“And you are sure that you understand?” Clover shifted her weight from one hoof to another. “Because I can go over the directions once more, if you desire it.”

Colgate rolled her eyes in exasperation. Clover had led her near to the edge of the dark and foreboding woods that marked the border of the forbidden area where the Necronomicon lay in wait. While Colgate had appreciated her company, the other unicorn had begun to grate on her nerves. She gave Clover a weary smile and nodded.

“I think I got the gist of it the fourth time you mentioned it,” Colgate confirmed, only letting a little bit of her frustration slip into her tone.

Clover frowned. “Chosen one, it is of the utmost importance that you take all of this very seriously!” she chided. “With the book safely in our hoofs we can end this curse and-“

“And send me back to my own time,” Colgate finished impatiently. “You sound like a broken record.”

“Pardon me?” Clover asked, confused as well as annoyed. “A what?”

“It’s something that repeats itself,” Colgate explained.

“Ah ha! Then surely you must admit that I am not a ‘broken record’ as if I were repeating myself I would not be broken,” Clover countered, grinning smugly.

“It only repeats when it’s broken,” Colgate growled, feeling the beginnings of a migraine building behind her eyes.

“Ah,” Clover relented. “Yet, regardless of what sort of record I resemble, I did not mean to cause you distress. I merely wish to leave as little to chance as possible.” She gave the forest a nervous look as she added. “I would join you in retrieving the book, but I fear I would not survive the journey.”

Colgate waved a hoof. “Don’t worry about it. I know you’re trying your best and I am grateful for the help, but you don’t need to stress out about any of this.” She trotted ahead toward the tree line as she called back over her shoulder. “Besides, last thing I want is for you to get eaten by a horrible tree monster and leave me stuck here with Princess kill-crazy!”

Clover grimaced as Colgate reached the tree line. “Do not forget the words you must speak before retrieving the book! Klaatu barada nikto! Do not forget!”

“Yeah, yeah I got it!” Colgate shouted back as she ducked into the forest. She dropped her voice into a low, mocking tone and added. “And don’t forget your scarf Colgate, you don’t want to catch a cold. Thanks mom.”

Colgate continued to mutter to herself as the air thickened, a heavy fog covering more and more of the landscape as she trudged ahead. Under hoof the forest floor became spongy as the thick layer of leaves hid the edge of some great bog. High above, perched upon the twisted branches of sickly trees, huge black birds stared down with cold eyes and cawed at the lone pony.

“Oh go shove a pie in it!” Colgate shouted, startling the crows from their roosts. As they flew away, she magically tossed a rock after them. “This place is creepy enough without you flying clichés cawing at me!”

Feeling slightly better, Colgate felt a spring return to her step. While her stay at the castle had, on the whole, not been that bad, she was starting to feel a little homesick. Now, with the book so close, for the first time since her life had taken a sharp turn into utter insanity, the thought of things returning to normal actually seemed somewhat plausible. Admittedly, a return to normality without Lyra in her life, but…

Colgate sighed, feeling the spring leave her step as suddenly as it had come. She had not had much of an opportunity to really think over the ramifications of her friend’s death before. as Between being dragged to her death in chains after being thrown through time and being lectured, she always had something pressing to keep her mind off of really thinking about what had happened in the cabin. Now though Colgate could not help but wonder what she was going to do with herself when she did get back. Colgate still had a few old college friends she occasionally spent time with, but with Cadence out of the country and Lyra dead, that mostly just left Twinkleshine and while Colgate would never say that Twinkleshine was a stuck up, obnoxious nag who she only was ever friends with because all her friends seemed to like her for whatever reason… Well she would not deny it if somepony were to make that observation.

Colgate had just begun to wonder if she could count that one friendly bartender as a friend and what it said about her that she was resorting to considering smiling servers friends when she was shaken from her train of thought by falling into a pool of bog water. She thrashed about in the water, shouting a string of profanities as she tried to get a firm hold of the relatively drier land of the bog. As she did so, an eerie silence fell across the bog, as the bugs and frogs and other wildlife suddenly quieted. As Colgate pulled herself onto the bank she strained her ears to hear the squelching of anypony, or anything moving throughout the bog. Her eyes darted to and fro, expecting to see waterlogged corpses shuffling toward her through the fog.

A full minute passed and Colgate had just about given up her watch when she heard a faint whistle off in the distance, growing louder. In the fog a dark shape, larger than anypony and high above the ground, began to emerge as Colgate felt her heart leap into her throat.

With a cry, Colgate pulled herself from the water and began to gallop as fast as her prosthetic leg and the marshy ground would allow her. Behind her the whistling rose, transforming into a howling scream as it grew closer. Just as it loomed over Colgate, ready to strike, the swampy ground rose up out of the bog and Colgate found herself once again on solid earth. Like a shot, Colgate dashed ahead, feeling the rush of air as the thing came down on the place she had been a moment before. Ahead, through the fog and atop a lonesome hill, a decrepit windmill came into view and Colgate turned toward it.

Even though her legs burned from exertion and her breath had started to come in ragged gasps, the last dozen yards to the top of the hill were still far faster than her flight through the marsh, so by the time she dove through the unbarred door of the old mill, she had just enough time to slam the door shut before the unspeakable thing crashed into the barrier with terrifying force. Colgate braced herself as a second battering-ram-like stick struck the door, the thing outside screaming in rage as it was denied entrance. For what felt like minutes Colgate leaned against the door, waiting for the next assault. Suddenly, from the walls came a horrific cry, like a filly screaming out for her mother. Colgate spun to face the sound, which rose in pitch as it raced along the walls of the mill, running higher and higher till it seemed to be running along the roof. And then silence.

Colgate stared at the place where the sound had disappeared as sweat began to form on her brow. Slowly, she began to look across the roof to a large hole, where a portion of the ceiling had collapsed in some time ago. Feeling her heart begin to beat hard against her chest, Colgate turned her gaze to the dark and foreboding ruin that was the interior of the mill.

Colgate cautiously stepped away from the door, giving it a sidelong glance as she prepared to throw herself back into it at the first sign of trouble, but the door stood still. Turning her attention to the interior of the mill Colgate felt a shiver run down her spine as she looked into the shadowy darkness all around her. Silhouetted against the beams of light, shining down from the holes in the roof, cogs and bars jutted out of the walls at strange angles, their purposes lost on Colgate’s frightened mind.

Shuffling under the archaic machinery, Colgate listened, darting her head back and forth. She felt her spine crawl as she jumped at every tiny noise she heard as her horn glowed to life, casting long shadows across the walls, which seemed much further away than they had before. From somewhere still hidden in darkness, a small voice began to titter. Colgate leapt away from the noise, smashing her head against a low hanging cog which protested with a crack that bounced off it as her vision spun.

Suddenly, movement caught Colgate’s eye as a flash of blue sparked in the darkness. With a shout Colgate vaulted a large bar and dove at the brightening blue light. In a flash, Colgate saw a blue unicorn diving back at her out of the blue, then her world was full of noise and flying glass as the other pony shattered against her. Colgate screamed as she landed heavily on the shards of the mirror, leaping back to all fours as fragments of mirror continued to cascade down around her.

“What is wrong with me!?” Colgate howled as she shook mirror shards from her mane, wincing as bits of crystal dislodged themselves from her legs and belly. “I mean, can’t the universe just give me a break for once?” She continued, carefully removing a stubborn piece of mirror that had managed to get itself embedded into her thigh.

Colgate twisted the large piece of mirror in her magic till she could see herself reflected in its surface. The disheveled, sodden and all around filthy mare reflected there looked less like the Colgate she knew and more a crazy, homeless pony. As a line of her own blood slowly ran down the reflection, distorting the image, Colgate tossed away the shard with a sigh.

“At least nothing cut me too badly,” Colgate muttered. “I guess there’s that.” She looked down at the broken mirror and at the tiny reflections of herself staring back up at her. Something in the tiny reflection caused her to laugh as she dropped it to the floor.

“Well that’s another seven years of bad luck.” Colgate raised her head and stared out the opening in the roof. “Which I guess is the cue for you to show back up, right?” She stuck out her tongue and blew a raspberry at the night sky. “Go ahead! See if I care! Give me your best shoot!”

At that Colgate heard a soft giggling from the floor and sharply looked down. At first nothing seemed to be out of place; the mirror shards were still scattered across the floor, reflecting the moonlight glittering down from on high. But as she looked, Colgate began to notice one significant change to the pieces of mirror, namely that she was no longer reflected in them.

“Oh my goodness, no…” Colgate moaned in horror as she stared at her non-reflection in the mirror, tears beginning to well in her eyes. “You turned me into a vampire!” Colgate screamed, sitting down with a thump and holding her hooves over her eyes. “You monsters! You made me a nosferatu! Curse you!” She throw herself to the ground with a sob. “Curse you all to Tartarus!”

“Hey, haybrain!” A high-pitched voice shouted from somewhere above as Colgate began to wail. Instantly the weeping pony lurched back upright and began to search for the source of the noise.

“Who said that? Who’s there?” Colgate asked, seeing no other ponies around her.

“Right above you,” the voice replied, sounding as if it was trying to hold back laughter. As Colgate looked up she was immediately struck by a falling cog directly on the forehead. Colgate staggered back, crashing as the high-pitched voice began to laugh hysterically.

“You think that’s funny, huh?” Colgate snarled, shaking her head to clear it of stares. “Why don’t you come down here and I will give you something to laugh about!”

As if on cue, Colgate felt an unexpected sharp pain in her rear. With a yelp, she leapt forward, spinning around in time to catch sight of her assailants bumping their hoofs together in between bouts of uncontrollable giggles. Colgate’s jaw dropped as her brain tried to wrap itself around the fact that she had just been stabbed in the butt by a team of tiny… hers?

The miniature Colgates looked exactly like her in every way in every way, except for the fact that they were all only a few inches tall. As the tiny Colgates collapsed into a fit of laughter Colgate felt her head begin to feel woozy. She almost sat down, but stopped herself at the last second as she felt a twinge of pain from the thing still sticking out of her backside. With a whimper she pulled the thing free and looked at it, wincing at the sight of a bloodied fork.

“Where did they even find this?” Colgate wondered aloud, startling her miniature duplicates into jumping back up to all fours and making a break for it.

“Oh no you don’t!” Colgate shouted, hurling the fork at the clones as they scattered. One tiny pony, too slow or too startled to run, simply watched the oncoming utensil with unabashed terror. Colgate felt her stomach turn as the fork skewered the miniature creature, pinning it to the ground.

“Nooo!” One of the fellow tiny ponies screamed in its high-pitched voice as it ran back to its companion, who was struggling futilely with the fork. “What did you do to her!?” it wailed in a voice that Colgate realized was her own, several octaves higher.

“I’m so sorry!” Colgate winced, shuffling over the pair. “I didn’t mean to kill her, I just… just…”

“Just what?” the distraught pony howled, pointing at Colgate with a shaking hoof. “Just wanted to try and murder us unprovoked?”

“Hey!” Colgate cried, feeling her stomach turn as the tiny version of herself which she had impaled went limp, sagging into the utensil which had killed her. “You stabbed me first and I think you dropped a cog on my head!”

“And was that worth killing her over?” the miniature Colgate demanded, leaning over to look at something behind the large Colgate.

“No!” Colgate shouted, feeling tears begin to well up in her eyes. “That was just an accident! A horrible accident that never should have… Do you smell smoke?”

“No.” The clone shook her head.

“Me neither!” the skewered pony confirmed, giving Colgate an innocent smile before both tiny ponies began to giggle again.

Colgate spun around and screamed as she saw her tail merrily burning from the tip, where the scattered Colgates had been diligently working. Colgate began to spin in circles, desperately looking for a bucket of water to extinguish the flame with. Suddenly, Colgate felt something hard and long jut between her legs and she tumbled to the floor, landing on her burning tail. Screaming and flailing, the burning pony desperately rolled back and forth as her tail fire began to spread onto her fur. Meanwhile the clones began to choke as their laughter reached new heights, causing one who had hidden herself high above in the rafters to fall to her death, laughing all the way.

Finally Colgate managed to suffocate the flames, sighing with relief as she came to rest facing the clones. The three remaining little spawned monsters grinned at Colgate as she glared back.

“We want to apologize for setting you on fire,” one said, barely trying to pretend to be sincere.

“Oh yeah?” Colgate growled, horn glowing to life as she reached out for something to smash the demon with.

“Yep!” The clone nodded, trotting closer. “Cross my heart and hope to die-” Colgate lifted up a heavy cog, “-stick a horn right in your eye!” the clone shouted, charging forward and jabbing Colgate, who screamed and dropped the cog directly onto her own head. As she lay stunned, she felt her mouth forced open and something horrible and wriggling shoved past her lips. With a start her eyes shot open and looking down she saw the handle of the fork sticking out of her now closed mouth.

As the wriggling ceased, a memory of what had been on that fork hit her like a ton of bricks and Colgate began to gag violently, desperately trying to force the tiny monster out of her mouth. As she did so, however, the three remaining Colgates threw themselves against her lower jaw and nose, blocking off her air supply.

“Be a big girl and swallow your medicine,” one of the monsters chided giving Colgate a broad, killer smile. “Don’t want to make mommy mad, do you?”

Colgate, still mildly concussed from the multiple head injuries, struggled weakly as the thing in her mouth forced its way down her throat. Finally, running out of air drove Colgate to begin desperately trying to breathe in. Seeing that they had won, the remaining Colgates dashed away, laughing as they went, all while Colgate rasped in deep lung lungfuls of air, allowing the demon to slide the rest of the way down her throat.

For a while Colgate just sat and pulled herself back together, feeling her head for open wounds and testing her eye to see if she had gone partially blind. She had just about reassured herself that she was, in fact, more or less in one piece when her guts suddenly twisted in agonizing pain. Colgate bent double, retching as the pain rolled up her body and into her shoulder. She stared in abject horror as before her very eyes a small cut opened on her shoulder before widening to reveal a blue eye underneath. The eye rolled up to meet Colgate’s horrified stare.

Colgate screamed as she bolted for the door, stumbling over bits of machinery as she fled. Her shoulder throbbed as it bulged outward from her body, some hideous shape mutating out of her body like a growth. Colgate shoved her way through the door and collapsed to the ground with a cry of anguish as a fully formed head forced its way fully out onto a growing neck protruding from her body. Desperately, Colgate searched the ground for a stick and upon seeing one, grabbed it in her magic and prepared to attack.

“Wait!” The head screamed, holding out a hoof that was now growing grotesquely from Colgate’s side.

“What?” Colgate asked, feeling her stomach turn over as she realized her extra head was a mirror image of her own.

“This!” The head cackled, punching Colgate in her original nose. Colgate dropped the stick with a shout and clutched her nose. Unfortunately, this left her open as the mirrored head began to wail on the original with her new hoof, as a third back leg began to savagely kick her shins. Terrified and confused, Colgate rolled down the sloping hill and down toward the bog, all the while being battered by her strange new limbs.

As they slid to a stop at the edge of the bog, Colgate felt a wrenching from her side as the assault finally ended. Unsteadily, she pushed herself back to all fours and looked up at the thing that had been attacking her. A few feet away and looking just as confused as she was stood an almost perfect duplicate of herself, save for the flesh and blood leg where her mechanical one should be. She raised a hoof to her mouth and watched as the duplicate perfectly matched her movement, as if she were looking at a reflection of herself.

“What are you?”

The duplicate broke the mimic as it gave Colgate a crooked smirk. “Oh, isn’t it obvious? Never mind,” The mimic’s smirk grew into a sneer. “I forgot who I was talking too.”

“Hey!” Colgate snapped. “Don’t get smart with me you creepy eyeball mutant!”

“Oh I wouldn’t worry about me getting ‘smart’ with you, Colgate. I mean, after all, I am you...” The duplicate’s horn glowed to life with a faint blue aura as she spoke.

“Hey, cut that out!” Colgate shouted, feeling her cheeks burn. “Also what do you mean by, ‘you’re me’?”

The other Colgate laughed as she levitated a branch from the ground and began to pluck the twigs off it one at a time. “Oh I meant exactly what I said; I am you.” She plucked the last twig from the branch and rolled it around in her magic, examining it as she took a step closer to Colgate. “Well there is one key difference between us, I suppose…”

Colgate looked down at her twin’s leg. “The fact that you didn’t get bitten by a deadite or the fact that I was not born as an abomination of the laws of nature by crawling my way out of another pony’s side?”

The duplicate paused then shrugged. “Alright, you have me there I guess, but there is one other key difference between us.”

“The fact that you talk like a pretentious jerk?” Colgate asked, innocently.

The duplicate rolled its eyes and shook its head. “No, what I am trying to get at is that when I formed myself from your body, I left behind all your neuroses, your inhibitions and morals.” The duplicate broke into a wide grin. “Or to put it a way that you would understand, you’re ‘good’ Colgate…” Suddenly she swung the branch underhoofed, right under Colgate’s jaw. As the unicorn fell to the ground, the duplicate rushed forward, lashing out with the branch. “…While I am free to be bad Colgate!” she finished with a scream of delighted laughter.

Colgate crawled away from the villainous copy as she telekinetically reached out for anything that she could use to protect herself. As her mirror bore down on her again, she felt her magic wrap around the shaft of a spear. With a shout, Colgate wrenched the spear free where it lay half buried in mud and held it menacingly between herself and her clone. The other Colgate looked surprised as her predecessor pointed the mud-slick weapon at her, then her surprise gave way to amusement as she laid a hoof gently on the tip of the spear.

“Oh no!” the doppelganger mocked. “Whatever shall I do now that the big bad Chosen One has a weapon?”

Colgate tried to her best to look intimidating while lying flat on her back, slowly sinking into the mud. “Don’t push me,” she warned, dropping her voice as low as it would go and giving the tip of the spear a flick, knocking her mirror’s hoof away. “I don’t want to kill you, so let’s both just walk out of here alive. We are reasonable ponies, so let’s not do anything rash.”

The other Colgate snickered as she guided the spear’s tip toward her left eye. As Colgate blanched, her other self took the haft of the spear in her own magic and began to press it down into Colgate’s gut.

“Let’s face it dear,” the other Colgate snickered as she pushed down harder, causing Colgate to whimper in pain. “You don’t have it in you to hurt another living pony.” She pushed harder. “Because in the end, you’re just a pathetic little coward who let her friends die, who didn’t deserve to outlive Lyra,” She twisted the shaft, causing Colgate to cough as the air was pushed from her diaphragm. “And who is too much of a goody-goody to stop her better half from finishing what the stupid tree started!”

As the mirror Colgate drove down for one last push, she felt a sudden resistance as the spear shaft burned to life with a second blue magical aura. She looked down the shaft to see Colgate glaring back up at her, her face set and grim.

“I didn’t let my friends die,” Colgate snarled, as her horn flared to life, causing the spear to jut forward till its tip pressed against her copy’s eye. “And I’m not that good.”

Colgate squeezed her eyes shut as she rammed the spear forward.

Author's Note

So evil Colgate as less of a annoying jack ass who punches Ash in the face repeatedly before getting shot with an amazing one liner and more as a physical manifestation of Colgate's doubts and self loathing, literately beating herself up over the things she has done and her own perceived failings. What do you guys think? Better? Worse? No strong feelings one way or the other?