It's Not a Cold Dark Place
– BONUS: Original Opening (April 2012) –
1: Hush Now (December 2012 rewrite)
With thanks to NorsePony, Sgt_Byrd, Chromosome and modulusshift for pre-reading the first two chapters,
and thanks also to my wonderful followers for helping me believe in myself again <3
It was a stuffy night in August, and in a house on the edge of Ponyville, a pegasus filly had her ear to her parents’ door. Sweat dripped down her forehead. On the other side of the door, her mom and dad were locked in a heated argument.
“What about Scootaloo?” said Mom. “How are you gonna explain this to her? Or, let me guess, you’re gonna up and leave without saying a word, aren’t you?”
“Who said anything about leaving her?” Scootaloo’s father replied in such a way as to send a chill down the filly’s spine. Mom’s voice dropped to an enraged whisper.
“If you think for even one second that you’re taking her with you, then you’re—”
“She’s coming to Cloudsdale and she’s going to get a chance to be a real pegasus, none of this here rubbish hanging around with that earth pony friend and that unicorn. Why doesn’t she spend her time flying instead? By Celestia, the poor thing can barely even hover!”
It was all too easy for Scootaloo to picture her mother creasing her brow, the bitter way in which she rolled her eyes. “So you’re interested in her all of a sudden, huh?” Mom spat. “Just like you were interested when you arranged her birthday party last year—oh wait, that was me, wasn’t it? Or like how you were interested when she was in the talent show—ah, but you didn’t bother to show up, did you?!”
“You’re one to talk, always out of town, always dumping her on Rainbow Clash.”
It’s Rainbow Dash, thought Scootaloo, a prickle of anger mixing with her anxiety. Dad couldn’t even be bothered to get her hero’s name correct yet he wanted to drag her halfway across the country? She shuddered. She already had enough to worry about without the threat that everypony who mattered would suddenly be missing from her life.
The voices stopped, and with them, Scootaloo’s heart. Did they know that somepony was listening? A certain little somepony who ought to have been in bed a full five hours ago? Don’t just stand there, Scoots, hissed a voice in her mind. For Celestia’s sake, run, run!
Scootaloo turned to run, only to end up tripping over her hooves, and she smacked her face against the floorboards—whack! Her vision blurred; it was like being kicked in the forehead. But since the last thing she wanted was for her parents to know that she had been eavesdropping, she bit her lip, and forced herself to stand up straight.
Just in time to see the door burst open.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she cried. “I didn’t mean to listen, I...”
Her voice trailed off, and no wonder: where before her parents had been shouting, now silence filled the corridor, the sort that worms its way into your head and refuses to budge; silence so thorough that even the water pipes joined in, their usual creaks and groans drowned by a sea of quiet. And where there should have been her parents’ familiar bed through the open doorway, its four legs resting on a tattered rug and surrounded by the hand-me-down furniture passed through five generations of her mother’s family, there was now nothing but pitch blackness.
She was alone.
“H-hello?” she said, taking a tentative step towards the room where, twenty seconds beforehoof, her parents had been arguing fiercely. “Hello?” she said again, more forcefully this time. “Mom? Dad?”
Almost immediately, Scootaloo wished she had kept her mouth shut, for the pony that answered was neither her mother nor her father. In fact, it was like no-one she had ever heard, a voice to make the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end. It put her in mind of forgotten rooms in abandoned houses. It reminded her of caverns hundreds of feet below the surface of the earth, and of deep valleys in the far-flung corners of the world, places where wet, cold creatures clung to rocks in the darkness. The voice was all of these things, and more, and the mere sound of it was enough to make her retch; rusty nails being dragged across a sheet of steel.
“Come closer,” the pony said (if indeed it was a pony), and perhaps it was her imagination but the words sounded desperate, as though the voice didn’t simply want her to walk nearer but that the entirety of its existence depended upon her doing so. “Come closer, closer, oh please come closer. I can smell you. I can almost taste you.”
“W-who’s there?” Scootaloo whimpered, not so much as daring to blink.
“You... don’t recognize me?” said the voice, sounding hurt. “But you must. You must!”
Scootaloo’s heart pounded. Her legs trembled so violently that simply standing straight became a struggle. “W-where’s Mom and Dad?”
The creature growled. “Say that you love me.”
“Alright, I love you, I love you!” said Scootaloo, taking a step back. “Where’s my parents?”
The voice’s owner drew in a deep breath and licked its lips. It savoured Scootaloo’s words in the same way a pony might pause to enjoy the taste of a fine meal in between bites. After a while it said, “We don’t need parents. All they do is fight and argue and they don’t even love you. Not like I do.”
Scootaloo realised how hot she was feeling, so stiflingly boiling the corridor seemed. Had somepony dunked a tub of icy water over her, she would have welcomed it gladly. “What have you done with them?” she whispered.
“They had their chance.”
“Where are they?!”
Scootaloo stamped a hoof, and beyond the doorway, she heard something prowl back and forth in a tight circle. Judging from the heavy footsteps (it sounded more like pads than hoofs), whatever the creature was, it was enormous...
Scootaloo forgot she had ever been worried about her parents arguing. She forgot the insults, the jeers, the names, the shouting; all of it vanished, and in its place rushed fear such as she had never known, so powerful that her stomach leapt to her mouth—all that stopped her from running was a vague determination to be as fearless as Rainbow Dash. What if she never saw her parents again? What if they had been devoured, and the last words she had heard from them had been small, petty and vicious? “Sh-show yourself,” she said more bravely than she felt. “Or what are you? Ch-chicken?”
The creature chucked. Scootaloo screamed as eyes appeared in the doorway, the most terrible pair of eyes she had seen in her life. They were as big as dinner plates, and they lacked pupils and glowed blood red, illuminating sharp, pointy teeth set in a mouth big enough to swallow a grown pony whole. The monster bounded through the doorway, massive tongue drooling, its breath stinking and those red glowing eyes narrowing...
Rainbow Dash burst into the bedroom to find the filly tossing and turning and screaming. “Scootaloo,” she cried. Sitting on the bed, she tried to shake her awake.
Scootaloo’s eyes were tightly shut. Those teeth were going to sink into her flesh like butter, those claws were going to tear her up, rip her limb from limb—
“Wake up, Scoots. Wake Up!”
Scootaloo gasped: light! Yet not the harsh white light at the end of a long, black tunnel, but rather a soft, yellow glow... and somepony was leaning over her...
“Get away, get away,” she shouted, kicking aside the blanket and hitting the pony in the face.
“Ouch!” Rainbow yelled. “Watch those hooves, kid!”
More than anything else, it was Rainbow’s cry of pain that finally dragged Scootaloo back to reality. She blinked once, blinked twice. Rubbing the sleep from her eyes, she saw her Wonderbolts posters plastering the walls, and photos of herself and her friends. Her scooter was propped up by the door. Sitting in the light of the lantern was a pile of all the Daring Do novels she owned, including a few that Rainbow had lent to her. The window rattled. A chilly draft reminded her that it wasn’t a balmy night in the middle of August, but the dead of winter.
“Sheesh! Ya ever tried getting a cutie mark in bucking for apples?” said Rainbow, holding her nose, which was bleeding. Looking down, Scootaloo discovered blood on one of her own hooves from where she had kicked her foalsitter in the face, and the drops felt warm. Rainbow Dash wiped them away with a tissue.
The realization that she was safe was like sinking into a hot bath, and as Rainbow rubbed her hoof, she almost cried with relief. She was in Rainbow’s cloud house. Everything was fine. She was with Rainbow Dash, and everything was going to be fine.
“S-sorry,” Scootaloo whispered sheepishly, bowing her head, her cheeks burning so much that even with her fiery orange fur to hide it, she was sure the older mare could tell she was blushing. Rainbow Dash grabbed another tissue from a box on the bedside desk, and rather than using it for her own bleeding, wiped Scootaloo’s forehead clean of sweat.
“Same dream again, huh?” she asked.
“They’re getting worse,” Scootaloo whispered after a pause. “It tried to eat me up this time.”
“It did what?!”
Now that she was awake, Scootaloo wanted nothing more than to place her head upon the pillows and fall fast asleep snug, cosy, and warm as she listened to snowflakes pat against the window; she resisted, and instead shot her foalsitter a little grin, for she sensed that there was nothing the older pegasus wanted more than to climb into her dreams and give the imaginary monster a piece of her mind.
“Chin up, Scoots,” Rainbow said. “So your dreams have been super lame this week. No biggie. They’ll stop soon enough.”
“I hope so.”
It was an understatement. The past week, with Dad in his new home in Cloudsdale and Mom away on yet another business trip, this bed had been her home, and this room transformed into her fortress. Scootaloo lost herself in tired, hazy thoughts. Rainbow was right. Dreams passed. They wouldn’t last forever.
... Not like the pain of Mom and Dad’s separation.
Without thinking, Scootaloo threw her forelegs around the startled mare but almost immediately let go. “Sorry,” she mumbled, cheeks burning once again. “Um, please don’t tell anypony I did that.”
“Ya mean don’t tell anypony that even the most awesome filly in Ponyville needs a little help sometimes? ‘Cos if ya ask me, that’s what it sounds like you're asking there.”
Rainbow placed a hoof on Scootaloo’s shoulder, and behind the mare’s eyes, Scootaloo saw pity and love, saw them as clearly as the all the colours of the rainbow present in her foalsitter’s mane... and suddenly, it was too much to bear: her nightmares, her worries, the memory of her parents’ last fight. And though Scootaloo tried to stop herself, she sniffled, and then in the way that a brook flows into a stream and then a stream becomes a vast, wide river, her sniffles turned into fully fledged crying. No longer caring about embarrassing herself in front of her hero, she pressed her face into Rainbow’s coat, allowing the older pegasus to wrap her forelegs around her and making Scootaloo feel, for the briefest moment, as though all the troubles the world couldn’t harm her anymore, not when she was protected by the shield of Rainbow’s hooves. This was why she loved Rainbow Dash. Not because of her flying, her funny pranks or her bravery, but because she was the only pony in all of Ponyville who made her feel truly safe.
She made her feel loved.
It was two minutes later but it felt closer to sixty. Scootaloo lifted her head and smiled weakly. “R-Rainbow? Could, um... could you sleep here tonight? You can have the bed and I’ll sleep on the floor! I just want you to be in the same room... and... err...”
Rainbow leant forward and planted a kiss on Scootaloo’s forehead, and then gently lowered her charge’s head back on the pillow. “Sorry kiddo,” she said. “No floor’s good enough for ya, so it’s the bed or bust. Listen. I’m down the hallway, ya know that. If you need me then shout out and I’ll be here in a flash. Even if ya think it’s for something really small. Even if it’s just for a glass of water.”
“Mean it?”
Rainbow winked. “Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a cupcake in my eye.”
A moment passed. Scootaloo gazed at Rainbow, brimming with curiosity as to what the older pegasus was thinking about.
Getting up off the bed, Rainbow opened the window and got a face full of snow. Then, poking her head into the blizzard, she glanced this way and that, making doubly, extra certain that they were alone. She shut the curtains and drew in a deep breath.
And she started to sing.
“Hush now, quiet now,
It’s time to lay your sleepy head.
Hush now, quiet now,
It’s time to go to bed...”
Waves of tiredness washed over Scootaloo, forcing her eyes shut. Not many ponies knew that Rainbow Dash sung (although with her rough voice, calling it ‘singing’ was being generous). In fact, Scootaloo wondered if she was the only one. She hoped so. The feeling that knowledge gave her was so precious that she wanted to hold onto it, clutch it tightly to her chest and never let go.
Rainbow continued to sing. The words transported the filly to distant places, vast oceans, mountains, forests, and endless plains of soft grass under a shining moon, and where dreams hung overhead like stars. She had never felt so tired; but wonderfully tired, and so she lay perfectly still under the sheets as Rainbow stood close by. The sound of snowfall against the window was getting louder. The flurry was turning into a blizzard.
Too soon, the lullaby ended. “And don’t ever tell anypony,” said Rainbow. “I’ve got a reputation ya know. I’d never hear the end of it! And I’m gonna keep the window open slightly. Yeah, I know it’s snowing, but man, you’re like a fire or something, you’re boiling hot! I’ll come back and shut it again soon as you’re sleeping.” Rainbow eyed the pile of Daring Do novels next to the bed, and grinned. Running a hoof down the spines, she carefully pulled out one of the books and put it within easy reach on the bedside desk. “There ya go. ‘Daring Do and the Crown of Ice.’ If ya wake up and you’re still feeling hot, five minutes of that and it’ll cool you right back down again. Oh, and Scoots...”
A shiver of excitement ran through Scootaloo. “Yeah?”
Rainbow winked. “I bet your mom wishes you sweet dreams, right? I’m gonna go one hoof further and wish ya awesome dreams as well! Sleep tight. Things’ll look better in the morning.”
Rainbow shut the door behind her, leaving Scootaloo alone in the lamplight and glancing around at all her possessions (it was a testament to how often both her parents were out of town these days, but almost everything in Rainbow’s supposed ‘guest’ room belonged to the little filly, from the lamp on the desk, to the clothes in the wardrobe and the posters on the walls). Then she switched off the light. “Sleep tight, Scoots,” she whispered to herself.
Yet, now she was on her own again, all her worries marched back one by one to haunt her: the breakup, the shouting, the possibility of being dragged to Cloudsdale. She was about to call out for Rainbow but stopped herself at the last second. Brave fillies didn’t need help. They took care of themselves.
What she needed was something to distract her. Something. Anything...
The idea that came to her was as wonderful as it was impossible. She smiled, whispering the idea out loud and trying to fool herself into thinking it could become true.
“I wish Rainbow Dash was my sister.”
Scootaloo pictured shooting stars in a black sky. She imagined four-leafed clovers and fairies in the forest. She dreamt of golden lamps in the middle of the desert, and of wands fashioned from the finest, oldest wood.
Then she turned over in bed and thought no more.
Apple Bloom was frowning. “We’re worried about ya, Scoots! We ain’t seen ya in two weeks!”
“I’m... I’m sorry. I just—”
“We just want to help,” said Sweetie Belle. “We can’t do that if, if you’re always locked in your room.”
“We’re the Cutie Mark Crusaders!” Apple Bloom stamped a hoof on the grass. “We stick together! Just ‘cos your parents gone split up that doesn’t mean we’re gonna abandon you. Scoots, we love ya!”
“Yeah,” added Sweetie Belle. “Come back. Please! You’re not even in school anymore. It’s not the same without you.”
“I’m sorry,” Scootaloo insisted, but no matter how many times she said it, it didn’t lessen the uncomfortable sensation in her stomach, as though some small, impish creature was prodding against the inside of her belly. She wanted to reach out and hold her friends. She wanted to play with them, rush through Ponyville, through forests and meadows, and never stop running...
But she couldn’t.
The sky turned black. The grass shrivelled up, and Apple Bloom’s yellow fur became white, as did her red mane and orange eyes; then all that was left was the pink bow in her hair, and then that too vanished into nothingness. At the same time, Sweetie’s eyes dimmed and the bounce left her mane, and a second later, where once there had stood a little white unicorn, now there was darkness so thick and crushing that Scootaloo could have been at the bottom of the deepest trench in the middle of the ocean, or lost in a cave and cut off from sunlight. “Sweetie Belle! Apple Bloom!” she called, yet there was nopony to answer her. Her friends were gone.
“We don’t like whining. You have to be brave like Rainbow Dash.”
“Leave me alone,” Scootaloo snapped. “I’m not in the mood.”
Something gigantic circled her, something larger than Princess Celestia herself. A pair of frightful, glowing eyes opened up in front of her in the blackness.
“Wh-what d’you want?” Scootaloo whispered, wishing desperately to wake in bed, oh Celestia, please let her wake up, please, please, oh Luna, oh Celestia, oh please. Those eyes! Those terrible eyes which stared and stared, eyes of pure, relentless evil...
The creature spoke, its rank breath making Scootaloo retch. “Hush,” it said. “Be quiet and hush, now. Hush now, quiet now. Hush. Hush. Hush.”
And just as Scootaloo was about to shout at the creature, scream at it to leave her alone, there was a light. It was small at first, no bigger than the most minuscule star peering through a gap in cloud cover, but it grew larger and larger, and fast. By the time she was even aware of what she was looking at, the light had doubled, tripled, quadrupled in size. Then it was as large as a cart. Then it was bigger than a house, and Scootaloo gasped as the source came into clear view. It was a wolf.
But no ordinary wolf, for it was ten feet tall and had astonishingly green eyes, and fur so unbelievably white that it seemed to shine. The monster yelped and fled. Scootaloo wondered why she wasn’t doing the same.
And then the wolf spoke. “Wake up, kid,” it said simply.
Its voice was that of the largest mountains. It was that of ancient forests and civilizations long forgotten, and it was older then the foundation of Equestria. Scootaloo couldn’t stand that voice; yet she longed to hear it again, to bask in it, to let it rumble in her ears and wipe her mind clean of worry.
Then something grabbed her from behind and tugged sharply.
Scootaloo gasped.