Horror: Perception
Darkness shrouded the basement of the library, panting ponies all panicked and gathered together, squeezing into the space as best as they could, but for the most part they were all uncomfortable, unorganized, and thoroughly terrified. The last pony in was Twilight, who was screaming and hunching down on the floor, rolling around and trying to bat some unseen creature off of her body. "No! Nononoit'snotreal! It can't be real it's not real these aren't real!" she screamed over and over as if to try to placate herself, but it was no use. "Somepony help me!! PLEASE!!!"
Spike rapidly rushed up and slammed the door shut, locking it tight, all five locks on it, several ponies backing away from the panicked Unicorn brushing something only she could see off of her body, her eyes wide in pure terror and her breathing borderlining hyperventilation as her logical mind tried to keep a grasp on the fact that she knew this wasn't real....but all the bites, the poison being pumped into every facet of her body, it FELT real. She could feel her muscles tightening and her heart beating faster and faster with every second, her mind falling for the trick the monster had imposed upon her.
She began to twitch and struggle, her muscles going taut while Spike mounted her chest after getting her onto her back, her legs struggling but her muscles denying her need to move, tears streaming from her eyes both from the pain of the bites she believed she was bearing, and from the poison her mind was making a reality within her bloodstream, causing it to course into every facet of her body. He grabbed hold of her face, staring desperately into her terrified eyes, her breathing ragged and raspy. She couldn't get any air!
Spike shook her and tried his best to get her attention, the little dragon clenching his teeth and staring into her eyes! "Twilight! TWILIGHT!! It's not real! You figured that out, none of it's real! You've gotta snap out of it!" he shouted to her, Rarity and Pinkie Pie approaching the two with just as much desperation as Spike had to get Twilight to hang on.
Rarity was to her left, gently grasping one of her forehooves with her own, trying to get her body to move some, at the very least. "Yes darling, just a little longer, it's almost over. You can make it, you have to make it!" she said, her voice cracking, so close to breaking out into tears. She knew all too well how Twilight felt right now....and with her breathing stopping, the sight of Twilight's eyes rolling into the back of her head horrified her.
Spike could feel her heartbeat going a mile a minute and then some under where he was sitting on Twilight's chest. Pinkie Pie was right on the situation, unable to bear the thought of losing another friend. "Spike, move! Get off!" Pinkie said, giving him a firm shove before he had a chance to react, her hooves pressing to the center of Twilight's chest and pressing down again and again in a steady rhythm, desperate rasps one might call breaths wafting in and out of the lavender Unicorn's open muzzle. "C'mon Twilight, you gotta keep breathing! C'MON!!" Pinkie shouted, pressing harder and harder, trying her best to force those breaths in and out of her and keep her lungs moving.
Finally, the terror began to fade, and Twilight took a heavy, deep breath, her eyes snapping to attention and going wide while she hungrily drew in another and another, her lungs burning the minor lack of oxygen causing a small headache that began to fade some as she panted and heaved for air. Her legs and her entire body instantly went slack and she flopped over to her side, coughing up some blood that had filled her previously panicked and desperate lungs. Rarity breathed a sigh of relief and Pinkie flopped over Twilight's middle, giving the Unicorn the best hug she possibly could, given the situation.
Twilight curled up on herself and just....cried. She was so close, and she could still barely breathe, her body barely able to comprehend the possibility that all of what she thought just happened wasn't real. "Thuh....thank you....!" she whimpered out to her friends, Spike crying a little as well and hugging Twilight's head.
Rarity did much the same as Pinkie, hugging over Twilight's chest and neck, the four friends taking some brief comfort in the spared life if their favorite bookworm, the only reason they knew what they were dealing with at this point....they hoped, at least. It was an educated guess at best.
Twilight's breathing slowed as her heart slowed down as well, her sore body restricting her movement, the out-of-shape Unicorn needing assistance to get up, her writhing and thrashing moments earlier having forced her pack off of her back. "Spike....open letter in my pack, has all the information....get it to the Princess, now!"
Spike nodded and headed over to the saddlebags Twilight had thrown on before ducking into the basement, quickly pulling out a very thick book, several sealed inkwells and quills, and then the letter, at the very bottom, crumpled and slightly torn, but it would have to do.
As she heard the scribble of extra notes from a quill, and then the puff of Spike's green flame breath consuming the scroll, Twilight tried to think back on the day, and all the things she had seen....and how horribly her world had been turned upside-down. It was all ANY of them could think of....
Twilight sat with Rarity in her boutique, a frown adorning her features while the fashionista went to work sewing up some more parts to yet another new dress design that apparently Twilight's 'slightly plush figure' had inspired this time around, just from being looked at from behind while sitting in Rarity's boutique waiting for Fluttershy.
"What time do we normally go to the spa, again?" Twilight asked in a flat, clearly annoyed tone. "I'm pretty sure it was supposed to be an hour ago."
Rarity seemed utterly oblivious to Twilight's current attitude problem, her focus entirely on the seams of the dress and the accuracy of her stitching, not wanting to waste a chance to really work on one of her more spontaneous ideas. When Rainbow Dash almost seemed to burst through the front door however, Rarity's concentration was shot.
"Heya there gals! What's shakin'?" she called out to them in the most casually cool and most effectively focus-breaking way she possibly could....so, the same as she usually did for Rarity, the poor fashionista missing a stitch and grumbling, looking away from her work.
Twilight shrugged and motioned to herself with a frown while Rarity spoke up. "Well! I WAS working on a new fashion statement for our dear Twilight here-"
"-Against my will mind you-" Twilight quickly chimed in.
"-so that she could look as fabulous as I do when we go out on our spa dates!" Rarity said with her usual flourish whenever something she said included the word 'fabulous'. "All we need now is for Fluttershy to show up....she's over an hour late...." Rarity said, her voice growing quieter, more pensive and thoughtful. "....I do hope she's okay."
"You're not kidding! EVERYpony's been busy today! Pinkie Pie's busy with work, Fluttershy's a no-show, something's got AJ freaked out and she's locked herself in her room....and then I find you two in here playing dress-up," she grumbled flatly at the last part, a sudden grin overtaking the speedy pegasus. "You should really lock the door when you two get like this. Ponies might start gettin' ideas~....!"
Rarity just about stabbed Twilight in the rump, when she heard that. Of course Rainbow Dash, being the prankster she was, waited for just the perfect position, just the right place in the conversation to say that, Rarity's eyes bugging out with her face only inches from Twilight's hindquarters, if you took away the fabric she was so intently focused on stitching up.
She gave the pegasus an intense glare, eyes slitting and teeth clenching shut, her words only hissing out from between them. "If that meant what I think it meant, Rainbow Dash...."
"Huh? Whaddaya mean, Rarity?" she asked, her face one of pure innocence, aside from the gigantic 'I'm bucking with you' grin. "I'm not sure what yer gettin' at. I dunno where your mind is....such a dirty mind you prim and proper mares have!" she said, making a few pointing motions at Rarity's face with a forehoof.
Rarity just growled for a moment, but then, just as suddenly, she seemed....fine. "I will not fall into such cheap tactics of immature teasing from an equally immature pony....now, do you mind? I have work to do."
"Yeah yeah, I know....you're no fun anyways! At least I can get a rise out of AJ, but she's unavailable. Anyway, I'm gonna go see what Fluttershy's up to," she said in a monotone, bored voice as she flew out the front door. "Lllater!"
"Be sure to remind her that today is our spa day, would you Rainbow Dash?! Thank you!" Rarity said in her most cheerful voice, as she usually did when calling out to someone, save for them being in distress.
Twilight, witness to the entire spectacle, could only contain her laughter at the look on Rarity's face moments before she denied their prankster of a friend any gratitude in getting her riled up. "Oh, she did get to you though, didn't she?"
"Mmmhmm."
"What're ya gonna do about it, then?" Twilight asked, mostly curious but still amused.
"She will fear the concept of sleep by the day's end."
Rainbow Dash flew through the air, her eyes scanning the skyline, giving brief glances to the cloud cover to make sure her workers were doing their jobs correctly. Her scan was half-hearted though, work was the last thing on her mind today. Instead, her mind was focused more on her errant friend, one of her best friends, that came to Ponyville with her from Cloudsdale.
It wasn't like Fluttershy to disappear for two, going on three days now no matter how nervous she got, she still loved to visit Rarity and talk about fashion with her, or visit Twilight to make sure she was taking proper care of herself....which she was, or at least, Twilight was eating right. Exercise, however, was a matter that only Applejack and Rainbow Dash had covered the best. Fluttershy was no doctor, though. Unless Veterinarians counted as doctors, these days.
Rainbow Dash began to feel uneasy as she spotted the cottage in the distance. For one, she heard nothing, which was disconcerting enough; there was ALWAYS noise coming from Fluttershy's hut, this close to the Everfree Forest! Mainly because of her animals, which was the second reason she was feeling off kilter: there were no animals. She also didn't see any smoke rising from the chimney on Fluttershy's house, or any lights on inside....so she had to wonder if it even contained a Fluttershy as well!
Tentatively, she landed a short trot away from the front door, the whole place giving her the creeps. She felt like she was being watched, but she didn't hear anything....which was fine, if she couldn't hear it, then it couldn't hurt her. She was too cool to be caught off-guard. But there were zero animals. Some feathers had been scattered around outside the nearby chicken coop, but otherwise....all quiet. She gulped and rubbed a forehoof against her left foreleg while she took stock of her surroundings, the hairs standing on end on the back of her neck once she settled her gaze on Fluttershy's front door.
Rainbow Dash firmly knocked on the door, calling out loudly. "FLUTTERSHY! You in there?! Hey Fluuutershyyy!" she called out more and more, but still no answer. But then, with her hard knocks, she didn't notice that she'd pushed the door halfway open until she looked back down to it when she tried banging on it some more, having been looking up at the second story windows in the cottage while calling out.
She felt queasy with an odd feeling of dread as she stepped inside. 'I shouldn't be here alone....!' her mind thought, but her concern for her friend pushed her forward. 'I'm the Element of Loyalty....I'd be a traitor to not figure out what's goin' on and make sure Fluttershy's okay!' she told herself while searching through the house, first examining the kitchen. Fresh dishes, dirty and waiting to be cleaned. Breakfast on the table, and....scratches on the table?
She ran her hoof over some marks on the kitchen table, leaning in and slitting her eyes, looking at them with a critical eye. "Not a Manticore or a Hydra....not that a Hydra could've fit in here to begin with...." she mumbled to herself, her wings extending halfway, the need to run becoming stronger at the sight of more claw marks, tiny little ones with a bit of blood staining the wood of the table, between the larger claw marks. The small claw marks were far more numerous, as if something small had desperately been gripping at the edge of the table again and again, trying to get free or run or....well, whatever happened here.
She suddenly felt that feeling again. Like she was being watched, but still, no sounds. Just a very strong sense of dread as she turned and walked with cautious, even timid steps upstairs towards Fluttershy's room. 'I'm not scared....I'm not scared....!' she kept repeating to herself as she walked down the hall, passing the bathroom after giving a quick peek inside. Fluttershy's toothbrush was out, a cloth for wiping her mouth clean after brushing, and the faucet was dripping a steady drip that sounded loud enough to wake the dead, for how quiet it was in the entire area, let alone the cottage itself.
All that was left was Fluttershy's bedroom, now. The end of the hallway. Rainbow Dash knocked semi-firmly on the bedroom door. "Fluttershy....? Y-you in there....?" she asked in a hushed voice, leaning her ear against the door, trying her best to hear something, anything, that might be her friend just messing with all of them, or maybe she was just sick and could explain all of this, the lack of animals and the....the claw marks, in the kitchen....
Getting no reply, Rainbow Dash clenched her teeth and pressed down on the handle to the door, her pushing it open with a light shove. She tilted her head and peeked inside. A strong, pungent and rotten smell instantly hit her nose, and she wretched, pushing the door open all the way on accident while reaching to cover her nose. With her eyes clenched shut for a few moments, trying to bear the powerful stench that had been sealed into the room.
The moment she opened her eyes, however, she was greeted with the most awful thing she'd ever seen in her life. There, on the bed, lay her closest, best friend....slaughtered. The one eye she still had was wide and filled with a horrific gaze, staring at where something was that absolutely terrifying to her. The other half of her face had been eaten, large and razor-sharp teeth having bitten into and left marks on her skull and in her skin. Her insides had been spilled out and strewn over the bed, some half-eaten and some untouched, the heart already long gone down the throat of whatever did this to her.
Now, Rainbow Dash was a cool pony. She was collected, and she could handle a lot of things. But seeing her friend like this, her worst and darkest fears realised....first, she wretched, vomited and heaved at both the smell and the sight before her, then she buckled down and laid close to the doorway, sobs pouring out from her. She didn't want to believe it....she couldn't believe it!
Her wings went to full attention and her crying stopped very quickly as the very scary realization dawned on her, laying there on the floor: there was only one way out of this upstairs area, aside from the window on the other side of the bed. In other words, if this was a trap, she trotted right into the middle of it with a big 'Kill Me' sign taped to the back of her head!
Just then she heard movement in the room, and she snapped her head around, looking to her right into a dark corner of the room. Just as quickly as it had appeared to her though, out of the corner of her sight, it had disappeared, hidden amongst the shadows....but she waited, very slowly backing towards the door to the room, her eyes scanning left and right throughout the room, stomach doing flips every time she passed over the half-eaten body of her beloved friend....and that was when she heard the buzzing.
Her eyes went wide and her entire body trembled. Loud buzzing, louder and louder, as if it were coming from everywhere. She looked all around herself, already back in the hallway, the light shining in through the window leaving a vivid image of Fluttershy's corpse for her sickening perusal. She saw them as they began to come out of the openings in her friend's body, out of her mouth and eye socket and nose, out of the gaping hole in her stomach and from in-between her ribs. An impossible amount of bees that began to fly and buzz all through the room, before rushing towards her in the hallway.
Terror struck her flight response like a sack of bricks and she turned tail and RAN, her hooves beating against the wooden floor of the house and the stairs as she rushed down, through and out of the first floor of the house. She could feel the bees though, they were landing, stinging, their little syringe-like stingers pushing their venom into her skin, ten then twenty then thirty stings, all of them creeping up along her back and sides. She beat her wings hard and took off, breath rushing from her open mouth in terrified gasps.
She couldn't comprehend what was happening to her, heading straight up towards the clouds. Bees had NEVER chased her through the cloud cover in the past, a good thing for her because she was allergic to them, she'd have to rush to the hospital and get treatment ASAP for the stings she already received, let alone the ones she was still feeling as more and more of them caught up to her. She was flying as fast as she could though! How were they getting to her?!
She closed her eyes as she burst through a cloud, knocking a bunch of them off of herself in the process, her ragged breathing slowing just a little while she tried to figure out what was happening, and what she should do. She had no time though....because instantly, the buzzing sound was all around her again.
She looked around just in time to get covered completely in them, more bees than the ones she'd seen before, the pegasus screaming and brushing them off frantically, batting and flailing her wings and her entire body, landing on the cloud she'd punched through and rolling around on it while trying to get them off of herself. She could feel the venom from their numerous stings kicking in, the pain was immense, and it had her mind utterly gone in a panic. She'd suffered from anaphylactic shock before, and the tightening she felt in her chest was a sure sign of it.
Brushing and batting at her body wildly, her wings began to go rigid as the venom did its work on her body, her breathing coming in desperate gasps while she stumbled around the cloud on her hindlegs. Soon, she found the edge and she slipped, the fall eliciting a desperate scream from her. Her eyes gazed at the ground the further and further she fell, trying her hardest to flap her wings and catch herself, or at least slow the descent to survive the fall, but it was to no avail. She couldn't get them to move, and she could barely breathe, her legs beginning to go rigid as well.
With a sickening crunch she landed head-first in a free-fall towards the ground, her neck snapping and leaving her paralyzed, the bees stinging her more and more....but then, right before her eyes, they disappeared, fading from her view. She couldn't feel her body though below her chest, and above all else she couldn't feel the stings she'd received. She could even breathe! Her eyes shifted around desperately, trying to see if her screams got anypony's attention, but nopony was there.
She tried to yell, but her sounds only came out as weak little croaks and gurgles, blood pouring from a wound in the side of her head and from the corner of her mouth. She could feel and breathe, but she couldn't move anymore. Above all else though, she could feel the breath of something standing over her, sniffing her. Adrenaline rushed through her body, just before it bit down on her hindlegs and rapidly dragged her away, straight into the darkness of the Everfree Forest....the last thing she saw was the claw marks in the ground she was being dragged across, of the creature that likely killed her friend. Despite the fact that she was about to die, only one thing occured to her in that final moment.
'I'm so sorry, Fluttershy....'
Twilight groaned and rolled her head around and stretched her neck out some more, finally released from her servitude as Rarity's living mannequin. Rarity took the prototype dress and set it down on a less fleshy mannequin pony off to the side, looking very pleased with herself.
"Thank you so much for that darling! Your input was perfect for getting the dress JUST right, I really must thank you with a free dress once I'm done touching up this design," she said in her extravagant fashion, turning her head and looking to the clock. "Though....it seems our spa day is no longer an option." she sighed.
Twilight nodded to that and shook her head. It had been three hours since Rainbow Dash had shown up and come looking for Fluttershy. It was getting close to sunset now, and both ponies were on edge about their friend's no-show. Fluttershy would NEVER do such a thing on purpose, and Rainbow Dash would have likely come back by now to let them know what was going on with the all too kind yellow pegasus.
None of it sat well with Twilight. "Rarity, are you done working for today? I'm going to go check on Applejack at Sweet Apple Acres, see if Fluttershy's there by any chance," she said, heading for the door after throwing her saddlebags back on over her back. "Maybe you could go see if Fluttershy's at her house?"
"Oh that's right, Fluttershy's been going out with that Big Macintosh lately, hasn't she....? Ah, young love, how I adore it so!" Rarity said with a dreamy sigh.
Twilight rolled her eyes and shook her head. "That's not the only reason! Remember what Rainbow Dash said? Something's got Applejack spooked. Call me paranoid, but I think something wierd's going on here...."
Rarity smiled some and walked up to Twilight, patting her on her shoulder. "Oh, you're always worried about everything Twilight, it's what you do best! Don't worry, I'll visit you at your library after I go have a talk with Fluttershy....if she's there, that is. Ooh, but what if she's off with another stallion?! Such scandalous behavior...." Rarity muttered, grinning as the wheels in her wild imagination turned and churned.
Twilight stared at her friend and sighed. "Yes. I'll meet you back at my library, Rarity....see you in say, an hour?" she offered while heading out the front door of Rarity's boutique.
"Of course, darling! This shouldn't take very long at all, just let me get some of my things ready and I'll be off!" Rarity said, disappearing into the back after putting up her 'Closed' sign in the store windows.
Twilight just sighed and walked off at a brisk pace, heading straight for Sweet Apple Acres. She had a bad feeling, and she didn't like what it was making her think of. Why didn't Rainbow Dash return? Where was Fluttershy?!
Twilight's growing concern led her to Sweet Apple Acres in near-record time, her standing in front of the farmhouse, none of the Apple Family working the fields on as nice a day as today....that struck Twilight as particularly odd. She looked around the outside of the farmhouse, but nopony was there, not even Apple Bloom or the Cutie Mark Crusaders. She took one walk around the farmhouse before knocking on the front door. When nopony answered, she let herself in.
Standing on the living room, she saw Granny Smith sitting in her rocking chair as she usually was, but she was completely still, her head slumped forward like it usually was when Twilight visited during her nap time. Twilight smiled and stepped up to her, gently resting a hoof on her shoulder, then easing her head up and back....only to find that Granny Smith's eyes were wide open, pupils dilated and her faze frozen in a look of fear.
Twilight jumped and stumbled back a little, staring for a moment and watching, then placing a hoof against her chest. There was no heartbeat, and no breathing. "Oh....no. Oh no," she whispered at first, then got louder the second time as a very sickening feeling welled up in the pit of her stomach. "Applejack?!" she called out much louder this time, running through the house and upstairs to AJ's room, shoving the door open. Empty. Apple Bloom's room, empty, same with Big Mac's. Even Granny Smith's bedroom was empty.
Twilight rushed out of the building, her gaze turning this way and that, scanning the horizon of the entire apple orchard, hoping that she might be able to see somepony, ANYPONY, out there working the fields, but the place was desolate! But then, her keen eye noticed that the barn door was open a little, and she ran over to it, looking around each side of the barn before pulling the large wooden door open with her magic and stepping inside. She wasn't prepared for what she found inside.
She stepped inside carefully, cautiously, the whole situation beyond surreal for her. She felt truly alone, yet, she also felt like somepony was keeping an eye on her. She could feel herself trembling just a little, the silence deafening to her, despite being a bookworm that preferred quiet places. But....when she reached the middle of the barn, it wasn't completely quiet. She could hear a familiar sound, the sound that Applejack's rope made whenever it was pulled taut and strained, or rubbed against something. It seemed to be a sound that was all around her.
"Applejack? Big Macintosh? Are either of you in here....?" she asked quietly, stopping in the middle of the barn and looking down as her hoof touched something wet. She sat down and turned her hoof over, and the sight of blood made her heart race. Her eyes wide, that sound of that taut, straining rope, and....and the swishing of air. She jumped to her hooves and looked up, and let out a sharp scream of surprise.
Up above her, near the loft, swaying in long swings back and forth by a rope, was Applejack. Her cold dead eyes stared downward and blood dripped from the corner of her lips from the noose strangling the life out of her. Twilight looked around and rushed up the slanted ladder leading up to the loft, her breathing as fast as her heartbeat now. She stepped over to where AJ must have stepped off and to her death, her friend's lifeless body swaying towards and away from her over and over, Twilight looking down and grabbing the Stetson hat that Applejack left sitting on a bale of hay.
When she picked up that hat though, she saw a letter beneath it, folded in half to fit securely under the Stetson. Picking it up with her magic, she opened it and began to read it, tears flooding her vision and forcing her to wipe her eyes dry several times over the course of taking the whole thing in.
To whomever finds this,
I'm so sorry you had to see me like this. I tried so many other ways, I even thought about just goin' into the Everfree Forest an' lettin' the monsters there eat me, but....well, there's not much Everfree Forest left for that sorta thing, heh. Stabbin' myself was too hard, and I don't like the thought of drownin', so I decided I'd end it someplace that's familiar to me: my barn.
I just can't live in a world without all of my friends. All of Ponyville. My family, even. I could hear 'em before I got my noose ready. Could hear them knockin' on my bedroom door, askin' me if I wanted any breakfast. I knew I had to put an end to it right there. Everypony died overnight and I'm the only one left, and now I'm hearin' voices? I don't wanna go totally crazy before I die!
If money means anythin' to you, in whatever kinda world you live in after whatever happened....I've got a hundred Bits stored under one of the floorboards in my room as rainy day money. Help yourself, I certainly won't be needing it.
Applejack
Twilight's eyes were wide and her mind was blank, the letter repeating in AJ's voice over and over in her head. She finally looked up and looked her friend almost face-to-face as her dead body swung towards the lavender Unicorn, causing a powerful sick feeling in Twilight's stomach. "Oh, by Celestia, what....hlk!" she started to say, covering her mouth with her hoof, but it wouldn't stop her from heaving all over the bale of hay Applejack had set her things down on. Thankfully, Twilight already put the Stetson in her saddlebags along with the letter, the horrified bookworm trying to catch her breath after removing the contents of her stomach over part of the loft.
She looked to her dead friend one more time, a few sobs escaping her as her mind tried to comprehend the very possibility of one of her most honest, hard-working, proud and brave friends killing themselves. Then there was the letter....'all alone'? She wasn't alone! She was bright and friendly yesterday, they hung out and even had lunch, she was smiling and laughing, none of it made any sense at all!
Unable to bear the sight of AJ swinging limply as she was anymore, Twilight rushed down from the loft, heading for the door to get some fresh air, but somepony was there. Her eyes lit up at the sight of Big Macintosh standing there in the doorway, a hoof scythe strapped to his right foreleg. "Big Mac! Big Mac, what happened here, your sister, sh-she....Applejack's....!"
The normally stoic and calm stud of a pony stepped carefully towards Twilight, his eyes stern and focused, a scowl on his face. "Now now....m'really sorry 'bout this Twilight, but if y'all were still alive, ya'd understand, m'sure...." he said to her, making Twilight stop dead in her tracks. They stood facing each other, Twilight stepping back while Big Mac stepped forward, the Unicorn unsure now, but the look on his face wasn't one she wanted to see. He looked upset, sad, but determined all the same. "It's me or you zombie, an' ah'm aimin' t' survive all this!"
Her eyes went wide as he lunged for her, swearing she'd spotted something standing behind him, but just as quickly as she thought she'd seen it, it was gone. Her horn glimmered and she blinked out of existence, appearing far behind Big Mac, right at the door. She started to run, but she stumbled when she felt something fleshy underhoof. Looking back at what she'd stepped on, it was a....a snake?!
She gasped as more and more snakes began appearing all around her, seemingly out of thin air, several of them bursting right up out of the ground like missiles and lunging right for her, fangs bared. Two bit into her flank and she screamed as the poison injected and caused a sensation the likes of which she never ever wanted to have to feel again. She HATED snakes! She'd hated them and was terrified of them ever since her encounter with a rattlesnake as a little foal, the poison almost killed her!
She could feel the venom burning its way through her rapidly pumping bloodstream, the adrenaline and fear driving her forward as more and more snakes appeared around her. As she looked, she thought she'd spotted something once again, but as soon as it was there, it was gone, and she couldn't remember what it looked like even a little bit. All she remembered was that something was there, in the orchard, and another, and another!
Every time she saw one of the damnable things, her situation only seemed to get worse, more snakes appearing until, when she looked back, right on the edge of Sweet Apple Acres on the road towards town, she could see that the entire apple orchard was full of snakes, and they were all chasing after her! "This isn't real, this can't....none of this is....!" she struggled to say through her ragged panting, charging down the pathway as fast as she could.
"This isn't real!!!"
Rarity strolled happily along the path towards Fluttershy's house. Sure, she'd been stood up for their spa date, but that was no reason to hold a grudge. She was sure Fluttershy had a plenty good reason for not showing up!
As she approached the bridge leading over to Fluttershy's house, her smile faded and she looked around, suspicious of something. The whole place felt off, as if it weren't....noisy enough? She never thought she would think that about Fluttershy's home, often being bothered by the presence of so many noisy animals whenever she came over to enjoy some tea with her fashion-savvy friend.
In fact, it bothered her now that there were NO animals to speak of! No chicken clucking, no birds singing, no Angel Bunny giving her the stink-eye and being generally grumpy upon her arrival....nothing about Fluttershy's home said 'Fluttershy' at the moment, for her, not on the outside at least.
As she approached the cottage, she took a look around, looking to the empty chicken coop, the empty animal stalls, and then....oh dear. There was a large blood splatter on the ground, close to the pathway leading into the Everfree Forest! A chill ran up and down Rarity's entire body while she approached it, looking at a cyan feather, one of many, that was soaked in the blood. She did her best to deny it, but she knew whose color those feathers matched....and the trail of blood leading away from the blood splatter and into the forest didn't bode well for what she thought was the likely truth.
She suddenly felt very vulnerable. This was no longer a social call and she no longer wanted to know what happened to any of these animals. No, instead she began backing up, looking this way and that, paranoid that she was being watched, stalked by someone that set a trap that first Rainbow Dash fell into, and now she had done the same. Perhaps some kind of deranged axe murderer? Maybe an animal from the forest, like a bear or something? Or maybe-wait. Wait a minute.
"Oh, HA HA HA you two! You got me good, I actually believed you were both dead for a minute there!" Rarity called out, hmph'ing with indignance and storming up to the cottage, shoving the front door open and stomping in. "You both have SUCH a sense of humor! Or maybe it was just you somewhere around here Rainbow Dash, with your silly little pranks!"
Rarity grumbled and walked upstairs after peeking inside the kitchen and finding no one, figuring that they must be hiding upstairs. "Come on, joke's ov-" she started to say, but....then she saw the body. She smelled it, she saw it from the end of the hallway. Fluttershy's rotting body on her bed.
She stood there, frozen, her mouth open and her legs unable to move. She didn't want to believe what she was seeing. She wanted to believe this was some kind of elaborate joke as well, but the smell was too distinct, and too powerful for her to believe it could be a fake. "F-Fluh-Fluttershy....!" she said almost silently, tears running down her cheeks while her mind returned to the blood stain outside....and the feathers. "Rainbow Dash....t-too....?! By Celestia, what's happened....?!" she asked herself, looking as if she were in a state of shock.
Her eyes shifted to her left when she thought she heard something downstairs, her rushing down as if she were possessed, looking into the kitchen. "Rainbow Da-huh?" she began to say, but was cut off when she thought she saw something, but just as suddenly as it had appeared in front of her, it was gone, and she couldn't remember a single feature about it....just that it was actually there.
She backed away from the kitchen slowly, a sudden warmth rushing through her body along with the air around her, the entire house suddenly feeling like a sauna. Her gaze broke away from the kitchen and turned to the walls, the staircase, and that was when she both saw and smelled it: the smell of burning wood and straw. The house was on fire.
Fire. The thing that killed her parents. The thing that trapped her and her sister in their room for an entire hour while the rest of the house evacuated as best it could. The thing that almost killed them both if not for the valiant effort of some firefighting ponies and the magic of some civilian Unicorns and their strategic use of a nearby lake's water supply.
The moment she ran outside, the fire followed, as if it were alive, Rarity able to look behind her as it engulfed the trees, the grass, anything flammable on either side of the path she was running down, it set it on fire to continue after her. She could feel it licking at her body, the intense heat that threatened to set her ablaze just like before, the fashionista screaming for help as she got close to town.
Halfway into town though....it all stopped. The flames, the heat, all of it went away, as if it were never there to begin with. But behind herself, in some of the houses close to the path she'd been running back on, she could hear some ponies screaming for help as well, chaos seeming to erupt behind her. She just kept going, rushing back to her boutique. It was about time for her sister to be out of school, and it was her night to have the Cutie Mark Crusaders over! She prayed they were home, so she could take them to the library with her. She couldn't make heads or tails of what had just happened to her, she felt herself get singed, even burned a little, but now there was nothing! No pain, no lost fur, her mane was even pristine still, despite the exertion and the wind whipping through it during her run.
She barged into her boutique, and let out a massive sigh of relief when she saw the three Crusaders talking to each other about what they were going to do today. None of them had time to argue as a desperate Rarity ordered them all to come with her, the four rushing as quickly as they could over to the library. Surely Twilight could make sense of some of this!
"WHAT?!" Rarity shouted, the look of anguish on her face heart-breaking for Twilight, but the news of Rainbow Dash and Fluttershy being dead had hit her just as harshly. "What do you mean she's....!" she began to shout, but then she looked over to the Crusaders, and turned her gaze back to Twilight, her voice much lower, just barely above a whisper. "Hung herself, why would she-"
Twilight's horn lit up and she pulled a small letter out of her saddlebag, handing it over but keeping AJ's Stetson concealed. Rarity went to reading it with bleary eyes, a hoof pressing to her lips in disbelief. "Sh-she died thinking she was alone....?"
Twilight nodded while looking through another book, browsing through monster descriptions and names. "Yes....and Big Macintosh thought I was a zombie. I think. Either that or he went insane, but I don't think he wrote that letter," she said quietly, not wanting Apple Bloom to hear her. "The letter's nonsensical from that line of thought."
Rarity looked to Twilight with a scowl. She sounded so....calm, so focused. It made Rarity mad beyond reason. She grabbed Twilight from behind and threw her onto her side, standing over her. "Don't you talk about this like it's nothing! How can you just sit there and pretend like it doesn't bother you?!"
"I don't know, Rarity!" she shouted up at her friend, shoving the white Unicorn off of herself. "It's all I can do! If I don't, I'll just...." she said, her voice cracking a little. "I-I'll just stuh-start....oh Celestia, they're dead....!" she said, sitting up and covering her face with her forehooves, her entire body trembling while she struggled to fight against her emotions, a battle she was quickly losing. "Guh-get more books....quickly! I-I have to figure this out, we've gotta know what we're dealing with here....!"
The white Unicorn cringed and started grabbing book after book off of the shelf, anything that had a title that even HINTED at monsters, Twilight told her to get for her and Spike to look through! "I-I'm sorry, Twilight...." Rarity said quietly to her, Twilight's tear-stained face nose-down in another book, a determined look in her eyes while she sniffled and flipped through several pages quickly, the section having nothing to do with magical beings.
The little dragon was flipping through page after page of yet another book, shaken by what he'd heard of whatever these things were. What would he do? Did they have an effect on him too? If they did....what was his greatest fear? He couldn't help but dwell on such things while looking through the books and bookmarking where the magical creatures sections started and ended, placing them in a pile for Twilight's rapid perusal.
"All I can say for sure is that they're magical in nature, and you have to look at them for....whatever happens, to happen!" Twilight said, sighing and rubbing her forehead a little, around her horn. "I don't....I've never heard of anything like this! I-I looked at several of them, they were all over Sweet Apple Acres! After I did, all I saw were snakes....s-so many snakes....!" she said quietly to Rarity, shivering where she sat, reading a book rapidly and flipping through some more pages.
Rarity blinked and lifted her head up. "Now that you mention it...." she said, turning to face Twilight, stopping her book retrieval to speak. "I recall seeing something in Fluttershy's kitchen just before the fire started....and began chasing me," she said, unable to help but add that last part in. It scared her half to death, feeling the flames that close to her, her heart was still racing a mile a minute. "It felt so real...."
"That's the constant then. You have to look at them in order for something to happ-....What's that....?" Twilight began to say, cutting herself off when she heard something in the distance, outside. She got up and opened the door, the screams of various citizens easily heard in the distance.
Twilight looked back to the Crusaders, who had been sitting in the corner with something small to eat, all three of them trembling when they heard the screams as well. "Tw-Twilight, what's that?" Apple Bloom asked, the shakiness in her voice plenty of an indication that she could put far more than two-and-two together. "Where's mah sis....?" she asked, her eyes watering up.
Twilight's heart broke as the little filly went right over the edge, the lavender Unicorn rushing up to Apple Bloom and hugging the young filly against herself with her forelegs while she let out a sorrowful wail, both of her friends joining in to try and soothe her somewhat. "I-I'm so sorry Apple Bloom....I'm gonna miss her too....!"
Rarity just watched and Spike cried as well, but kept to his work, wiping his eyes on his forearm whenever he started to have trouble seeing, determined to help with what he could. There was a sudden anger in Twilight's gaze as she looked over to Rarity and Spike, letting go of Apple Bloom and turning to them. "Rarity, go get Pinkie Pie and everypony else you possibly can! Just keep your eyes closed when going down open streets and you should be okay! Spike, go with her and help round everypony up and bring them here!"
Both of them looked to each other, then to Twilight. "What? Why?! What could coming here possibly do for anypony right now?" Rarity asked, Spike suddenly smiling as the realization dawned on him.
Twilight eyed her assistant and nodded, smiling. "The basement. It's large, we could easily fit a hundred ponies down there. We can't save everypony, but we can at least save most of the ponies we know!"
"What about you Twilight? What'll you be doing?" Rarity asked, heading for the door, Spike hopping up onto her back, which irked the fashionista, but now wasn't the time to be a complainer.
Twilight nodded and walked over to both of them. "I'll be reading the rest of the books to try to find some creature that fits the description....now you two," she said, suddenly grabbing both of them from the side and giving them a tight hug. "Come. Back. Alive. With Pinkie and everypony else, okay?!"
Rarity didn't need much more encouragement than that, and neither did Spike. Navigating their way from building to building after leaving the library, and taking discreet, quick peeks down quieter streets, Rarity got to work with Spike's help, calling ponies out of their homes and sending them to the library as quickly as they could.
Twilight, in the meantime, returned to the Crusaders, who seemed to calm down some, though Scootaloo looked more scared than the other two. "Twilight, are my parents gonna come here?" she asked hopefully
Twilight thinking for a moment before nodding to her. "Th-they live right next to Sugarcube Corner, right....? Of course, Rarity and Spike will send them here along with everypony else they can get to. Now, you three, I have a very important job for you...." she said, putting on the most forced smile she could, but it was a sincere effort at least. "I want you to get into the kitchen, grab all the canned food you can, and start taking all of it downstairs. There are some boxes folded up next to the fridge, just pile them up in those. After the canned food, THEN start gathering up the perishable food and taking it downstairs too. Okay, girls?"
All three of them took the hint, figuring questions were worthless at this point, there wasn't much choice in the matter, whatever was going on right now anyways. Twilight went right back to her books while the girls worked as quickly as they could, box after box of canned goods getting taken down into the rather large cellar, Twilight only having two books left to look through by the time half of the ponies that would be staying down there with them began to show up.
By the time Rarity, Pinkie and Spike returned, the screams were only a few blocks away, and the sound of overall chaos and terror was overwhelming....but then, she found it. The entry in the one book that explained it all! She had no time though, her quickly ushering Rarity and the others down into the cellar after making the mistake of looking out the window. She saw three of them, all together around one house just down the street, directly in her line of sight, and just as quickly as she spotted them, they were gone....and the snakes were back in full force.
She screamed as several bit into her hindlegs, her jumping up to her feet and throwing her book into her saddlebags, which were also full of the snakes her mind believed were there. She knew better, but that didn't change the pain, the burn of their venom, and her increasing agony as she made for the trap door leading down into the cellar.
Snake after illusionary snake squished underhoof as she took it step by step, the door only ten more steps down. Rarity and Pinkie could hear her screaming, and they both jumped out of the thick cellar door and grabbed her, pulling her inside, and to safety....if she survived her 'wounds'.
It was over for now, for Twilight. She was exhausted from that last brush with death, the soreness leaving her a heaping mess in the corner Rarity and Pinkie led her to, Twilight's breath still coming in eager pants and small gasps, her lungs slowly recovering from her ordeal. "Purcips....thuh-they're called Purcips...."
Rarity and Pinkie both looked to each other in the darkness, just letting Twilight speak for now while exhaustion overtook her. "Purcips are ancient....ancient predators of ponies," she explained. "Th-they're normally underground creatures, but sometimes they come to the surface to forage...."
Above them, heavy footsteps could be both heard and felt, several ponies jumping and going silent, some murmuring amongst one another. "I'm so sorry everypony, I got a letter to the Princess...." Twilight tried to tell everyone all at once, as quietly as she could.
"It's all a matter of time now."
