Isolation and Terror - Chapter I
As the night air started to fill the quiet town of Ponyville and the pleasant country of Equestria, Grim Weave arose from a pool of smoky darkness and slowly walked out of the metallic cave he had been living in 24/7 for the last few years. His completely purple pupils stared out along the clearing. His cave, located at the base of the mountain Canterlot stood upon, but on an almost completely different side.
He always hated the light of day, the only thing he hated with all of his soul, that is if he has one. Save for his eyes, he was black as night from head to hoof, wearing nothing but black platemail armor all over every inch of his body. nopony could touch his coat if they tried, and even his eyes were armored, but with simple goggles built to color everything behind them purple.
He didn't see in purple shade of color, but neither was he color blind. He flared out his somewhat mis-shapen wings and crouched down, few moments later he took off into the air, jumping with great force. He stuck his wings out as he aimed for Ponyville. Nighttime was one of the few times he could come out and see something other than a purplish brown cave. You could say he had an allergy to sunlight similar to vampires, only he simply found he could hardly see in the light.
Darkness was his element and he saw everything easily at Night, allowing him to glide down to Sugar Cube Corner and land atop it's roof. He surveyed the area but unlike the other many nights to the town, he felt off, as if he were being watched. He knew of the one known as "Pinkie Pie" and her rumored ability to defy reality in small ways, but this feeling of being watched was far off, as if something in the sky was looking at him. He shrugged it off and ignored the feeling, sitting down on the roof's tiles.
Taking in a deep breath, he felt as close to relaxed as somepony like him could feel, but it was actually more of anxiety he felt. He huffed out the deep inhale slowly as as he did so, a black fume spewed out his nostrils and mouth, it was identical to the smoke in his cave in that it didn't vanish like his normal breaths did, taking a lengthier time of half a minute to disappear fully. To the corner of his vision something quickly flew down to a building and it made him stand defensively and look in its direction immediately. Across the street to his slight right was a taller body, colored to stay hidden in the night, but last he checked dark blue never went with red.
He sat down, seeing this body as none other than "Princess Luna" or the Princess of The Night that they called her. He huffed in slight irritation as it was plainly obvious she was looking at him, but he ignored the staring.
About ten minutes later he eventually got annoyed enough and looked to Luna calling to her "What do you want?" almost spitting his question that felt more or less rhetorical than something to be answered. She leapt off the building she stood upon suddenly and landed next to him. He studied the difference in their height and came to the conclusion she only had two inches on him, and she would notice that he had a very similar body build to a stallion like Big Macintosh. Despite what most other ponies did, he simply sat there looking dead center into her eyes, not flinching or looking as if he were about to bow or anything. She asked him a simple question "Who art thou?" and she simply got snapped at "What do you care? Few are worthy of knowing my name". She looks a bit saddenned by his rude answer, but then asks "What dost thou mean by 'worthy'?".
He replied simply, in a more irritated tone, "Worth my time" And as he thought she asked yet another question "Why hasn't our sister detected you? She can sense all living things in Equestria"
This made him grin, something that was rare but it wasn't a happy grin either "Unlike everything else, I'm the exception to the rule that you're either alive or dead, nothing inbetween" He looked at her with the grin and suddenly leapt off the building, having had enough to do with talking for years. He went to the Everfree forest, well again, he more or less glided there. His wings were large and bulky and made more for catching air and gliding that flying. As such they were also wide, the bones attaching him to them were largely wider than most pegasi.
He also didn't like ponies who asked questions, Questions always got him into trouble.
Luna watched him as the black armored stallion flew, or more accurately, glided to the Everfree Forest. She considered in following him, but decided against it. It wasn't the questions she had about him, but more that the Everfree Forest was a place of very bad memories. She swore everytime she looked at it she could hear Nightmare Moon's evil laugh. She looked to Canterlot, remembering she couldn't be here long either. Not for the same reason as his, which she suspected, but because by the time she got there, it would be nearly time to lower the moon for her sister to raise the sun.
Flapping her wings, she took off into the air to Canterlot, much less dramatically than Grim had. She had much time to think to herself, but she herself had a couple of new questions.
Questions like "What is He?", "Should I tell our sister?" and even the usual "Why does he breathe out smoke like that?" She'd ask her sister or atleast let her know of his presence in Equestria. When she was near other ponies, she could usually feel something about them, like any would, she could feel an air of happiness, sometimes sadness with others, but with Grim...
Nothing. She didn't sense anything from him, it was like he was simply a void; nonexistent, yet still there. Ofcourse Luna wasn't in any way demented, she didn't have a single clue why he didn't seem to have some sort of aura. We'll just have to ask Celly when we see her She thought, Canterlot coming closer and closer.
Knowing about Grim wasn't the top priority, but it was one of the most interesting things to happen in a while.
They Say Something unlike anything else lies in the deepest regions of the Everfree Forest. Whether this 'something' is dangerous, is what Stormy Facade is here for. Trudging through the marshes of the Inner Everfree, the pegasus' hooves and legs were more than soaked and caked in muddy water. She jumped out of the thick mess and hovered in the air, shaking her legs in a slightly futile attempt to shake them clean and surveyed her surroundings. She could hardly see a thing, but could make out only shapes and flew further into the forest until she was stopped at a cliff. This cliff went down into an abyss whose bottom could very well be non-existent.
She lands at the edge and peers over the edge. The cliff seems to slope outwards starting from the rim of the pit, hinting there might very well be something down there. She yells down into the pit "Hello!" and sits down. The moon shone above a tad brighter than it usually did but the light only went into the pit about a few meters before turning into a purplish fog.
She closed her eyes and suddenly threw herself sideways against the grassy dirt, using the contact to split into two parts. Both parts were identical, however both had dirt and mud on their hooves, and were about half the size of how Stormy was normally. Stormy was considered short even for a mare, compared to Lyra Heartstrings, she was about 5 feet tall, making the two copies 2 and a half feet tall.
One of the copies smiled at the other, both hugged, and the one who'd smiled originally, jumped into the chasm, freefalling for a complete minute before hitting the ground with a splat, turning her into a thin sheet on the surprisingly soft ground. Of course it hurt hitting the ground like that, but pain was something she rarely felt in all of her stupid ideas. The copy reformed from the puddle as if by magic, or simply by design and looked around. The purplish fog was gone but the area had a purplish glow, looking up she realized the fog was actually black, the strange flesh on the ground was magenta and shined the glow.
"Whoooo Darrrrrrres... To enter my domaaaain" a chilling voice said from beyond her eye sight. A massive paw, or hand hit the ground in the lit up area, and in a dramatic way something large and truly horrifying came into view.
It was 20 feet tall and was similar to a fantastically large and anorexic hamster. It's fur was colored a greyish white and had a head with antennae that looked opposable with thick blades on the ends of them, located above it's eyes. it's legs were large and powerful with spikes dotting its paws. The worst part was the blades jutting out of it's sides and back, bent around its own body like a protective, yet offensive shield.
This monster's jaw was either non-existent or hidden by its massive teeth. If Stormy knew of Orcs, she'd see the teeth were like an orc's teeth, but on steroids, each bone jutted past its own chin. For a giant, skinny hamster it stood tall and proud, somewhat like a certain three-headed dog she knew in her homeworld.
Stormy's copy was shaking in place, huddled close to the ground as she was too paralyzed to move out of utter terror. Talking was out of the question, and even the monster knew this as it raised a paw and brought it's claws to bear. They resembled those of a cat, and they were fantastic in size, a bit of a contrast to it's teeth somehow. It brought it's massive clawed paw down upon the copy, but all it did was squish the copy to it's paw, snapping it out of it's frozen state of terror.
The monster brought it's paw up to look at the blob of red and blue on its paw and seemed either amused or annoyed as the blob shaped itself back into the copy of Stormy and took off immediately.
Suddenly before she touched the fog, the copy was smacked by a very hard tail, it felt more like a mace than a thin tail, and it shot the normally sticky mare, far into the sky. The copy would be flying for a day or two it felt like. The Sun was coming up, and as the Real stormy kept staring into the pit, This Monster suddenly burst from below the fog layer and made a valiant effort to get out of the pit, but came up short as it almost reached a paw up to Stormy, who jumped back and ran the other direction, despite the almost-blinding darkness of the Everfree Marshes.
-A Few hours Later-
As Princess Luna lowered the sun and her sister raised the sun, the land was filled with a warming glow of day once again. however, Grim saw this as the only entrance of the Everfree Forest lit up and shined a bit inside. He groaned as he looked deeper into the forest, not actually having anything more to do than torment timber wolves for an hour or two, or until he got bored with it. He turned to the light and walked into it, exiting the forest, of course he'd just simply explored the place for a couple of hours, and even slept in for a couple more, but one can only do so much in a dark forest.
Stunned by the daylight, he hardly saw anything and wandered in a direction he hoped his cave was in. He wasn't sure how the townsfolk of Ponyville would react to him, but he'd figure that out soon enough.
Crouching down low he lifted off and glided as far as the wind would take him, but that only landed him in Ponyville as he flew directly into the town hall, falling to the ground with a very heavy thud. He rubbed his armored head, feeling a bit dazed as he huffed out black smoke. Behind him and almost all around, he heard ponies asking "What is that?", "Is that really a pony?", "Who is he?", or even one he heard quite a bit whenever he was outside like this "Why is it here?". He stood up and shook himself up and blinked his eyes, but no good. The light stung his eyes whenever it was open, although the purple goggles helped, and once more he jumped high into the air and glided to the mountain, hoping to get to his cave, but he wasn't the best at luck and it proved just that as something hit him mid-flight, giving him a jolt.
He hit the ground and who or whatever hit him did their best to hold him down "Gotcha" The voice seemed strange, he hadn't heard it before, and he'd snooped on conversations of everypony from Ponyville to Manehattan.
Grim pushed the assailant off him with a single forehoof and got up, blinking "Who in all of the blinding void is there!" He exclaimed.
"Oh Nopony special, just a big ol' bag of bones" The assailant quipped in a rather amused tone. Grim looked at the source of the voice and walked towards it, but didn't find a single thing and was tackled from behind, and pinned into the ground. He who had attacked him attached something to all his hooves, it felt like metal; Metal he couldn't break. That was new for him at least. He felt humiliated. Whatever position he was in, it felt like he was some new prize some hunter caught, he was hogtied by a mortal! He narrowed his eyes and was able to get only a flash of a glimpse at him as he was laid onto his side but that didn't help one bit. With a huff, he asked his new captor, being drug upon the ground by what didn't look like a normal earth pony "Seriously... Who are you?"
"Just call me Bones"