The night is grim and full of dark
It’s a night for monsters. Then again, it’s always a night for monsters when there hasn’t been a day in years. By now the monsters have made themselves right at home. They snatch up ponies by the score when they aren’t snatching up prime real estate in the dankest, darkest parts of the realm.
Places like the cathedral.
The cathedral’s one of those places that’s been old forever. Timeless, almost. It’s been old since the days when days had sun, a stone survivor from the first time the Princess fought Nightmare Moon. The time she won. The Everfree grew up around it and over it, but never quite dared to brave the interior even after all these centuries. The big double doors are just splinters and dust now. They offer no resistance when Applejack canters up the steps into the darkness beyond.
A pony doesn’t enter such a place lightly. Applejack’s only here because she’s got good reason, 'here' being one of those places she would rather not be, thank you very much. But a job's a job, so she straightens her hat and pulls a duster tight around her throat. It does nothing to stop the night’s chill, but it feels nice to wear.
The sour taste of cold spit fills her mouth. Breath mists in the bars of moonlight that slant through the foyer. Clip, clop. Clip, clop... Every step is the death of silence. Her hooves echo off stone floors, stone walls, stone pillars. Her tongue rakes across dry teeth. She checks the corners, the cobwebs, eyes unblinking. Darkness weighs on her back, gnawing at her hide even through the duster.
There’s a cloying stench hanging on the air. She knows that scent. It’s the rot of death, both old and fresh. Blood is smeared here and there, all of it a few hours fresh. Not enough to be noticeable right away in the darkness, but Applejack sees it all the same. She knows what to look for. Her hoof reaches for reassurance on her flank, under the long coat. Something glints there in the moonlight, something heavy, something metal. She pats it, then moves on.
Plip.
A different kind of something drips from the ceiling. She stops, looks down. Blood speckles the floor at her hooves. More drops follow.
Pit, pat.
She cocks her hat back, rolls her eyes to the ceiling. Even with all her experience she almost doesn’t notice the black shape hanging in the shadows overhead. A lump, suspended from a beam.
Her ear twitches. She stares.
Two more drops fall to the floor. Pit, pat.
"Listen, pal," she says evenly. "Are yah gonna come down here so we can talk, or what?"
Her voice echoes softly into the dark.
The dangling lump shivers. It rotates, slowly unfurling into a greater and more sinister form. Flesh comes apart at the seams and bones splinter. Saliva pours down like the last dregs of water from an upturned bucket and splashes across her hooves. Applejack takes a step back. She grimaces and wonders where the rest of the meal went.
A long knife hiss drips out of a gaping maw stuffed full of fangs. Matching red eyes glimmer in the moonlight.
Applejack's grimace widens further. "Well. You’re a big fellah, ain’t yah?"
Leathern wings flare open and the creature drops with a thud. Even hunched down it looms above any pony. Applejack’s seen plenty of vampires in her day, killed more than a few, even held pleasant conversations with one or two. But whatever this is, it certainly isn't the kind of bloodsucker you share tea with. Not even if you wanted to. She almost whistles appreciatively at just how ugly it is. Ugly as sin.
The vampire-thing hisses again, louder this time, but it doesn’t seem particularly threatened by her. Curious, maybe. She looks it in the eye and wonders if it can speak. It just twists its head and bristles some of that coarse black hair that covers it from pig-nose to stump-tail.
"Alright, I'll cut to the chase." She licks her teeth. "I'm not here for small talk. But I suppose you already surmised that."
Mister monster snaps its jaws open and shut, wide eyes blinking one at a time. By the Princess, it’s just like a giant bat. It doesn’t even have hooves. No pony ever had grasping claws like that. Was it ever a pony at all?
Applejack sighs. "Alright. Look, I'm not a very good shot with this thing..."
As she speaks she produces an enormous revolver from under her duster. Symbols of the sun and the Princess adorn the metal, wards against evil. The weight of it sits on her upraised hoof, pale as the stars and twice as dangerous. Gold filigree glints in a thread of moonlight.
She keeps her eyes square on the beast.
"...But... Big Macintosh here fires REALLY big bullets. So what’s it gonna be? We gonna do this the easy way, or are we gonna--"
The vampire, or whatever it is, doesn’t appear particularly impressed. It turns to the side and, almost languidly, bounds away.
Applejack rolls her eyes with another anguished sigh. "The hard way, then."
She jams the revolver between her teeth and tears after the beast. It lopes ahead in a wide arc, leapfrogging between the pillars. The thing’s fast, even at a leisurely jog. But there’s nowhere for it to go.
She aims at a gallop, her tongue finds the trigger, and she pulls. Big Macintosh kicks in her mouth.
BANG!
The first shot goes wide by a yard and wreaks exaggerated destruction on the foyer’s distant wall. A new shaft of moonlight spears through the room.
Applejack skids around a sharp turn and slows to a trot. Her hooves strike sparks off the floor and the duster flares out behind her.
BANG!
The next shot takes a chunk out of a hapless pillar. Her teeth clench, tongue gone numb. The smell of cordite cancels out that of blood and death. Her ears ring and her eyes water. But she doesn’t hesitate. She doesn’t blink.
BANG!
This time she blows a pillar nearly in half just as the creature ducks behind it. Dust and stone fill the air. Hairy leather disappears in the muzzleflash for half an instant before her eyes catch a glimpse of movement. It knows it's in danger now. With every bound it picks up speed and she realizes it’s headed for a crumbling gap in the ceiling.
She leads him, no time to draw a fine bead. Just enough time for one last shot.
BANG!
Applejack takes the vampire in the side just as it passes through a shaft of light. Even over the noise of the blast she can hear the impact of the bullet. THWOP! Powder burns sear her muzzle and Big Macintosh punches her in the teeth. Confounded thing kicks like a cannon. Her whole face buzzes. She keeps walking.
The shot flings the big beast across the room. It somersaults, caught right in the middle of a leap. One torn wing slaps a pillar and then the whole sack of meat goes down on the floor, thump, into a roll.
It doesn't get up.
Applejack takes her time picking her way through the wreckage. Faint after-images float superimposed under her eyelids and turn swirling dust into half-realized jump scares. She blinks them away and tries to calm her breathing even though she knows it’s pointless. The adrenaline still pumps in her veins, her whole body shivering. Maybe it's the cold.
The beast doesn't appear to be alive when she reaches it, but she stands well back just in case. She learned long ago that you don't leave anything dead on the floor without checking it first.
How many times did she shoot?
She never was much for math under pressure, so she just empties the revolver into the vampire's toothy face. This time she doesn’t miss. The first shot opens up the thing's head like a can of beans. The second shot just cleans some of the mess off the floor.
*click*
There, that makes six... and most of them misses. She reminds herself to work on her aim. Big Mac will certainly chide her about it when she gets home, and then he'll chide her over naming the gun after him. Or Granny Smith will, seeing as her new favorite pastime is haunting everypony in the house. Applejack can almost hear her crooning on the wind: "Ah'm the one who's day-yed! Ya shudda named tha gun after meeeee!"
Applejack cracks the revolver open, spits out the taste of metal and gunpowder. Smoke curls from the barrel and empty brass bounces off the floor. She takes her time reloading, one shell at a time, always with one eye on the monster at her hooves. The taste won't leave her mouth, but the smell of gunsmoke is slowly replaced by that of blood and busted bowels.
"We done here?" She snaps Big Macintosh shut again and balances it on her hoof.
The headless corpse spasms a little. Just the nerves finally playing out. Odds are it was playing possum when she finished it off. Probably just waiting to jump up and give her a good scare, maybe another scar or two. Fat chance of that now.
She smirks. “Alrighty then.”
Big Macintosh spins around her hoof and slides back into the holster. She takes satisfaction in the sound; leather whispers the shape of iron. The weight of it under her duster is comforting. Stops her shaking so much. She gives it a pat, then straightens out her hat and tugs the brim farewell toward the corpse on the floor. She turns to leave.
Applejack’s halfway turned around when the drop of blood blots on her sleeve. She glances down at the crisp redness of it, wonders for just an instant if it might be hers. How long was her guard down? Icy dread pools in her stomach. One hoof paws at Big Macintosh. Then, slowly, her eyes turn upward to the arched ceiling.
Dozens of red eyes and huge, hair-leather forms dangle in the darkness. Wings spreading to the ceiling. Blood slowly oozing from gaping maws to fall, glistening, to the floor. Pit, pat.
And at the center yawns a pale yellow monster, hooved, with a pony’s face and wild mane of pink from which tiny nesting faces stare. Their eyes match their mother’s, blood red, and fix all as one on Applejack.
Hisssssssssssssssss.
She frowns. "Oh, hay..."
Author's Note
So I actually wrote this over a year ago for a friend of mine (in Skype, no less). HAVE A LINK <<< proof, because I'm that kind of weirdo. And as you can see, it was... poorly written. Over time it was gradually polished to something EQD might publish, but I just never got around to trying my luck. I was quite hung up on the idea that this should be the beginning of a larger story. It works better as a oneshot. (minor edit: two paragraphs didn't get divorced when they were supposed to. Now they be.)
