Why are there so many tentacles? And why do they seem attracted to mine?!
"Sneerkt!" I snorted thickly, as I stared almost hatefully down at the book sitting on my table. My right hand lightly drummed against the table and I rested my beak against my left as if it were my chin. To anyone looking it would look like I stuffed my hand into my facial tentacles. I couldn't get this. Magic didn't make sense to me. Not only is there math, but there's sigils, and runes, and diagrams that I can't make heads or tails of.
"Sneerl!" I snorted one again. My sinuses were killing me and I'm pretty sure I didn't actually have sinuses.
"Dad... can you not do that? It's gross." I looked over at the filly on the couch. Held in her purple-tinged gold glow was a controller. Which was hooked up to the PS4. Dinky was playing Diablo 3 Reaper of Souls. Unsurprisingly she was playing the Necromancer, specifically a pet-build Necromancer.
"If you're going to sneeze, don't sneeze on me." Looking to my right, I stared blankly at Eldritch-Lyra as she sat in the chair next to mine and stared at the Laptop set on the table in front of her. Her glowing eyes were wide, and the thin, multi-jointed hands she'd spawned out of her hooves were shaking and twitching on the keyboard and mouse. She was taking slow, shaky breaths as her whole body shivered. She'd thought since Dinky was Mare Enough to play all of the SoulsBorne Series, she was Mare Enough to play Amnesia: The Dark Descent. Oh, that poor, poor mare.
"Snerkt.... Sorry you two. I've got something in my nose, and it's driving me crazy." I groaned, dropping both of my hands to the table while shaking my head.
"Dad... you don't have a nose...." Dinky said, looking over at me with a half-lidded stare. She was still murdering demons, even when she wasn't focused on the game. I love my freakish gaming prodigy.
"Noted." I stated bluntly.
Something was building up and it felt very uncomfortable.
"ACHOO!" I sneezed, snapping my eye shut and swiftly moving my head to the left. I heard a girlish yelp and something landed on my wingback chair. I blinked tears out of my eye as the blockage was suddenly gone.
"Dad... I think you just sneezed out a Loli..." I shook my head and looked at Dinky, who in turn was looking at the wingback chair.
There was a girl that looked no more than ten in my wingback chair. She was rubbing her head and blinking her light blue eyes. She had the whitest hair I'd even seen and she was wearing a very frilly red and black dress. Four black tentacles came out of her back that, strangely, appeared dazed.
Wat.... I stood up from my chair as Dinky, making sure to pause her game first, dropped her controller and ran under the table. Lyra leaned back in her chair, peeking around me to see the loli. Said loli shook herself, briefly looked around the room in evident confusion, until she laid her eyes on me. Wait... She looked familiar.... Why did she... "Wait... Dakot-"
One of her tentacles lashed out, wrapped around my wrist, and tugged. And.... I was flying... I heard a crunch, a mixture of braking plastic, glass, metal and wood. I was upside down, in the corner, laying on the remains of something, and I was just in time to hear the girl's yelling.
I swear to the God's of the 8 Divine's, if she so much as scratches my T.V. She's out to the curb. no matter how cute she is.
"AHHHHH! Not today, Cthulhu!" She screamed, her tentacles flailing as if they were as scared as her. She looked around in a panic. "Now where is Sheogorath?! I have to file some complaints!"
Dakota?
"Hey!" came Dinky's squeaky voice as she popped out from underneath the table. "Do you know what you just did?!" That's it Dinky, you lay into her for hurting your dad. "You just broke the T.V.!" Awwww, now I'm sad... wait.... T.V.?... Did she... just toss me.... into..... MY ENTERTAINMENT CENTER?!
I felt the room go cold as all the color in the world bled to shades of gray. Dinky, Lyra and Dakota locked their eyes onto me as my baleful gaze fell on the loli. "U-uh.... Dad... Calm down... You can fix the entertainment center..." I switched my gaze to Dinky, who was doing her best to head off something very, very bad. "A-also, you're scaring the girl."
I turned my gaze back to Dakota to see that she was indeed quite frightened. Three of her tentacles were doing their best to placate her, one however, was giving me the eyeless equivalent of a Death Glare. I closed my eye, took a slow, deep breath, and opened it to see that the world returned to normal. I proceeded to use my tentacles to right myself and help myself up to to my feet. I did my best to ignore the cracking of my broken stuff beneath me. "That was a seventy-inch, plasma screen T.V." I clicked my tongue, and took a slow breath in. "So how can I help you?" I folded my hands and cocked my head to the side.
Dakota blinked at me. "Was.... Was that an Abridged reference?"
"Indeed it was." I nodded. "Eldritch." I placed a hand on my chest. I gestured to Dinky. "My daughter, Dinky Hooves." Then I gestured to Lyra. "Lyra Heartstrings, Eldritch-Pony and Herald of the Elder Nerd."
"U-ummm, Dakota." She said weakly, noticeably calming down.
"Nice to meet you." I eye-smiled. "One moment please." I stepped off of the ruins of my entertainment center. Then turned around. "CTRL-Z."
-pop-
The entertainment center was good as new. Spinning around, I noted that Dakota was staring at the fixed entertainment center. She blinked at me. "How'd you do that?"
I shrugged. "I don't know. I tend not to think about things."
She blinked. "You don't?"
"Nope."
She shook herself. "Wait, wait, wait! Where am I, how did I get here, why can I understand you, and how do I get home?!" She snapped, half-panicking. Her tentacles began looking around for something to placate the frightened girl. One of them grabbed Dinky. Dinky yelped as she was pulled into Dakota's arms. Dakota squeezed Dinky close like a teddy bear. My father instincts twinged briefly, until Dinky visibly calmed down, softly patting Dakota.
"Eh-hem." I cleared my throat. "In order. One, you're in my house, in Ponyville, and in Equestria. Two, I sneezed. I may actually have portal’ed you here on accident. Three, I have no idea, I've never thought about it personally. Lastly four, I don't know but Twilight may know. She may hate me but she can probably help. For I don't know a thing about magic."
"It's true, he doesn't." Lyra nodded sagely, having gotten off her chair and reverted to normal.
"Not helping Lyra." I groaned, glaring at her. She simply grinned at me in response.
"Ummmm, okay?" Dakota held Dinky against her chest with an arm, and stroked Dinky's mane with her free hand. "So I'm in an alternate Equestria where I can actually understand everypony. I've been accidentally summoned by discount-Cthulhu-"
"Hey..."
"-and he doesn't know how to send me back." Dakota took another breath. One of her tentacles poked her and gestured around the room. "Yes, yes, I can tell he's a nerd."
"So.... Twilight?" I asked awkwardly. "I'm really sorry I can't do more." I rubbed the back of my head with a tentacle.
"It's fine...." Dakota sighed. "Let's go. Twilight is better than nothing..."
"Hey... It's gonna be okay." I say taking a step towards her. I froze when all four of her tentacles started glowing. They swiftly stopped as Dakota glared at them, and I moved to hug her. I got a weird feeling. I'm pretty sure I felt Her tentacles probing my tentacles. Why were her tentacles probing mine? Nope, not thinking about that too hard.
I let her go, turned and led her to the front door. "Wait for me!" Lyra called as she followed us into the kitchen. As I pushed open the door, Dakota blinked. "So, you live across the street from Twilight?"
"Yup. Let's go." I nodded and strode out the door, with Dakota, still holding Dinky, not that she was complaining, and Lyra. It was about midday, the sky was cloudless and sunny. All in all it was a pretty nice day. On the way there Dakota spoke up. "Wanna know something funny?"
"Hmm, sup?" I asked glancing at her.
"My Twilight botched the spell that let me communicate with everypony. I've been having to learn their language." Dakota sighed.
"Oh harsh! Dammit Twi, why does everyone trust you with magic?" I groaned, facepalming.
"When Twilight first met daddy," Dinky began, "she thought he was evil. Dad monologued then speared a muffin on her horn."
"O-oh that w-would be a-amazing!" Dakota said through giggles.
"And here we are." I announced as we got to the door. I looked at Lyra."Lyra, will you knock for me please?"
"Why?" Lyra raised an inquisitive brow.
"So we can surprise Twilight." Dinky squeaked as Dakota continued petting her. I couldn't help but notice her tentacles "staring" at mine. That's actually beginning to creep me out a bit. My tentacles are not sentient! You won't get anything out of them!
"Oh, gotcha." Lyra nodded and knocked on the door.
"Just a minute." I heard Twilight call for the other side of the door. Soon enough the door opened. "Hello-" She froze mid-welcome as she spotted us. "Oh... What is it this time Eldritch?' She groaned and rubbed a temple with a hoof.
Warning: Eldritch Horrors may cause neurotic purple unicorns massive headaches.
"Hi Little Purple, I'd like you to meet my other daughter, Dakota." I gently pushed Dakota forward. She briefly gave me a strange look, then shrugged and appeared to go along with it.
Twilight blinked in shock at Dakota. "Your... What?!" A couple hairs popped out of her mane. "How did you make her?! That's.... That's just...."
"Shhhhhh....." I reached out with a tentacle and pet her face. "It was a messy process. Have a muffin." I pulled a muffin from nowhere and speared it on her horn.
TwilightIsMyNewestServantNow. #MessyBabyMaking. #MuffinHorn. #ThisWillEndInDeath. #TheCorrectWayToUseAMuffin.
"Was that it?" Dakota whispered.
"Yep. A joke that's been on a marathon so long, I'm surprised it hasn't died yet." I whispered back.
Twilight's eyes shrank to pinpricks, as she began to breathe heavily.
"Wait, Twi before you lose it, I brought her here for a reason. I have a task for you." I cut her off before she could explode. Twilight froze mid-freakout. "You see Twi, she's not supposed to be here. She got summoned on accident and we need your help to send her back, because as much as I give you shit, you're Smartest Pone."
Twilight blinked. "Wait... you summoned her? How?"
"I channeled Godhood while sneezing." I shrugged. Dakota, Dinky, and Lyra laughed at that.
Twilight's eye twitched. "And why can't you do it?"
"Do you expect me to know the ins and outs of interdimensional teleportation?" I asked, crossing my arms over my chest. "Would you trust me with the ins and outs of interdimensional teleportation?"
Twilight deflated. "I'll start researching for you..." She stabbed a hoof into my leg. "But you owe me!"
"Of course, I'll let you borrow the XBOX again." I chuckled.
"Oh no, I get to determine what the favor is!' Twilight snorted.
"Fine, fine." I waved a dismissive tentacle. "Come find us at Sugercube Corner if you find anything. Oh, and have fun." With that I lay a tentacle on Dakota and a tentacle on Lyra. There was a buzzing burst of static, and we were in the main room of Sugarcube Corner.
"What's up bitches." I announced to the semi-empty bakery. Misses Cake actually laughed at my entrance.
"Urp!" I looked down to see Dakota dry-heaving. "Urp- Why... Why did you teleport?"
"One, it was quick, and two, YOU'RE NOT SICK." I stated. My voice rumbled the bakery, startling a few customers.
Immediately her dry-heaving stopped. She looked very confused. "What did you just do?" She asked.
"I willed you not to be sick. Like I've got the Thu'um. Bitches love the Thu'um." I nodded, chuckling.
"No it was more than that." She looked up at me, clearly deep in thought.
"Hold that thought for a moment." I turned to Misses Cake. "Apologies for the disturbance."
"Oh it's alright dearie. What can I get ya?" Misses Cake smiled in a motherly sort of way. I glanced at my companions
"Lemon Surprise muffin." Lyra said after a moment of looking at the menu.
"Chocolate Chip muffin." Dinky chirped, waving a forehoof from within Dakota's embrace.
"Ummm, I'm okay." Dakota said, still looking at me like I was a puzzle she wanted to solve.
"Okay if you're sure." I looked back to Misses Cake. "I'll have half a dozen glazed donuts and half a dozen powdered donuts."
"Alright dearies’, that'll be ten bits." Misses cake nodded after ringing us up.
I snapped my fingers and pointed at the counter. "Money."
-pop-
A stack of ten bits appeared next to the register.
"We'll be outside." I said turning away.
"We'll get that out to you soon." Misses Cake called, as I led Dakota and Lyra out of the bakery to have a seat at one of the roundtables. I pulled a chair over from another table and sat down, while Lyra sat down across from me. Dakota however, moved her chair over to sit next to me. I looked at her as she studied me, doing my best to ignore the fact that her tentacles were entwining with mine. Dammit ladies! Simmer down! They aren't going to return your affections! Lyra kept glancing between us, grinning like she knew something weird was going to happen.
"Hey Dritchy!" Pinkie Pie appeared next to me, setting down our munchies in front of each of the correct recipients. When she came to Dakota, she gasped! "Huh! Who is this!? How did you sneak her into Ponyville without my knowing!? Is she your daughter!?"
"Hey, Pinkie, this is Dakota, I summoned her on accident, and for today, yes, yes she is." I rattled off as Dakota looked between the pink mare and me.
"How did... Never mind, at least Pinkie's the same." Dakota sighed.
"I gotta get back to work, but I'll see all of you later." Pinkie sand and bounced back inside.
"You haven't heard her swear yet." I chuckle. "So, why do you keep looking at me?"
"I'm trying to figure out your magic." Dakota narrowed her eyes at me. It was kinda cute actually.
"Well if you figure something out, tell me, reading Twilight's books don't help at all." I pulled a donut out of the box, stuffed it under my tentacles and started chewing on it with my beak. My facial tentacles caught any stray bits that fell.
"Hmmmm can you do something? I want to see it in action." She gestured. She looked behind me. "Hey, is that..."
Suddenly my vision was obscured by a hoof as I heard the quiet beating of wings. "Guess who..." A feminine voice cooed right behind me. I chuckled darkly as my tentacles lashed up and grabbed a pair of wings and a pair of forelegs and pulled. My vision swiftly cleared as Derpy, in her mailmare clothes, plopped into my lap.
"Well hello there." I lowered my head close to hers and lowered my voice to a deep growl. Derpy shivered as her wings snapped out. I glanced up at Dakota, who bore a look of shock on her slack-jawed face. "Dakota, meet Derpy. My marefriend. Derpy, meet Dakota. A girl I accidentally summoned and our second daughter for the day.
"Oh my goodness!" Derpy's forehooves shot up to her mouth. "She's adorable! Eld, I want one!"
"Since I haven't gotten to say this yet, Yay I have a sister!" Dinky cheered, levitating her muffin over to her mouth so she could take bites out of it.
"Well, you got her until either Twilight, or I through shenanigans, figure out how to send her home." The moment I said that Derpy leaped off my lap and hugged the surprised girl. Dakota's tentacles seemed too interested in mine to care that their host was getting the stuffing hugged out of her.
"Can't... breath...." Dakota squeaked out. I chuckled mischievously, raised a hand high and brought it down with a thunderous, echoing smack. My hand spanked Derpy's flank, which caused a visible ripple to cascade over said flank.
"GAH!!!" Derpy cried out, leapt off of Dakota, landed back on my lap, spun around, glared at me and simultaneously shoved a hoof into my chest and my groin, causing me to grunt and bend over slightly. "I told you not in public!" Derpy hissed at me.
"Sorry..." I wheezed. "Won't happen again..."
"It better not." Derpy snapped. Then her face softened and she turned around to face Dakota, roughly and painfully dropping her flank into my lap. "I'm sorry about that Dakota, did I interrupt something?"
"Ummmm.... one sec.... I need to bleach my brain..." she responded stupidly. Then she shook herself. "Ummm, yeah so I just wanted Eldritch here to try doing his voice thing so I can figure it out."
Derpy glanced up at me. "Well, do your voice thing." She was trying to keep an air of professionalism. "Don't let me stop you."
"Don't you have work?" I queried.
"Just got off, now please do your..... voice thing." She was having a rather hard time containing her giggles.
I rolled my eye. "Fine... goofball.." I looked around until I spied Lyra's muffin, which Lyra had only taken a single bite out of, sitting on the table on a napkin.
Idea.
I stared at it. "LIVE."
The muffin wobbled. Lyra noticed. "Oh come on!" She whined.
"LIVE."
The muffin began vibrating, every so often bouncing along the table.
"LIVE!"
The muffin began to swell, like there was something inside it trying to get out. It leapt off the table and rolled into the middle of the street, I scooted my chair so I could visually follow it.
"My muffin! It was innocent!" Lyra cried.
"Uhhh... Lyra-" Dinky began but was cut off.
"Shhhhh... I must grieve." Lyra dropped her head into her forehooves.
"LIVE!" My voice shook the surrounding area, as the muffin briefly stilled.
"Well that was anticlimact-" Dakota was cut off as the muffin erupted. Yellowish bread expanded out in all directions as the newly formed doughy-monster shrieked an unnatural birth scream.
"Derpy hon, I think I'll let you handle this one" I said flatly, leaning back in my chair.
"Muffin Monster!" Dakota, Dinky, and Derpy all cried in pitch-perfect unison. Which got the attention of said Eldritch Abomimuffin. It shrieked at them, spraying all of us with lemony muffin filling. "RAAAAAGH!" All three girls screamed as they leapt onto the Lemony Horror and began to devour it. Lyra and I laughed our heads off as Derpy reenacted the scene from Alien with an explosion lemon filling.
Surprisingly, it only took the a few minutes to kill the Breadwitch Horror, leaving a half-eaten muffin carcass in the middle of the street. Rainbow flew by, glanced at the remains, glanced at us, and flew off with a. "Must be Tuesday..."
"Sooooo, How do all of you feel." I asked as Derpy literally licked me clean of icing, bread crumbs, filling, and lemon juice.
"Oh that was so goooood." Dinky lay flopped on top of the table.
"How'd you two eat all that?... Urp.." Dakota burped slouching into her chair.
"Practice." Derpy sighed, flopping against me and looking content.
"So, did you learn anything?" I asked, beginning to pet Derpy like an overly large cat.
"I think..." Dakota responded, slowly pushing herself up till she sat straight. "My best guess is you're channeling a Verbal-based form of Madness and/or Chaos. In layman's terms, you say something with enough force of will behind it, it happens."
"Now why couldn't Twilight just say that?" I gestured at Dakota. "Here she is having me reading Magic for Dummies books when we both know that wouldn't work." I nodded at her. "Thank you Dakota. So, you think if I will hard enough I could send you home?"
"Well possibly." Dakota tapped her chin in thought. Her tentacles still hadn't let mine go. Seriously ladies, are you that damn thirsty? "There is that Chaos-slash-Madness aspect or component."
"So it needs to cause a form of Chaos or Madness as well?" I mused, running a hand through Derpy's mane. "Lyra mind helping me experiment?"
"Ummm, sure?" Lyra sounded unsure. "Just please be gentle."
"That's my line." Derpy whispered into my ear.
"Derpy, trying to concentrate here." I said as my gut filled with the slithering, twisting feeling. "LYRA, GO HOME!"
-pop-
Lyra disappeared in a flash of bruised purple.
A moment later she was back. Only she was panting, blushing and drenched in what I hoped was water. Her eyes were unfocused. She flopped against her chair. "You didn't specify what home meant..." was all she said.
"Oops... You okay there?" I asked as everyone else looked at her in a mixture of worry and confusion.
"Oh, I'm... just great.... need to remember that place when Bonny's feeling adventurous." Lyra yawned and proceeded to go to sleep.
"Ewww.." Dinky said, slowly scooting herself from the mare as the rest of us scooted away from her general vicinity.
"Well.... That kinda.. worked." I said weakly.
"It... technically... did. Lyra is part-Eldritch Being if I remember what you said correctly." Dakota said looking a bit disturbed. "Ugh... no stopping giving me the mom talk." She glared at one of her tentacles, looking a little green.
"So what now? Do I call on some higher power?" I chuckled, closing my eye and shaking my head. "OH COME GREAT EVIL, HELP THIS GIRL GET HOME." My eye snapped open. "Oops."
-pop-
A small white rabbit popped into existence right in front of me on the table. It shot me a rather foul look, chucked a carrot at me, which bounced off my head, gave me the finger while yelling a rather foul bunny-speech about my mother, and then hopped off the table. As he hopped away I heard him squeaking about how he was going to shit in all of my video game cases.
"Was that Angel Bunny?" Derpy asked, looking very confused.
"Yep." I stated. "Apparently he's the most evil thing on the planet."
"You know... that's not surprising." Dakota giggled slowly facepalming.
"Soooooo, what now? Do you want me to try and send you home or do you want to wait for Twilight? Because if I got this right I just got to word things correctly, like a Wish in D&D." I said, thinking out loud.
"Well, if you're feeling up to it." Dakota shrugged but I could tell she was nervous.
"I'm pretty sure I know what I'm doing now." I nodded.
"I believe in you." Dinky squeaked.
"I believe in you." Derpy mirrored her daughter's statement, nuzzling my hand.
I felt a swell of something inside me. It made me feel powerful. I stared at Dakota. "Dakota, before you go, there's something you need to do when you get back to your Equestria." I said solemnly.
'What's that?" She looked curious, and a little worried by my tone.
"You need to graffiti Discord's statue." I said, keeping my solemn tone.
Everyone at the table lost it, even me after a few moments of composure.
"Ah ha, that's great... I'll make sure to do that." She nodded at me with a small smile.
"Good." I eye-smiled back.
"Wait!" Derpy cried. Both of us stared at her. "Group hug!"
Dinky and Derpy Leapt at Dakota, knocking over her chair. Laughing I picked up and hugged the cute fluffy pile. Then I carried the pile to the middle of the street, making sure to gently let down Dinky and Derpy before setting down Dakota.
She straightened her somewhat ruffled dress. "Okay, I'm ready."
"Eh-hem." I cleared my throat and took a breath. "DAKOTA THE TENTACLED LOLI, I ELDRITCH THE NAMELESS GAMER RETURN YOU TO YOUR HOME DIMENSION! GO NOW IN SAFETY AND PEACE, FOR YOU BARE THE BLESSING OF THE ELDER NERD!"
The air grew still as once again the world lost color. The ground shook and the cloudless skies rumbled with thunder.
-pop-
And Dakota was gone. With her leaving everything went back to normal.
I heard the pounding of hooves. "Okay I think I got... it...." Twilight Sparkle skid to a halt not five feet away. She looked at Derpy, Dinky, and I. "Heh heh, Eldritch... where's Dakota?"
"Oh, I just sent her home." I said cheerily.
Twilight's eyes began to twitch as her mane slowly morphed into a tangle of stray hairs.
"eeeeellllLLLDDDRIIITCH!"
"Girls now would be a very good time to leave."
Author's Note
This story brought to you by Nature.
