Shadow Prophet

"Hey, Raven, wake up!" Shadow begged, shaking the sleeping mare in her bed.

"Leemeelone..." she muttered, turning away from him.

"No! We've gotta get outta here soon! The cleaning lady could come along and report us for not paying for the room!" Shadow retorted.

"Ugh..." Raven moaned, knowing this was true and that she would have to get out of bed. Moving like an inchworm, she slithered to the edge of the bed, and promptly fell off the end of it. "AGH!" She yelped as she hit the floor, and Shadow couldn't contain his laugh.

Now fully awake, Raven jumped up, and her face turned red as she yelled at Shadow to shut up. He did, but still a few giggles slipped through and he had a big smile on his face.

Raven went over to the coffee machine, which was half-full; Shadow had made coffee an hour before (Raven knew this because the smell had brought her to a half-conscious state, but she had decided to go back to sleep). While she poured herself a cup of the caffeine-rich drink, Shadow went into the bathroom and grabbed the two towels hanging from a pole above the toilet and brought them out, slinging one over his shoulder and tossing the other over Raven's face. She pulled it off and asked Shadow, "What's this for?"

He replied, "Hey, we're going on an inter-dimensional journey. If you're gonna be jumping around the multiverse, you gotta know where your towel is."

Raven was surprised for a moment. "Where'd you hear that?"

Shadow looked back her, also surprised. "What, you've never heard of The Ponyhiker's Guide to the Galaxy? It's a good book, with some good advice."

"You mean you've never seen the movie?" Raven asked.

"What's a movie?" Shadow replied.

"Never mind." She dismissed. She had almost forgotten that there was no electricity where Shadow came from.

"Well, drink up, then we gotta get going. Oh, and considering the circumstances, I think it'd be best to drink it pure and black, for the full effect." Shadow said to her as he went around making the room look like they hadn't been there.

"What?! No! Coffee's disgusting without creamer," Raven argued.

"Alright, but don't fall asleep on the job." Shadow replied.

"Yeah, because it'll be so boring jumping from world to world that I would fall asleep." Raven remarked sarcastically.

She poured herself a cup of coffee and added creamer and sugar, then sipped it slowly. She took a deep breath as the coffee's warmth spread all over her. This was just what she needed right now.

Shadow was much less relaxed. He started towards the door, stooped, started towards Raven, stopped, started towards, the door again,then stopped, and said to Raven, "I'm gonna go see if we can use the elevator."

"Okay, just don't die of stress while you're out there," She replied.

Shadow smiled for just a second, then went out the door, propping it open with a phone book. Outside the room, he felt exposed, like the police might jump out at any second from around the corner and tell him to freeze, which he would do regardless.

He went down the carpeted hall and turned at the middle to what was more of an indentation than another hall. Along all three sides of this indentation were two elevators each.

Shadow went to one at random and pushed the button that would call the elevator for a downward trip. Instead, the button above it, which pointed upward, lit up. Confused, Shadow looked up at the digital display, which read "1". As the number changed to "2", the elevator passed the closed doors, and from the edges and the middle came a bright white light, flooding through every crack, then it went up, and was gone with the elevator.

"What the..." Shadow pushed the down button again, but the up button stayed lit up. The numbers on the display began to rise faster and faster. "3", "4", "5", "7", "9", "12", speeding up too fast for the counter to keep track. The elevator doors began to shake violently, and there was a noticeable whirring sound from within the shaft that rose and rose in pitch as the elevator went faster and faster. Shadow stepped back in awe as the counter passed the number 50, knowing that the hotel had only 20 floors.

The counter stopped counting numbers after it reached 99, and began to read "∞". Suddenly, the whirring and the shaking stopped, and the display changed once again to, "GOD". It stayed there, saying only that, doing nothing else. Shadow was confused and scared. With a million thoughts running through his head, he galloped back to the hotel room, bursting inside and grabbing Raven Wing's hoof. In surprise, she dropped her coffee cup, and the drink spilled all over the tabletop.

"Hey!" Raven yelled. "What do you think you're doing?!" Shadow frantically shushed her, and the serious look on his face made quieted her immediately. He let her go and waved for her to follow him. She did, following hm out of the room. There, he stopped and went to kick the phone book out of the door, locking it shut behind them. He led Raven down the hall to the elevators. As soon as they came into eye contact with the elevator Shadow had tried to access, the doors opened, revealing a steamy inside.

"What the hell is this?" Raven asked.

Shadow shrugged and pointed at the floor number display. Seeing that it read, "GOD", Raven's eyes widened. "This is like some weird creepypasta."

"Yeah, whatever. We should go in." Shadow said.

"What? No, we don't do that. We can do a lot of things here, but that isn't one of them." Raven replied. Shadow looked her in the eyes.

"Do you trust me?" He asked.

"W-what?" Raven replied. "What do you mean?"

"I know I haven't shown it much, but I can be a leader. I can shine a flashlight through the immense darkness in those other worlds. I know things. But for this all to work, I need you to trust me."

Raven looked at the elevator, then at Shadow's serious expression. Finally, she said, "Yeah. I mean, yes, I trust you."

"Good. Then we're going in there." Shadow began towards the open elevator doors. Raven Wing, however, stayed put. Shadow turned around, went to her, and looked at her for a moment. Then he took her hoof into his, and led her to the elevator. She went next to him, and realizing what she was doing, the intimacy of it, her cheeks turned red. Once inside the elevator, though, Shadow slipped his hoof away from hers.

The moment, they were both inside and standing still, the doors closed. The elevator didn't even move before the two were whisked away. The Universe flying past you like leaves in the wind, except you're the leaf. Then they weren't in the Universe anymore. Then they were nowhere. Then they were somewhere, but within nowhere, a place somewhere has no business being.

Shadow Prophet and Raven Wing found themselves sitting in gray plastic chairs in the waiting room of an office building. In front of them was a boxed room with windows, in which sat a white mare with brunette hair wearing purple glasses and filing some paperwork.

As they became aware of their surroundings, they both got out of their seats and trotted uneasily to the desk. The mare did not notice them.

Shadow cleared his throat. The mare stopped writing, then looked at the two ponies. She squinted through the glasses at them, then looked back to her paperwork. Shadow was about to clear his throat again, when the mare said with a very high level of not-caring and boredom, "Please return to your seats, your Agent will be right with you, courtesy of the G.O.D."

The last part made Shadow raise an eyebrow. "What? The G.O.D.?" The mare ignored him. Shadow sighed and returned to his seat. Raven was about to ask the mare another question, but decided against it. She didn't look like the type that had much patience. Raven also returned to her seat. They sat for a minute or two, not speaking, not moving.

Then, from behind a door that had a paint job so similar to the wall that they had not previously notice it, there came the sound of running. The running's volume increased until out burst a tired-looking brown stallion in a business suit. He trotted up to the mare after catching his breath and said, "Maurice, what did I tell you about being rude to the clientele?"

"Meta, go complain to Jehovah about it if it annoys you so much." She retorted in the same monotonous and boring voice.

"What? No! Of course not! How could I approach... Him?" He panicked for a moment, but caught himself. Calmly, he trotted over to the two extremely confused ponies.

"Hello, confused equines! My name is Meta Phoreal, I will your agent today. Please follow me," the stallion requested. They did, feeling completely numb.