Shards of glassby Lief_NiellChaptersWakeExploreRougesHattensSpiritFarmWakeMy eyes slowly opened, only to blink a few times, unaccustomed to the new found light. As my vision slowly returned to me I looked around, taking in my newfound surroundings. It seemed to be a house of some sort, a pretty run down home at that. The house was just barely overrun with weeds and thorns, broken windows scattered the floor underneath, and cracks of light shot down from the holes in the roof. Everything was broken. But what my eyes were drawn to, was a large mirror in the very center of the room so gargantuan that it reached almost twenty feet in height, and almost just as wide. It too was shattered, but everything else bent around it, as if avoiding its presence. The vines twisted almost making a circle around the mirror, not a single leaf entered within it's borders, and a dome of light, forming from a perfect circle in the roof shined down on it. It seemed to envelop the room, wrapping around my surroundings like a black hole. I started to walk towards it, almost like it was pulling me in, taking control of my will. As I neared the edge of the barrier, I noticed I had a small piece of glass in my hoof. I walked across the circle of vines, and the piece of glass started to quiver, about five feet away the piece of glass flew from my hand, flew to the mirror and almost merged with it. I stopped for a second, wondering what happened, before continuing on to the mirror. I reached out to the mirror with my hoof, slowly nearing the surface, and my hoof started to quiver, I touched the surface, and it was like it wasn't there! No, it was like I wasn't there, as if it was more real than everything else, the only thing truly there. It was this real thing, that started to bellow out a thick, white mist that quickly surrounded the broken down house in its eeriness. I backed away with urgency, my mind speeding miles to think of something, anything to do. An appendage with five smaller stumps branching out from on larger one emerged from within the glassy plane, all of them pale and withered, reached out through the mirror, it grasped at the edges, looking for a hold on this world. It finally reach the end of the mirror, and it's hand wrapped around the edge. Vines showed through it's hand as it clenched the edge, and a giant leg started to burst through the smoke. Following it was the rest of the creature's body. It was devoid of all color, only appearing in different shades of gray. Thick, silken robes wrapped around the creatures body, covering each of it's appendages except for the very ends. It's head was very unusual, with a small nose and eyes, and a large mouth and ears. Looking closer, I saw that the thing's 'eyes' were nothing more than the sockets with only small beads of light filling the hole, giving the impression of pupils. Whatever was on it's forehead was covered up by a ghostly, translucent crown, arcing above his head. His robes were embedded with jewel like structures, and on each of his small appendages were rings of different shades. There was only one thought, one question, in my head once this creature and I met eye to eye: Is this Death? It's empty mouth freaked open, and a deep voice rang through the entire space. "At last, you summon me, young master." Then, its eye sockets focused toward me, and it... stopped. The mist completely dissipated as we started at each other for what seemed to be the longest moments of my life. "Oh dear, tell me young one, can you tell me who you are?" I opened my mouth to speak, but it quickly hit me like a brick wall, I couldn't remember my own name. I couldn't remember who I was at all. My eyes widened in shock as I opened and closed my mouth, unsure of what to say. His noticed this, and his pupils seemed to widen. He turned back to the mirror, seeing that it was shattered. "I feared as much, looks like even her descendants are not immune to this curse." he turned back towards me and motioned what seemed to be a sign to follow him. "Come, young one, there is much we have to talk about." He said as he began to walk away, myself cautiously following suit. __________________________________________ The ghostly figure led me throughout the building, with crisscrossing long pathways with rooms appearing in random locations. It was as if the architect of this place intended to create a giant labyrinth instead of a house. "Your mother was a talented magician, working alongside Star Swirl the bearded and Mellobrook in research to further ponykind's civilization. She specialized in memory magic and contacting other dimensional creatures, such as myself." What looked like a smile played at his lips, as if he cherished the thought. "But of course, this path had risks. As a safeguard, in case something ever happened to her memory, she created that mirror that you saw before, and I was to guard it in case anything happened. Of course, I was visited her frequently, she was rather clumsy and lost her memory often, but after try after try, we finally achieved what we had been researching for almost a century: immortality." He explained as I looked at him with shock and wonder. They actually made a spell to make one immortal? "If she was cut down, her body would reform here, no matter what you did to her, she would always come back. Unfortunately, the experiment was not without it's side effects, her already weakened memory was forever damaged, and she would have trouble recalling spells, potions, or even her own name. I was charged to always be by her side as she grew more and more child like, reverting to her younger form as she lost more and more. But..." His voice began wavering, as if what he was recalling hurt him like being stabbed a knife. "When the blast came, right before it hit her she launched me into the mirror and as she reverted to her adult, true form... she gave me one last charge: to protect whoever freed me from the mirror. As the blast hit her... it was the last thing I saw... she didn't die, but her eyes dimmed. I had seen the effect all to often, it was what happened when she lost her memory. Then it hit the glass... and the mirror was shattered into pieces. My only way back into this world was lost. My last thoughts were trying to hold on to my own memories, as the blast ripped them into shreds, all I could hold onto was those facts. Whoever did this, I don't think it just affected me and her, the blast broke the mirror, which relied on the memories of all those she knew... I think that blast effected the entire world." We had stopped walking, and I began contemplating what he said. I didn't know what to make of it, but it seemed like he was telling the truth. I didn't even know who or what he was, but if he knew my mother, he could be trusted right? "Why are you telling me this?" I asked him, and he turned to me. His lifeless sockets looking straight into my own eyes. "Because, young one, you are her child. You have inherited her curse, as well as her blessing. You too are immortal, and you are the only one who can return those lost memories." He said. ExploreWe walked around the abandoned mansion for a few more minutes before I brought up the nerve to ask the clocked figure in front of me, "So.... mister giant thing of death, where are we?" He looked at me for a second before saying, "My name is Tartarus...jr. As for where we are, I honestly have no damn idea, my memory has also been affected. I can barely remember what I told you only minutes ago..." "Well isn't that amazing Mr. Tartarus, I can almost feel your usefulness from here!" I replied, my tongue dripping with sarcasm. Five seconds later, everything went black. "Ugh... what happened?" I groaned, waking up what I assumed was hours later. I tried to remember what happened, but nothing came to mind. It was like I was being blocked from remembering anything. "One of the useful things about you being immortal is that I can kill you and not feel bad." Said Tartarus without even a second of hesitation or remorse. Seriously? He just killed me without a second thought all because of a bit of sarcasm.... This guy either is really sensitive, has major anger issues, or an absolute nutter. I just hope it's not the latter. "Don't you want me to go on some giant quest to retrieve pieces of this mirror? You probably shouldn't kill someone you want to have help you." I stated "Well, I think that anyone with a sane mind would probably want their memories back." He was right, but I wasn't about to let him in on that. "I honestly don't care about them that much. What memories I had before whatever happened to me are gone, so I really don't care if they come back or not." He stared at me for a bit, then shook his head. "I suppose I can't argue with that, but you must be interested in the history of this world!" "Nope." I said blatantly and blankly. "Not even a little bit?" Asked Tartarus with the glimmer of hope I wasn't going to give him. "Not in your wildest dreams, I hate history." He sighed, looking defeated. "Fine, but I am still charged to protect you, helping or not." He said in a slightly irritated tone. I sighed in response to this, and started to walk away, looking for an exit. He glided next to me, facing backwards. Sometimes I forget he's like a ghost, and each time it freaks me out. Wandering through the mansion halls, I managed to find a kitchen, a bedroom, a congregation hall, a throne, heck I found a dirty pool everywhere I went. I seemed to find everything but an exit. I walked for hours in this damn place, wandering every way I could go. After what felt like the fifth hour, I yelled, "I quit! I don't even want to leave, I don't even care anymore!" as I found myself in the center of the horrid mansion for the Nth time. In a strange apparition of mist a door appeared, leading to outside. I found my eye twitch as Tartarus fell to ground, howling with laughter. "It seems your mother has a sense of humor!" He said between his wheezing laughter. "My mother is the damn devil if she thought that was funny!" I responded, I looked back at the door, trying to see what laid behind it. It was veiled with smoke, blocking any vision through. I started to walk towards it, edging my way to it's smoky apparatus. I stuck a hoof through, seeing if it happened to be a killing machine, because at this point I wouldn't be surprised. Seeing that my hoof was not torn off, I stepped through and found myself- Just... behind the doorway. I threw my hooves up in the air, exclaiming my frustration in a few choice words. "Should've known, this place is one giant troll fest." I said. I turned around, expecting Mr. Gray to be laughing his bony ass off again, only to see... a giant forest. "What the?" I exclaimed as nothing but the doorway remained of the castle behind me, replaced by this new scenery. I turned back around, only to find that instead of the castle, I found the same wooded area. I sighed, of course it wouldn't be straightforward, my madman of a 'mother' thrived on whatever this was. I scanned the area to see if there was any nearby towns, or signs of any. Alas, as my luck always seemed to be these days, I was stranded. A shadow covered the light behind me, and before I could react I was smothered by Tartarus. He glided straight past me, covering me in his ghostly body, I wasn't pushed around, but breathing inside him was like breathing on a extremely humid summer day. "Hmm..." He said as he surveyed the scene I responded by trying to his through his plasma. He looked down, his eyes widening as he hopped away from me. "Dear Lord, don't you know it's rude to go breathing in a ghosts essence?" He stated in disgust, as if he was the victim in what had occurred. "You went out of the door and smothered me before I could react!" "That's no excuse!" "That's the best excuse there is!" I retorted, but before our argument could go any further a sound could be heard between the two of us. That sound being a faint beat. We stopped squabbling and stared, at what was making the sound: a bush. We l stepped closer, with Tartarus following closely behind. I bent down, "Hello?" I whispered to the bush, no answer. I repeated my greeting, but there was no change in anything, Tartarus started to snicker. "Screw you bush!" I barked as I started to stomp on it, it didn't help in any way at all, but it made me feel better. The now trampled bush allowed me to see past it, and discover the true source of the beat, a small group of ponies singing around a campfire. "Oh." I said as Tartarus tried to contain his laughter. To no avail, of course. "Well I'm going to meet them, if you want to follow, you've got to do something about... this." I said pointing at his tall, bony figure. "Ah, they might not be used to the appendages, good point." I was about to say that the appendages were the least of the problem, but then he turned into a small ball of light with wings. "The heck is that?" I asked. "Dunno, but I'm sure they will take it as some sort of good luck sign, balls of light seem to do that." I shrugged, a tiny ball of light was better than a ten feet tall creature of death. I held my breath, and walked from the bush into where the ponies were. RougesI walked towards the group singing around the fire, sporting a friendly smile and I waved at them. "Hello!" I said, and they turned to look at me. "I was wonder- GAH!" I yelled as the pony on my right, who was also the largest of them all, slammed into me and sent me flying. I flew for a good couple of feet before coming to a rest by a tree, dazed and in pain. The pony nearest to where I used to be zipped over, and in a flash overturned every nook and cranny that could hold anything. I almost felt violated by the way she searched my body. She ended it with a bop on the nose, then shouted. "He's got nothing!" Yelled the pony who searched me, before she zipped back to the others. They all nodded, then the one farthest from me, a pegasus, stood up and started to speak. "Sorry about the rough welcome, but these days, if you let your guard down you'll find someone taking everything you've worked to save. The name's Night, this fellow next to me is Entry." he said, pointing to the cloaked pony on his left. He continued to his left, pointing to the brute of a unicorn that had clobbered me not two minutes ago. "This good chap is Tanker, and next to him is his twin brother Tinker." Tanker grunted in response while his almost dwarf-like unicorn twin smiled at me. He then pointed to the pegasus who seemed to be tending to the fire and a smoking pot on top of it. Must've been food. "My good friend Amber, and the mare who searched you is Hoodlum." He said, introducing the final mare, who just sneered at me in return. "What brings you to these parts?" Asked Night. "Well, I was wondering where the nearest to-" I started, only to be interrupted by Tartarus. "We are looking for some things we lost, mainly small pieces of glass, and we were wondering if you had seen any?" He asked before we saw that they had seemed to only just notice Tartarus, and they backed up a step before deciding to respond. "Yes, as a matter of fact we have seen some, but first we must ask you another question." he said pointing at Tartarus. "How the hell did that parasprite talk?" "I'm sorry, I don't know what a paraprite is." I said in response, almost immediately earning a weird look from Night and his posse. "Did you hit your head? How did you get this far without knowing what a parasprite is? I'm surprised that nasty little bugger hasn't gone berserk and eaten everything you have. Unless... he already has." Said Night sceptically as he looked at my side and my lack of supplies. "I can assure you good sir, whatever a parasprite is, I'm not that." Said Tartarus. "Hey, I haven't seen a parasprite that has talked. As long as you keep that thing away from the food, you can stay." They walked back to their fire, with us following. "So, about the piece of glass?" Tartarus said. "Ah yes, your piece of glass, I'd be happy to give it to you, but that would leave us with quite a predicament. You see, that little piece of glass is keeping all the critters away, and we'd rather not part with our beast o'way just yet. Seeing as we would have quite the 'infestation' problem." "What would be the infestation problem exactly?" Tartarus asked. "Why they would be you, in case you didn't get the memo, your kind devours everything in its path. If the swarm, or even one parasprite sees a scrap of food, it eats without remorse and in a number of seconds. And if it gets too hungry, it doesn't get too picky about what it eats, living or not. Usually, we would be dead by now, either by starvation or a even more horrible death. But, luckily for poor old us, we found a neat little piece of glass, the same one you say you're looking for. For some reason or another, the little buggers seem to avoid it like the plague. We go out without it," he looked over to the pony named Entry. "What was the chance that we would even be able to make it out alive again?" The pony looked up, then made a symbol with his hooves. "Two percent, and we don't exactly plan on leaving." Tartarus nodded, or more like bobbed up and down. "So, if we were able to keep them away without the glass, would you give it to us?" He asked. Night laughed, and after he had finished, he said to us, "If you could find another way to keep them away, I'd be more than glad to give it to ya. This thing may keep them away, but it feels like it's taking our energy in return." He looked over to their bag of supplies warily. "Plus, it gives us the creepiest feeling, like there's a monster breathing down our back...just watching us." Said Night in a silent, disturbed tone. I looked up at Tartarus, thinking. It didn't take much to put two and two together and guess that he was most likely the source of that discomfort. "But hey, while you're here, you can have some dinner, we've got plenty of extra." I sat down, pondering, if what they were saying was true, immortal or not I too was going to need a way to get past the parasprites. Maybe I could convince them to head to town with the piece of glass. "So, why don't any if you want to head back to civilization?" I asked the group, Night taking it upon himself to answer that question for all of them. "We've all got our reasons. Hoodlum has stolen from the pockets of so many powerful people she's the only small time crook to have a reward of over a thousand bits. Alas, she got a bit too cocky, and tried to steal the regalia from Celestia's own head! Got herself a dreadful time in the clanker. Tinker and Tanker worked as a team, making large scale heists of the most secure places, broke into stuffy noble's vaults. Unfortunately, one noble was a bit more prepared than the others, had a trap set just for them. Entry worked as an accountant for almost every important pony, and on every single giant purchase they made he took a bit of their money, only a couple bits. He covered his tracks well, and had amassed a large fortune just as big as those he worked for, was almost ready to retire and everything too. Unfortunately, some detective or PI got a whiff of what he was doing, and unraveled all of his work. I pity him, one of the nobles was really mad, cast a mute curse on the poor bastard. Smart as any high profile genius and can't speak a word." I looked to Night and the only pony he's not mentioned yet. "What about you and Amber?" "Us? Well, depending on your view, we either did the least or the most evil. When war broke out between Celestia and Luna, we chose the wrong side. Found myself a natural profession for war and strategy and rose the ranks fast, before I knew it I was leading a sizable chunk of her army as one of her generals. What I didn't have in strength, I made up tenfold in strategy and leadership. Soon Amber showed up, Luna thought he would be a good lieutenant. She was correct, and he showed talent in giving troops moral support and as a great cook. Only downside was that he wouldn't hurt a fly, froze up in battle like a mouse looking into the mouth of a lion, and would faint at the sight of a drop of blood." Said Night as he looked to his war buddy, who had begun to blush in return of the embarrassing details that had been spoken of. "Didn't really matter though, he could calculate the enemies plan like he was in their head, and planned the whole thing out before it even happened, I only really took charge the small amount that his plans didn't work. Before we knew it we were at the front of the war, cutting through Celestia's front lines like paper. He knew every man who was under his charge by name..." he stopped talking and looked over to where Amber was cooking stew silently. "And has mourned every one." I looked to Amber, and I noticed it. His eyes. Though he was smiling, I could see in his eyes all the pain and suffering he has seen, all the death... It's like he wants to cry, but he has no more to give. Nobody should have to endure that kind of pain, so how can he? Night turned back to me and continued his story. "Anyways, we marched to the capital in one final push, we had victory in our grasp. Luna was now standing right beside us, looking over our strategies and leading the troops with us. Defense after defense fell, and soon we were in the palace. Then, in a second, everything crumbled. Blood Dancer, the Griffon King himself, and his army swept in from the rear. Nightstalker, one of our own generals, turned against us and killed his lieutenant. We could've survived it, but Celestia herself flew in and tackled Luna, engaging in a duel that everyone knew how it would end. Our section was the only one that held out for more than a minute, hour after hour, our troops held out against the battering, soon even Celestia joined in, and I had the honor of fighting her myself. Could barely hold out, but I knew that as soon as I fell, so would my troops. I had to keep fighting, for them. Dodging, slicing, I fought like I had never had before. But of course she was an alicorn, and I, a simple pegasus. Eventually she wore me out, and as the last of my troops fell, so did I." A most delicious smell wafted over, and Night's story was interrupted by Amber hitting his spoon to the pot, signaling dinner was ready. Wooden bowls were arranged with soup inside each of them. Stumps of trees served as seats. I took up my bowl, and after seeing everyone else do the same, I sipped from the bowl, and it was as if liquid straight from heaven was flowing down my throat. "This is delicious!" I exclaimed. Amber grinned, and sipped from his own bowl, I could tell he took his cooking very seriously. "It's a gift alright!" Hoodlum said. "Parasprites or not, we would have starved without him." "Hey, you wanted to know why we can't give you the piece of mirror?" Tinker said looking up from a small cube like object he was tinkering with. "Yeah, parasprites right?" Tartarus said. "Look behind you." He said, darting his eyes to the spot behind where I was sitting. We turned around, and almost fell out of our seats, a giant swarm of small round things with wings, not unlike Tartarus, was amassing all around us. But they never crossed a line made out of small twigs encircling the camp. "Crazy right!" Said Tanker, laughing wholeheartedly at how I fell out of my seat. Entry nudged Night and made a series of movements with his hooves when he had his attention. Night nodded when he finished and looked at me soon after. "Entry asked how you got here, and now that he mentions it, I'm curious too. How exactly did you manage to get past that?" He said, motioning over to the swarm of parasprites. "That's a funny story, really. Ya know how you asked if I hit my head?" I said. "Don't tell me, you have absolutely no idea?!" "None at all, I swear. I just woke up here, near you guys." It was sort of true at least, I'm not completely lying to them. "Just how hard did you hit your head?" Tinker asked me, not looking away from the cube in his hooves. "Hard enough that I didn't know who Celestia and Luna are, much less that there was a war between them. Heck, I don't even know my own name!" Entry made another series of movements with his hooves, to which Night gladly translated again. "Entry said that's pretty hard alright." I took another swig of my soup, swirling it in my mouth to really get all of the taste before swallowing. "Hard enough to feel like I fell down a canyon." I said. We all finished our soup, then Night continued his story. "After the battled had concluded, I was so tired. Everyone else on our side had surrendered and denounced Luna as soon as she lost to her sister, and like pigs, they groveled at Celestia's hooves. Fuckin' yellow bellied cowards, the lot of 'em. Me and Amber were the only ones who refused to denounce her, and believe me, they wanted us to. They did everything they could think of just to get us to say something along the lines of ‘I was brainwashed!’ or ‘I was forced to! Luna is evil, she made me side with her!’ But of course we refused, and we became the scapegoats. Life sentences in the highest security prison in all of Equestria was our punishment. All of us," he said pointing to the rest of the group. "Found ourselves in the same cell, and we thought we would be there until we shrivelled away and died." "What happened?" I asked, almost on edge from Night's story. "The man in the cell next to us, he was someone we could agree was insane. He always muttered, and would spontaneously do crazy things, like climb up his cell walls. One day, he stops muttering, and sits down. The guard near him walked over near him, thinking that he was safe, after all, he didn't have any magic, and it wasn't like he could bend alloy steel bars in a room that nullified all magic inside it. We all thought that, but as soon as the guard stepped near, he launched himself into the air, and bent the bars like they were tinfoil. Poor guy didn't even have time to react, he was dead before he hit the ground. Luckily for us, the keys rolled over to our cell, and Tinker was just small enough to fit his arms through the bars. We expected a fight, figuring that our neighbour had been taken out already, but all we saw was carnage, the beast had killed every single guard in it's path. Course, we knew that when life gave you lemons, you make lemonade, and we walked out of the most secure prison without a single defence pointed at us. The beast was easy to track, what with the massive trail of blood and limbs, so we went the opposite way. We raced to shelter and safety, picking up news all throughout. Apparently the beast ran into a dragon's cave, and found itself between the elite guard and one of the most powerful beings known. Heard it put up a fight, even clawing one of the dragon's eyes out and killing three guardsmen before it died. Alas, with our distraction dead, they quickly realized that we were gone, and then focused their search on us. By that time, we were already in here, an impenetrable natural forest. With a piece of glass being the master key." He yawned, and flopped down on a blanket. "And that is how the Hattens arrived here. Now, I'm going to get some shut eye, while you try to find a way to stop those." He said pointing to the swarm of parasprites before heading to a spot near the fire and falling into sleep, his group following that same motion. I too started drifting to sleep, wondering just what I had been told. The names resonated with me, but I couldn't point it just out. Celestia, Luna...who were they to me in the past? I stared at the moon, and noticed that it almost looked like a pony was in it. The more I looked at it though, it was similar to the feeling Night and the others have had since getting our glass, like it's watching me back... Just what have I gotten myself into? HattensThree days had past since I had joined the Hattens, and I slowly got used to their weird routine, and soon made my own to fit. At morning a natural alarm clock of parasprites woke all of us up, except, of course, Tinker, he slept like a bug bear in hibernation. (At least, that's what Hoodlum said.) In fact, Tinker and Tanker were exact opposites, where Tinker slept in, Tanker was always the first to wake up, while Tinker was very agile, Tanker, probably due to his size, was quite clumsy. Tinker was a sharpshooter and even made his crossbow to custom fit him, of course, he couldn't even slash a knife in a straight line. Tanker on the other hand couldn't shoot anything five feet away from him, but could wield huge spears, axes, and swords with uncanny ease unbefitting his usual clumsiness. Tinker could create extremely weird machinery out of a couple spare parts he had in his coat, while Tanker couldn't create anything resembling useful if he had an entire supplies needed to make a castle. And... Of course, who could miss the last one, Tanker loved any kind of humor, he would make jokes you could laugh your head off, puns that would make anyone cringe, of course while trying to hold back a smile, and riddles that would befuddle even Entry for a few minutes. Judging from the record, you probably know how Tinker is, he absolutely abhorred any kind of jokes, and he tried his best to avoid any and all humor, if you said the funniest joke in the world, Tinker would simply fixate you with a stare like a Basilisk, according to hoodlum, until you backed off, and even when he tried to make a joke, usually to try to appease his brother, it would be the absolute most horrible joke that gives you this sour taste in your mouth just thinking about what he said. It would either be way too dark or grim, or one thankful occasions, simply not funny at all, one of the most memorable being "What's the hardest part of a vegetable to eat? The wheelchair!" For the life of me, I didn't get it, but apparently everyone else did, and a very disturbing silence filled the campfire, only pierced by the buzzing of parasprites and the waving of Entry's hand in what I could only guess was a extremely rude gesture. But, of course time goes on, not stopping to strike down such horrid humor, and Tinker lived another day. Every morning without fail Amber cooked the most delicious meal, somehow using leaves, acorns, and a pinch of meat and spices to create what Hoodlum called ichor, and everyone agreed with him. After that we had what Night said Entry called his warm up, and he laid out seven platforms complete with small figurines of things called pawns, knights, bishops, castles, and a single king and queen. each had a special ability, and the objective was to capture your enemy's 'king.' Apparently he had carved all of it himself, and was able to carve one for both me and Tartarus during the night that I had arrived. I never really got the hang of it, and on the first day he was able to capture my king in 7 moves and he lost a single pawn, while three of my pieces were lost, including the queen. Nobody was surprised about this, as he beat Hoodlum in eighteen moves, only losing three pieces, and Tanker was taken down in twenty five, but was able to take out an impressive number of Entry's figurines. The only people who could put up a fight was Tinker, Night, Amber, and Tartarus. But eventually first Tinker lost, with fifty two moves, and then Night dragging it out despite having only a king, bishop, and a couple pawns for the last half for ninety two moves. What had surprised everyone, however, was when Tartarus showed a surprising proficiency at the game, with only he and Amber putting up a real match against Entry. The match moved over a hundred moves, and no clear winner was in sight of either of the games, All three competitors made moves that made no sense to me, or to anyone else but themselves, only for five moves later the seemingly random play would enable them to have an advantage. Of course, things could only stretch out so long, and as a hundred and fifty moves approached, the winners became clear. Amber had cleared Entry of all of his best figurines in a few swift and concise moves so easily that we couldn't tell if he had taken all this time to set it up, or had simply gotten serious. Tartarus was on the losing side, but he made sure for that every figurine he lost, Entry would lose one too. It ended with apparently the usual, with the exception of Tartarus. Amber, one hundred fifty moves exactly, and won, and Tartarus, with one hundred sixty two moves, but only three pieces remained on the board, the kings, and one bishop belonging to Entry. After that confusing game they called chess we went on something much simpler, a hunt for food. They packed everything edible they had in five minutes, with pinpoint precision they had everything wrapped up in bags for them all to carry, with Tanker carrying the most, and you can probably guess who carried the least. Night explained that as they were going out to check traps if they kept their stuff at camp, and left with the piece of glass, their supplies would be eaten, and a horrible fate would befall whoever left the camp without the key. Wildlife had found ways to avoid the parasprites with camouflage, burrowing down into the ground, or a host of other things. Of course, it didn't really stop them from falling into traps, or Tanker's spear. It was a simple, mundane task, simply wandering with a host of items to pick up dead things and kill living ones. While Hoodlum Tinker, and Tanker hunted, Night checked traps, and Entry and Amber foraged for berries, fruits, and edible grass. Hoodlum and Tanker seemed to have made a game of hunting, to see who could bring in the most pounds of meat, only for Tinker to have brought back the most in the end, with a grimace on his face. When all of the hunting was over, we all settled in, and as Amber cooked the meal we had brought back, they all started to tell stories. Entry crafted fictional tales of ancient legend, which was translated by Night to Equestrian. Tinker told stories of a future with where he said something called science was advanced much beyond what we had today, honestly I wouldn't have understood a word of what he said if what he told was accompanied by flashing images that flowed from his horn. Hoodlum told of a story of a brave adventurer who traveled the world, finding great treasure and discovering lost civilizations. Night told what he called the great story of history, depicting great struggles of all kinds that he had remembered reading about. Tanker would tell of folk tales of the wildest things, such as creatures that were described much like Tartarus, but with skin that only came in shades of white to black, and had struggles much like ours, it was just as complicated to understand as Tinker's 'sci-fi' stories. Usually about the time the sun went parallel to the ground, creating a brilliant orange sky, the meal was ready to eat, I dug into it with all of the ferocity of a parasprite, finding myself extremely hungry. "Will you look at that, you could mistake him for a northern griffon with the way he's tearing into the meat!" Hoodlum said, and for the first time I noticed that they were all staring at me rather strangely. I slowly put the leg of a rabbit I had been eating started sipping the soup gingerly. After a nauseating minute of everyone staring at me chugging down the soup, Tinker decided to explain their concern. "While we can eat meat, for most ponies it's uh... an acquired taste as they say." I couldn't decide whether to reply or not, so I continued to drink the broth. "You can eat it, we were just surprised at the... velocity at which you ate it." Hearing what I took as the ok to eat more, I dove into the rabbit, tearing gigantic chunks of and letting the flavor swirl around in my mouth. Those poor ponies didn't know what they were missing! "I think we created a monster." Was all Hoodlum or anybody said while watching me eat the rabbit. I simply replied with "You gonna eat yours?" After dinner everyone did their own thing, Tinker fiddled with the small parts he had, creating something, grunting, then reconfiguring it to create something else. Tanker and Hoodlum talked with each other, chatting about what they had done, and what they plan to do. Entry and Amber both had pads of paper, but while Entry seemed to be writing something, Amber drew, he flipped through page after page, drawing rough sketches of ponies, and other things. Night simply laid down and looked at the night sky. Me? I pondered how to solve the problem of the parasprites, whatever else happened, I wasn't getting out of this forest without solving how to get rid of the beastly things, and to add to my horrendous luck the door to the mansion had disappeared. I started to drift to sleep when I heard a melody echo throughout the forest, eerie, haunting and smooth, it gave me chills hearing it. I turned around and saw that it emanated from Tinker's small gadget, unlike all the other times when he simply grunted and started to rearrange it, he held the box as it played the sad song, and a smile rose to his face. I started to listen, and I soon heard underlying melodies, under the original melody, like a ghostly choir singing its tune from the dead. It was almost hypnotic in style, then I noticed something quite uncanny, the parasprites, instead of fluttering around, screeching with no rhythm or rhyme, they followed the song, gently swaying to the choir as if it was one attentive being listening, with it fluttering in a way that matched that of the music, even adding another layer to it. I slowly got up, and walked over to where Tinker was so absorbed with the box that he noticed nothing of what was going on. I tapped him on the shoulder, and as he looked up I saw a hint of longing in his eyes before he noticed what I was pointing to, and his face turned to one of shock and surprise as he watched the swarm sway to his music. "Aria, even in death you never cease to amaze me." He whispered, he was so struck by what happened that he forgot about his box, not noticing as it slipped from his hoofs until it hit the ground. As it hit, the music skidded to a halt, and as it faded away the parasprites whipped themselves into a frenzy, screeching a flying around so fast and so heavily that it seemed like a chromatic wall had appeared in front of us. Both of our eyes went from wonder to panic as the wall started to move forward, crossing the stick line, as if breaching an invisible barrier. "Fix it fix it fixitfixitfixitFIXIT!" I yelled as the wall of parasprites moved ever closer, edging its way to us, probably not helping much. "I'm trying my best!" He yelled back frantically reinserting screws and other things. The wall moved closer and closer, enveloping our supplies, and by now everyone had taken notice of this dilemma, and we all backed up to where the piece of glass was kept, and Tanker started to wave his spear at the swarm, desperately trying to fend of the wall of parasprites that enclosed us, devouring everything in its path. Tanker's spear broke off, and what little stalling he did was gone, and the wall of parasprites closed in on us with terrifying determination. Just as the swarm was about to eat us all, Tinker inserted one last screw, and with joy he started the music again, yelling "I got it!" Almost immediately the swarm was pacified, and started to flutter with the song again, even more peaceful than before. We all looked at each other, and back at the swarm of parasprites, now fluttering around us with tranquility. I reached out a hoof, and expected it to be chewed off as soon as it came into contact with a parasprite, but instead it simply rested on my arm, shaking to the music. I breathed a sigh of relief, immortal or not, that would've hurt, I looked to the others, then stepped into the multitude of creatures. Not a single one even tried to bite me, they simply swayed to the music, creating a cascade of color fitting the feel of the song. In fact, they seemed to have a performance of their own, creating giant colors and images each cascading into each other to create a beautiful backdrop to the seemingly haunting music. Tinker was the first to recover from the shock of what had transpired, and said. "You know, when they aren't trying to kill us, they truly are majestic." SpiritWe all started walking around, no longer confined to the parasprites, half trying to let it blend in, while also trying to admire the show they put on for us. Entry frantically scribbled in his journal, while Amber seemed to be trying to draw the scene in front of us, we all looked around to find our stuff, as much of it had thrown by the parasprites' rage. I soon found Tartarus laying down beneath some overturned supplies, fast asleep. I slowly lifted him up by a wing and, ever so harshly, tried my best to slap him to the nearest tree and into a pile of ghostly goo, of course, this only succeeded in carrying a couple inches, and waking him up. "Wonderful day isn't it! look even the parasprites are... oh, did I do something wrong?" He said as I fixated him with my best death glare I could muster. "You could say that," I said, my eye involuntarily twitching. "Maybe a nice save from the giant swarm that was right about to rend us limb from limb, Mr. all powerful demon." He yawned, and lazily looked up at me, as if he was simply looking at a bug, despite me being a good twenty times his current size. "You're immortal, they would probably tear you apart so fast you wouldn't feel a thing, no biggie, and then we would return and collect the shard, and be on our way." The way he so casually remarked of it struck me as disgusting, as if he had no care about life. "What about the others! I don't believe they are immortal!" I lowered my voice to a whisper, hoping he would cue onto it, as I didn't exactly want the fact that I'm immortal being thrown around, it could 'rustle some jimmies' as Hoodlum would say. Unfortunately, he didn't pick up on it, and spoke in his normal voice. "So what of it, they are simple mortals, even thieves, murderers, and traitors, nobody would miss them. And even if someone did, they don't have any importance in the long run, despite being good company, that's all they are really good for. And, say, we kept with them on our travels, we would be branded as accomplices, and when they are eventually captured, you would be too, and many years would be taken off our search for the shards." My blood started to boil, so what if they were 'mortals' or criminals, or whatever, they were good ponies! Even if not good ponies, still ponies, lives, just because he was so concerned about some pieces of goddamn glass he would not care if they died! I raised my hoof, planning try my hardest to swat him out of the sky, even though I knew I couldn't touch him. But when my hoof reached his body, I felt contact, actual contact, like that of bones, not goo like I had felt all the other times! I used all of my strength to slam him into the ground, and he bounced off of that, slamming into the tree I had tried to hit into before, and I heard an encompassing thunk as the tree seemed to bend a little bit, much like when Tanker had slammed me into the tree. So what! you're just gonna let them be eaten because you're lazy! And so what if we have a longer lifespan than them, it doesn't mean you can regard them like figurines on a chessboard! I yelled with all my might at the demon, all of my energy seemed to fill to a burst! Then it flattened like a deflated balloon as the air started to warp, and even seem to boil around Tartarus. In an instant, the small parasprite illusion shattered, and his true form was revealed. His usual demeanor was broken, instead of an almost skeletal face his head was broken, and black liquid flowed from the cracks and edges of what now seemed like a mask. I stared at my hoof, which had some of the black liquid on it, I quickly shook it off, and looked back at the demon known as Tartarus. As I watched, his bones started to fuse back together, as everything else around it seemed to be sapped of life, and the tree that he had crashed into withered away, making a husk like it had been dead and rotting for a hundred years. His mask reformed into the skeleton body that I had seen before, and the pinprick eyes returned, only they were now seemingly burning red! He took a single step toward me, and he twisted one of his rings, producing a sparking fire as something started to emerge from it. Just as a shape started to form from the ring, sky blue light started to emerge from his spotlight eyes, slowly replacing the blood red that had illuminated his body. When it completely replaced the red he twisted his ring, and the mist dissipated into nothingness. He looked down at me, his eyes back to a brilliant white as he took a single step towards me. "Boy." He said, picking me up with one hand and bringing me to his height, His spotlight pupils now shone directly into mine, and his voice resonated with contained anger. "Let me get a few things straight with you, I am not a demon, I am a spirit, and don't you ever call me one of those vile despicable creatures ever again. Next, I am your guardian, but that does not mean I will knock some sense into you if I have to." In response I gave him a defiant glare, if he wanted to kill everyone in order to get these things, I would have no part of it, no matter what he did to me. He sighed and slowly put me down, relaxing his bony body. He sat down, once again putting us at eye level, but now it was at mine, and through his anger, another emotion seemed to be conveyed through his words, respect. "I should've known, you really are your mother's son, just as stubborn, innocent, and goodhearted as she was." "I suppose I have some explaining to do," He said scratching his non existent neck. "Truth be told, even if I was awake, I wouldn't have been able to save you or the 'Hattens'." I gave him a confused look, and in response he waved his hand, as it arced towards a tree, I expected a thunk as bone would meet bark, but instead his hand phased through the tree as if they were on different planes of reality. "As a spirit my ability to manipulate the world is rather limited, you were only able to touch me due to you being my anchor, almost all other physical objects are beyond my realm of grasp." It made sense, but as I looked past him I remembered the tree that he crashed into, the one now withered up. I asked about that, and he looked back at the tree before giving me an answer. "There are certain things that can interact with spirits without being an anchor, they are enabled this ability by being exponentially close to the afterlife. The tree, for example, was a liverwood, a tree known for growing where the deceased lie, using the nutrient of the dead to quickly grow. Some cultures view them as a monument, others a curse or evil omen." I was able to grasp the gist of it, and he seemed to be relieved at that fact. I walked over to the others, before realizing that they were carrying on like there wasn't a giant skeleton walking beside me. "Wait, why didn't notice our little... scuffle?" "I can still do simple illusion magic, all they saw was my parasprite form being smacked softly into a tree, which did not wither and die. As long as you don't try to backhand me into any conveniently placed trees, you'll see me as a parasprite again in a few minutes, give or take." We approached where they were working, only to hear a few delectable swears passed by Hoodlum as he overturned the supply store, only to find a very obvious lack of supplies waiting for us. "Looks like the dancin' pests didn't bother to save our food, everything's gone!" Night looked over from his position, saying. " It's the same over here, looks like the buggers took all of it." A rousing voice echoed through the camp, belonging to Tanker. "It's the same all around, looks like." Everyone nodded in agreement, as we somberly extracted what was left of our stuff, as most of it was broken or eaten by the swarm. "It doesn't look like we can salvage much, and the mirror seems to no longer work against the things," He turned to TInker. "How long can you keep that box singing?" He responded solemnly. "Only a couple of hours, it's partially magic operated, and it's exhausting me." Worried looks spread through the small group, the silence was broken by none other by Entry and Amber, with Entry tapping Tankers broken spear to get everyone's attention. "If that's the case, then we need to get out." Amber said. "Either that, or we'll be giving ourselves up to how the swarm feels about the music stopping again." This broke everyone from their trance, and we quickly started packing our remaining things up, and we started to head to civilization. Night walked up to me, with the piece of glass in hoof. "Well, one way or another, you found another way to keep the parasprites at bay, so I don't believe we'll be needing this." He put the piece in my hoof, and started to walk to the others. "Oh, and if you want I guess you get a free guide to out of this forest, whether or not you want to stay with us." I put my piece of glass into my new saddlebag, one down, whoever knows how many to go. FarmWe trudged ahead, never stopping to view the scenery, as we were on a tight schedule, making our way through the forest, the farther we walked, the less the parasprites followed, one by one they stopped following the haunting music, and made their way back to the depths of the forest. More and more light penetrated through the high tops of trees, and before we knew it we had left the safety of trees, and they shifted into giant fields of golden wheat, all growing ridiculously high, reaching even above our heads, and leaning in like a gaping mouth about to swallow us whole. They walked with their heads lowered, and legs tense, as if they were prepared to dash at any moment. I suppose they had a right to, now that they were out of the forest, if their stories were right they were in just as much danger out here as we were in the forest, surrounded by bloodthirsty parasprites. A barn started to show through the layers of wheat, and a single pony, lacking both a wing or a horn layed down beside it, a sliver of wheat in his or her mouth, and their coat was a dark brown. The others sighed, of relief or despair, but whatever it was they were quickly cut off as the barn door opened, and they all dashed to the safety of the tall golden crops. A pony, no, two, no three, one of each species walked out of the barn door, each clad in synonymous armor, each depicting a bright sun on their body. The pony sleeping slowly opened his eyes, and leaned over to the ponies I supposed were guards from the Hattens reaction. "You gentlemen find what you were looking for?" The earth pony stepped forward, responding to the pony. "Afraid not, good sir, but we are thankful for your cooperation in this brutal time." "No problem, you guys are already stretched incredibly thin, and I prefer to not interfere with your jobs, hate to create extra work." "Erm, thank you, kind... citizen." They trudged up the path to where I was, and almost didn't notice me, up close I noticed they had bags under their eyes, as though they hadn't slept in days. When they did notice me they put on a business face and walked up to me holding up some papers. "Excuse me, we're sorry to bother you, but have you seen any suspicious characters such as these, we were told they were in the area." They held out a small stack of four papers. I looked at them, none of which depicted any of the Hattens, instead they depicted four different ponies, all unicorns, all in pinstriped suits, they looked more like they were going to a business meeting than belonging on wanted posters. "I'm afraid not, I'll tell you if I see these ponies." "Thank you... for your cooperation." He said, half falling asleep. They continued on right past where the Hattens were hiding, seemingly not noticing them even as they past right by Tanker's hiding place. They trudged on, heads nodding down then shooting back up, and they soon were past our line of sight. "You folk can come out now, don't pretend to hide, I saw you from a mile away." The pony laying next to the barn spoke, his eyes were closed, but when no one emerged he repeated the statement. "I said get out of my perfectly good crops and onto the nice pathway I set up, not hide in them like a bunch of bandits!" When no one moved he sighed and said, "Now, don't worry, I won't call any guards, if you were looking for trouble you would've mugged those unfortunate souls when they past you, wouldn't take much, even if they find who they are looking for they aren't going to capture them in their deprived state." First Night, then Hoodlum, and then all the others besides Entry moved out of the golden wheat, and back on the path. He didn't look up, but simply said. "All of them, mister light foot, I'd hate to have to drag you out of there, be an awful lot of work for both of us." Finally Entry moved out of his hiding place, and out into the open. "Great," The pony said, "Now, who might all you fine people be?" We explained ourselves, sensing no hostility from the strange pony, and he simply yawned when we finished our story. "From the woods, you say, must be on the run from your jumpiness. I'll see if grandma has any extra food she can hand out, wanted to give it to the guards, but they refused, poor chaps haven't had any good rest in weeks." He leaned back even further, and knocked on the barn he was leaning on three times in rapid succession, and a final one a second later. an answer of eight knocks, some farther apart than others, echoed from the barn. "You're in luck, she's got some extra bread and water for you guys." "Uhhhhhh..." We were just as confused as the guards were, if not more so. "Thanks?" "No problem, you guys take it easy, I'll lead you to the table." He opened his eyes and yawned, mouth gaping open. he scratched his back and started to lead us to the barn doors. He paused right before he opened the doors. He turned to us and said. "Oh, by Celestia, you might want to duck." "What?" I said, before any response was issued he swung open the barn doors, and a high pitched wail could be heard throughout the old house. "AYAYAYYAYAYAYAYAYAYYAYAYAYAYYAAAAAAA" A voice yelled, I remebered his advice and slammed to the ground just as a pony flew past me, swinging on a rope. Everyone followed suit, but Tanker was not so lucky, as he had been placed at the lowest point of the swing, and even ducking, his considerable girth had made him an optimal target for the crazy pony. All of his gigantic weight was sent flying, knocking over anyone behind him, and was being propelled by the pony. He fell belly up, and before he could react a bucket of water was flung on his face, and a loaf of bread was shoved into tanker's mouth. "Grandma please! Just one day! Didn't you get the knock?" "You know the rules Gilden, all ponies need the exercise, if they can 'scape from me they can eat at the table! Wohohohohohoo!" The pony stood up, and lo behold, the pony who took down tanker was none other than an old, wrinkled pony, holding stacks of bread. We were all dumbstruck for a moment, our brains trying to comprehend just what kind of shenanigans was happening. "Wohohohohohhohooo!" Our shock quickly turned to adrenaline and pure, raw, fear as the old lady started to run at us at blinding speeds, and with a very dangerous gleam in her eye. She targeted Hoodlum first, and Hoodlum did what she knew second best, run like hell itself was racing to feed him a loaf of bread. She shot across the barn, running for the hills, and at first it seemed that she was outrunning the devil granny, and the old lady leaned to the left, seemingly giving the impression of giving up and turning around. She disappeared into the wheat, probably to attack us and take us by surprise. Hoodlum slowed down a bit, her legs starting to give out. He approached the top of the hill, with granny nowhere to be seen, she gasped a sigh of relief, and collapsed at the top of the hill. "You almost got me sonny, but you're gonna have to run a little faster than that if you want to eat at the Oat's table!" Her scream was muffled as a loaf of bread was put in her mouth. The granny had moved into the wheat, and had seemingly reappeared at the top of the hill! The old lady turned to us, causing a shiver to go down our spines, and she disappeared into the wheat again. Our hearts raced as clumps of golden wheat shifted and swayed to the wind, never giving her position away. For what seemed to be an hour, we stood, frozen in anticipation of where she was going to appear next. A small shift in the wheat appeared for a moment, then the crazy lady shot out of the grains, launching herself at Night. Unlike me, he seemed ready for the oncoming onslaught, and gritted his teeth as the small ball of death raced to him. At the last moment, he rolled to the left, the wind of the granny arm thrusting bread could be felt feet away. The old lady seemed to grin, seemingly accepting this new challenge. "Left, up, right, up, down, why you're going all around!" She said in a singsong voice, trying to hit the poor former general with the piece of bread. Each time she launched another piece of bread, Night barely dodged it, ducking, jumping, rolling, blocking, anything and everything possible he tried to stop the pastry from being forced inside his mouth. He started to tire, and his dodges became less and less accurate, more often than not he grazed the pastry, barely stopping it. In a last ditch attempt he tried fighting back, raising his hoof to knock the piece of bread from her hand. And... he did! despite all odds, he timed it just right, knocking the piece of bread from her hoof... And into her other hoof, his eyes widened, but that was all he could react before her hoof came thrusting down, filling his gullet with a loaf of bread and knocking him to the ground. She turned around and narrowed her eyes on Me, crap. "Let's go sonny boy!" She yelled, launching herself to me. "Wait!" I yelled, and surprisingly, she skidded to a halt. "Yes dearie?" "Um, uh, erm," My brain wracked up for anything that fell within a plan. "Could I... have a loaf of bread?" "Why yes!" She launched herself at me, about to put the loaf of bread in my mouth. "Wait!" I yelled again, "I meant like that I could use against you, it seems kinda one sided when you're the only one with the bread, could I have one to try to get you with by any chance?" "Oh, why didn't you say so? of course!" Her terminal velocity stopped, and she slowly put a loaf of thin bread in my hoof, then backed up and took a similar piece from her pile. "As the industrialists would say, en garde!" She launched herself at me, piece of bread in her hand. We clashed in my desperate bid to not have a loaf of bread shoved down my throat, and despite the softness of the bread, it rattled my right foreleg to it's core, but at least I blocked it. In one swift movement she rolled behind me, somehow keeping the bread clean the entire roll, and thrust the breadstick where I was a second ago, if not for a skeletal hand pulling me out of the way. "Keep your eyes open, one hit and it's all over!" Tartarus said, before thrusting my head down to avoid another swing of the devil granny's bread. This swing had left her open, and I jabbed my breadstick at her face. Or where her face was, in a flash she had disappeared, and nothing besides Tartarus saving my neck once again by tossing me aside to avoid a strike from above. The old woman squinted at the parasprite illusion,and started swinging the breadstick at the parasprite, with Tartarus able to easily dodge her swings like a... well as Hoodlum would put it, a parasprite and a swatter. She was distracted by Tartarus, and took the opportunity a second time, swinging in for the meal. Just as my breadstick was about to reach it's intended destination, The granny leaned back, and in a swift movement thrust her breadstick in my mouth. Didn't actually taste that bad, could use some meat, but of course I was in too much of a daze to realize that, and pain, so much pain, getting whapped by a breadstick wielded by an old grandma hurts a lot more than you'd expect. As I slowly recovered, munching on the bread, I saw the old lady slowly approaching Amber, who was sitting down. "May I have a piece of bread?" Amber said, smiling and holding out his hands. The devil granny grinned and sped up to meet him, but just as she was about to pelt him with the bread, a rock that, looking back, was obvious was there, but seemed to never catch my attention, hit the old lady's hooves, causing her to go flying. "N-now!" Amber yelled, and Tinker appeared out of the grass, wielding a small blowgun made of tightly interwoven wheat, and shot a small pellet, aiming right where the old granny was flying. At the last moment this crazy lady seemed to twist in midair, and flung a loaf of bread at terminal velocity speeds at the same angle as the pellet. They collided, and the pellet was shot to the side, and the bread shot to Tinker, landing with a sickening thump on his face. "Ha! Gotta try a little harder than some rocks and a plum seed to take me out!" She said, but her eyes widened when she looked down, when she threw the bread it changed her trajectory the slightest bit, and straight into Tanker's freshly dug hole. A lovely fwump could be heard as she landed, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. "How deep is that hole?" Gilden asked? "A good fifteen feet, she isn't getting out of there anytime soon." Tanker said, wiping the sweat from his brow. "You just had to say that." said Amber. As soon as the sentence was finished the old lady started to cackle, giving everyone a near heart attack as she leapt out of the hole while flinging a piece of bread at Amber, hitting him in the stomach. She turned to Gilden, saying, "Your turn dear grandkiddie 'o boy!" It seemed that even relatives were not spared in the bread apocalypse. His eyes widened more like someone who had forgotten something important, and then he quickly... Did nothing at all, he just waited for his granny of death to come to him, like a man who had accepted his fate, and judging from the fact that this happened regularly, was no surprise. Just as her hoof came wailing down to deliver her punishing grains, her arm seemed to bend, like it was being distorted, and the cascade of hooves and bread that came after the first all seemed to bend around Gilden, creating a vortex of bread as seemed to fire her punches at the speed of sound, but without him moving an inch, not a single one seemed to land. Then something strange happened, a bead of sweat formed on his head, then another, then another, and soon the distortions lessoned, and in one final blow, it completely stopped, and Gilden was knocked to the ground by the force of the bread. She took out a piece of bread, and the both of them nibbled away at the meal, and for the moment everything seemed calm, even peaceful, at least until the bread was finished. "Alright where's lightfoot?!" The granny said, wiping the last crumbs from her mouth. From what Gilden had said, I assumed that she meant Entry, and sure enough, he was gone. "What of wuss." "Grandma!" Gilden said, looking shocked. "Well then why don't they come out and fight?" "Because they've been running all their lives, and you just took out everything they could throw at you." "THEN THEY FIGHT LIKE STALLIONS UNTIL THE VERY LAST!" The grandma shouted, rushing into the grass. "Hoh boy, listen I'm really sorry about this, my grandma can be a bit... nonsensical at times." In response, Night, Tanker, and I lifted our bruised faces and raised an eyebrow in unison. "Really nonsensical at times, but if it's any consolation she does this to just about everyone, considers a rite of passage." It's a rite of passage to chase your guests down and stuff their face with baked goods?" Tartarus said. "Only here. . . shiny parasprite." He said, as if he had just seen Tartarus. "I'll take that pause as a moment of awed silence for my shining glory." A silence was kept, only to be broken by a single loud thump echoing through the stalks of wheat, and we all were frozen in silence as dragging was heard, and a single Entry was dragged through the grass, bread stuffed in his mouth. "So, how are you? I do hope you enjoy it here!" The grandma said.
WakeMy eyes slowly opened, only to blink a few times, unaccustomed to the new found light. As my vision slowly returned to me I looked around, taking in my newfound surroundings. It seemed to be a house of some sort, a pretty run down home at that. The house was just barely overrun with weeds and thorns, broken windows scattered the floor underneath, and cracks of light shot down from the holes in the roof. Everything was broken. But what my eyes were drawn to, was a large mirror in the very center of the room so gargantuan that it reached almost twenty feet in height, and almost just as wide. It too was shattered, but everything else bent around it, as if avoiding its presence. The vines twisted almost making a circle around the mirror, not a single leaf entered within it's borders, and a dome of light, forming from a perfect circle in the roof shined down on it. It seemed to envelop the room, wrapping around my surroundings like a black hole. I started to walk towards it, almost like it was pulling me in, taking control of my will. As I neared the edge of the barrier, I noticed I had a small piece of glass in my hoof. I walked across the circle of vines, and the piece of glass started to quiver, about five feet away the piece of glass flew from my hand, flew to the mirror and almost merged with it. I stopped for a second, wondering what happened, before continuing on to the mirror. I reached out to the mirror with my hoof, slowly nearing the surface, and my hoof started to quiver, I touched the surface, and it was like it wasn't there! No, it was like I wasn't there, as if it was more real than everything else, the only thing truly there. It was this real thing, that started to bellow out a thick, white mist that quickly surrounded the broken down house in its eeriness. I backed away with urgency, my mind speeding miles to think of something, anything to do. An appendage with five smaller stumps branching out from on larger one emerged from within the glassy plane, all of them pale and withered, reached out through the mirror, it grasped at the edges, looking for a hold on this world. It finally reach the end of the mirror, and it's hand wrapped around the edge. Vines showed through it's hand as it clenched the edge, and a giant leg started to burst through the smoke. Following it was the rest of the creature's body. It was devoid of all color, only appearing in different shades of gray. Thick, silken robes wrapped around the creatures body, covering each of it's appendages except for the very ends. It's head was very unusual, with a small nose and eyes, and a large mouth and ears. Looking closer, I saw that the thing's 'eyes' were nothing more than the sockets with only small beads of light filling the hole, giving the impression of pupils. Whatever was on it's forehead was covered up by a ghostly, translucent crown, arcing above his head. His robes were embedded with jewel like structures, and on each of his small appendages were rings of different shades. There was only one thought, one question, in my head once this creature and I met eye to eye: Is this Death? It's empty mouth freaked open, and a deep voice rang through the entire space. "At last, you summon me, young master." Then, its eye sockets focused toward me, and it... stopped. The mist completely dissipated as we started at each other for what seemed to be the longest moments of my life. "Oh dear, tell me young one, can you tell me who you are?" I opened my mouth to speak, but it quickly hit me like a brick wall, I couldn't remember my own name. I couldn't remember who I was at all. My eyes widened in shock as I opened and closed my mouth, unsure of what to say. His noticed this, and his pupils seemed to widen. He turned back to the mirror, seeing that it was shattered. "I feared as much, looks like even her descendants are not immune to this curse." he turned back towards me and motioned what seemed to be a sign to follow him. "Come, young one, there is much we have to talk about." He said as he began to walk away, myself cautiously following suit. __________________________________________ The ghostly figure led me throughout the building, with crisscrossing long pathways with rooms appearing in random locations. It was as if the architect of this place intended to create a giant labyrinth instead of a house. "Your mother was a talented magician, working alongside Star Swirl the bearded and Mellobrook in research to further ponykind's civilization. She specialized in memory magic and contacting other dimensional creatures, such as myself." What looked like a smile played at his lips, as if he cherished the thought. "But of course, this path had risks. As a safeguard, in case something ever happened to her memory, she created that mirror that you saw before, and I was to guard it in case anything happened. Of course, I was visited her frequently, she was rather clumsy and lost her memory often, but after try after try, we finally achieved what we had been researching for almost a century: immortality." He explained as I looked at him with shock and wonder. They actually made a spell to make one immortal? "If she was cut down, her body would reform here, no matter what you did to her, she would always come back. Unfortunately, the experiment was not without it's side effects, her already weakened memory was forever damaged, and she would have trouble recalling spells, potions, or even her own name. I was charged to always be by her side as she grew more and more child like, reverting to her younger form as she lost more and more. But..." His voice began wavering, as if what he was recalling hurt him like being stabbed a knife. "When the blast came, right before it hit her she launched me into the mirror and as she reverted to her adult, true form... she gave me one last charge: to protect whoever freed me from the mirror. As the blast hit her... it was the last thing I saw... she didn't die, but her eyes dimmed. I had seen the effect all to often, it was what happened when she lost her memory. Then it hit the glass... and the mirror was shattered into pieces. My only way back into this world was lost. My last thoughts were trying to hold on to my own memories, as the blast ripped them into shreds, all I could hold onto was those facts. Whoever did this, I don't think it just affected me and her, the blast broke the mirror, which relied on the memories of all those she knew... I think that blast effected the entire world." We had stopped walking, and I began contemplating what he said. I didn't know what to make of it, but it seemed like he was telling the truth. I didn't even know who or what he was, but if he knew my mother, he could be trusted right? "Why are you telling me this?" I asked him, and he turned to me. His lifeless sockets looking straight into my own eyes. "Because, young one, you are her child. You have inherited her curse, as well as her blessing. You too are immortal, and you are the only one who can return those lost memories." He said.
ExploreWe walked around the abandoned mansion for a few more minutes before I brought up the nerve to ask the clocked figure in front of me, "So.... mister giant thing of death, where are we?" He looked at me for a second before saying, "My name is Tartarus...jr. As for where we are, I honestly have no damn idea, my memory has also been affected. I can barely remember what I told you only minutes ago..." "Well isn't that amazing Mr. Tartarus, I can almost feel your usefulness from here!" I replied, my tongue dripping with sarcasm. Five seconds later, everything went black. "Ugh... what happened?" I groaned, waking up what I assumed was hours later. I tried to remember what happened, but nothing came to mind. It was like I was being blocked from remembering anything. "One of the useful things about you being immortal is that I can kill you and not feel bad." Said Tartarus without even a second of hesitation or remorse. Seriously? He just killed me without a second thought all because of a bit of sarcasm.... This guy either is really sensitive, has major anger issues, or an absolute nutter. I just hope it's not the latter. "Don't you want me to go on some giant quest to retrieve pieces of this mirror? You probably shouldn't kill someone you want to have help you." I stated "Well, I think that anyone with a sane mind would probably want their memories back." He was right, but I wasn't about to let him in on that. "I honestly don't care about them that much. What memories I had before whatever happened to me are gone, so I really don't care if they come back or not." He stared at me for a bit, then shook his head. "I suppose I can't argue with that, but you must be interested in the history of this world!" "Nope." I said blatantly and blankly. "Not even a little bit?" Asked Tartarus with the glimmer of hope I wasn't going to give him. "Not in your wildest dreams, I hate history." He sighed, looking defeated. "Fine, but I am still charged to protect you, helping or not." He said in a slightly irritated tone. I sighed in response to this, and started to walk away, looking for an exit. He glided next to me, facing backwards. Sometimes I forget he's like a ghost, and each time it freaks me out. Wandering through the mansion halls, I managed to find a kitchen, a bedroom, a congregation hall, a throne, heck I found a dirty pool everywhere I went. I seemed to find everything but an exit. I walked for hours in this damn place, wandering every way I could go. After what felt like the fifth hour, I yelled, "I quit! I don't even want to leave, I don't even care anymore!" as I found myself in the center of the horrid mansion for the Nth time. In a strange apparition of mist a door appeared, leading to outside. I found my eye twitch as Tartarus fell to ground, howling with laughter. "It seems your mother has a sense of humor!" He said between his wheezing laughter. "My mother is the damn devil if she thought that was funny!" I responded, I looked back at the door, trying to see what laid behind it. It was veiled with smoke, blocking any vision through. I started to walk towards it, edging my way to it's smoky apparatus. I stuck a hoof through, seeing if it happened to be a killing machine, because at this point I wouldn't be surprised. Seeing that my hoof was not torn off, I stepped through and found myself- Just... behind the doorway. I threw my hooves up in the air, exclaiming my frustration in a few choice words. "Should've known, this place is one giant troll fest." I said. I turned around, expecting Mr. Gray to be laughing his bony ass off again, only to see... a giant forest. "What the?" I exclaimed as nothing but the doorway remained of the castle behind me, replaced by this new scenery. I turned back around, only to find that instead of the castle, I found the same wooded area. I sighed, of course it wouldn't be straightforward, my madman of a 'mother' thrived on whatever this was. I scanned the area to see if there was any nearby towns, or signs of any. Alas, as my luck always seemed to be these days, I was stranded. A shadow covered the light behind me, and before I could react I was smothered by Tartarus. He glided straight past me, covering me in his ghostly body, I wasn't pushed around, but breathing inside him was like breathing on a extremely humid summer day. "Hmm..." He said as he surveyed the scene I responded by trying to his through his plasma. He looked down, his eyes widening as he hopped away from me. "Dear Lord, don't you know it's rude to go breathing in a ghosts essence?" He stated in disgust, as if he was the victim in what had occurred. "You went out of the door and smothered me before I could react!" "That's no excuse!" "That's the best excuse there is!" I retorted, but before our argument could go any further a sound could be heard between the two of us. That sound being a faint beat. We stopped squabbling and stared, at what was making the sound: a bush. We l stepped closer, with Tartarus following closely behind. I bent down, "Hello?" I whispered to the bush, no answer. I repeated my greeting, but there was no change in anything, Tartarus started to snicker. "Screw you bush!" I barked as I started to stomp on it, it didn't help in any way at all, but it made me feel better. The now trampled bush allowed me to see past it, and discover the true source of the beat, a small group of ponies singing around a campfire. "Oh." I said as Tartarus tried to contain his laughter. To no avail, of course. "Well I'm going to meet them, if you want to follow, you've got to do something about... this." I said pointing at his tall, bony figure. "Ah, they might not be used to the appendages, good point." I was about to say that the appendages were the least of the problem, but then he turned into a small ball of light with wings. "The heck is that?" I asked. "Dunno, but I'm sure they will take it as some sort of good luck sign, balls of light seem to do that." I shrugged, a tiny ball of light was better than a ten feet tall creature of death. I held my breath, and walked from the bush into where the ponies were.
RougesI walked towards the group singing around the fire, sporting a friendly smile and I waved at them. "Hello!" I said, and they turned to look at me. "I was wonder- GAH!" I yelled as the pony on my right, who was also the largest of them all, slammed into me and sent me flying. I flew for a good couple of feet before coming to a rest by a tree, dazed and in pain. The pony nearest to where I used to be zipped over, and in a flash overturned every nook and cranny that could hold anything. I almost felt violated by the way she searched my body. She ended it with a bop on the nose, then shouted. "He's got nothing!" Yelled the pony who searched me, before she zipped back to the others. They all nodded, then the one farthest from me, a pegasus, stood up and started to speak. "Sorry about the rough welcome, but these days, if you let your guard down you'll find someone taking everything you've worked to save. The name's Night, this fellow next to me is Entry." he said, pointing to the cloaked pony on his left. He continued to his left, pointing to the brute of a unicorn that had clobbered me not two minutes ago. "This good chap is Tanker, and next to him is his twin brother Tinker." Tanker grunted in response while his almost dwarf-like unicorn twin smiled at me. He then pointed to the pegasus who seemed to be tending to the fire and a smoking pot on top of it. Must've been food. "My good friend Amber, and the mare who searched you is Hoodlum." He said, introducing the final mare, who just sneered at me in return. "What brings you to these parts?" Asked Night. "Well, I was wondering where the nearest to-" I started, only to be interrupted by Tartarus. "We are looking for some things we lost, mainly small pieces of glass, and we were wondering if you had seen any?" He asked before we saw that they had seemed to only just notice Tartarus, and they backed up a step before deciding to respond. "Yes, as a matter of fact we have seen some, but first we must ask you another question." he said pointing at Tartarus. "How the hell did that parasprite talk?" "I'm sorry, I don't know what a paraprite is." I said in response, almost immediately earning a weird look from Night and his posse. "Did you hit your head? How did you get this far without knowing what a parasprite is? I'm surprised that nasty little bugger hasn't gone berserk and eaten everything you have. Unless... he already has." Said Night sceptically as he looked at my side and my lack of supplies. "I can assure you good sir, whatever a parasprite is, I'm not that." Said Tartarus. "Hey, I haven't seen a parasprite that has talked. As long as you keep that thing away from the food, you can stay." They walked back to their fire, with us following. "So, about the piece of glass?" Tartarus said. "Ah yes, your piece of glass, I'd be happy to give it to you, but that would leave us with quite a predicament. You see, that little piece of glass is keeping all the critters away, and we'd rather not part with our beast o'way just yet. Seeing as we would have quite the 'infestation' problem." "What would be the infestation problem exactly?" Tartarus asked. "Why they would be you, in case you didn't get the memo, your kind devours everything in its path. If the swarm, or even one parasprite sees a scrap of food, it eats without remorse and in a number of seconds. And if it gets too hungry, it doesn't get too picky about what it eats, living or not. Usually, we would be dead by now, either by starvation or a even more horrible death. But, luckily for poor old us, we found a neat little piece of glass, the same one you say you're looking for. For some reason or another, the little buggers seem to avoid it like the plague. We go out without it," he looked over to the pony named Entry. "What was the chance that we would even be able to make it out alive again?" The pony looked up, then made a symbol with his hooves. "Two percent, and we don't exactly plan on leaving." Tartarus nodded, or more like bobbed up and down. "So, if we were able to keep them away without the glass, would you give it to us?" He asked. Night laughed, and after he had finished, he said to us, "If you could find another way to keep them away, I'd be more than glad to give it to ya. This thing may keep them away, but it feels like it's taking our energy in return." He looked over to their bag of supplies warily. "Plus, it gives us the creepiest feeling, like there's a monster breathing down our back...just watching us." Said Night in a silent, disturbed tone. I looked up at Tartarus, thinking. It didn't take much to put two and two together and guess that he was most likely the source of that discomfort. "But hey, while you're here, you can have some dinner, we've got plenty of extra." I sat down, pondering, if what they were saying was true, immortal or not I too was going to need a way to get past the parasprites. Maybe I could convince them to head to town with the piece of glass. "So, why don't any if you want to head back to civilization?" I asked the group, Night taking it upon himself to answer that question for all of them. "We've all got our reasons. Hoodlum has stolen from the pockets of so many powerful people she's the only small time crook to have a reward of over a thousand bits. Alas, she got a bit too cocky, and tried to steal the regalia from Celestia's own head! Got herself a dreadful time in the clanker. Tinker and Tanker worked as a team, making large scale heists of the most secure places, broke into stuffy noble's vaults. Unfortunately, one noble was a bit more prepared than the others, had a trap set just for them. Entry worked as an accountant for almost every important pony, and on every single giant purchase they made he took a bit of their money, only a couple bits. He covered his tracks well, and had amassed a large fortune just as big as those he worked for, was almost ready to retire and everything too. Unfortunately, some detective or PI got a whiff of what he was doing, and unraveled all of his work. I pity him, one of the nobles was really mad, cast a mute curse on the poor bastard. Smart as any high profile genius and can't speak a word." I looked to Night and the only pony he's not mentioned yet. "What about you and Amber?" "Us? Well, depending on your view, we either did the least or the most evil. When war broke out between Celestia and Luna, we chose the wrong side. Found myself a natural profession for war and strategy and rose the ranks fast, before I knew it I was leading a sizable chunk of her army as one of her generals. What I didn't have in strength, I made up tenfold in strategy and leadership. Soon Amber showed up, Luna thought he would be a good lieutenant. She was correct, and he showed talent in giving troops moral support and as a great cook. Only downside was that he wouldn't hurt a fly, froze up in battle like a mouse looking into the mouth of a lion, and would faint at the sight of a drop of blood." Said Night as he looked to his war buddy, who had begun to blush in return of the embarrassing details that had been spoken of. "Didn't really matter though, he could calculate the enemies plan like he was in their head, and planned the whole thing out before it even happened, I only really took charge the small amount that his plans didn't work. Before we knew it we were at the front of the war, cutting through Celestia's front lines like paper. He knew every man who was under his charge by name..." he stopped talking and looked over to where Amber was cooking stew silently. "And has mourned every one." I looked to Amber, and I noticed it. His eyes. Though he was smiling, I could see in his eyes all the pain and suffering he has seen, all the death... It's like he wants to cry, but he has no more to give. Nobody should have to endure that kind of pain, so how can he? Night turned back to me and continued his story. "Anyways, we marched to the capital in one final push, we had victory in our grasp. Luna was now standing right beside us, looking over our strategies and leading the troops with us. Defense after defense fell, and soon we were in the palace. Then, in a second, everything crumbled. Blood Dancer, the Griffon King himself, and his army swept in from the rear. Nightstalker, one of our own generals, turned against us and killed his lieutenant. We could've survived it, but Celestia herself flew in and tackled Luna, engaging in a duel that everyone knew how it would end. Our section was the only one that held out for more than a minute, hour after hour, our troops held out against the battering, soon even Celestia joined in, and I had the honor of fighting her myself. Could barely hold out, but I knew that as soon as I fell, so would my troops. I had to keep fighting, for them. Dodging, slicing, I fought like I had never had before. But of course she was an alicorn, and I, a simple pegasus. Eventually she wore me out, and as the last of my troops fell, so did I." A most delicious smell wafted over, and Night's story was interrupted by Amber hitting his spoon to the pot, signaling dinner was ready. Wooden bowls were arranged with soup inside each of them. Stumps of trees served as seats. I took up my bowl, and after seeing everyone else do the same, I sipped from the bowl, and it was as if liquid straight from heaven was flowing down my throat. "This is delicious!" I exclaimed. Amber grinned, and sipped from his own bowl, I could tell he took his cooking very seriously. "It's a gift alright!" Hoodlum said. "Parasprites or not, we would have starved without him." "Hey, you wanted to know why we can't give you the piece of mirror?" Tinker said looking up from a small cube like object he was tinkering with. "Yeah, parasprites right?" Tartarus said. "Look behind you." He said, darting his eyes to the spot behind where I was sitting. We turned around, and almost fell out of our seats, a giant swarm of small round things with wings, not unlike Tartarus, was amassing all around us. But they never crossed a line made out of small twigs encircling the camp. "Crazy right!" Said Tanker, laughing wholeheartedly at how I fell out of my seat. Entry nudged Night and made a series of movements with his hooves when he had his attention. Night nodded when he finished and looked at me soon after. "Entry asked how you got here, and now that he mentions it, I'm curious too. How exactly did you manage to get past that?" He said, motioning over to the swarm of parasprites. "That's a funny story, really. Ya know how you asked if I hit my head?" I said. "Don't tell me, you have absolutely no idea?!" "None at all, I swear. I just woke up here, near you guys." It was sort of true at least, I'm not completely lying to them. "Just how hard did you hit your head?" Tinker asked me, not looking away from the cube in his hooves. "Hard enough that I didn't know who Celestia and Luna are, much less that there was a war between them. Heck, I don't even know my own name!" Entry made another series of movements with his hooves, to which Night gladly translated again. "Entry said that's pretty hard alright." I took another swig of my soup, swirling it in my mouth to really get all of the taste before swallowing. "Hard enough to feel like I fell down a canyon." I said. We all finished our soup, then Night continued his story. "After the battled had concluded, I was so tired. Everyone else on our side had surrendered and denounced Luna as soon as she lost to her sister, and like pigs, they groveled at Celestia's hooves. Fuckin' yellow bellied cowards, the lot of 'em. Me and Amber were the only ones who refused to denounce her, and believe me, they wanted us to. They did everything they could think of just to get us to say something along the lines of ‘I was brainwashed!’ or ‘I was forced to! Luna is evil, she made me side with her!’ But of course we refused, and we became the scapegoats. Life sentences in the highest security prison in all of Equestria was our punishment. All of us," he said pointing to the rest of the group. "Found ourselves in the same cell, and we thought we would be there until we shrivelled away and died." "What happened?" I asked, almost on edge from Night's story. "The man in the cell next to us, he was someone we could agree was insane. He always muttered, and would spontaneously do crazy things, like climb up his cell walls. One day, he stops muttering, and sits down. The guard near him walked over near him, thinking that he was safe, after all, he didn't have any magic, and it wasn't like he could bend alloy steel bars in a room that nullified all magic inside it. We all thought that, but as soon as the guard stepped near, he launched himself into the air, and bent the bars like they were tinfoil. Poor guy didn't even have time to react, he was dead before he hit the ground. Luckily for us, the keys rolled over to our cell, and Tinker was just small enough to fit his arms through the bars. We expected a fight, figuring that our neighbour had been taken out already, but all we saw was carnage, the beast had killed every single guard in it's path. Course, we knew that when life gave you lemons, you make lemonade, and we walked out of the most secure prison without a single defence pointed at us. The beast was easy to track, what with the massive trail of blood and limbs, so we went the opposite way. We raced to shelter and safety, picking up news all throughout. Apparently the beast ran into a dragon's cave, and found itself between the elite guard and one of the most powerful beings known. Heard it put up a fight, even clawing one of the dragon's eyes out and killing three guardsmen before it died. Alas, with our distraction dead, they quickly realized that we were gone, and then focused their search on us. By that time, we were already in here, an impenetrable natural forest. With a piece of glass being the master key." He yawned, and flopped down on a blanket. "And that is how the Hattens arrived here. Now, I'm going to get some shut eye, while you try to find a way to stop those." He said pointing to the swarm of parasprites before heading to a spot near the fire and falling into sleep, his group following that same motion. I too started drifting to sleep, wondering just what I had been told. The names resonated with me, but I couldn't point it just out. Celestia, Luna...who were they to me in the past? I stared at the moon, and noticed that it almost looked like a pony was in it. The more I looked at it though, it was similar to the feeling Night and the others have had since getting our glass, like it's watching me back... Just what have I gotten myself into?
HattensThree days had past since I had joined the Hattens, and I slowly got used to their weird routine, and soon made my own to fit. At morning a natural alarm clock of parasprites woke all of us up, except, of course, Tinker, he slept like a bug bear in hibernation. (At least, that's what Hoodlum said.) In fact, Tinker and Tanker were exact opposites, where Tinker slept in, Tanker was always the first to wake up, while Tinker was very agile, Tanker, probably due to his size, was quite clumsy. Tinker was a sharpshooter and even made his crossbow to custom fit him, of course, he couldn't even slash a knife in a straight line. Tanker on the other hand couldn't shoot anything five feet away from him, but could wield huge spears, axes, and swords with uncanny ease unbefitting his usual clumsiness. Tinker could create extremely weird machinery out of a couple spare parts he had in his coat, while Tanker couldn't create anything resembling useful if he had an entire supplies needed to make a castle. And... Of course, who could miss the last one, Tanker loved any kind of humor, he would make jokes you could laugh your head off, puns that would make anyone cringe, of course while trying to hold back a smile, and riddles that would befuddle even Entry for a few minutes. Judging from the record, you probably know how Tinker is, he absolutely abhorred any kind of jokes, and he tried his best to avoid any and all humor, if you said the funniest joke in the world, Tinker would simply fixate you with a stare like a Basilisk, according to hoodlum, until you backed off, and even when he tried to make a joke, usually to try to appease his brother, it would be the absolute most horrible joke that gives you this sour taste in your mouth just thinking about what he said. It would either be way too dark or grim, or one thankful occasions, simply not funny at all, one of the most memorable being "What's the hardest part of a vegetable to eat? The wheelchair!" For the life of me, I didn't get it, but apparently everyone else did, and a very disturbing silence filled the campfire, only pierced by the buzzing of parasprites and the waving of Entry's hand in what I could only guess was a extremely rude gesture. But, of course time goes on, not stopping to strike down such horrid humor, and Tinker lived another day. Every morning without fail Amber cooked the most delicious meal, somehow using leaves, acorns, and a pinch of meat and spices to create what Hoodlum called ichor, and everyone agreed with him. After that we had what Night said Entry called his warm up, and he laid out seven platforms complete with small figurines of things called pawns, knights, bishops, castles, and a single king and queen. each had a special ability, and the objective was to capture your enemy's 'king.' Apparently he had carved all of it himself, and was able to carve one for both me and Tartarus during the night that I had arrived. I never really got the hang of it, and on the first day he was able to capture my king in 7 moves and he lost a single pawn, while three of my pieces were lost, including the queen. Nobody was surprised about this, as he beat Hoodlum in eighteen moves, only losing three pieces, and Tanker was taken down in twenty five, but was able to take out an impressive number of Entry's figurines. The only people who could put up a fight was Tinker, Night, Amber, and Tartarus. But eventually first Tinker lost, with fifty two moves, and then Night dragging it out despite having only a king, bishop, and a couple pawns for the last half for ninety two moves. What had surprised everyone, however, was when Tartarus showed a surprising proficiency at the game, with only he and Amber putting up a real match against Entry. The match moved over a hundred moves, and no clear winner was in sight of either of the games, All three competitors made moves that made no sense to me, or to anyone else but themselves, only for five moves later the seemingly random play would enable them to have an advantage. Of course, things could only stretch out so long, and as a hundred and fifty moves approached, the winners became clear. Amber had cleared Entry of all of his best figurines in a few swift and concise moves so easily that we couldn't tell if he had taken all this time to set it up, or had simply gotten serious. Tartarus was on the losing side, but he made sure for that every figurine he lost, Entry would lose one too. It ended with apparently the usual, with the exception of Tartarus. Amber, one hundred fifty moves exactly, and won, and Tartarus, with one hundred sixty two moves, but only three pieces remained on the board, the kings, and one bishop belonging to Entry. After that confusing game they called chess we went on something much simpler, a hunt for food. They packed everything edible they had in five minutes, with pinpoint precision they had everything wrapped up in bags for them all to carry, with Tanker carrying the most, and you can probably guess who carried the least. Night explained that as they were going out to check traps if they kept their stuff at camp, and left with the piece of glass, their supplies would be eaten, and a horrible fate would befall whoever left the camp without the key. Wildlife had found ways to avoid the parasprites with camouflage, burrowing down into the ground, or a host of other things. Of course, it didn't really stop them from falling into traps, or Tanker's spear. It was a simple, mundane task, simply wandering with a host of items to pick up dead things and kill living ones. While Hoodlum Tinker, and Tanker hunted, Night checked traps, and Entry and Amber foraged for berries, fruits, and edible grass. Hoodlum and Tanker seemed to have made a game of hunting, to see who could bring in the most pounds of meat, only for Tinker to have brought back the most in the end, with a grimace on his face. When all of the hunting was over, we all settled in, and as Amber cooked the meal we had brought back, they all started to tell stories. Entry crafted fictional tales of ancient legend, which was translated by Night to Equestrian. Tinker told stories of a future with where he said something called science was advanced much beyond what we had today, honestly I wouldn't have understood a word of what he said if what he told was accompanied by flashing images that flowed from his horn. Hoodlum told of a story of a brave adventurer who traveled the world, finding great treasure and discovering lost civilizations. Night told what he called the great story of history, depicting great struggles of all kinds that he had remembered reading about. Tanker would tell of folk tales of the wildest things, such as creatures that were described much like Tartarus, but with skin that only came in shades of white to black, and had struggles much like ours, it was just as complicated to understand as Tinker's 'sci-fi' stories. Usually about the time the sun went parallel to the ground, creating a brilliant orange sky, the meal was ready to eat, I dug into it with all of the ferocity of a parasprite, finding myself extremely hungry. "Will you look at that, you could mistake him for a northern griffon with the way he's tearing into the meat!" Hoodlum said, and for the first time I noticed that they were all staring at me rather strangely. I slowly put the leg of a rabbit I had been eating started sipping the soup gingerly. After a nauseating minute of everyone staring at me chugging down the soup, Tinker decided to explain their concern. "While we can eat meat, for most ponies it's uh... an acquired taste as they say." I couldn't decide whether to reply or not, so I continued to drink the broth. "You can eat it, we were just surprised at the... velocity at which you ate it." Hearing what I took as the ok to eat more, I dove into the rabbit, tearing gigantic chunks of and letting the flavor swirl around in my mouth. Those poor ponies didn't know what they were missing! "I think we created a monster." Was all Hoodlum or anybody said while watching me eat the rabbit. I simply replied with "You gonna eat yours?" After dinner everyone did their own thing, Tinker fiddled with the small parts he had, creating something, grunting, then reconfiguring it to create something else. Tanker and Hoodlum talked with each other, chatting about what they had done, and what they plan to do. Entry and Amber both had pads of paper, but while Entry seemed to be writing something, Amber drew, he flipped through page after page, drawing rough sketches of ponies, and other things. Night simply laid down and looked at the night sky. Me? I pondered how to solve the problem of the parasprites, whatever else happened, I wasn't getting out of this forest without solving how to get rid of the beastly things, and to add to my horrendous luck the door to the mansion had disappeared. I started to drift to sleep when I heard a melody echo throughout the forest, eerie, haunting and smooth, it gave me chills hearing it. I turned around and saw that it emanated from Tinker's small gadget, unlike all the other times when he simply grunted and started to rearrange it, he held the box as it played the sad song, and a smile rose to his face. I started to listen, and I soon heard underlying melodies, under the original melody, like a ghostly choir singing its tune from the dead. It was almost hypnotic in style, then I noticed something quite uncanny, the parasprites, instead of fluttering around, screeching with no rhythm or rhyme, they followed the song, gently swaying to the choir as if it was one attentive being listening, with it fluttering in a way that matched that of the music, even adding another layer to it. I slowly got up, and walked over to where Tinker was so absorbed with the box that he noticed nothing of what was going on. I tapped him on the shoulder, and as he looked up I saw a hint of longing in his eyes before he noticed what I was pointing to, and his face turned to one of shock and surprise as he watched the swarm sway to his music. "Aria, even in death you never cease to amaze me." He whispered, he was so struck by what happened that he forgot about his box, not noticing as it slipped from his hoofs until it hit the ground. As it hit, the music skidded to a halt, and as it faded away the parasprites whipped themselves into a frenzy, screeching a flying around so fast and so heavily that it seemed like a chromatic wall had appeared in front of us. Both of our eyes went from wonder to panic as the wall started to move forward, crossing the stick line, as if breaching an invisible barrier. "Fix it fix it fixitfixitfixitFIXIT!" I yelled as the wall of parasprites moved ever closer, edging its way to us, probably not helping much. "I'm trying my best!" He yelled back frantically reinserting screws and other things. The wall moved closer and closer, enveloping our supplies, and by now everyone had taken notice of this dilemma, and we all backed up to where the piece of glass was kept, and Tanker started to wave his spear at the swarm, desperately trying to fend of the wall of parasprites that enclosed us, devouring everything in its path. Tanker's spear broke off, and what little stalling he did was gone, and the wall of parasprites closed in on us with terrifying determination. Just as the swarm was about to eat us all, Tinker inserted one last screw, and with joy he started the music again, yelling "I got it!" Almost immediately the swarm was pacified, and started to flutter with the song again, even more peaceful than before. We all looked at each other, and back at the swarm of parasprites, now fluttering around us with tranquility. I reached out a hoof, and expected it to be chewed off as soon as it came into contact with a parasprite, but instead it simply rested on my arm, shaking to the music. I breathed a sigh of relief, immortal or not, that would've hurt, I looked to the others, then stepped into the multitude of creatures. Not a single one even tried to bite me, they simply swayed to the music, creating a cascade of color fitting the feel of the song. In fact, they seemed to have a performance of their own, creating giant colors and images each cascading into each other to create a beautiful backdrop to the seemingly haunting music. Tinker was the first to recover from the shock of what had transpired, and said. "You know, when they aren't trying to kill us, they truly are majestic."
SpiritWe all started walking around, no longer confined to the parasprites, half trying to let it blend in, while also trying to admire the show they put on for us. Entry frantically scribbled in his journal, while Amber seemed to be trying to draw the scene in front of us, we all looked around to find our stuff, as much of it had thrown by the parasprites' rage. I soon found Tartarus laying down beneath some overturned supplies, fast asleep. I slowly lifted him up by a wing and, ever so harshly, tried my best to slap him to the nearest tree and into a pile of ghostly goo, of course, this only succeeded in carrying a couple inches, and waking him up. "Wonderful day isn't it! look even the parasprites are... oh, did I do something wrong?" He said as I fixated him with my best death glare I could muster. "You could say that," I said, my eye involuntarily twitching. "Maybe a nice save from the giant swarm that was right about to rend us limb from limb, Mr. all powerful demon." He yawned, and lazily looked up at me, as if he was simply looking at a bug, despite me being a good twenty times his current size. "You're immortal, they would probably tear you apart so fast you wouldn't feel a thing, no biggie, and then we would return and collect the shard, and be on our way." The way he so casually remarked of it struck me as disgusting, as if he had no care about life. "What about the others! I don't believe they are immortal!" I lowered my voice to a whisper, hoping he would cue onto it, as I didn't exactly want the fact that I'm immortal being thrown around, it could 'rustle some jimmies' as Hoodlum would say. Unfortunately, he didn't pick up on it, and spoke in his normal voice. "So what of it, they are simple mortals, even thieves, murderers, and traitors, nobody would miss them. And even if someone did, they don't have any importance in the long run, despite being good company, that's all they are really good for. And, say, we kept with them on our travels, we would be branded as accomplices, and when they are eventually captured, you would be too, and many years would be taken off our search for the shards." My blood started to boil, so what if they were 'mortals' or criminals, or whatever, they were good ponies! Even if not good ponies, still ponies, lives, just because he was so concerned about some pieces of goddamn glass he would not care if they died! I raised my hoof, planning try my hardest to swat him out of the sky, even though I knew I couldn't touch him. But when my hoof reached his body, I felt contact, actual contact, like that of bones, not goo like I had felt all the other times! I used all of my strength to slam him into the ground, and he bounced off of that, slamming into the tree I had tried to hit into before, and I heard an encompassing thunk as the tree seemed to bend a little bit, much like when Tanker had slammed me into the tree. So what! you're just gonna let them be eaten because you're lazy! And so what if we have a longer lifespan than them, it doesn't mean you can regard them like figurines on a chessboard! I yelled with all my might at the demon, all of my energy seemed to fill to a burst! Then it flattened like a deflated balloon as the air started to warp, and even seem to boil around Tartarus. In an instant, the small parasprite illusion shattered, and his true form was revealed. His usual demeanor was broken, instead of an almost skeletal face his head was broken, and black liquid flowed from the cracks and edges of what now seemed like a mask. I stared at my hoof, which had some of the black liquid on it, I quickly shook it off, and looked back at the demon known as Tartarus. As I watched, his bones started to fuse back together, as everything else around it seemed to be sapped of life, and the tree that he had crashed into withered away, making a husk like it had been dead and rotting for a hundred years. His mask reformed into the skeleton body that I had seen before, and the pinprick eyes returned, only they were now seemingly burning red! He took a single step toward me, and he twisted one of his rings, producing a sparking fire as something started to emerge from it. Just as a shape started to form from the ring, sky blue light started to emerge from his spotlight eyes, slowly replacing the blood red that had illuminated his body. When it completely replaced the red he twisted his ring, and the mist dissipated into nothingness. He looked down at me, his eyes back to a brilliant white as he took a single step towards me. "Boy." He said, picking me up with one hand and bringing me to his height, His spotlight pupils now shone directly into mine, and his voice resonated with contained anger. "Let me get a few things straight with you, I am not a demon, I am a spirit, and don't you ever call me one of those vile despicable creatures ever again. Next, I am your guardian, but that does not mean I will knock some sense into you if I have to." In response I gave him a defiant glare, if he wanted to kill everyone in order to get these things, I would have no part of it, no matter what he did to me. He sighed and slowly put me down, relaxing his bony body. He sat down, once again putting us at eye level, but now it was at mine, and through his anger, another emotion seemed to be conveyed through his words, respect. "I should've known, you really are your mother's son, just as stubborn, innocent, and goodhearted as she was." "I suppose I have some explaining to do," He said scratching his non existent neck. "Truth be told, even if I was awake, I wouldn't have been able to save you or the 'Hattens'." I gave him a confused look, and in response he waved his hand, as it arced towards a tree, I expected a thunk as bone would meet bark, but instead his hand phased through the tree as if they were on different planes of reality. "As a spirit my ability to manipulate the world is rather limited, you were only able to touch me due to you being my anchor, almost all other physical objects are beyond my realm of grasp." It made sense, but as I looked past him I remembered the tree that he crashed into, the one now withered up. I asked about that, and he looked back at the tree before giving me an answer. "There are certain things that can interact with spirits without being an anchor, they are enabled this ability by being exponentially close to the afterlife. The tree, for example, was a liverwood, a tree known for growing where the deceased lie, using the nutrient of the dead to quickly grow. Some cultures view them as a monument, others a curse or evil omen." I was able to grasp the gist of it, and he seemed to be relieved at that fact. I walked over to the others, before realizing that they were carrying on like there wasn't a giant skeleton walking beside me. "Wait, why didn't notice our little... scuffle?" "I can still do simple illusion magic, all they saw was my parasprite form being smacked softly into a tree, which did not wither and die. As long as you don't try to backhand me into any conveniently placed trees, you'll see me as a parasprite again in a few minutes, give or take." We approached where they were working, only to hear a few delectable swears passed by Hoodlum as he overturned the supply store, only to find a very obvious lack of supplies waiting for us. "Looks like the dancin' pests didn't bother to save our food, everything's gone!" Night looked over from his position, saying. " It's the same over here, looks like the buggers took all of it." A rousing voice echoed through the camp, belonging to Tanker. "It's the same all around, looks like." Everyone nodded in agreement, as we somberly extracted what was left of our stuff, as most of it was broken or eaten by the swarm. "It doesn't look like we can salvage much, and the mirror seems to no longer work against the things," He turned to TInker. "How long can you keep that box singing?" He responded solemnly. "Only a couple of hours, it's partially magic operated, and it's exhausting me." Worried looks spread through the small group, the silence was broken by none other by Entry and Amber, with Entry tapping Tankers broken spear to get everyone's attention. "If that's the case, then we need to get out." Amber said. "Either that, or we'll be giving ourselves up to how the swarm feels about the music stopping again." This broke everyone from their trance, and we quickly started packing our remaining things up, and we started to head to civilization. Night walked up to me, with the piece of glass in hoof. "Well, one way or another, you found another way to keep the parasprites at bay, so I don't believe we'll be needing this." He put the piece in my hoof, and started to walk to the others. "Oh, and if you want I guess you get a free guide to out of this forest, whether or not you want to stay with us." I put my piece of glass into my new saddlebag, one down, whoever knows how many to go.
FarmWe trudged ahead, never stopping to view the scenery, as we were on a tight schedule, making our way through the forest, the farther we walked, the less the parasprites followed, one by one they stopped following the haunting music, and made their way back to the depths of the forest. More and more light penetrated through the high tops of trees, and before we knew it we had left the safety of trees, and they shifted into giant fields of golden wheat, all growing ridiculously high, reaching even above our heads, and leaning in like a gaping mouth about to swallow us whole. They walked with their heads lowered, and legs tense, as if they were prepared to dash at any moment. I suppose they had a right to, now that they were out of the forest, if their stories were right they were in just as much danger out here as we were in the forest, surrounded by bloodthirsty parasprites. A barn started to show through the layers of wheat, and a single pony, lacking both a wing or a horn layed down beside it, a sliver of wheat in his or her mouth, and their coat was a dark brown. The others sighed, of relief or despair, but whatever it was they were quickly cut off as the barn door opened, and they all dashed to the safety of the tall golden crops. A pony, no, two, no three, one of each species walked out of the barn door, each clad in synonymous armor, each depicting a bright sun on their body. The pony sleeping slowly opened his eyes, and leaned over to the ponies I supposed were guards from the Hattens reaction. "You gentlemen find what you were looking for?" The earth pony stepped forward, responding to the pony. "Afraid not, good sir, but we are thankful for your cooperation in this brutal time." "No problem, you guys are already stretched incredibly thin, and I prefer to not interfere with your jobs, hate to create extra work." "Erm, thank you, kind... citizen." They trudged up the path to where I was, and almost didn't notice me, up close I noticed they had bags under their eyes, as though they hadn't slept in days. When they did notice me they put on a business face and walked up to me holding up some papers. "Excuse me, we're sorry to bother you, but have you seen any suspicious characters such as these, we were told they were in the area." They held out a small stack of four papers. I looked at them, none of which depicted any of the Hattens, instead they depicted four different ponies, all unicorns, all in pinstriped suits, they looked more like they were going to a business meeting than belonging on wanted posters. "I'm afraid not, I'll tell you if I see these ponies." "Thank you... for your cooperation." He said, half falling asleep. They continued on right past where the Hattens were hiding, seemingly not noticing them even as they past right by Tanker's hiding place. They trudged on, heads nodding down then shooting back up, and they soon were past our line of sight. "You folk can come out now, don't pretend to hide, I saw you from a mile away." The pony laying next to the barn spoke, his eyes were closed, but when no one emerged he repeated the statement. "I said get out of my perfectly good crops and onto the nice pathway I set up, not hide in them like a bunch of bandits!" When no one moved he sighed and said, "Now, don't worry, I won't call any guards, if you were looking for trouble you would've mugged those unfortunate souls when they past you, wouldn't take much, even if they find who they are looking for they aren't going to capture them in their deprived state." First Night, then Hoodlum, and then all the others besides Entry moved out of the golden wheat, and back on the path. He didn't look up, but simply said. "All of them, mister light foot, I'd hate to have to drag you out of there, be an awful lot of work for both of us." Finally Entry moved out of his hiding place, and out into the open. "Great," The pony said, "Now, who might all you fine people be?" We explained ourselves, sensing no hostility from the strange pony, and he simply yawned when we finished our story. "From the woods, you say, must be on the run from your jumpiness. I'll see if grandma has any extra food she can hand out, wanted to give it to the guards, but they refused, poor chaps haven't had any good rest in weeks." He leaned back even further, and knocked on the barn he was leaning on three times in rapid succession, and a final one a second later. an answer of eight knocks, some farther apart than others, echoed from the barn. "You're in luck, she's got some extra bread and water for you guys." "Uhhhhhh..." We were just as confused as the guards were, if not more so. "Thanks?" "No problem, you guys take it easy, I'll lead you to the table." He opened his eyes and yawned, mouth gaping open. he scratched his back and started to lead us to the barn doors. He paused right before he opened the doors. He turned to us and said. "Oh, by Celestia, you might want to duck." "What?" I said, before any response was issued he swung open the barn doors, and a high pitched wail could be heard throughout the old house. "AYAYAYYAYAYAYAYAYAYYAYAYAYAYYAAAAAAA" A voice yelled, I remebered his advice and slammed to the ground just as a pony flew past me, swinging on a rope. Everyone followed suit, but Tanker was not so lucky, as he had been placed at the lowest point of the swing, and even ducking, his considerable girth had made him an optimal target for the crazy pony. All of his gigantic weight was sent flying, knocking over anyone behind him, and was being propelled by the pony. He fell belly up, and before he could react a bucket of water was flung on his face, and a loaf of bread was shoved into tanker's mouth. "Grandma please! Just one day! Didn't you get the knock?" "You know the rules Gilden, all ponies need the exercise, if they can 'scape from me they can eat at the table! Wohohohohohoo!" The pony stood up, and lo behold, the pony who took down tanker was none other than an old, wrinkled pony, holding stacks of bread. We were all dumbstruck for a moment, our brains trying to comprehend just what kind of shenanigans was happening. "Wohohohohohhohooo!" Our shock quickly turned to adrenaline and pure, raw, fear as the old lady started to run at us at blinding speeds, and with a very dangerous gleam in her eye. She targeted Hoodlum first, and Hoodlum did what she knew second best, run like hell itself was racing to feed him a loaf of bread. She shot across the barn, running for the hills, and at first it seemed that she was outrunning the devil granny, and the old lady leaned to the left, seemingly giving the impression of giving up and turning around. She disappeared into the wheat, probably to attack us and take us by surprise. Hoodlum slowed down a bit, her legs starting to give out. He approached the top of the hill, with granny nowhere to be seen, she gasped a sigh of relief, and collapsed at the top of the hill. "You almost got me sonny, but you're gonna have to run a little faster than that if you want to eat at the Oat's table!" Her scream was muffled as a loaf of bread was put in her mouth. The granny had moved into the wheat, and had seemingly reappeared at the top of the hill! The old lady turned to us, causing a shiver to go down our spines, and she disappeared into the wheat again. Our hearts raced as clumps of golden wheat shifted and swayed to the wind, never giving her position away. For what seemed to be an hour, we stood, frozen in anticipation of where she was going to appear next. A small shift in the wheat appeared for a moment, then the crazy lady shot out of the grains, launching herself at Night. Unlike me, he seemed ready for the oncoming onslaught, and gritted his teeth as the small ball of death raced to him. At the last moment, he rolled to the left, the wind of the granny arm thrusting bread could be felt feet away. The old lady seemed to grin, seemingly accepting this new challenge. "Left, up, right, up, down, why you're going all around!" She said in a singsong voice, trying to hit the poor former general with the piece of bread. Each time she launched another piece of bread, Night barely dodged it, ducking, jumping, rolling, blocking, anything and everything possible he tried to stop the pastry from being forced inside his mouth. He started to tire, and his dodges became less and less accurate, more often than not he grazed the pastry, barely stopping it. In a last ditch attempt he tried fighting back, raising his hoof to knock the piece of bread from her hand. And... he did! despite all odds, he timed it just right, knocking the piece of bread from her hoof... And into her other hoof, his eyes widened, but that was all he could react before her hoof came thrusting down, filling his gullet with a loaf of bread and knocking him to the ground. She turned around and narrowed her eyes on Me, crap. "Let's go sonny boy!" She yelled, launching herself to me. "Wait!" I yelled, and surprisingly, she skidded to a halt. "Yes dearie?" "Um, uh, erm," My brain wracked up for anything that fell within a plan. "Could I... have a loaf of bread?" "Why yes!" She launched herself at me, about to put the loaf of bread in my mouth. "Wait!" I yelled again, "I meant like that I could use against you, it seems kinda one sided when you're the only one with the bread, could I have one to try to get you with by any chance?" "Oh, why didn't you say so? of course!" Her terminal velocity stopped, and she slowly put a loaf of thin bread in my hoof, then backed up and took a similar piece from her pile. "As the industrialists would say, en garde!" She launched herself at me, piece of bread in her hand. We clashed in my desperate bid to not have a loaf of bread shoved down my throat, and despite the softness of the bread, it rattled my right foreleg to it's core, but at least I blocked it. In one swift movement she rolled behind me, somehow keeping the bread clean the entire roll, and thrust the breadstick where I was a second ago, if not for a skeletal hand pulling me out of the way. "Keep your eyes open, one hit and it's all over!" Tartarus said, before thrusting my head down to avoid another swing of the devil granny's bread. This swing had left her open, and I jabbed my breadstick at her face. Or where her face was, in a flash she had disappeared, and nothing besides Tartarus saving my neck once again by tossing me aside to avoid a strike from above. The old woman squinted at the parasprite illusion,and started swinging the breadstick at the parasprite, with Tartarus able to easily dodge her swings like a... well as Hoodlum would put it, a parasprite and a swatter. She was distracted by Tartarus, and took the opportunity a second time, swinging in for the meal. Just as my breadstick was about to reach it's intended destination, The granny leaned back, and in a swift movement thrust her breadstick in my mouth. Didn't actually taste that bad, could use some meat, but of course I was in too much of a daze to realize that, and pain, so much pain, getting whapped by a breadstick wielded by an old grandma hurts a lot more than you'd expect. As I slowly recovered, munching on the bread, I saw the old lady slowly approaching Amber, who was sitting down. "May I have a piece of bread?" Amber said, smiling and holding out his hands. The devil granny grinned and sped up to meet him, but just as she was about to pelt him with the bread, a rock that, looking back, was obvious was there, but seemed to never catch my attention, hit the old lady's hooves, causing her to go flying. "N-now!" Amber yelled, and Tinker appeared out of the grass, wielding a small blowgun made of tightly interwoven wheat, and shot a small pellet, aiming right where the old granny was flying. At the last moment this crazy lady seemed to twist in midair, and flung a loaf of bread at terminal velocity speeds at the same angle as the pellet. They collided, and the pellet was shot to the side, and the bread shot to Tinker, landing with a sickening thump on his face. "Ha! Gotta try a little harder than some rocks and a plum seed to take me out!" She said, but her eyes widened when she looked down, when she threw the bread it changed her trajectory the slightest bit, and straight into Tanker's freshly dug hole. A lovely fwump could be heard as she landed, and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. "How deep is that hole?" Gilden asked? "A good fifteen feet, she isn't getting out of there anytime soon." Tanker said, wiping the sweat from his brow. "You just had to say that." said Amber. As soon as the sentence was finished the old lady started to cackle, giving everyone a near heart attack as she leapt out of the hole while flinging a piece of bread at Amber, hitting him in the stomach. She turned to Gilden, saying, "Your turn dear grandkiddie 'o boy!" It seemed that even relatives were not spared in the bread apocalypse. His eyes widened more like someone who had forgotten something important, and then he quickly... Did nothing at all, he just waited for his granny of death to come to him, like a man who had accepted his fate, and judging from the fact that this happened regularly, was no surprise. Just as her hoof came wailing down to deliver her punishing grains, her arm seemed to bend, like it was being distorted, and the cascade of hooves and bread that came after the first all seemed to bend around Gilden, creating a vortex of bread as seemed to fire her punches at the speed of sound, but without him moving an inch, not a single one seemed to land. Then something strange happened, a bead of sweat formed on his head, then another, then another, and soon the distortions lessoned, and in one final blow, it completely stopped, and Gilden was knocked to the ground by the force of the bread. She took out a piece of bread, and the both of them nibbled away at the meal, and for the moment everything seemed calm, even peaceful, at least until the bread was finished. "Alright where's lightfoot?!" The granny said, wiping the last crumbs from her mouth. From what Gilden had said, I assumed that she meant Entry, and sure enough, he was gone. "What of wuss." "Grandma!" Gilden said, looking shocked. "Well then why don't they come out and fight?" "Because they've been running all their lives, and you just took out everything they could throw at you." "THEN THEY FIGHT LIKE STALLIONS UNTIL THE VERY LAST!" The grandma shouted, rushing into the grass. "Hoh boy, listen I'm really sorry about this, my grandma can be a bit... nonsensical at times." In response, Night, Tanker, and I lifted our bruised faces and raised an eyebrow in unison. "Really nonsensical at times, but if it's any consolation she does this to just about everyone, considers a rite of passage." It's a rite of passage to chase your guests down and stuff their face with baked goods?" Tartarus said. "Only here. . . shiny parasprite." He said, as if he had just seen Tartarus. "I'll take that pause as a moment of awed silence for my shining glory." A silence was kept, only to be broken by a single loud thump echoing through the stalks of wheat, and we all were frozen in silence as dragging was heard, and a single Entry was dragged through the grass, bread stuffed in his mouth. "So, how are you? I do hope you enjoy it here!" The grandma said.
