Prologue
Hello. My name is Professor Strangebrain, though most call me strange. I prefer Professor. Now, before you go accusing me of having a ridiculously bad name, keep in mind the writer ran out of ideas. My job is to use a teleportation spell to transport random creatures from unknown dimensions to my lab, where I will then study their behavior. The safety protocols aren't exactly safe, as I haven't a proper cell to study them in. They just roam around my house, and I'm perfectly fine with it. I study them, they try to kill me, and we're all happy.
The one thing I have to worry about is my assistants, because beginners never last long if they don't take it seriously. I usually just go it alone. Of course, the lucky mare/filly/colt/stallion makes it and either gets diagnosed with PTSD, leaves, or stays. I prefer them to stay.
Usually the tests are performed on something that seems straight out of Tartarus, but occasionally something peaceful gets sent through. We never have any idea of what's getting sent through, and by we I mean me but sometimes other ponies. The most dangerous thing I had studied to that point was some sort of scaly, small, vicious little bastard. He was bipedal and had 2 normal claws on each foot, along with 1 hooked claw, clearly designed for disembowelment. He also had 2 dexterous arms, and his limbs protruded from his lower body. The creature was also feathery, and had glaring, yellow eyes with slits for pupils. He was a reptilian, and recognized as a "raptor".
On a brighter note, the friendliest creature I've studied was a furry little gal. She was certainly feisty at times, but still loving for about 63% of the time. She was slender, and looked almost identical to a cat. The differences were that she was golden, and had long black hair pointing off the top of her ears. She was given the name "Lemures Leo", old-pony for Goblin Lion, because of her ears.
Now onto the ponies that had criticized me of insanity and idiocy. There would be those that would constantly send me letters of concern, pretending to worry about me, or those that would threaten to call the police. I wouldn't blame them. But I was perfectly fine, right? Sure, I would seem a little iffy here and there, but I was mostly sane... mostly.
Ok, I admit, I was crazy, but still, I could take care of myself, and I never hurt anypony other than me. Ponies would ask, "What insanity drives you to such actions?" and I would answer, "The pure fascination it brings." They would then look at me like I was a rapist. I ignored the look. They just never understood the idea of discovering something new and almost completely different to the things we're used to.
Anyhow, that basically describes my time as an adult.
Chapter 1: "Good riddance, you bastard."
Chapter 1
The beastly figure roamed my hallways. I felt a wonderful feeling of both success and absolute terror. I had the lab locked up tight, so he couldn't get in and wreck my life's work. Sadly, there was but one problem; I wasn't in the lab.
I had absolutely no clue what the hell that monstrosity in my house was, and that was surprisingly, a wonderful feeling. A feeling of adventure, wonder, and complete horror. It felt like this world was perfect. And I was going to make it better. Hiding in the bathroom wasn't going to help me last long, so I used a special spell I had learned to see through the door. Nothing. The ghostly shape of a stallion wasn't there to greet my eyes, only my empty hallway was showing; a warm welcoming to step out of the restroom. This creature was very different compared to most of the species I studied; he consisted of a black smoke, thicker than stone itself. The smoke took up the shape of a stallion, and the only part of him that was distinguishable between him and the shadows were his eyes. The dark red bulbs took up most of his "face", and they weren't anymore welcoming than the rest of him.
I decided to name this monstrosity "Tenebris Equum", old pony speak for "Dark Stallion". When he had first seen me, he slowly turned towards me and began to creep forth, a path of shadows following him. His eyes paralyzed me; the red voids staring into my very soul. I slowly began to heat up once I stared back, and as soon as I felt a burning pain in my horn and face, I cringed and closed my eyes, the pain disappearing shortly after. My flesh had regrown, showing that just so long as you stare into Tenebris's eyes, you will slowly burn to a crisp. If you break eye contact prior to death, your flesh will regenerate.
That was when I ran to the bathroom and locked the door. I also learned he has some form of allergy to physical contact with the living. He, at one point, bumped into me and when he did, I heard the most terrifying noise I will ever hear. It sounded like a thousand voices screaming out at once, despair filling the mass of screams. Tenebris recoiled in what I assumed to be pain. I could barely make out words in a strange language I was yet to learn. Judging by the tone, I believed it was a plead for help.
And now here I was, sitting in the bathroom, getting ready to leave to my laboratory. I creaked open the door, to see that there was no Tenebris to be found. Relieved, I creeped out into the hallway. I then sprinted to the lab, unlocked it with my unicorn magic, and stomped in, slamming the door and sliding all 12 locks into place.
"Whew!" I let out a sigh of relief and fell to the floor, panting. I then noticed how much sweat I was producing. "Looks like it's time to send him back to wherever he came from." I grumbled, checking my clock. I closed my eyes and tried to remember which spell it was. Let's see... Fear inducement.... Numbness.... Heat vision.... Extinguish... Incinerate... Aha! Here it is!" My mind was like a spell encyclopedia. I unlocked the door. Feeling confident, I strode into the hallway. I wasn't sure where to look for Tenebris first, so I decided the kitchen would be the place to look first. I took a left in the hallway, heading towards the kitchen. Once I got there, I was angered by my inability to find him. But, I did not let my anger overcome me.
Because he wasn't in the kitchen, I considered that he might be in the living room. Perhaps he needed a rest? I went back to the hallway, and walked down it. I took a left at the end of the hallway into the living room. I was getting angrier and angrier. Where the hell was he? Trying my best to keep my cool, I decided perhaps the bedroom would be a good option, too. I went to my bedroom and, you guessed it, he wasn't there either. I was about to shout in anger, but I was stopped by the feeling of breathing going down my spine.
"Ah. There you are." I mumbled, my anger changing to fear. I turned around, eyes closed, and swung my hoof into his face. The screams echoed in my ears, filling me with dread. "Don't like it, do ya'?" I asked rhetorically. I hit him again. This time, he flew back. Feeling success swell in my veins, I leaped onto him. The screams didn't stop. I didn't want to kill him, though, so I got off. "Right, seems you've 'ad enough, so I'm sendin' you home. Cheers!" I said, waving goodbye and using the spell known as "Return". My horn flashed grey, and the horrendous beast was sent home. "Good riddance, you bastard." I grumbled. I went back to the lab. Levitating a notepad and pencil off a desk, I began to jot down notes.
Name: Tenebris Equum
Test subject no. 24
Height: Aproximately 7 feet.
Weight: Unclear
Diet: None.
Danger level: 84%
Gender: Male
Similar to: No similarities
Movement speed: 6mph maximum.
Methods of killing: Unclear.
I placed the pad and pencil back onto the desk. There was a knocking on the door.
"I'll be but a moment!" I shouted to the door. I left the lab, closed the door behind me, and opened the front door. "Ah, Cinder! What brings you here?" I asked the mare at the door.
"Well, first, I heard shouting, then weird screaming, then cussing, and I was wondering if you were hurt, Professor." she explained. Most ponies would have an alarmed tone, but she knew about my experiments, and this was practically normal.
"I'm fine. Just had a particularly dangerous test subject." I explained. She nodded in understanding. "I'm not hurt." There was an awkward silence for exactly 32.8 seconds, until it was broken by Cinder's lovely voice.
"Well, best get back to breakfast." she decided.
"I have a nap to attend." I replied. I hadn't slept at all the night before, because I feared getting killed in my sleep. That fear was now gone.
-2 hours later-
I woke up. Now, I could go and look around Ponyville for any time rifts. They would occasionally appear after sending a test subject back. They were easy to fix, luckily. But if they were there too long, the planet could be sucked in. The only reason I only needed to look in Ponyville was because the rifts would only appear within a kilometer of where the spell was cast.
It was a sunny day, and it seemed almost everypony was out in the street. Most of them were gardening, or chatting, but of course the more "sophisticated" individuals were arguing, or gloating over their money. Yes indeed, the rich residents of Ponyville were morons. They thought they were nobles, but did they risk their lives for the sake of science? Did they dedicate their lives to studying the weird and wonderful? Hell no! Did they risk their life for ANYTHING?! Hell no! They deserved no glory.
I searched for 3 hours, but failed to find a time rift. This was concerning, because there was almost always at least 2. I would soon find an explanation.
I was nearly successful with being outside without communicating with anypony for nearly 3 hours! A new record, ruined by my neighbor Pinkiepie.
"Whaccha' doin'?" the pink mare asked, bouncing alongside me back towards my house.
"Going home." I mumbled. She gave me a concerned look.
"What's wrong?" she asked, tilting her head.
"Nothing. Just concerned about something." I answered, getting worried.
"Why? It's just another normal day!" she questioned, clearly confused.
"Because of something to do with my latest experiment." I replied.
"What happened?" she asked.
"Nothing." I replied.
"Then what's wrong?!" she asked.
"I-.... Nevermind..." I grumbled. Finally, I had gotten to my house. I opened the door and walked inside. Closing the door, I removed my cape and dropped it to the ground. I needed to think for a while.
Chapter 2: "I have made a grave mistake."
Chapter 2: "I have made a grave mistake."
"Hardwire, pass the inorganic mercury." I ordered my assistant, Hardwire. The purple filly complied.
"Yes Professor!" she said, levitating a bottle towards me. I very carefully pored the precious liquid into a vial of arsenic. When I wasn't studying creatures, I was mixing together seemingly impossibly dangerous forms of poison. Hardwire hadn't any parents, so as her caretaker, she had my consent to work on it. I knew it was dangerous, but she was too smart to mess around with poison. And she wouldn't stop begging me anyway, so I just complied to get her to stop asking. I would be a horrible parent.
"You drink that, and you die a slow, painful, horrible death." I would warn her. Fortunately, she took me seriously. And if she drank it, she would die a horrible death. The poisons usually killed with paralysis, a horrendous death in which the victim is conscious the entire time it takes the poison to kill. During the process, the victim is paralyzed meaning their limbs wouldn't respond to their commands, so the victim couldn't move. These poisons took especially long to do their work, so it would be an especially long and painful death.
"Ha! The mixture is almost complete!" I laughed. Hardwire gave me a look.
"You're crazy, you know that?" she giggled.
"Don't you think otherwise!" I replied. "Ok, now I need a dangerous dose of Scopolamine." I instructed the filly. The reason behind 3 extremely dangerous ingredients was so even the strongest individuals would be affected by the poison. The filly returned with the ingredient. "Thank you, Hardwire."
"No problem, Professor!" she cheered. She certainly loved praise. I stopped her before she could put down the drug.
"Will you do the honors?" I offered. She gazed at me with awe.
"HECK YEAH!" she shouted. She then dropped the pill into the mixture, watching it disintegrate under the toxin's surface.
"Excellent work, my little scientist!" I praised the filly, patting her on the back. "Now, we can make a few more samples, and show our work to the army, they buy it and mass produce it, and we get money!" I declared. "Or, we could keep it to ourselves." I said. I liked that idea better, for some reason. You never know when poison will come in handy these days.
Frigidus membrum was completed. It has a simple meaning behind the name; limb freeze. I had a massive collection of poisons, the most effective items in the collection being Cyanide and Botulinum Toxin. Of course, Nightshade was in there too. No wonder everypony thought I was mad.
-2 Days Later-
"Hey professor, look at the paper!" Cinder said, levitating a newspaper over to me. It was lunch, and we were sitting outside Sugarcube corner. I stared at the paper, terrified by the front page;
"Murder victim burned to death! Authority goes crazy!"
On the morning of June 12th, 1411, a stallion's corpse was found in his house. Most of the flesh had been burned off, and all that remained was the black skeleton. Local forensics scientist Wildmane has determined it belongs to none other than Penciltip. His neighbor, Goose, says she knocked on his door after hearing some sort of crashing and screaming. "Nopony answered, so I so I just went and got the police." Says goose. The authority is on the look out for any suspects, but have almost no evidence to make an assumption. "Such a murder is strange," states chief of Ponyville police Heavyhoof. "as there was no burns found on the walls or floor. As though he was the only thing burning." Officers recommend to have a phone at the ready, in case the murder strikes again.
I was absolutely horrified.
"I have made a grave mistake." I mumbled.
"What?" Cinder asked, confused.
"Nothing." I replied. I failed the spell! My thoughts filled with images of the horrific things that were soon to come. Don't worry, Strangebrain, I told myself. Maybe it's just a coincidence. It probably is, and that means I just have to deal with a murder, not a supernatural being with the ability to stare at you until you burn to death. This thought calmed me a bit, and the growing tenseness in my body was gone. Of course, I still had my suspicions. If it was Tenebris, I knew how to stop him, and how to avoid his attacks. But nopony else knew. Of course, I wasn't going to tell them how to save themselves because of 2 things;
1) They would ignore me, simply thinking I was crazy.
2) I wasn't sure it was Tenebris anyway!
So, I decided to just disregard it in the meantime. Not a smart decision, on my half, but too late now. I scratched my mane, and decided I would go home to think, and try to understand what is to come.
"Well, Cinder, I have work to do, so I best take my leave." I told the mare, getting off the bench.
"Ok, see you soon!" she said, waving.
"Farewell." I replied, trotting away to my house. I opened the door to see Hardwire poking a stick into a cage. "Hardwire, stop tormenting the test subject!" I commanded. She complied.
"Sorry, professor!" she shrugged. I sighed.
"So, any notes on behavior?" I asked the filly.
"Well, he really likes berries." she mumbled, pointing at the berry stained, toad-like creature.
"Vegetarian..." I mumbled. "Well, anyhow, I have some thinking to do, so keep an eye on little Velox here." I instructed her. Velox meant "swift". The little toad got that name form his surprisingly fats running, for an amphibian. he ran in a manner similar to that of a crocodile, his legs flailing back and forth.
I walked into my thinking room, the lab, and sat in a padded chair. A computer console swung towards my face, still going no closer than 1 feet towards me. A voice like that of a robotic male's greeted me.
"Hello, professor!" the voice greeted, a smiling stallion appearing on the screen before me.
"Good day, Glistening Spark." I replied to the voice.
"What brings you into therapy today, my dear sir?" Spark asked.
"Oh, just a bit of strange things coming up in the news that concerned me." I answered, still calming down from reading the paper.
"Oh, is it perhaps that sex scandal about Carrot top?" Spark asked, the stallion on the screen's face going from a happy one to one that suggested he was snickering.
"Of course not, that stuff comes up in the news all the time!" I answered, a serious expression on my face. "It's about the murder."
The stallion's face went from laughing to frightened.
"Ah.... the murder..." Spark mumbled, his tone going from happy to cold, and quiet. A chill ran down my spine. On the screen, several pictures of whom I presumed to be Penciltip appeared on the screen. "Penciltip was a poliite young stallion, without many rivals, so finding a suspect is especially hard. What's even stranger is how he died. He was burned, but he seemed to be the only thing so much as touched by any sort of fire. What troubles you about the murder, sir?" asked the console, showing the stallion again, a sincere expression on his face. Spark scared me sometimes, with how calm he seemed sometimes.
"The fact that I feel it is linked with Tenebris Equum!" I declared. "First off, when I sent Tenebris "back", no time rifts appeared. There was almost always 2. Furthermore, Tenebris always kills through incineration of the flesh, correct? So I feel it is my fault by failing the spell to send him home. If anypony dies, it's my fault." I finished. The stallion put his hoof to his chin in thought.
"That's an interesting conclusion." Spark mumbled, deep in thought. "So, did explaining your fears to somepony help?" he asked. I had to think about this for a moment.
"I guess, a bit." I finally mumbled.
"Lovely, sir!" cheered Spark. "I am glad to be of use."
"Well, best be going now." I said, getting out of the chair and clicking a button on the monitor. The screen swung back to the wall, barely missing impact. I left to the living room. I saw that Hardwire was poking Velox through the gaps in the caging, giggling as it cuddled her finger. "Uh, Hardwire, I don't suppose you would do that if he was carnivorous, would you?" I asked. She looked at me.
"Of course not!" she replied, clearly serious. I uttered a simple "ok" and jotted down notes about Velox on a notepad.
Name: Velox
Test subject no. 25
Height: Aproximately 7 inches..
Weight: 89g.
Diet: Vegetarian.
Danger level: 2%
Gender: Male
Similar to: Toads, frogs.
Movement speed: 8mph maximum.
Methods of killing: None.
"Hardwire, that's all we need to know about Velox." I told the purple filly. "You may go home now."
"Bye, Velox!" she waved the toad-like creature goodbye. "Bye, Professor!"
"Farewell, Hardwire." I said in farewell. She pranced out the front door, shutting it behind her. I never did know where that foal was off to, nor did I know where she lived. Sometimes she would say something about her friend "Scootaloo" or something like that.
My horn flashed, and Velox was enveloped in a grey glow. With a sudden flash, he was gone. Back to looking for time rifts. How fun.
I was relieved to find 3 time rifts altogether, meaning that at least THIS time, the spell worked. I dealt with them as though they were almost nothing. If they had a chance to grow, however, they would be significantly harder to remove. Exhausted by paranoia and my extensive use of magic, I stumbled home, slumped through the door, and collapsed onto my bed as sleep enveloped me in a state of bliss.