuizotl, “She apparently caused some very serious trouble in Ponyville… twice!”

“Oh?” asked Daring, grateful for a distraction, though not for the same reasons.

Ahuizotl nodded, then he proceeded to tell her about the incidents involving an angry Ursa Minor and the Alicorn Amulet. At the end of it Daring hung her head and sighed sadly.

“That sounds like his daughter, alright. I wonder if he was disappointed in her when he heard about all that.”

Ahuizotl shook his head, “No, Dr. Hoo- I mean Dr. Lulamoon didn’t seem like the type who could ever hate his own flesh and blood.”

Daring nodded in agreement, “I think you’re right, I saw a few pictures of him with his wife and Trixie when I was investigating the house… they all looked so happy.”

Ahuizotl placed a comforting hand on Daring’s back as the sound of tears hitting the pavement came to his ears.

“I think I’m broken.” she said suddenly.

Ahuizotl’s mouth fell open, “Wh-wha- can you repeat that?” he stammered after taking in what she had said.

“I said: I’m broken.” she growled, looking him in the eye, “Are you deaf?”

Ahuizotl furrowed his brow, then, as quick as lightning, he reached out, clasped her hooves in his hands and pulled up so that they were eye-to-eye.

“Listen to me very carefully.” said Ahuizotl in a low, shaking voice, “You are not broken, you may be traumatized and you will have scars from what happened, but you are not broken. You’re Daring Do, you have a will of iron, you’re as tough as leather and as strong as a thousand ponies. You will never be broken, because you’re strong, stronger than I am, stronger than anypony else.”

Daring’s mouth hung open by the time that he had finished. She stared at her former foe with a look of shock and awe.

Ahuizotl noticed this and grew concerned, he opened his mouth again to ask her if she was okay, but Daring placed a hoof to his lips to shush him.

“Thank you for that.” she said with genuine relief, “I’m glad that I have a friend like you.”

Now it was Ahuizotl’s turn to looked shocked and awed.

Daring snickered and petted his head. Then she turned and hopped off the bench as a train rolled into the station.

Ahuizotl watched her go with a heavy heart. He started to get up to leave when Daring turned back to him.

“You comin’ or what?” she called out.

And he was by her side in a flash.

Daring laughed openly at this display, and it was the first real laugh that she had given in what felt like ages.

The two snuck aboard the train that was heading for Equestria as, high in the glittering sky, the full moon shone brightly.

---

In the shadows of the ruins, the Facsimiles stood in a small circle and gazed upon the remains of one of their own.

“Why did you send him to his death?” asked one.

“Because he was young, foolish, soft.” said the First, “I was getting sick of foalsitting him. He let his sadism get the better of him on many occasions, this was just his unlucky day.”

“I see” said another, “Why did you let the interlopers escape?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” sneered one who wasn’t the First, but acted like he was, “He let them escape because his creation is a stupid and feral dog.”

The First shook the cluster of tentacles that served as its head, “No, the Shadow isn’t one of my creations, it was just something that came from the Valley and made took up residence in the darkness.”

“But why didn’t you stop them?” asked one.

“Because they didn’t impede our plans.” stated the First.

“Hmmm…. I see.” exclaimed another, “And… does that mean we have it?”

Had the First possessed a normal mouth, it would have smiled, “Yes… we have it.”

The First opened the slit in its chest and deposited the object upon the blackened sand. The others gathered closer and gazed at it with the kind of hateful mirth that a cat gets when its taken the limbs of a mouse before it has its meal.

“It’s beautiful.” said one.

“Hmmm.” exclaimed another, “It is perfect.”

“How many?” asked a new one.

“Exactly one-hundred.” said the First.

One of them gave a moan of pleasure, “Oooohhh, I can taste the pain.”

“As can I.” said the First, reaching out with a tendril and placing the object back into its body, “We still have work to do. What progress has the Order made?”

“Plenty.” said one, “Though one of them went rogue.”

“That doesn’t matter so long as this rogue does His work on this plane of existence.” said the First dismissively.

The Facsimiles exclaimed their understanding.

“Praise Grogar.” said the First

“Praise Grogar!” echoed the others.

Then a shadow passed briefly over the moon and they were gone, leaving only the remains of their fellow entity.

But even that, like the rest of the Temple of Tambelon, would soon be swallowed by the ever-shifting sands.

Author's Notes:

Stay tuned for the Epilogue, everyone :)

The Lunar Quest

Princess Luna, co-ruler of Equestria and Sovereign of the Night, sat on the balcony that overlooked the sprawling royal gardens and her vast, beautiful night.

Ordinarily, this sight would have soothed all of the frustrations that the day had brought and made her feel content and happy.

But not this night.

On this night Luna’s bones felt leaden and cold, her head and the base of her horn ached. She gazed up at the myriad of glittering stars and felt their chilling presence from across the universe; it was a rare thing indeed when Luna felt ill at ease with her own stars.

But tonight her mind was a whirlwind of dark thoughts. During the last three days her court had been flooded by ponies who came from small towns and cities on the outskirts of Equestria itself, all of whom were claiming to have heard odd sounds or see odd things in the dark of night.

On top of that, Hoofington and Trottingham had been reporting disappearances, mostly involving foals or the homeless.

And then there was the Effigy.

Luna turned her gaze on the bone construct, feeling a chilling shiver roll up her spine. It took a lot to faze her, but the accursed object, made of the bones of foals, made her sick to her stomach.

I loathe being reminded just how cruel me and my sister's subjects can be. she thought sadly.

And yet she couldn’t drag her eyes away from it. Her gaze was affixed firmly to the small skull at the center of the circle, the skull which acted as the pupil of an eye.

Luna blinked, Why has it grown darker in here? she thought as the light in the room grew dimmer and the temperature slowly dropped.

This is dark magic! she realized with a start, I have to tear my eyes away now!

Then the eyes of the skull, which had been hollow and black, were suddenly occupied by a sickly, green light that resolved themselves into floating orbs. Luna couldn’t look away now, and in the light she saw things, things that seemed blurry and vague, yet startlingly real at the same time.

She saw a shadow on the moon.

She saw a world of colors and shape that were almost inconceivable to the mortal eye.

She saw two beings of pure celestial goodness fight a twisted shadow that towered above them.

She saw an army of abominations sweep across the land, their unnatural forms corrupting the very ground that they walked upon.

“Luna?”

The familiar voice startled Luna and cut off the flow of horrific images. Luna turned to address her sister, but she didn’t see Celestia standing there.

In her place she saw a tall figure with a head of blazing yellow fire and a body of molten earth, then Luna blinked and a very confused and worried Celestia stood where the solar phantom had been.

“Are you alright?” asked the Princess of the Sun.

Luna shook her head and held a silver-shod hoof to her temple. Celestia cantered forward and draped a hoof over her younger sister’s back.

“You need rest, Luna.” she said with a gentle smile, “I’ll handle your court tonight.”

“Nay, dear sister.” said Luna with a shake of the head, “We-I mean I-I must be there for my little ponies and if the price that I must pay for that is the occasional headache then so be it.”

“But you weren’t suffering from a headache, were you, Luna?” asked Celestia.

Luna gazed at her sister for a moment before chuckling tiredly, “How did you know?”

“I saw you looking at that vile thing.” said Celestia, disgust lacing her tone, “It’s evil, Luna, you must destroy it.”

Luna nodded, then whirled around and fired a blast of magic that annihilated the Bone Effigy with a loud BANG!

Celestia shrieked and jumped a foot in the air as Luna howled with laughter.

“Why must you be so… so… over the top?” asked Celestia, placing a hoof to her barrel.

“Because it amuses me.” giggled Luna, “And it helps you lighten up.” she pointed a hoof at her sister, who blushed.

Luna gave another giggle before sobering up and asking her sister what she needed.

“There’s someone here who wants to speak with you.” she said, “He says his name’s Professor Rathburn and he claims to know the reason behind the disappearances and all of those sightings that have been plaguing our little ponies.”

Luna perked up, “Rathburn? Goodness, Tia, send him in!”

Celestia cocked her head, “Do you know him?” she asked.

“Yes!” said Luna, nodding her head fervently, “He’s the head professor at the Lunar School of Magic. He was the only person who dared approach me when I first returned.”

Celestia nodded her head in understanding and then used her magic to pull the large double doors of the court room open, revealing a scrawny griffon in a loose-fitting trenchcoat.

“Ah, good morrow to you, Princess Luna.” he greeted in a loud and hearty voice that sounded completely at odds with the rest of him.

Professor Rathburn limped into the courtroom, which allowed the two princesses to see him in a better light: he had light gray fur and dark gray feathers that seemed to be whitening at the tips, his head feathers were slicked back, revealing a thin, nearly-haggard face marred by a single, lengthy scar that ran from his forehead to the left most corner of his beak.

As he drew closer Luna saw Celestia’s eyes widen as they landed on his right paw, which was twisted gruesomely so that it faced backwards.

Most other ponies would find their hearts filling with pity and empathy for the poor old griffon’s plight, but Luna could only admire how fast her was, despite his handicap and advanced age.

“Tia.” said Luna, turning to address her older sister, “would you leave us for a while?”

Celestia nodded with a smile, “Of course, Lulu, I can see that you’re excited about meeting your friend and I don’t want to intrude.”

The Solar Princess swept out of the room, giving her sister one last hug and a “See you later, Lulu.” before she did.

Luna watched as her sister left then, when Professor Rathburn was near enough, Luna teleported in front of him and wrapped him in a big hug, which the aged griffon returned with gusto, nearly lifting her up in the process.

“Hello, Professor Rathburn!” she said happily.

“Greetings to you as well!” exclaimed Rathburn with a big- if not tired-smile, “How is your latest endeavor faring?”

Luna sighed, “It is no less arduous than expected, but there are many problems that our little ponies face.”

Rathburn nodded, “I see, and does this outpouring of problems have anything to do with the bevvy of disappearances and the sightings of the phantasmagorical?”

Luna nodded, “Yes, it is most unnatural… and there have been so many disappearances as of late, and the police can never find these missing persons. I sent out some of my night guard, but they haven’t found anything yet.”

Prof. Rathburn sighed sadly, “It’s as I feared.”

Luna’s ears perked.

“Why?” asked Luna.

Prof. Rathburn looked the lunar princess in the eyes and said, in a grim voice, “I am afraid that these displaced individuals will not be recovered living.”

Silence fell across the courtroom as Luna gave the aging griffon her fullest attention.

“These individuals, they were mostly foals and those who had no-one to miss them, am I correct?”

Luna nodded silently.

“Then it has begun.” said Rathburn severely.

“What has?” asked Luna, letting worry creep into her voice.

Prof. Rathburn sighed, “Forgive me if I slip into what my students call ‘Lecture Mode’, but my answer requires some explanation. Over the years I have been noticing an increasing number of strange events across all of Equus: increases in the number of disappearances in small towns, sightings of strange phenomena, reports of cult activity, insanity amongst certain families and religious groups and a surplus of mostly unexplained murders in a myriad of ghastly fashions.”

The griffon looked at them and saw that she was following him fine, so he continued.

“I grew interested- nay-obsessed with unlocking the secret behind these occurrences, knowing in this withering old gut of mine that something wasn’t right in the world. I took a sabbatical from my work and trekked across Equus to investigate the sites of the more… unpleasant occurrences.”

Rathburn reached into his coat and pulled out a large, black folio which he handed to Luna, who asked what it was.

“A dossier that includes my experiences, the locations that I visited and some of the entities that I encountered.” said Rathburn simply, then he asked “ Tell me, Luna, have you heard of the Children of Darkness?”

Luna shook her head, “No, I have not. Would you explain?”

Rathburn nodded, “The Children of Darkness is the colloquial name given to all of the creatures that hold the rank of fireside tales and ghost stories: blanks, vampires, skinwalkers, zombies, ghouls, frazzits, liches, deep ones, lurkers, homunculi, facsimiles, necromancers, wights, raptorians, flesh-golems and other forms of the resurrected dead.”

Luna nodded and Rathburn continued, gesturing to the dossier as he did.

“Hoofington and Stagnation in Equestria, The Glimmerstone Mines in the diamond dog territories, Quatermass in Trotland and the Badlands south of the Winking Isles. All of these places are accursed, poisoned by the influence of the Children of Darkness.”

Luna levitated the black dossier up to eye-level and began flipping through it, taking in the pictures, drawings and bits of writing contained within.

“Oh my, this is… quite detailed.” said Luna as her eyes landed on a picture of a severed head lying in the grass near an old tombstone; it’s skull seemed to have been hollowed out.

“Yes, it is indeed.” agreed Rathburn, “I have been tracking down evidence of the Children’s reemergence and what I’ve found as tended to be unwholesome to say the least. I am deeply sorry if I have disturbed you.”

Luna shook her head and closed the dossier, “This is a bit too detailed to be a fake.”

“I assure you, it is real.” said Rathburn, moving closer, “And the danger is growing with each passing night. I need your help, Princess.”

Luna looked taken aback, “Me? Me personally?”

Rathburn nodded, “Yes, Luna, you personally.”

“But...why?” asked the lunar princess.

Rathburn looker her in the eyes, “Because you have influence, finely-honed and powerful magical talent and skill, you know the Night better than almost anyone, you are kind, you are strong of will and you also know darkness better than anyone else.”

Luna pinned her ears and looked away, the memory of Nightmare Moon bringing the all-too-familiar prickle of tears to her blue eyes.

Rathburn sidled up to her and draped a wing across her back, gently pulling her into a warm embrace.

“I apologize for bringing that up, but, as I said, you are strong, you are powerful, you are the perfect pony to help me, not for my sake, but for the sake of every living soul on this planet. I believe in your goodness, my dearest princess.”

Luna looked at him and saw the sincerity and truth in his golden eyes. She nodded and pulled away.

“How am I supposed to help you?” she asked softly.

“I have two main reasons.” said Professor Rathburn, “One is that you have a type of magic that has, at one point, came into contact with dark magic, which makes your magic able to fight off these creatures better than others. And secondly, because I think that you’d make a great leader, a far better one that I ever could be.”

“A leader?” asked Luna, “A leader of what?”

Rathburn straightened up, a sign that Luna knew meant that he was gearing up to say something important.

“The leader of a group of talented individuals who have come into contact with the Children of Darkness.”

Luna blinked once, twice, then she said, “Wh-what?”

Rathburn sighed and pinched the bridge of his beak, “I want you to lead a team of indiv-”

“Yes, yes, I understood that!” snapped Luna, cutting him off, “I just want to know how you expect me to find individuals like that.”

Rathburn nodded, “I think that I have a very good place to start. I recently caught wind that two persons who were recently spotted entering Hoofington, both very scarred and both very...interesting to the eye.”

‘Who are they?” asked Luna.

“I believe their names are Daring Do and Ahuizotl.” supplied Rathburn, turning to gaze out of the balcony window.

Luna raised a brow, “Daring Do with Ahuizotl? I’m sure Celestia would love to hear about that.” she stated wryly.

Rathburn turned back to her, “When asked about what happened to them, the two spoke of a temple in Saddle Arabia that lay amidst a sea of black sand, they told the questioner about hungering shadows and unspeakable tortures performed on hapless ponies that had been captured by creatures that I believe to be part of a shape-shifting race known as Facsimiles.”

Luna was silent for a moment before asking, “Were you the one who questioned them?”

Rathburn turned and smiled at her, “Fortune was smiling down upon me that day.”

Luna snorted and Rathburn chuckled, after which they lapsed into silence that grew more uncomfortable over time as Luna began to really think about what the old griffon was asking her.

Can I really be sure that he’s telling the truth about his reasoning for wanting me? What if he DID make up this whole thing? But what purpose would that serve? He’s far too intelligent and too kind to want to try and assassinate me.

But what about the Children of Darkness, what are their goals? Why are they after my subjects?

Maybe I’ll just ask Rathburn and hope that I can get this straightened out.

Finally she asked, “Why do you think that I’ll help you, even if you’re right about these Children of Darkness returning?”

And, without missing a beat, Rathburn replied, “Because you are a kind monarch who loves her subjects.”

Luna faltered, but then plowed on, “What are their motives for abducting all those people?”

Rathburn shrugged, “I am not sure, but I think that they might be trying to gather enough power to do something of cataclysmic destructiveness.”

“What makes you think that Daring Do and Ahuizotl will join this quest of ours?”

“I think that they’ll join for similar reasons to you: I think that they’ll join because they want to protect their fellow ponies.”

“Where will our base of operations be?”

“My office is large and in the basement of the school, it would be the perfect place.”

“What would we call ourselves?”

“Alright, now you are just stretching.” said Rathburn, turning to a very flustered and red-faced Luna.

“I just….I-I don’t... know about this.” she admitted weakly, hanging her head in shame.

“Please, don’t say that.” said Rathburn, moving to her side, “I know you, Luna, I know that you have it in you to become more than just one half of a monarchy. I know that you have the mettle to become a hero.”

Luna was silent for a minute, letting that last part sink in.

A Hero?

The word filled her with a kind of joy that she rarely felt: a joy so clear and warm that it made all of her other doubts melt away.

“I can finally, finally redeem myself for my acts as Nightmare Moon.” she said, looking up at the now-shocked Rathburn with a beaming smile.

“But-but we’ve all forgiven you for that, Luna.” said Rathburn.

Luna shook her head, “Not everyone.”

Professor Rathburn went silent as he digested the statement, then he pulled the lunar alicorn into a tight hug. One that she returned with gusto a second later.

“I’ll be a hero…” she whispered happily, the prospect of her redemption filling her eyes with happy tears.

A few minutes later she pulled away, looked the old griffon right in the eyes and asked, “When do we start?”

Professor Rathburn smiled, “Whenever you are ready… boss.”

Luna’s smile grew.

And the Lunar Quest began.

Author's Notes:

So there you have it: the door to the Pony Dreadful 'Verse has opened.

I'd like to thank everyone who fave-ed the story and threw a comment my way. You certainly brightened up my days quite considerably.

If you are interested in reading sequel and side-stories to this...story, then please feel free to check out the group that I've created for these stories and, if you want to WRITE a story for this 'Verse then please PM me and we'll see about working it out.

So long and, if you've retreated into your subconscious in fright at this tale, just remember: that's where the monster's live.