Let's fly to the fucking castle
Here be spiders
”WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!!”
You jump up at the sound of a panicked scream resonating all throughout the castle. That was your mare, no doubts about it.
Now, statistically speaking, there’s a good chance you have nothing to worry about. This was most likely due to a prank from the pink one, or maybe but less likely but still possible; the rainbow one.
Or maybe her realizing she’s missed some important astronomical event that won’t occur again for another hundred years.
Or maybe she found out you lied about the average height of the human male.
Or maybe... she found some clues about what happened to that ‘The future is stallionist’ book Rarity kindly offered her a couple years ago...
In which case maybe you should consider turning 360° and moonwalking your way out for a few hours.
But, it could also be an actual, proper scream of terror, in which case she could need your help...
Again, not very likely, her being a horse demigoddess and all kinds of makes your banal and very magicless human nature not the best at handling equestrian threats, comparatively speaking, but if there’s a single chance you could provide assistance, then you have to take it.
Thankfully, your body came up with that conclusion all on its own while you were pondering about the possible reasons for this event to trigger, which is why you’ve been running for a good thirty seconds already, trying to find your little princess.
Fuck why is this castle so big in the first place, ughh
And why does it even need intersections?!
“Twilight?! Where are--Oof?!”
Your body hits the ground before you could even register that something pushed you down, and it keeps going for a while as well, whatever it is that hit you, it did so with enough force to push you all the way to the wall.
You need a good second to reassess the situation, and you can already feel the shock is going to leave a mark on your ribs, but you quickly put the feeling of pain aside when you realize the cause of your tumble. Or the culprit, rather.
“Twilight!”
She looks just as disoriented as you are, shaking her head to readjust her thoughts before slowly trying to lift herself up and unravel the mess of hooves and legs your stumble stuck herself in.
It doesn’t take you more than a second to decide to help her.
“Are you okay? I’m sorry, I didn’t see you--”
”ANON!” You recoil a bit at her tone.
“I’m right here, no need to screa--”
”We need to go! NOW!” For some reason, she feels the need to scream.
And the second her four hooves are on the floor, her horn flashes purple and you find your hand surrounded in the tingling aura as it helps you up.
“Why?! What happened?!” You ask.
Okay, it may be an actual, proper code red. She’s terrified, that much is certain.
”SPIDER! LIBRARY!” She's too busy looking left and right, trying to come up with the quickest way out to even speak properly.
...
“A spider?”
”Not just any spider! That one is huge!”
“Like the last one?”
She frowns.
”In my defense, that one looked much bigger when it was close enough I could hear it breathing!” She takes the time to turn her head around to throw you a menacing glare as she says that.
Or, as menacing a glare could be from a pretty pouting purple pony princess.
But your right eyebrow rises all on its own nonetheless, your experienced body now easily ignoring the pony's natural teasing defense mechanism.
“You’ve defeated villains the size of literal mountains before,”
”None of them looked like spiders!”
“You’ve also defeated demons, demigods, chimeras, the queen of a species of quadrupedal bugs filled with holes--”
”I told you not to call them that!”
And what are they going to do? Invite you to spend some time in one of their talking forums or whatever it is they call it?
But you don't tell her that, now's not the time to debate on the specist nature of such definitions.
Rather, you have a much juicer thing to tease her about right now. Something you definitely cannot let go to waste.
“And you’re scared spiders,”
”I’m not scared of spiders! Only the ones that are the size of my hoof!”
Yet you can't help but roll your eyes at her sillyness. Classic Twilighting.
But you’d lie if you said you didn’t find that part of her endearing anyway.
So with a sigh, and a quick headpat for your mare, you decide to take matter into your own hands: “Let’s go and find that spider then,”
”Didn’t you hear what I just said?! We can’t go back in there!” You can see in her eyes she believes you completely lost it at that point.
“That’s word for word what you said last time,”
She harrumphs.
Bingo
Some level headed argument to spice things up: “And what else can we do anyway? Do you plan on never going into that library ever again or something?”
”We could... go fetch Fluttershy? Maybe she could do something!”
And now the killer move...: “Okay well, you go fetch Fluttershy, and maybe the airforce while you’re at it, and I’ll go and get us rid of that evil, hoof-sized spider,”
”NO!” She screams again, and you’re pulled back before you could even take a single step.
Sadly, your sarcasm is completely and utterly ignored, something you dearly miss from the times where ponies thought you were a very serious being.
You think it was the tie. It must've been the tie.
”I’m not letting you go in there alone!” And sure enough, her magic is positively stopping you from going anywhere.
You gotta say though, this is thrilling; not only her displaying how much she cares about you, that’s a given, but the fact that you can be useful...
...somewhat.
It’s not a lot, sure, but it’s something, and it’s not like you have a lot of occasions to prove your manliness in this alien world. To show ponies you also possess a reliable back they can lean on from time to time. A very reliable and very manly back.
It feels good to show them you’re worthy, or something silly like that... Who the hell knows, you're not a shrink.
“Well then, how about you just stick behind me while I go have a look?” You tell her.
She’s obviously not persuaded.
“Worst case scenario, you cut one of my legs and you run while it starts eating me, deal?” There’s still worry in her eyes, but this one at least reaches the corner of her lips.
Good enough
And it doesn’t take you long to reach the crime scene, the little pony closely in tow, and you can feel the wing wrapped around your hip shivering upon reaching the double doors.
They’re barely open, yet you can’t seem to be able to see anything past the narrow gap, not only is something hindering your sight, but the room on the other side looks to be completely devoid of light sources...
Which is very strange considering that library must have at least five windows and, though the sun is slowly setting, there should still be more than enough light to see what was on the other side.
That gives you pause.
“Did you... huh... did you close the curtains or something?”
You turn your head to look at your shaking mare, her eyes having turned the size of pinpricks as she visibly ponders about what could be waiting for you behind those doors, and all the while not allowing her gaze to leave the doors, she shakes her head.
“N-no...” She whispers back.
Okay well, whatever, let’s get this over with!
It’s just a spider, what could possibly go wrong!
Her winged hold onto you tightens as your hand reaches for the door’s handle, and you start pushing it, trying to get the thing to open, at first using a moderate amount of strength, the same you would expect for such a door, but it’s barely budging.
Rather, you can feel some sort of elastic force holding it back.
So you push it harder, this time hard enough to get a grunt out of you, and sure enough, it opens up, and as the light from the many windows on your back pours into the room, your eyes widen.
As expected, but not hoped, what was holding the door was webbing.
So much webbing.
So much webbing every fucking where.
You gasp and your mare whimpers in surprise. Bewilderment. Terror.
The light from behind you can’t really reach the back of the room, yet you can still somewhat distinguish forms and shades and more threading connecting the various shelves around the room, the barest amount of light being reflected here and there.
Oh, there’s some on the floor as well...
...and all the way to the fucking ceiling.
The 15 feet high ceiling.
“Mother of god,” That one comes out of your throat without you realizing.
”I told you so!” You're sure you can hear some smugness hidden behind the fear in that one.
tap tap tap tap tap tap
What the
“What was that?!” You eye the room left and right, trying to identify where the sound is coming from, to no avail, the low light as well as the size of the room making it impossible.
”I don’t want to know!” Her wing tugs at you, as if trying to convince you that it wasn't worth it.
tap tap tap
What the fuck is that sound
The ceiling?
”I don’t like this, we need to go now!”
You don’t like it either.
You never heard a spider making noise before.
“So, huh... when you said it was as big of your hoof, you were talking about its width right, not it’s length or--”
tap tap tap
OK, never-fucking-mind
Let’s close that shit and call the shy one, better her than either of you, worst case scenario discord will get us rid of them if they attack her.
You go and grab the handle again and--
tap tap tap tap
It’s getting closer--
TAP
You don't even need to use the sound to estimate where the thing was anymore since it dropped right in front of you, and close enough for the light passing through the now open door to expose it.
It's a spider.
Or something of the likes, your brain is too busy declaring DEFCON 1 to count how many legs the shit has, to be honest.
And not that you had the time to do so, as a fraction of a second later, it turns towards the both of you (assuming that was its face) and the tapping resumes.
TAP TAP TAP TAP
“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!” You scream. Not in fear, of course, but to try and intimidate the beast. Yep. Definitely that.
”CLOSE IT CLOSE ITCLOSEITCLOSEITAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!” The mare on your right screams as she's tugging onto your shirt to get you to do the thing she's telling you to.
Fear and surprise had you frozen solid, your mind barely had the time to come up with an escape plan before her words reached you, which thankfully lead you to slam the door closed in time to keep the evil on the other side.
Instantly, your instincts took over and you recoiled from the barrier protecting you from whatever was tap tap taping about on the other side.
You also may or may not have let out your manliest wail to date as you were shuffling about the ground, trying to keep your head up and your body as far away from whatever that was.
And by wail you mean warcry, of course.
”I-I, just let me, I’m sure I know of a spell to lock it--”
NOPE
You don’t even give her the time to finish her sentence that you were already up and leaping towards her, snatching her mid-air before throwing her over your shoulder as you would a bag of potatoes, and started sprinting faster than a fellow african-american holding a bike that wasn’t yours.
“Fuck this shit, we are so out of here!” You tell her before flying down the first set of stairs.
She yelped in surprise when you picked her up, but otherwise didn’t express any argument towards your choice of action.
And so you run like a mad man, your mare still on your shoulder as corners and intersections pass by.
Another floor down, and you still have one to go!
Fuuuck, why is this castle so big
Another corner--
And you step into something.
Something that made a crunchy sound when stepping onto...
You nearly stumble as you slow down, trying to stop your progression to check onto what it was that you stepped into, and your eyes widen as it dawns onto you.
It was it!
Or one of them.
Or something like it!
“What the hell is that?!” Your eyes can't seem to move from whatever it was.
Your princess, wondering what it is that got you curious in the first place, slowly turns around, her head recoiling in disgust as her peepers finally catch sight of your immediate center of interest, but is quickly followed by her wings, flaring wide and flapping to try and get her as far away from it on pure instinct.
”Eeeep!”
But your hold onto her barrel is strong enough to keep her down and against you, and thankfully, her wings quickly give up, not being strong enough to lift the both of you, and her instincts come up with the next best thing if the flight part isn't possible; hiding. So she turns around once again and quickly wraps her hooves around your neck to use as a temporary bunker. Jabbing your maw with her horn in the process.
But you're used to it at this point, so you easily find the strength and composure to ignore it.
And more importantly, now's not the time for uncoordinated movements and separating yourselves, you've seen Alien, thank you very much.
Right now, you need to stick together and go about it methodically and--
It isn't moving.
And another second of observation is enough to make you realize it never was, it. For one, it's much smaller than it. And slightly whitish, and you can clearly see where you foot 'entered' it, and the fact that there's no blood or anything anywhere...
It's empty.
“It’s empty?” You're unsure whether your rhetorical query reached the still trembling purple mass or not, not that you expected any kind of answer anyways. So, you decide to take another couple of seconds to calm yourself down, before moving towards it to examine it further.
”Why are you going that way?! Let’s go the other way!” So she was aware of her surroundings enough to realize that.
“No, no, look!” You pat her back, trying to comfort her and make her understand there wasn't any immediate danger or anything, and you succeed.
It still takes her a great amount of effort to turn her eyes towards it as you start playing with the thing with the tip of your boot.
“It’s just shedding, it looks like,” You say, matter-of-factly.
”Yes, okay, it’s its molt, I saw it, great, can we go now?!” There's frustration in her words, she obviously would rather you kept going.
“Okay, okay!" You say, holding the hand that wasn't already busy holding her up in surrender, "I just thought maybe we could learn something is all! Aren’t you the academic one here?!”
”Oh, I’m sorry for being too busy caring about our survival to care about what its shedding is like!”
Woah, time to defuse this bomb “Come on, let’s calm down a bit, we’re two floors down and last I heard spiders didn’t know how to open doors, I think we can relax for now--” You try to sound as reassuring as you can, but she doesn't want any of it.
”Relax?! How do you think that thing got here in the first place?!” She says, pointing at the empty shell, ”And how do you know there’s only one of these things anyway?! For all we know, there could be dozens of them crawling all over the castle--” The sound cuts her off.
tap tap tap
You both gasp in unison, both your heads turning to the right, where the sound was coming from.
tap tap tap
And that was behind. Towards the stairs going down...
SHIT
“YOU JINXED IT!” You whisper-shout.
”I DID NOT!” She whisper-shouts back.
You don’t really take the time to think things through that you push the door on your left open and rush in, slamming the door behind you and locking it. You can't risk it.
”Why’d you lock ourselves into the 47th’s guest bedroom?!” She asks as she takes off from your grasp in a couple of flaps.
“Well EXCUSE me princess, but there was one of those things blocking the exit!” You reply as you keep your ear against the door, trying to maybe hear clues on their whereabouts.
Your tone makes her recoil and she takes a moment before replying with a sigh, ”Ugh, sorry, the stress is getting to me,”
Her own tone making you realize you may have went overboard yourself, “It’s fine,” You nod, before pushing your ear back against the door.
Not the time to worry about this anyway, first you both need to get out of this one alive, and hopefully in one piece, which isn't a given seeing the pickle you're in.
The door's the only way out, and the taptaptaping stopping right on the other side seems to indicate the not-so-little shits are smart enough to stand guard...
Well, at least the lock should easily keep them out.
“So, what are we going to do now?" She asks, wondering if you've got a plan.
“You could blast them?” You shrug.
”I AM NOT blasting those poor things!” She looks offended at your proposition.
“Why not?!” You sound offended by the fact that she acts offended.
”They didn’t do anything wrong! I can’t just blast living creatures for no reason--” She says as if it was the most logical thing to think.
You have to resist the physical urge not to facepalm right then and there, “They want to fucking eat us! How’s that not a good enough reason to blast them!”
”You don’t know that! Maybe they’re just trying to communicate or--” And with that the urge became too strong, and you're sure your new neighbors could hear the meaty slap.
“OH SURE, here, just let me go and ask them if they would like to join us for fucking brunch or something!”
Sirs and ladies; Twilight Sparkle, the smartest and silliest of horses.
TAP TAP TAP TAP
Those were loud. Loud enough that you could hear them from this side of the door without even being close to the door.
TAP TAP
Much louder than anything you’ve heard until now, whatever it is that’s making these sounds, it must at least be the size of a dog.
"What's--"
"Shh!" You hush her.
TAP TAP TAP
Okay, a really big dog--
SLAM
Dread fills the both of you as you turn towards the door.
No fucking way
SLAM
WHAT THE SHIT
A dog big enough to ram a fucking door?!
Shit.
Shit shit shit.
SLAM
WHAT DO YOU DO?! "WHAT DO WE DO?!"
The purple mare looks just as lost as you are.
Then, a glare catches the corner of your eye as the sun’s last rays reach the border of the huge window adorning the room.
That’s a way out. For her, at least. You couldn’t survive the drop, let alone reach the window since it’s so high up, but she can fly.
Guess this is it...
The end of the ride
You still had shit to do, but...
Yeah...
But you still have time for that. You have to tell her.
It's now or never.
“Twilight,” She turns to you, letting out a breath she seemingly wasn’t aware she was holding in the first place as you interrupt her train of thoughts, “Listen, this is very, very important,”
She looks puzzled, but she nods nonetheless, “I know this is going to sound really weird, and maybe very stupid, even for me, but I--”
SLAM
FUCK
“In the fridge on the third floor, the ice cubes in the back?” She frowns a bit, not sure where you’re going with this, but nods nonetheless, “They’re made of my liquid love,”
It takes her a couple of seconds to process your words.
”Your WHAT?!” You expected as much.
“My semen, if you will,”
”I UNDERSTOOD WHAT YOU MEANT--” You cut her off by placing your finger on her lips, you don't have a lot of time.
“I know! I know you’re going to be mad, and you have all the reasons to be mad! My bad! Honest!” She makes a face, but you’re unsure whether it’s one of disgust or fear or contempt, you’re too busy thinking about your last words, really.
“But listen, I knew something like this would happen someday, and I just thought, you know, I needed to find a way to leave a little bit of myself into this world, and so I’d write this epic last will where I’d tell you about it and about how I want my first son to be named after my dad and that would make every one cry and all that but, yeah, I never got around to writing it, you know how bad I am at writing and stuff like that,” You wish you could make it sound funny, but you just couldn't find it in yourself.
SLAM
You notice the door is starting to give out, the poor lock's creaking under the creature’s weight. Guess you gotta wrap it up.
“Anyways, you have to blast that window and get out while you still can,” you tell her, pointing out the window in question.
Her expression turns back to a worrying one significantly faster than you expected, considering what you just confessed to her, ”What?! Wait, what about you--”
“We don’t have time, it’ll be fine, you need to get out right now,” You grab her and pull her into a hug without giving her the time to reply.
“I’m glad I got to know you Twilight, I love you,” You’re unsure how you’re able to keep the tears in, especially as she tightens her hold onto you when your words reach her.
Maybe the adrenaline.
SLAM
Anyway, you’ll have all the time to think about this in the underworld.
“Now," You start, taking a deep breath to steel yourself, "LET’S FLY TO THE CASTLE!”
”WAIT WHAT--” She squeaks as you grab her by the barrel and instantly hurl her towards the window with all the strength you can muster.
You're scared she was going to crash against the window for a moment, but she blasts it at the last second and you let out a relieved sigh as you see her flared wings disappear from your sight.
That’s it. She’s safe.
SLAM
BAM
You turn around as the door finally collapses.
The creature takes a good second to realize the door finally went down, and your eyes finally meet. Though, you’re kind of confused as to which ones you’re supposed to be looking at. The bigger ones, you’re guessing.
TAP TAP TAP TAP
It doesn't wait and decides to get it over with and finally rushes for you, its numerous legs making short work of the distance.
Hopefully it’ll kill you quickly, you’d rather not the last thing she heard from you was your agonizing screams.
...not that your sperm preservation confession was that much better, now that you think about it.
Still, you close your eyes and grit your teeth, waiting for your impending doom.
Then, a warm, tingling feeling spreads all over your body. Must be its venom already taking effect...
Maybe this isn’t so ba------aaAAAAAAA?!
“What the?!” Your feet aren’t touching the ground anymore, and you open your eyes to confirm it.
You’re flying. In a purple aura. Floating would be more appropriate.
But still, not fast enough to out-speed the eight legged mutant wanting sum' of dat, but your instincts kick in, literally, and you shove the freak back with a pump to the face, and a second later, you’re levitated out of the window and right next to the flying purple horse.
Of course, your weak limb wasn’t enough to get rid of the beast, or to deal any kind of damage really, and you can already hear the TAP TAP TAP quickly followed by one of its legs poking through the frame.
Don’t tell me it plans on growing wings or something?!
But before it could, Twibtwab’s horn flashes some more and a stream of glitters of purple and pink gushes forth, covering the wall just as the creature was readying itself to jump for you, using its limbs as a sling of sort, but only resulting in a loud BONK as the magic protection proved more than enough to keep the evil contained on the other side of the now broken window.
Holy shit
You’re alive
You try not to look down as you’re still floating a good 30 feet in the air, but you’re alive...
You don’t think you ever felt your heart beating so fast in your life, even if you tell yourself that a lot since you came into this world.
And it’s a short way down, her magic quickly and skillfully making you touch the soft grass, which you instantly sit unto, feeling the need to recover your breath after living through such events.
And you both spend the next ten seconds not saying anything, her sitting a couple feet next to you and watching up, making sure the thing does not break free, the BONKS and loud scratching sounds telling you of its attempts at doing just that.
Well, you really didn’t think you were getting out of that one... to be fair, magic is still relatively new to you! You can’t be expected as a magicless ape to think about using it under stress like that!
...but that kinda makes things awkward.
“Listen, Twi, about those ice-cubes--”
”We are not talking about that,”
You're just trying to tell her you're sorry! “But--”
”Ever.” Her gaze stay transfixed onto the threat up there, and her voice sounds as neutral as ever, but you know you'd better not push your luck with this one.
Oh shit, that was a period! You never saw her use a period before!
Yikes
You need a new subject, STAT! “So, huh...”
”...”
“I guess that means we’re moving? The castle really is too big anyway--”
”Let’s burn it.”
“Burn it?!”