Sea Swirl’s face hit the floor before she realized what was happening. She let out a yelp, more from surprise than pain, and lay there for a few seconds. Eventually, she put her front hooves on the ground and slowly pushed herself up.
“Ugh…what happened?” she asked as she rubbed her nose. She pulled her hoof away and looked at it. No blood, despite face planting pretty hard. Well, that was a good thing at least.
The Unicorn blinked and looked around. “Symphony?” she called into the dimly lit room. “Hello? Is anypony there?”
Only the darkness answered her.
Where had everypony gone? One moment she had been sitting in a nice little teashop with several other ponies, listening to Symphony play her violin, and then she had been falling, falling…until she had ended up smacking her face on the floor.
“Where am I?” she asked as she looked around. As soon as the words left her mouth, lights flashed on overhead, flooding the room with illumination. Her raspberry eyes shrank away for a moment, and then adjusted.
“Whoa…what the…?” a familiar voice filled the air as the lights came on. A second later, the voice was drowned out by a low rumble followed by a crash that made Sea Swirl jump.
“Sea Swirl?” the same voice asked as the Unicorn landed.
“Pinny Lane?” Sea Swirl replied. Sure enough, the bowling pony was standing at the front of a lane, her sky blue hair pulled back it its usual ponytail, wearing her favorite bowling shirt.
“Hey Sea Swirl!” the Unicorn said as her blue eyes lit up. “I didn’t realize you were coming to bowl. Care for a competition?”
“I…” Sea Swirl looked down and found that she was wearing her own pink and yellow bowling shirt. She shrugged. “Okay, you’re on!” With that, she walked over to the bowling lane, summoned her ball, and made ready.
“Magic or no?” Pinny Lane asked with a grin.
“No magic, of course,” Sea Swirl said as she put her ball on the wooden floor. Then, she flung it down the alley and sent it crashing into the white pins at the end. Strike. “I can actually beat you this way.”
“We’ll see about that,” Pinny Lane said as she sent a ball down the same lane. It slammed into the pins and sent them spinning, giving her a strike as well.
“I didn’t know you were back in town,” Pinny Lane said as her ball came back to her. “Taking some time off from the job in Canterlot?”
Sea Swirl readied her ball again. “Yep. Although…” She rolled her ball down the lane again, and smiled as she got another strike. “I…don’t remember the trip back here.”
“Well.” Pinny Lane went next. Strike for her as well. “Maybe you just fell asleep on the train.”
“Maybe…” Something about that sentence didn’t make sense to Sea Swirl. It was in the back of her mind, chewing at her brain, but she couldn’t place her hoof on it.
Sea Swirl shook the odd feeling from her mind and sent her ball down the lane again. It was halfway to the pins when it suddenly made a ninety-degree turn and rolled into the gutter.
“Oh, tough luck,” Pinny Lane said. She rolled her ball next and it went nearly all the way to the pins before it floated up into the air and then popped like a bubble. “Nuts. I hate it when that happens.”
“Yeah, me too,” Sea Swirl said with a smile. She grabbed her ball and made ready to bowl again, but then something changed. She wasn’t sure what it was, but it felt like somepony had swept a duster through her head and pulled out a mass of cobwebs. She shook her head and looked up to where the ball had popped. She opened her mouth to speak.
“That…doesn’t usually happen, does it?” Pinny Lane said before Sea Swirl could voice her concerns.
“No, it doesn’t.” Sea Swirl blinked, looked around, and then studied the ball resting beneath her hoof. She pressed down on it and suddenly it popped like a soap bubble. “What in Equestria…?”
“Ponies!” a voice boomed through the air and Sea Swirl recognized it. Without a word, she trotted over to the exit and walked out of the bowling alley.
Ponyville looked the same, but the sky was a strange shade of purple and a strange fog seemed to blanket the area. All of that would have been strange, but Sea Swirl had a feeling that it was all about to make sense. She looked around town until…
Sure enough, Sea Swirl spotted Princess Luna floating in the middle of town. She was encased in a bubble and dozens of white light strands were flowing from her horn.
So that was it. This was a dream.
“Princess Luna,” Sea Swirl said in unison with many other ponies as they all walked up to her and bowed. Sea Swirl notice that the Princess looked to be in a bit of pain. She wasn’t surprised by that, considering the fact that she appeared to be using a lot of magic.
“There is no time for bowing, my friends!” Princess Luna said in a strained voice. “There is something coming. Something terrible. No…it is already here!”
Sea Swirl looked up to the sky and panic rose in her stomach. It looked liked a section of the soft purple sky had been ripped away. In its place, there was a blot of dark sky filled with cold stars. It pulsed around its edges and moved through the sky like a blob. As Sea Swirl stared at it, she felt like it could engulf her in a second, drowning her in darkness so complete that she would never see the light of day again.
A terrified scream escaped her mouth and joined the screams of other ponies.
“I am so sorry!” Princess Luna pleaded. “I brought this upon you! But I will end it now!” Princess Luna fired a beam of light from her horn and it slammed into the liquid darkness. The beam drove the thing back, and a howl of agony escaped from it, but just as Sea Swirl began to feel relieved, Princess Luna’s attack ceased.
For a split second, Sea Swirl and the other ponies stood perfectly still, staring at the patch of darkness. Then it lunged forward, and panic took over.
Sea Swirl screamed and ran as the ponies around her began to panic. Inside. She had to get inside. She peeled away from the crowd and made a mad dash for the bowling alley. She dove through the door and then yanked it closed with her magic. She turned the lock and then spun on her hooves so that she was facing the door.
“What the hay is going on?” Pinny Lane asked and Sea Swirl jumped when the cream colored Unicorn placed her hoof on Sea Swirl’s hip.
“There’s…there’s something out there!” Sea Swirl panted as she glared at the door.
“What?” Pinny Lane asked, and Sea Swirl could hear the panic building in her voice.
It’s okay. It didn’t see me come in here. We’ll be fine. We’ll be—
Ice seemed to fill Sea Swirl’s veins as the darkness began to seep in around the edges of the door. She began to back up as it filled the room, until she bumped into a wall.
“What is that thing?” Pinny Lane asked as she huddled next to Sea Swirl.
“I have no idea!”
The Unicorns huddled together and watched as the darkness seeped into the bowling alley. For a horrible moment, Sea Swirl worried that it would just surround and consume them, but it didn’t. Instead, it shot down to the far end of a lane, and a long tendril of darkness stretched out and touched one of bowling pins. The darkness then shot across all the lanes, sending tendrils out to touch pins on each one, and then it smashed through a wall and disappeared.
Slowly, Sea Swirl and Pinny Lane let go of each other. Trembling, they walked over to the hole in the wall and looked outside to see Ponyville in chaos.
“Is…is it gone?” Pinny Lane asked. As soon as the question left her mouth, both ponies shrieked and darted back inside as the darkness swept across the sky, chasing several ponies through the streets.
“At least it’s leaving us alone,” Sea Swirl whispered as she sat against the wall. Maybe if they were really quiet, it wouldn’t come back.
“Um, Sea Swirl?” Pinny Lane said as she tapped the lavender pony’s shoulder. “Do the pins usually hang from the ceiling like that?”
“What?” Sea Swirl looked down the nearest lane and her heart nearly jumped into her throat. Half the pins on the lane were now hanging upside down. She watched as their round tops sharpened into points, and the red stripes ran down their bodies, until they looked like they were covered in blood. The same began to happen to the remaining pins on the floor, and when they finished transforming, the entire area began to twist and turn, like a dragon waking up from a long nap.
The razor-sharp pins slammed together and then the edge of the lane turned up, and Sea Swirl realized that she was looking at a literal mouth. Two red eyes appeared above the top of the pins and instantly turned toward the two Unicorns. The process repeated on each of the lanes and then, in unison, all of the mouths started laughing.
Sea Swirl wanted to bury her head in the ground to escape the horrible sound, but she didn’t even have time to cover her ears. The long wooden boards on the lanes suddenly ripped themselves free from the floor. They twisted and turned in the air, like a dozen tongues coming out of each mouth, and then one from the nearest alley shot toward the two Unicorns. Sea Swirl jumped aside, but the wooden tentacle caught Pinny Lane around the ankle. It slowly began to drag her across the floor and toward the mouth.
“Sea Swirl!” Pinny Lane screeched as she tried desperately to dig her hooves into the floor, but it did little good. The mouth continued to pull her in.
“Hold on!” Sea Swirl sprang to her hooves and ran toward Pinny Lane. One of the tentacles from another alley took a swipe at her, but she jumped over it. She land in front of Pinny Lane and hooked her front hoof around the Unicorn’s, but before Sea Swirl even had a chance to start pulling, two tentacles slammed into her chest and sent her flying.
Sea Swirl slammed into something metal and then slouched against the wall. Her head was ringing, and as she opened her eyes, she noticed that her vision was blurry. That wasn’t good.
“HELP!”
The sound of Pinny Lane’s terrified voice banished all the dizziness and pain from Sea Swirl. Her vision came into focus immediately, and what she saw threatened to paralyze her.
The mouths were fighting over Pinny Lane. Whenever one of them seemed to get her close enough to eat, a wooden tentacle from another mouth would shoot over and pull her away. She was fighting back as best she could, kicking at the possessed wood and using her magic to defend herself, but she was like Sea Swirl when it came to offensive magic; neither were exactly brilliant fighters.
“What do I do?” Sea Swirl asked as she stared at the scene. Even if she rushed in again and combined her magic with Pinny Lane’s, she doubted that they would be strong enough to—
Something dropped onto Sea Swirl’s head. She blinked and looked up just in time for it to drop onto her face.
She had crashed into a drinking fountain, and the impact had knocked it loose enough for it to start dripping on her.
An idea sprang into Sea Swirl’s mind instantly. She wasn’t good with offensive magic, that was true. But she had yet to meet another pony who was as in tune with water as she was.
Sea Swirl stood up and wrapped the drinking fountain in her magic. She took a deep breath and then pulled as hard as she could. To her surprise, the metal contraption flew off of the wall like it was made of paper. She flung it aside and smiled as the burst water pipe began to spill water all over the floor.
“Hey you!” Sea Swirl shouted as she stood in the pool of quickly growing water. “Put my bowling buddy down.”
All the lanes looked at her at once, and for a moment they seemed to forget about Pinny Lane. But the moment didn’t last very long. Their wooden tentacles immediately went back to fighting over the Unicorn.
“I said,” Sea Swirl concentrated on the water pooling around her hooves and slowly made it rise around her and then forced it into a hoop above her “let her go!”
Sea Swirl used her magic to send three jets of water flying toward the wooden planks tugging at her friend. She focused her magic on their tips and froze the water into sharp points and sunk them into the wooden extensions.
The lanes let out a horrible scream and the wooden tentacles immediately retreated from Pinny Lane. The bowling pony fell to the floor and quickly made a mad dash for Sea Swirl.
“Hurry!” Sea Swirl called. Two tentacles shot out toward Pinny Lane, but Sea Swirl sent more water flying toward them. She batted them away just before they managed to grab the pony, but Sea Swirl didn’t let up. She continued to fire more and more water jets toward the wooden beams, beating them back until the mouths were reeling in pain.
One of the wooden boards shot straight toward Sea Swirl, faster than any of the others. She raised her hoof out of reflex, and as she did the water around her reacted. It flowed up in front of her and blocked the wooden plank. Without thinking, Sea Swirl froze the wall of water and then brought another jet down on the board, freezing it just before it hit. It cut through the wood with ease and the lane let out a howl of pain so fierce that the entire building shook.
“Ha!” Sea Swirl said, both in triumph and relief. She turned and smiled widely at Pinny Lane as she ran up. “Did you see that? I’m awesome!”
“Time to go!” Pinny Lane said as she grabbed Sea Swirl’s hoof and made a dash for the exit. The water Sea Swirl had been controlling instantly lost its form and splashed back on the ground as she was pulled away.
Both ponies reached the exit and dashed outside, although the sight that greeted them didn’t feel all that more friendly. Entire buildings had apparently come to life and were attempting to eat ponies. A massive white tear was in the purple sky, and the midnight blue smoke thing had grown in size considerably.
“What in Equestria is going on?” Pinny Lane asked as the two of them stopped just outside of the bowling alley.
“I have no…” Sea Swirl trailed off as the ground beneath her hooves began to shake. Slowly, she and Pinny Lane turned around and their mouths fell open.
The bowling alley was coming to life. It rose out of the ground and its doors shattered. The two giant pins out front sharpened into fangs while the two oversized purple bowling balls rose up on two long ropes. The sign across its top warped and twisted until it formed a face, with bowling balls for eyes and pins for eyebrows. The face turned into a frown as the building looked down at the two ponies.
“Uh…” Sea Swirl said as she slowly backed up. She watched in horror as the monster raised one of its massive bowling ball arms and brought the ball crashing down on a nearby streetlamp, crushing it in one blow.
“Really time to go!” Pinny Lane said and she took off without a second look. The building didn’t even seem to notice. It kept its eyes focused squarely on Sea Swirl.
“Heh heh,” Sea Swirl laughed as she continued to slowly move away. “I, uh, guess you’re a little sore about—whoa!” The building brought one of the massive balls down and she dove out of the way. Her teeth smacked together as the impact rocked the ground, but she didn’t have time to worry about it. She needed to get away, and fast.
Sea Swirl took off running as fast as she could. She could hear the building stomping after her, and with each step it seemed to gain ground. Panic gripped her mind as she darted through the streets of Ponyville. She couldn’t think of where to go, or what to do, or anything besides running, but she knew she couldn’t run forever. Her legs were already starting to burn and she was still exhausted from using her magic to manipulate the water so much.
The ground shook again and she nearly lost her balance. She risked a look back and grimaced. It looked like the building would catch her longer before she tired out.
“Big Mac!” a voice called through the nightmare. Sea Swirl only heard it because she recognized it as Applejack’s. She looked around briefly, hoping maybe the Earth pony was about to come to her rescue, but she saw no sign of her. “You can do anything in a dream, remember?”
Once again, Sea Swirl felt like somepony had run a duster through her head and swept away all the cobwebs. That was right. This was all a dream. Granted, it was actually a nightmare, but it was still in her head. Sort of. And that meant that Applejack was right.
She could do anything in a dream!
An idea began to form in Sea Swirl’s head as she ran through the streets. She looked around the small town, trying to get her bearings. There was town hall, and there was Sugarcube Corner, which meant that what she was looking for was just ahead.
There! She Swirl’s heart beat a little faster when she spied what she was looking for. Without a second thought, she charged forward, the bowling alley right behind her. The stone circle ahead of her drew closer with every step, but it seemed to be taking forever. She looked back over her shoulder and saw the monster building raising one of its massive bowling balls. She looked ahead again. Just a little further now.
The massive bowling ball began to fall.
Sea Swirl put every ounce of her strength into her legs and jumped.
The bowling ball began to crush the little covering over the stone circle.
Sea Swirl slipped between the bowling ball the lip of the stone circle just before she was smashed. She plunged into darkness for a few seconds, and then she felt the comforting feeling of splashing into water. She had made it.
She was in the town’s well.
Sea Swirl floated in the water for a moment, letting it surround her and soak her fur. Then the first stone fell into her pool and her focus came. She stretched her hooves up and sent the ground water rocking up the well, catching the rest of the falling rubble and shooting it out of the hole like a cannon.
The building stumbled backward as the force of the water and rubble slammed into its bowling ball limb, clearing the way, and then Sea Swirl rose with the rest of the water.
“You’re in trouble now,” she said, her voice echoing through the water. She had meant to simply ride the water, but she was in it now. She was a part of it. She felt it flowing through her, but she didn’t worry about drowning. She drew oxygen directly for the liquid, filling her lungs just as much as the water filled the rest of her. She was one with the water, and she knew it would obey her commands.
The building’s makeshift eyes seemed to widen in surprise, but then quickly turned back into a scowl. It roared at her and then brought one of its balls around to attack.
Sea Swirl raised her right hoof above her head and the water reacted the same way, bringing a wall of liquid up to block the incoming attack.
The bowling ball slammed into the wall of water and while it didn’t hurt Sea Swirl, she still felt the impact flow through her. She punched with her left hoof, and a geyser of water erupted from the liquid surrounding her. It slammed full force into the building and it staggered backward. It began to pull its limb back, but Sea Swirl wouldn’t allow it. She inhaled through her nose and then blew the breath out the same way, focusing on her right hoof and the water that she had used to block the attack.
Cold. Colder, she thought as the breath left her nose and formed bubbles around her head. Freeze!
Before the massive bowling ball escaped, the water that it had crashed into froze into a massive pillar of ice. It incased the entire ball and part of the limb, much to the building’s horror. It roared as it tried to free itself, pulling against the ice with all its might.
Sea Swirl both saw and felt the ice begin to break, and she knew it wouldn’t hold for long. She flipped forward in the water and kicked one of her hind legs out as she did. She completed the flip and brought her leg down in a striking motion. A moment later, water above her struck down like a whip. It struck right at the edge of the frozen limb, severing it with one blow.
The building howled in pain and staggered backward, its severed limb flailing in the air in a vain attempt to keep its balance. Sea Swirl pressed the attack, punching forward in the water, and sent a large chunk of the frozen pillar crashing into the building. It fell backward, but immediately began to get up.
Sea Swirl struck again, sending another massive chunk of ice crashing into the building. She screamed as she punched and kicked in the water, commanding it to pummel the building again and again. When the ice pillar was gone, she continued to attack with the water around her. She sent jets, streams, whips, and torrents of water crashing into the building, slowly pushing it into the ground.
Finally, her fury reached its boiling point. The thousands of gallons that had surrounded her before had been reduced to perhaps a hundred, and her body was beginning to feel more drained than it had ever felt before. She summoned the last of her strength and dove toward the building like she was diving into a lake. She put her hooves straight back to increase her speed, and thus the water’s as well. She heaved in one finally breath as the building drew closer.
Sea Swirl’s eyes met the building’s for a half second. She roared, and then she and the water plowed headlong into it.
The only way Sea Swirl could describe the noise was like hearing fireworks going off inside her head. The building’s wood twisted and warped around her for a brief heartbeat, and then it started to creak and crack as the pressure built, until finally is all began to snap and break apart. The boards snapped around her, the sounds echoing through the water as it left her. There was a final howl, whether from the water’s furious impact or from the bowling alley dying, Sea Swirl couldn’t tell, and then everything went still and dark.
Sea Swirl opened her eyes and found herself standing on the ruins of the building. She looked down at the smashed remains of one of her favorite hangouts and felt a small twinge of guilt, but that was quickly replaced with a feeling of utter exhaustion. Even though part of her brain knew that this was all just a dream, it still felt like she had used all of her magic for the next two weeks.
“Sea Swirl!” Sea Swirl slowly turned her head, her body stubbornly refusing to make the effort, and saw Pinny Lane staring at her from the street. The Unicorn tried to raise her hoof to wave, but she couldn’t manage it. She took a step forward, but her legs gave out instantly. She tumbled down from the ruins and came to rest face down in the street.
“Ouch…”
“Sea Swirl, that was amazing!” Pinny Lane said as she bent down and slowly helped the lavender Unicorn to her hooves. “Dream or no, I’ve never seen anypony do something like that.”
“Heh. Thanks.” Sea Swirl tried to stand on her own, but her legs refused so she leaned heavily on Pinny Lane. “I had no idea you could get exhausted in a dream.”
“Well, I hate to be pushy, but…” Pinny Lane raised her hoof and pointed to the sky. “Do you think you could do that again?”
Sea Swirl’s mouth fell open. The strange patch of darkness had grown in size and taken on the form of a pony. It now towered over every building in Ponyville, and it was slowlying walking into what Sea Swirl could only call a rip in the sky. And somehow, she just knew that if the thing made it through that giant tear, things were going to get really bad.
“What do we do?” Pinny Lane asked. The creature was already more than halfway through the giant tear.
“I…I have no idea,” Sea Swirl said. Her heart sank as more and more of the being disappeared into the tear, but then, just before it completely vanished, it pulled out and looked around.
“What the?” Pinny Lane said.
The giant creature began to rapidly shrink until it vanished among the remaining buildings in Ponyville.
Sea Swirl made a face. “What the hay just happened?”
Pinny Lane opened her mouth to speak, but before she could a flash of white light engulfed both of the Unicorns.
* * *
Sea Swirl’s raspberry eyes snapped open and she gasped. She instantly sat up and looked around, her heart beating so hard that it felt like it was cracking her ribs. It took her a moment to recognize her surroundings.
The Unicorn was back in her bedroom. She rolled over to see if a yellow mare had somehow ended up sleeping next to her, but she was the only one in the bed. As her head cleared, she realized how impossible such a thing would have been. Sea Swirl was back in home in Ponyville after all, not Canterlot.
The Unicorn yawned and rubbed her eyes. She looked out her window at the rising sun and cocked her head to the side. “What a weird dream.”
Author's Note
Once again, Sea Swirl is seen in an episode, but she doesn't get to do anything and she quickly vanishes. So once again, it's time to come up with a story about what she was doing while the rest of the town was busy dealing with the main problem. One day, Sea Swirl, you will get your chance, I'm sure. One day.
Anyway, hope you enjoyed reading it. Those of you who've read some of my other stories with Sea Swirl should pick up on a few things at the beginning and at the end.
