Shadows of the Night

Coming out of darkness I felt nothing, save a small pressure over my face, the rest of me felt kinda float-y. Opening my eyes only met them with a painful burning sensation due to a bright white light from God knows where. I was able to make out a blurred outline around my face. Moving my hands, unseen, through the white, it felt like they were passing through some sort of liquid sand, brilliantly fine, like silk made granular. As I tried to place my hands on my face they were forced to stop a few inches in front of it. As near as I could tell, I seemed to be wearing some sort of helmet. It was clear all the way through, covering my entire face. Feeling around some more my hands let me informed me of a tube at the top of it.

My head was starting to clear away some of the murk, and I finally thought to notice that I obviously wasn’t wearing any pants from the way, whatever it was that I was in, was rubbing and flowing around me.

Clutching my sides, afraid to touch around my head further, I reached out for Caligo. Whenever something made the lights go away he was always there to explain things, he could let me know what was happening. Reaching out to the corner of my mind he resided in only left me with a vague feeling of numbness, the same for when I tried to reach Somnium as well. I tried reaching for the darkness, I could feel little of it, and it was far away, but I could feel it slowly heading my command and pulling towards me, but stopped halfway, burning out of my grasp as it faded against the white light that surrounded me. I was alone. I was weak! I had nothing! I was just my old, pathetic, disgusting, self. A world filled with magic, and I could do nothing to fight against it. The herbivores could pound trees to get apples and put bears in headlocks, and had, before my eyes, which had consistently proved to be far from the every-problem-is-solved-in-twenty-two-minutes with a total lack of bloody violence. Where Baskerville sized hounds housed a skeleton that could crush gemstones and a set of titanic muscles to back it up! Where things the size of chickens could turn you to living stone, leaving you stew in your own thoughts for eternity, unable to move, breathe, or sleep!

Panic began to turn my spine to frost as fear lurched its way up my stomach. I was alone, floating… somewhere. I didn’t know! More of my mind continued to open up to me. I had come to Equestria, thinking to abandon my life on Earth, my parents, and my uncle, to live out what? The life of a hero? Why was it only now that the memory of diamond dogs in that forest, slaving other ponies was just now deciding to bother me? Hadn’t I thought it would be a worthy idea to stop that sort of thing, especially now that I did technically have superpowers?

‘True, but when you think about it, these idiots could solve so many of their problems with a small upward thrust at the base of the skull with a magicless blade of iron.’

I pulled my arms together tighter, making my shoulder blades ache.

‘No! That isn’t me. I can’t think like that! What happened to me?!?’

***

The second day the train ride was as relaxing as I thought it would be. The chugging of the engine and the gentle rocking of the cars made it particularly easy to fall asleep.

Sprocket had met me again for lunch, and we even found out that you could see the engine room, if you asked nicely. While Sprocket hadn’t come, in part because it clearly bored her to see something so basic as a steam engine and had railed on about how she couldn’t wait until they were able to scrap the antique, it was also due to some of the more delicate components in the engine that some of her arms might hit in the more confined spaces, and she simply refused to part with them, and held them like a mother would a child as she said so. Still, I was impressed by it all, but I’d always had a bias for trains over any other form of transportation. They’re just so much cooler.

Once that was done, Sprocket, I think in part to show off, lead me some of the equipment she had brought with her in her quarters, in first class, and yes, there was a mini-fridge, and also an added walk-in closest to accompany the added space. While she admitted to taking a few elementary testing materials to check basic compositions of crystals as to how well they would hold a magical charge and such, her big ticket item was a crystal cutter that she had brought with her. It looked exactly like a polished metal box, six inches tall and a foot in length and width. It was shiny, but it didn’t seem all that impressive to me, the only distinct feature was a square red lens that took up a few inches in the middle. But as she tapped a raw, uncut, murky green crystal on the center top of the box a beam of light came up, engulfing the crystal, upon which eight little arms, each with three long segments came out of a perspective slot, and grabbed the crystal with their pointed ends and held it up. Then another slot on the right side pushed out and revealed a row of gem cutting spectacles of increasing magnification, as well as a series of increasingly smaller sets of clamps, seemingly for grasping. I was impressed as it was, but then a small green panel with keys, like a computer board slid out, each key had either a number or some sort of math symbol, as far as I could figure, on it.

With a grin she said, “Watch this.” And brought forth two of her mechanical arms and typed a swift set of gibberish onto the board, then stepped back. A sound like a vacuum soon followed as a greater number of arms soon popped out of the remaining unused sides, these more akin to the multiple segmentation of the original tentacles she had on her back, each with what looked look a perfect sphere attached to their ends. Once they touched the crystal however, the hardened sides gave way with a flurry of dust, which was quickly sucked into the machine. There, in the span of only a few minutes, maybe three or four, I watched as the coarse crystal became a perfectly polished thing of beauty, and taking a shape of an octagon cut, much like the crystal that helped power her own suit.

The vacuum sound stopped, the arms returned to their compartments, and a small ‘ding’ chimed as a small container with the crystal shavings popped out.  Sprocket dumped the shavings into a metal container labeled as such, and pulled out a white cloth to wipe away some of the excess dust from the now rigidly smooth surface of the now shining rock.

“Okay, that was awesome.”

“Heh, if you think that was awesome you should probably stay away from my lab. We don’t want your jaw to come unhinged or anything.” She said, turning away and sliding the gem into a white suitcase.

“Don’t you need to run some tests before you do that though?”

“Well, yeah, my standard procedure is normally to first take a look at the basic crystal with my microscope back in the lab to see what sort of cut will be most in tune to help multiply magical resonance and amplify the charge. But I also make sure to grab a few extra to sell at the gem shops for a few extra bits, and I know Jasper likes to use this particular cut for some of his upper-class work.” She said tapping it, the crystal giving off a low pinging sound.

***

As the conductor called out the train’s expected arrival, he also pointed out the approaching city out the right windows. From a distance it was quite impressive. Large smoke stacks let forth puffs of smoke into the air. Building lined the around the entire city, some easily above seven stories high. I was pretty sure I also caught the glint of moving metal parts, like engines or giant gears poking out of the ground and slowly turning. And up in the sky, above the building I could even see a few miniature blimps circling through the sky, I caught sight of one, and could just barely make out the word ‘police’. I couldn’t help but smile, since the first thing I thought of was the blimps that I’d seen in Batman the animated series

As cool as the city was, it stood in sharp contrast with the land around it. While the scent of the ocean could be smelt, Sprocket had told me that it was a port town. The land had tracts of red and brown baked earth. I could even see a few volcanoes, barely, way out in the distance billowing smoke. I was quite glad for the ocean breeze blowing that all away. Still, that wasn’t to say there wasn’t any plant life, there just weren’t many trees, the closest things were mostly overgrown bushes, and even they looked a little twisted.

As the train rolled into the station I heard the whirring of Sprockets metal arms and the low reverberation as they hit the metal floor of the train, giving me a sharp, what I assumed to be friendly, hit on the back with her free hoof, she said, “We should hang out more, you’re alright. I live up near the center of town, you remember where, right?”

“If not, I can always ask.” I said, smiling away the pain of being hit. Hey, hooves hurt, and I despise being assaulted as well as the practice of hitting others for comradery. I just waved at her as she left, remaining silent for fear of exploding. She was rather nice after all, and watching as she cut her way through the crowds to the nearest wall, and then using her arms to scale up it, completely circumventing the congestion, made me a little jealous. Still, what’s wrong with a simple pat on the back?

As the pain began to fade away I took a breath of air and plunged into the crowd and slowly began to make my way through the sea of creatures. It was interesting to say the least. In Canterlot I had only seen ponies, the only variation being the occasional bat-winged pegasus, but here, even at the station, there was a whole variety of life. Griffins, diamond dogs, and a few minotaurs were peppered in through the crowd, almost as much as ponies. No one was really even giving me the time of day, but to push past me to get to their own trains. Even in the deepening shadows of the afternoon it took me a while to get to the information desk, mostly because I didn’t want to find out what it would feel like to step out of a shadow and appear inside someone. That would only end in the bursting of blood balloons, and mangled attempts at screaming. I shuddered as I repressed the thought and got to the window.

“Hell-” was all I allowed the pony to say before I grabbed one of the complementary city maps and made my way to the nearest iron bench. The light was poor, considering I was by a wall blocking the sinking sun in the west, but that really wasn’t a problem. Scanning through the legend I found the nearest police station, I also noticed that there was a separate legend symbol for guards, but that could wait. Standing up, I orientated the map to face it and myself north, fourteen street forward from the train station, then two streets over to the right. My kind of directions.

Standing up, I folded the map and placed it in my thigh pocket, thanking whoever invented the pocket, and waded my way through the remaining crowds of the station and stepped into Bitsburg.

The street lamps were just coming on; I still made me wonder when I saw them. To think they were just ordinary crystals, or, at least ordinary in Equestria, that they were just basically stones enchanted to give off light. No electricity, no science, just the thought of some unicorn placed into an inanimate object. The manipulation of energy, at least back home, would have been staggering to say the least, but here things were different, and I was only still just getting used to the idea.

As I started to walk, the streets were close to immaculate. My unasked question was soon revealed as a motorized carriage with rolling bristles under the carriage rolled slowly by, a belch of smoke emanating from one of the over-carriage exhaust pipes every couple of feet. The sidewalks were another matter, sometimes progress just means you get the good with the bad. I hate stepping in bubblegum. Not that there was much, but when going from the absolute none in Canterlot to stepping on the seemingly only one on the sidewalk, it makes for a big deal. I slid a shaft of darkness to scrape it away, placed it in the nearest receptacle, a mere two feet away, and continued.

‘Freekin’ kids.’

The city itself, from what I could see was quite an eyeful, though that might have had something to do with me being in the downtown area. Luckily I wasn’t on any streets with clubs, because the few restaurants I passed were completely packed, and moving around the crowd was enough of a hassle. I really didn’t want to do any shadow-striding because the sudden change of stepping in one spot and appearing in another would definitely have thrown off my count. I passed a few more shops, either open late, or just open for the night life. Two in particular stood out to me, one had a display window full of crystals charged with different shades of light. They were set on a mobile and were spinning in such a way that it made it look like each shade of color was swimming against the others around it. It was astounding. So much that I actually paused to gape at it from across the street. My sudden stop caused a small diamond dog to actually bump into me, causing him to growl, but he was either in a hurry or didn’t think I was worth his time because he hurried on by. The second store that caught my eye was a gear store, as close as I could describe. The sign over the center of the store read ‘Whirligig’s Wears’ and had a spring caught in a metal circle that kept it expanding and contracting and another gear just sticking out of the other side just aimlessly spinning in intermittent speeds. The sides of the building were much the same, everything about was just so alive and fluid, but I needed to get an application first and set up an interview if I wanted everything to be official and kept on going.

I only needed to move up four more streets when I saw it. Through a nearly pitch black alley, a small trickle of light was coming through a street lamp at the other side, was Sprocket. I didn’t think anyone would be wearing a set of metallic octopus arms or have a mane that stood up in places like a fire. She didn’t have her luggage with her, so she’d obviously gotten back to her home, she must have been close, but the more pressing matter was the way her arms hung limply at her sides as a diamond dog with a black bandana, flanked by a pegasus and a griffin each wearing the same atop their heads. I could see Sprocket still held herself like she usually did, even if it seemed a bit stiffer, but something didn’t feel right to me. I decided to walk over to them, and I had gotten half-way into the alley when the diamond dog took a step forward and pulled her up, by the neck, mechanical arms and all, off the ground.

“Well look who finally ran out of power guys?” The dog growled. The sounds of the two others soft laughter soon followed. “Aren’t you going to use your little toy to help save you? Oh!” he said, tapping the dark gem, causing a few sparks of green to fizzle off one of the edges, “heh, gave me a start there for a second, but it looks like we finally get to see what you’re really like.”

The gears in my head didn’t quite mesh until the griffin and the pegasus each to a step forward and pulled her lower legs apart. After that, things went dark.

The shadows erupted from me, soundlessly pulsing between full and void causing my cloak to billow around me. My steps remained silent as my entire world became the three meat-sacks in front of me. A black spike extended from the palm of my hand. I stopped, just close enough for the spike to tap on the dog’s massive shoulder and cut slightly into a bicep that dwarfed my head.

‘PDrEoStTeRcOtY!’ my thoughts’ screamed.

The dog didn’t get to even turn his head around before a part of my personal shadows were sucked into Sprocket’s crystal, pulsed a dark green, and a small click went off by her left shoulder as the welding gun gave a sputter. A cone of fire belched forth, and my world vanished as multiple screams mingled in the air and in my head.

***

I thrashed against the white, my body wrapping around it, as I tried to hide myself away from the light. I wanted my shadows! I pushed against the light, trying to use my darkness to overcome the brightness. I felt my powers wane as it ate away at it with ease, and made the glow grow brighter and pierce my closed lids.

***

Sprocket squeezed her closed eyes shut as the ringing in her ears continued unabashedly. Stretching, she reached to smash her offending alarm clock. It should have known better than to wake her up so early. A quick crunch, spring, and tinkling later she placed her bleary eyes back into the warm folds of her pillow, but the noise didn’t stop. Figuring she had just winged it and the clock must have been ready for round two she waited for the referee to blow his whistle for the next round. But it never came, only klaxon from the other side of the ring, across her bed

Bolting up, she stumbled as she got out of bed, her sleepy thoughts swept away in the tide of her racing adrenaline. Her experimental healing pod shouldn’t have been making that sound.

“How in bloody Tartarus can the system be overloading? It’s on a closed circuit!” She screamed to hear herself over the whining alarm helping to push the remaining dregs of drowsiness from of her system.

Going down the steps into her top level basement and lab, she saw a black form pulsate within the confines the mesophase-tank. She hadn’t expected such an output of energy from Rumor, but the fact that he was meant that he was now alive enough to do so. But before she could give herself a pat on the back, she rushed over to the control panel, and took in a single breath of regret, before she pushed the switch and opened the emergency release valves, watching behind the charged wall of clear crystal protection wall as the entire mixture fell through the grate, and became inert as its surface area increased across the wide catch beneath it.

As the light from the mesophase and the red lights from the alarm fell away the room was equally filled with an immense darkness, turning the room pitch. But this too faded away as the emergency lights filtered down through the dissipating dark mist and revealed the prone form of Rumor, his air helmet still attached to the two hoses which had a perfect cut across the strengthened woven bands of polymer fiber meant to be dense enough to keep the air in and circulating and keep the fine liquid grains of the mesophase out.

Contemplating just how much to a hairless ape he looked like, though it was a great deal better than the wheezing husk of burnt flesh she had brought in, she went over and released the seal on the helmet and pulled one of the lanky creature’s forelegs with her hooves, heaving him onto her back. The way his limp form dangled over her sides and dragged on the floor was like trying to haul a sack of potatoes and squid. With a huff she wished she had her own arms with her, but there hadn’t been enough time to grab them during the alarm, and since she was already half-way up the staircase, she didn’t see any need to get them now, especially since she kept them across from her room up on the first floor. Passing the clock near the front door she saw it was a mere ten minutes away from nine in the morning, a good two hours and ten minutes before she preferred to be out of bed. Sighing she made her way back upstairs and deposited the limp form of Rumor onto her bed, figuring he could get more use out of it than here since she was now too wound up to go back to sleep.

“Well,” she sighed, “early day today. Might as well make some coffee and try to figure out what caused the magical overload and subsequent backlash.” She muttered as closed her door behind her with a flick of her tail.