Shadow Prophet

Twilight Sparkle ran about the castle, screaming. Things had been going completely insane all day, and she needed to let off some steam. All day ponies had been sending letters and requests for the strangest things. A few examples were how all the sugar in all the bakeries in town had been mysteriously replaced with salt, how all of the text in every book in town had all been mysteriously replaced with large, jumbled letters splattered about the page that all spelled out, "Now you see, boy," nonstop, through the whole thing, how all of the writing on young fillies' assignments at school had been flipped upside down, how clouds were running away from pegasi and storming on unsuspecting ponies whenever possible. The list just went on and on.

Twilight sat down at her large crystal chair (she never liked referring to it as a throne, though the word, "chair," certainly had less of an impact) designated by the symbol representing her cutie mark at the top of it. She began to contemplate the events that had passed recently and anything that may have caused them. The answer snapped almost instantly into her head. Shadow Prophet! He had said the Universe was collapsing. Of course that was crazy talk, but he might know something about what was really happening. So, without further ado, Twilight left for Equestrian Mental Health Facility.

"Yes, Princess, he's right in this room, just down the hall," said Doctor Brownhoof as he greeted Twilight Sparkle yet again to the asylum. He thought about not telling her about the patient's escape attempt, but then realized she would probably find out anyways.

"And, um, last night, he tried to, er, made an attempt to-" Brownhoof was cut off.

"Escape. Get out. Return to society," Shadow Prophet said from his room, his voice coming out between the grates in the door.

Twilight looked into Shadow's room and saw him sitting on the floor, looking at the ceiling. She turned around and looked at Doctor Brownhoof.

"Is this true?" She asked. Brownhoof nodded, not wanting to upset the Princess further.

Twilight looked back to the holding cell, and used her magic to open the door. Doctor Brownhoof would've objected, but decided against it. This was the most powerful unicorn in all of Equestria, and she was clearly very agitated.

Twilight trotted into the cell, and closed the door behind her.

"Alright then. Tell me what you know about what's going on," Twilight said calmly.

Shadow Prophet lazily moved his gaze over to Twilight with uninterest. "What? What's happenin' ?" Shadow spoke in a slow, slurred voice that made Twilight think of him as drunk.

"You know, chaos, impossibly odd things, impossibly creepy things! You know something about them, don't you?" Twilight accused.

"Pfffft!" Shadow exclaimed, throwing his head back a little. "I don't really... I don't know what you're talking about. I'm a craaaaaaaaazy pony," Shadow said, spinning his hoof in a circle next to his head. Then he stopped, and in his eyes Twilight saw what looked like he had come to the ultimate epiphany, and had discovered the answer to all of life's problems. "Oh, thaaaaaaat!" He said, pointing a hoof at Twilight. "Yeah, yeah, yesh, da whole galaxy exploding and such. Yeah, we're all gonna die."

Twilight became very serious. "What?! What do you mean? You think we'll die?! Aren't you a little upset about that?!"

"Boof, calm down, misses grumpy-wumpy," Shadow said, leaning away from her. "Whas so bad about dying?"

Twilight groaned and facehoofed. What had these doctors had him take?

"Why would dying be a good thing?" She asked.

"Why not?" Shadow replied. "I don't really care. So what if everything goes away? I don't much care for everything anyways." Shadow slowly picked himself up and dragged himself over to his small bed. He climbed into it and pulled up the covers, turning away from Twilight.

"What are you doing?!" Twilight demanded.

Shadow waved his hoof at her. "Go away, I wanna die without somepony screamin' in my ear."

Twilight gave up talking to him. She looked around his room and wondered if the confinement could have driven him loopy. Then she saw an eerily familiar shade of blue sitting in the shadow under the small bedside table. Twilight inched closer to it and was overwhelmed by a rotten, horrible smell. She recognized it instantly as the notorious Poison Joke. What was a dangerous flower like that doing here in Shadow's cell? Twilight didn't necessarily have the time to sit down and contemplate all of the questions this sparked, so she ran over to Shadow, and leaned in close on him. She sniffed. Yes, the scent of the flower was definitely on him.

She looked around frantically for a moment, then almost had a heart attack as the loudest thunderclap she had ever heard sounded directly above the facility. While Twilight screamed for just a second, Shadow seemed completely unfazed, and as the thunder faded, she could hear him snoring peacefully. She could also make out a lot of other sounds, which were a lot clearer than they should have been, through a thick steel door. It was screaming and lots of running, along with some laughing and crying. Twilight instinctively looked over to the door of the cell, but was caught off guard by there no longer being any door. It was gone. The only sign that a door had existed at all were some empty hinges screwed into the wall.

Twilight edged towards the door, but froze as a royal guard galloped past her in fright, paying almost no attention to her and looking behind him. A second later, he was followed by a white mare with a nightmarish gleam in her eyes who had gotten hold of a long silver knife. She was obviously some sort of patient, considering her white sheet-like gown she wore. It occurred to Twilight that Shadow's door might not have been the only one to randomly (and quite inconveniently) vanish. She knew that to get to whatever washroom this place had so she could get some hot water, she would have to make a run for it. And whatever happened would happen, may Celestial help her.

So, pushing all thoughts of what kinds of wackos were running amok, Twilight tensed her muscles, and shot forward.

In times of great stress, like, let's say, running through a building full of potentially dangerous and completely insane ponies, one's adrenal gland produces a rather helpful hormone known as, "adrenaline." This, "adrenaline," would be one way to explain why Twilight Sparkle screamed the entire way through and empty hallway. On the other hand, excuse me, hoof, Twilight later stated that it felt like there was something following her, and she knew it wasn't a pony. She felt it was trying to stop her, and that it knew exactly what she was doing. This can be easily debunked as simply a delusion caused by the stress of her situation, or, as previously stated, just a side effect of the large amount of adrenaline running through Twilight's blood at the time.

Twilight ran straight through the door labeled, "Washroom," and stopped as it closed behind her. Whatever that strange presence was, it was gone now. She spun three hundred and sixty degrees, looking for a sink or anything that pumped water. She saw an opening that led into the showers, and galloped in. It was humid, even though the showers looked like they hadn't been used in quite a while. She ran to the nearest shower head and turned the red-colored knob to the left. Instead of hot water, Twilight heard a low grumbling sound from within the wall. She pressed the side of her head to the wall, listening closely. She heard something. Something... coming closer.

Twilight's eyes widened as she heard a deep growling voice yell, at a volume that rose alarmingly fast: "BOOOOOOYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!" Then, when Twilight expected some evil monster to reach out and grab her, a tile she had her head against blew out of the wall, knocking her over on her back with an, "Oompf!" The Princess looked moved her head up in time to have her face splashed with high-pressure freezing cold water. It billowed out of the hole like a waterfall, and was soon followed by the other shower heads in the room. Twilight scraped at the wetted tile floor until she was out of the immediate danger the waterfall from the hole posed. She turned over and coughed up water for a minute, then stood up. Her eyes were only half-open, there was chlorine in the water, and it had seriously irritated her eyes. She noticed the sound of the water had stopped, and the room was very cold.

Twilight Sparkle blinked some water out of her eyes, and looked around. Her vision was a bit blurry, but she could still make out what had happened. All the water, already on the floor or still falling, was frozen solid. It was a strange and yet beautiful sight. Her hooves were even stuck in a puddle that had frozen in a nothingth of a second. Her hair was also partially crystallized and stiff from frozen drops of water. Every breath was a small puff of steam. Water still pouring out of the shower heads had frozen in long icicles, splashes of water had frozen mid-splash, all of it was very, very confusing to Twilight.

What if, Twilight found herself thinking, he's right? She shook her head, denying her own thoughts. There was some sort of logical explanation for all this, there had to be. So, with a conflicted mind, Twilight pulled her hooves out of the thin ice and magically melted the rest of the ice, moving through the steaming hole she left. She headed onward, through another passage that was at the end of the showers when she trotted in.

She was relieved to see a simple sink, and a bucket near it that was collecting water from a drip in the ceiling. She used her magic to lift the bucket and absentmindedly dumped it out and moved it next to her as she slowly and carefully reached out with a trembling hoof to pull the red-labeled lever. She rested her hoof on it, and jerked quickly, recoiling instantly, expecting another waterfall. She breathed a sigh as steaming water billowed out of the faucet. Twilight filled her bucket up and turned off the faucet. She galloped through the already-melting frozen showers, out the door, into the chaos, and back to where she came from.

Finally back in Shadow's room, Twilight saw Shadow looking out of his barred window, smiling as though the greatest show on Earth was playing outside. She felt a twinge of annoyment at this somehow even-odder personality Shadow currently possessed, and supposed that was the irony. He was perhaps the strangest pony she had ever met, yet now he was stranger than that. Twilight hesitated for just a moment, then splashed the steaming water on Shadow.

Please work,please work, please work, Twilight thought. Shadow Prophet didn't react. He didn't care. Twilight's tense muscles were about to relax in the acceptance of defeat, when Shadow suddenly jumped in the air. "YEEEEOOOOOWWWW!!!" He yelled aloud, falling onto his thin bed and slapping himself all over. "Hot! Hot! Hot! Verrrrrryyyy hot!" He half-screamed, half-mumbled.

He caught sight of Twilight and stopped instantly. He looked at her with disapproving eyes. He didn't say anything, but his look got it all across. Once he felt the message had been received, he jumped up and looked out his barred window once again. Instead of smiling, though, he said, "Oh, sweet Celestia's shit!" He then looked at Twilight with a now panicked look. "Twilight!" He yelled unnecessarily.

"Yes?" Twilight replied.

"The rip! It's grown! Half of Ponyville is gone!" He jumped down from the bed and was about to rush past Twilight when he stopped just short of the doorless doorway.

"What is it?" Twilight asked. She turned around, and saw Applebloom, Sweetie Belle, and Scootalloo, standing next to each other, smiling evil smiles, and giggling evil giggles.

Twilight was about to ask what the girls were doing here, but Shadow spoke first. "Oh no. Remnants."