Good Boy

Chapters

A Strange Haunt
The Last Thestral
Crypty's Spooky Spaghetti
Long Horse
CONELRAD
Team Spooky

A Strange Haunt

Octavia found herself in a twisting maze. One whose walls had the texture of the night sky, tiny pinpricks of glowing stars illuminating them. She wasn't sure why she was here, or exactly how she got here, but she just knew that seeking the way out was important.

She shivered. The air was cold, and since she was now back in her regular pony form, she had no thick fur to protect her. It wasn't too bad, however, as a gentle hum caressed her ears, distracting her.

‘The hum of infinity,’ she thought, not exactly knowing why.

Suddenly, something interrupted it. A crackle behind her. She'd heard it before, but where? All she really could say was finding her way forward was now much more pressing.

So, she did just that, navigating the twisting paths. Whenever she came upon a fork, crackles always seemed to come from one of her options, so naturally, she took the other. She never ran into a dead end via this strategy.

Finally, she saw a new light ahead. It was grayer in hue than the light the stars were providing, but much more potent. Eagerly, she galloped towards it, though her vigor was quickly smashed when she reached it.

It turned out to be a window. One which showed a vast, ruined cityscape from a lofty height, as if she herself was within a tall skyscraper. Most of the city was rubble, with the pieces of collapsed buildings littering the streets. They shared space with the twisted metal husks of vehicles she didn't recognize. There were a few other skyscrapers left standing - ones much taller than she had ever seen - but they were in decay, their windows long since shattered.

‘What… what is this? Where is this?’

She wanted to look around further, a morbid fascination coming to her, but before she could, a bright light suddenly appeared on the horizon, blinding her.

When it finally subsided, she found herself sitting up in her bed, sweat dripping from her forehead. She glanced at her hooves - yes, hooves now - illuminated by a gentle morning's light.

'What a weird dream,' she thought.

Honestly, it was the type that Princess Luna would usually make an appearance in. That was if she was still bothering with ponies of her condition. Though to be fair, she wasn't sure if the night princess wouldn't enter her dreams anymore or couldn't.

Equally strange was that she could have sworn she had fallen asleep on her massage chair. Though then again, Vinyl might have had something to do with that.

And speaking of her...

Before Octavia could ponder further, Vinyl's voice echoed through their house in an odd mix of sweetness and purposeful obnoxiousness.

"Hey, wake up, princess!" she called. "We're having pancakes today!"

A slight burning smell confirmed this, and Octavia cringed. Vinyl didn't usually cook breakfast, partially because normal food wouldn’t do much for her. Only when there was something to celebrate would she make the effort.

And she had a sneaking suspicion she wouldn't like what it was about.

“Gonna find that Horse Snake,
Put em’ in a zoo.
And when we get that business done?
They’ll see our hearts are true!”

To say Vinyl was in a chipper mood would be an understatement. She was practically dancing around the kitchen, singing freestyle, as she served up two stacks of pancakes. Ones that were decorated with a look alike of their respective faces; smiling and in their monster forms, naturally.

Well, not that Vinyl ever went out of her monster form. Unlike Octavia, she didn’t have the luxury of transforming at will (or against her will if she wasn’t drinking her potions during a full moon). So, it was simply a matter of hiding her more vampiric features, just like she was doing at the moment. It was a good thing that, as far as Octavia knew, she had always worn purple shades, even before being turned.

Unfortunately, Octavia couldn’t match her mood. Not only because of the harrowing events that transpired last night, but because of the odd nightmare she had just woken from.

“Vinyl…” Octavia sighed. “Don’t you think you’re getting ahead of yourself here a bit?”

“What?” she said, grinning. “Naaaaaw, son! Don’t you see what kind of jackpot we just hit here?! Long Snake’s a gift from Faust, I tell ya’. One for us poor, unfortunate souls to take advantage of!”

“First off, I’m really not sure about the term ‘Long Snake’,” Octavia said, cocking an eyebrow. “Second off, since when were you a believer?”

Vinyl put on a look of mock offense. “Hey, Faust has always been my homegirl, for one thing, and for the other… well, yeah it’s kind of just a placeholder. But I can’t think of anything better.”

“How about just Long Horse?” Octavia suggested, beginning to carve into her pancakes.

Vinyl tapped her chin, thinking about it for a second, before shrugging. “Simple and sweet. Me likey! And speaking of sweet...”

To Octavia’s amusement, she stuck her two vampiric fangs into the pancake… and sucked them dry of syrup. This included the syrup that had soaked within them. This led to them actually compressing themselves slightly.

After she was finished, she licked her lips, smacking them a bit.

“Really?” Octavia chuckled.

“Hey, tree blood still counts as blood,” Vinyl shrugged.

Octavia held a skeptical smirk.

“Alright, alright, it doesn’t actually do anything for me,” Vinyl said. “But it still tastes good!”

“So, what exactly is your plan to capture our mysterious cryptid?” Octavia asked, changing the subject. “I’m assuming that’s what you want to do now, since you mentioned a 'zoo’. Do we bait it with apples?”

“Veeeery funny,” Vinyl said. “But nope. I don’t have a plan yet.”

“Then why are we celebrating like this?” Octavia asked, shoveling a fork’s worth of actually good-tasting pancake into her mouth. “Mmm, not that I mind.”

Vinyl grinned proudly in response. “Because just cus I don’t have a plan yet doesn’t mean I - and by I, I mean we - won’t come up with one! Just gotta put the ole’ noggins together.”

Octavia took a deep breath. She didn’t want to dampen her friend’s enthusiasm (beyond a bit of playful jesting, of course), but somepony had to be the voice of reason here.

“Look, I know you’re excited to have an opportunity to finally deal with a monster…”

“Damn right I am!”

“... But are you sure we even want to confront this thing?”

“Why wouldn’t we?” Vinyl hummed.

“We know absolutely nothing about it, that’s why!” Octavia said. “We have no idea what sort of capabilities it has, what its motivations are, where it came from, anything!”

“Pffft, I’m not an idiot, Tavi,” Vinyl laughed. “Like I said, we gotsta make a plan. And to do that we’re gonna need to do that thing where you look at words.”

“Read?” Octavia said blankly, only half-sure Vinyl was just messing with her.

“Yeah, that! There’s gotta be info out there somewhere about this thing. Monsters with necks the length of a Hoofball stadium ain’t just shrugged at.”

“Fair enough, but why not simply ask somepony who may already know for help?” Octavia suggested.

“Who, Zecora?” Vinyl asked.

“No. Someone with a bit more… experience fighting monsters.”

“Oh, yeah, that’ll go over well,” Vinyl chuckled. “‘Dear Princess Twilight. So last night me and my friend were out doing vampire and werewolf stuff when we saw this crazy cryptid creepin’ on your former students. Do you happen to know anything about anything about skeleton horses with thousand foot long necks?’

P.S. I know other vampires and werewolves act like chuds, but we’re good ones, promise. Please don’t send us to Tartarus.

Friendship is Magic, yo,

-Vinyl and Octavia.”

“Very, eloquent,” Octavia snarked back. “But you’re forgetting something: we could always ask anonymously. If she does know anything about the creature, she might take it seriously.”

“And then what?”

“Then…” Octavia said, thinking for a second. “Then we wait for her to arrive to deal with it. And… when she does we… jump in to help?”

Vinyl folded her arms. “Looootta stuff that could go wrong with that plan, Tavi.”

“And a looooottta stuff can go wrong if we do this on our own.”

“Alright, fine, you know what?” Vinyl huffed. “Compromise protocols activated. We’ll make a deal.”

“I’m listening,” Octavia said curiously.

“We try to do some research ourselves,” Vinyl said. “And if we don’t find anything, we write to Princess Twilight or the Pillars or whatever. Okay?”

Octavia thought for a moment, before finally nodding. You wouldn’t think something like Long Horse would be that obscure of a legend if there was knowledge about it freely available. And since it was apparently obscure, it was very likely said knowledge was either lost or locked away. It seemed pretty likely they weren’t going to find anything.

“Very well. Deal!” Octavia grinned. “So, where do we start?”

“The Castle of Friendship,” Vinyl said. “It’s got a pretty huge library still, ya’ know, even though Princess Twilight jacked half of it when she went back to Canterlot.”

“Since when do you visit libraries?” Octavia asked skeptically.

Vinyl blushed slightly. “Well… I wanted to check out some… books on learning sheet music.”

Octavia’s heart practically skipped a beat. Vinyl had actually been taking the time to learn music theory?! On her own?!

“R-Really?” Octavia blinked, a sudden surge of affection for the vampiric mare coming to her.

“Well, you kept saying how important it was for my musical career,” Vinyl said, scratching her neck. “So… I started learning.”

“I love you sometimes,” Octavia said, keeping it under her breath.

“What?”

“I mean--!” she coughed. “Uh, you’re, um, lovely sometimes. Personality wise. Yes.”

It wasn’t exactly a secret she had feelings for Vinyl - feelings that were reciprocated - but she didn’t want to take things too far, too quickly. Not until their new lives as creatures of the night were a bit more… stable.

“Daw, thanks Tavi,” Vinyl smirked. And just as Octavia finished up with her pancakes, she declared: “Team Spooky, to the library!”

“We are not calling ourselves that!” Octavia called, waving an angry hoof.

Vinyl, however, likely didn’t see or hear anything, for as soon as she finished talking, she dashed out the front door, giggling madly as she did.

“Oh, you little scamp,” Octavia said, narrowing her eyes.

“Hmmm, here we go…” Vinyl said, dusting off an ancient book and setting it at a nearby reading table at the Castle of Friendship’s library. “Creepy Critters: Obscure Cryptids and Other Monsters of Equestria. Maybe this will have it?”

Octavia sighed, closing yet another book that had nothing in it and stacking it on a pile of five more. “Seventh time’s the charm.”

“Lovin’ the enthusiasm!” Vinyl said chipperly, opening it to its table of contents. “Let’s see here…”

She began dragging a hoof down the page.

“Remember, ‘Long Horse’ is just the name we came up for it,” Octavia said. “It might not be--”

“Yeah, I know, Tavi, yeesh,” Vinyl said, rolling her eyes, before looking back at the book. “Hm, few things I haven’t heard of: Cartoon Cat, The Rake - what, like a garden tool? - Lil Nuggets, Slendermane... Eh, nothing about anything like a ‘Long Horse’.” Her eyes suddenly widened. “Hey, wait a minute... Bonesworth?!”

She began laughing wildly, drawing the attention of a few ponies nearby.

“Vinyl, keep it down!” Octavia hissed, not at all wanting eyes on them. “We’re in a library here! A daywalker library!”

“Sorry, sorry,” Vinyl chuckled. “It’s just… I’m pretty sure Crypty dated him at one time. Apparently, he’s a real goofball. Bit clingy, but I wouldn’t call him ‘creepy’. This book is biased, I tell ya’.”

“Well, what did you expect?” Octavia said.

“True…” Vinyl said, apparently only half paying attention. “Hm… you know what? That gives me an idea. I think we’re going about this all wrong.”

“And how would we go about it all right?” Octavia asked.

“We’re using regular pony books to try to research an irregular creature,” Vinyl said.

“So?” Octavia shrugged.

“Well, why use a regular source when we have irregular sources?”

Octavia gave her a concerned look. “I really don’t like where you’re going with this.”

“Come on!” Vinyl beamed, standing up from the table and making her way to the door. “If we hurry, we can catch the Ponyville Express to Canterlot. Maybe we can visit Crypty before opening hours.”

“B-But!” Octavia called, exasperated. She didn’t even want to think about how bad of an idea this was. “Wait! Aren’t we going to put these books away?”

…

“Vinyl?”

…

“Ugh,” she moaned, hurriedly grabbing half a stack of them and clumsily placing them on a random shelf, gaining a few odd looks as she did. “Ehe. Light research for a… night school project. Fun fun!”

And repressing just how impolite she was being, she dashed after Vinyl, leaving the other half sitting on the table. She whimpered slightly.

“Faust, forgive me for my sins.”

The Last Thestral

The ride to Canterlot was pretty uneventful. Save for a few rude whispers about why Vinyl was wearing a thick, wool hoodie in the middle of summer. Naturally, sunlight and her didn't get along much these days. Not that it bothered her much - she rarely went out during the day even before she was turned.

By the time they got to the capital city, the sun had dropped near the horizon. The two hurried through the hustle and bustle of its streets, heading, naturally, towards the largest graveyard in the city.

"Perfect time to meet Crypty," Vinyl explained. "Always gets there round' two hours before opening. Should be enough time to ask questions before the chuds get there."

"And she won't mind us bothering her right now?" Octavia asked nervously.

"Na," Vinyl said. "She likes talking with 'kiddies'. Doesn't usually get the chance with Goomers always bugging her for Grave Juice."

"What about me, though?" Octavia said, raising her eyebrows. “Even if I’m not fuzzy at the moment, she’ll know what I am, you know.”

Vinyl laughed. "She’s too old to care about that stupid feud. Trust me, she'll like you. Definitely try to bring up that you play the cello. She really likes ancient music." Vinyl coughed in embarrassment. "Er, I mean… retro music."

"Very thoughtful," Octavia said blankly.

She had never met 'Crypty' in person before. In fact, she had never even been into the Canterlot underworld. She dreaded even going near the place, let alone going in alongside a vampire, a werewolf's 'blood enemy'. It was just asking for trouble.

Fortunately, Vinyl had a plan.

"Canterlot underworld's neutral ground, so werewolves and vamps are supposed to 'get along' down there. Still don’t want anyghoul spotting us together, though, so just uh… trail behind me a little bit. We'll wanna keep our distance before we get to Crypt Keeper's.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to just stay up here?” Octavia asked. “The palace rose garden is lovely this time of year…”

“Na, I need you to come with,” Vinyl said. “Crypty might just think I’m making stuff up if ya’ don’t back me.”

“I wonder why she would do that?” Octavia said cheekily.

“Haw haw haw,” Vinyl grunted. “I never make stuff up. I just… exaggerate the truth sometimes.”

“Mhm,” Octavia smirked.

“Yeah, yeah, come on,” Vinyl groaned.

The entrance to the underground was hidden in plain sight. Inside a tomb engraved with the words: ‘PBB’s Hopes and Dreams’, no less, whoever that was. Blending in with the stone floor was a hatch. One that could only be opened by doing a very particular dance move called ‘The Thriller’, which Vinyl performed flawlessly. This even included a moonwalking bit which required her to balance on her hind hooves.

The hatch was certainly impressed, as it quickly swung open. And underneath it was…

A bit of an underwhelming sight. What Octavia had expected to be some sort of underground city was little more than a series of tunnels, torches lining their walls. They weren’t devoid of ponies, however, and as Octavia trailed Vinyl she had to occasionally squeeze by a few of them (a vampony she didn’t know giving her a particularly nasty glare). Occasionally, they’d even open up to wider passages, where various ghoul ponies had set up small stalls.

“Changeling Eyes! Get your fresh Changeling Eyes here! Pre-reformation!”

“Real Fake Alicorn Amulets! Premiere Real Fake Alicorn Amulets!”

“Death Sticks, anyone? Now vanilla scented!”

However, the real stars of the show were the various underground buildings the passages connected together. This actually seemed to be the entire point of them. There was pretty much everything needed for an literal underground society to function, from homes to stores to even the occasional municipal building such as a ‘volunteer guard house’.

‘Somepony has to keep everypony from killing each other, I suppose,’ Octavia shrugged.

Finally, after navigating through a few tunnels that seemed to be part of an old crystal mine, they arrived at their destination. Along with a few red-tinted windows and a rather beautiful, ornate door lining the side of their current tunnel was a sign that simply read: Crypt Keeper’s.

Octavia had to admit, everything seemed pretty classy for what she assumed was a ghoul dive bar.

Another, smaller sign hung on the front door titled, Closed Until Sundown, so Vinyl knocked instead, ushering Octavia to keep her distance as she did.

“Yo, Crypty!” Vinyl called. “You there?”

After a moment, there were a few clicks and clacks - the sound of a few locks being undone. Then, slowly, the door creaked open, revealing a surprisingly youthful, if not still bony mare.

Her red eyes explained why that was. Though what her vampirism didn’t explain were her peculiar, bat-like wings and fuzzy-tipped ears. Sure, vampires had the bat theme going on for them, and though Vinyl had never done it, she was pretty sure she could transform into one. However, she had never seen one that looked like a bat while in their normal form.

“Ah! Vinyl,” she said, giving a fang-toothed grin. “An unexpected pleasure. Let me guess: you’re just dying for a drink? HeheheHAHAHA!”

Octavia raised an eyebrow. Her cackle was way too gleeful for… that level of a joke.

Vinyl didn’t go along with it, either. She just gave Crypty a sarcastic smirk. “Really, Crypty? That one was a new low.”

Octavia half-expected the vampire to be offended at it, but instead, she merely laughed again. “Hahaha! That’s what I like about you, Vinyl. You’re no hoof-licker. Though still, one of these days I’ll come up with one that knocks you dead! Hehehehahaha!”

“Crypty…” Vinyl sighed.

She finished giggling, before giving Vinyl a smile. “Alright, alright I’ll stop… for now. What can I do for you?”

“Well, it’s kind of weird,” Vinyl said, scratching the back of her head. “I was wondering if you could tell us anything about a monster we ran into?”

“Well I can tell you all about this monster you’ve run into!” she laughed, pointing at herself. Vinyl actually chuckled at that one. “Hah! Gotcha! But seriously, who is we?”

“Heh. Remember my werewolf friend I was talking about the other day?” Vinyl asked. “Well…”

A moment or so later, Vinyl and a somewhat apprehensive Octavia sat at the Crypty's bar counter.

Her tavern, like Crypty’s sense of humor, was fit for Nightmare Night. Ghostly wisps drifted about the room, and Jack O'Lanterns were scattered about on various surfaces. Both were the only sources of light. Most of the furniture, while not too over the top, still seemed fit for a centuries-old haunted house.

None of it was helping Octavia’s nerves, that was for sure.

“So… Crypty…” Octavia said, trying to break the ice a bit. “All set for Nightmare Night?”

“Nightmare Night?” she said, raising an eyebrow. “What are you talking about? I haven’t decorated yet!”

Octavia’s flushed in embarrassment. “S-Sorry, I didn’t mean to ins--”

Before she could finish, both Crypty and Vinyl broke out into laughter.

“Relax, kiddy, I’m just messing with you,” Crypty smiled. “I know you didn’t mean anything by it.”

“Had you going though, didn’t she?” Vinyl giggled.

"Y-Yeah," Octavia said, chuckling along. Despite the embarrassment, she had the feeling the joke was for her benefit, to help her relax a little. And to its credit, she was feeling a lot more at ease.

Crypty raised a hoof. “Not that she was wrong, however: I do have a particular love for spooky degore.”

Vinyl and Octavia stared at her blankly.

“I also really like creepy puns,” she said, smiling innocently.

Octavia couldn’t help but be amused. The more she had seen of the ancient vampire, the more she was getting a very distinct feeling she actually liked the creepy aspect of what she was. It was a bit annoying at first, but it had its own charm to it. Better than the seriousness most ghouls treated themselves with.

“I must say, it’s nice seeing different ghouls sticking together again,” Crypty continued. “Never did like the feuds. A vampire and a werewolf side by side… well, it just makes my heart all fuzzy.”

“Crypty… you’re killing me here,” Vinyl sighed.

“I hope not!” Crypty beamed. “I wouldn’t want a stake in such a thing! HeheheHAHAHA!” She took a deep breath, before giving a grin. “Alright, that was the last one. Promise.”

“Faust does exist,” Vinyl said dreamily.

“You should probably hope she doesn’t,” Crypty chuckled. “Now then, all ghoulish giggles aside, you said you wanted to talk about a monster that wasn’t me, yes?”

“Well, yeah,” Vinyl said. “I know you're busy getting ready to open, but we were getting kind of desperate."

“It didn’t turn up in any of the library books we checked out,” Octavia said.

“And it was one you ran into, you said?” Crypty asked. “Where, in Ponyville?”

Vinyl and Octavia nodded.

“Intriguing,” Crypty said. “There are quite a few creepy crawlies out there that both mortals and immortals don’t know about, but they tend to keep their heads down.”

“Immortals?” Octavia said, surprised. “Like the princesses?”

“Of course,” Crypty chuckled. “They’re quite powerful, but they’re not all seeing, and most definitely not all knowing. They’re not even technically ‘immortal’, just very long-lived. But even still, to encounter something not in the books - many of which they helped fill - is very rare. What can you tell me about it?”

With that, Vinyl and Octavia began to tell the tale of their encounter. As they went on, Crypty served Vinyl and Octavia two separate drinks, one red and the other green respectively. Apparently, the two of them were her ‘ghoulie pigs’.

Yes, that was the name she gave for them.

By the time they had finished telling the story, Octavia was about half-finished with her ‘Graveyard Blast’, as Crypty called it, which she had to admit was pretty tasty. Meanwhile, Vinyl was about done with her ‘Blood Moon’, and was getting slightly tipsy.

Annnnd likely thanks to that, she was starting to… exaggerate things near the end of the story.

“... So I chased after it - almost caught it, too!” Vinyl said. “But I was tired after punching it so many times. Definitely gave it a few bruises to remember me by, though. Bones can bruise, right?”

Crypty gazed at her in the same way a mother would after saying, ‘That’s very nice, dear.’ Nevertheless, she didn’t call out Vinyl’s blatant lies. She seemed far too intrigued to bother with that.

“And that’s the whole story?” she asked.

“Indeed,” Octavia said. “Save for a few… minor self-promoting alterations."

"Hey!" Vinyl complained.

Octavia ignored her. "But what do you think, Crypty? Any idea what it was?”

“Oh, I have more than an idea,” she said, smiling coyly. “The creature you encountered? It has a name: Long Horse.”

Vinyl’s eyes widened, and she gave Octavia an impressed look. “Hey, you called it!”

“I mean, there were only so many names it could have,” Octavia shrugged humbly.

“Hah!” Crypty grinned. “I suppose that’s true. Still, like I said, it’s very interesting you’ve met him. There’s a reason why he didn’t show up in any of the books you read, after all. That being he hasn’t been seen since the times before Luna’s banishment.”

“Really?” Vinyl said, dumbfounded.

“Indeed,” Crypty said. “In fact, and this may seem crazy, but as far as I know, I was actually the last ghoul to encounter him. Before you, of course.”

Octavia’s eyes widened. At first, she wasn’t sure Crypty wasn’t just making this up. It would be a pretty big coincidence. But then again, considering she was over a thousand years old…

She had probably seen it all.

“Though to be fair, I wasn’t even a ghoul back then,” Crypty said. “This was right before I was turned. Back when I was still a flesh and blood thestral.”

“Thestral?” Octavia blinked.

“A long forgotten type of pony,” Crypty explained. “And one long presumed extinct.” She then gave her a comically over the top grin once more. “Though that’s because not many ponies know about me, tehe! Notice my batty wings? Well, those aren’t from vampirism.”

Octavia glanced at them, baffled to say the least. Another species of pony had lived in Equestria a thousand years ago? And nopony knew about them anymore? She supposed it wasn't that hard to believe, since nopony even knew about Princess Luna until a decade ago. But still...

“So how’d you meet Long Horse?” Vinyl asked, either already knowing about these ‘thestrals’ or playing nonchalant. She even smiled slightly. “He must have been pretty scary.”

“At first,” she agreed. “But it's a little more complicated than that."

"How so?" Octavia asked curiously.

"Hm…" Crypty said, smiling coyly. "I don't know, it's a pretty long tale."

"Come on, Crypty," Vinyl smirked. "I know you like telling em'. You have a whole night dedicated to story time! 'Tales From the Crypt' ring a bell?"

Crypty laughed. "Ah, what the hell? I’m in the mood for it." She raised a hoof in warning. "Though you better get comfortable, because I never did like cliffhangers. Easier to just use a support beam. HeheheHAHAHA!.!.!"

Crypty's Spooky Spaghetti

Crypty laughed. "Ah, what the hell? I have time. Though you better get comfortable, because I never did like cliffhangers. Easier to just use a support beam. HeheheHAHAHA!.!.!"

Vinyl looked like she wanted to die again. “Crypty… why?”

"When you least expect it, expect it!" she cackled. "But hmmm… where to begin? Ah, I know. Do you know how the feud between vampires and werewolves originally started? I bet you'll be surprised. It actually had to do with a much larger conflict: The War of the Two Sisters."

"The war of the wah?" Vinyl blinked.

"Not many ponies these days have heard of it. See, everypony thinks the battle between Nightmare Moon and Celestia was just a quick fight between them. And in a sense, it was. But Nightmare wasn't stupid. She knew to truly defeat Celestia, she'd need an army to… pacify her followers. So before she faced her sister, she recruited all of the creatures of the night she could. And almost everyghoul heeded her call."

She raised a bony hoof. "Save for the vampires. They stood… aloof."

"And I take it the werewolves weren't too happy with that," Octavia said.

"They took a special offense to it," Crypty said. "I'm not biased, though. Both sides were in the wrong. And to continue the feud to this day… idiotic, to say the least." She then cleared her throat. "Anywho, my people, the thestrals, also joined Nightmare Moon's crusade. This included yours truly. See, back then I had a bit more life in my step, hehe. Not to mention, a bit more naivety. I truly believed Nightmare Moon was going to make things better for all ponies. So like the rest of my tribe, I got armor fitted, my spear sharpened, and prepared for battle."

1013 Years Prior

"During the early stages of the war, before Celestia even knew Nightmare existed, my tribe was nicknamed The Shadowbolts. And it was part of a much larger fighting force, The Big Dead One. We, heh, had quite a few necromancers in that one. Not that we minded much. Their skellies worked as canon fodder while us thestrals handled the more… ambitious actions.”

A group of thestrals gathered around one of the innumerable campfires scattered on the edge of a great forest, Canterlot looming beyond the far side of it. Many were just now waking up, the moon having just risen, and leaving their tents. This included a particular white-maned bat pony: a younger version of Crypty.

It was slightly unusual to be up this early, but the barks of their chieftain were calling them to attention. So they lined up in a single file line in front of him, the light of the fire’s flame dancing off their fur.

“Listen up, everypony!” he called, his voice on par with thunder. “Orders just came down from the Grand Admiral himself! The march on Canterlot begins soon!”

There were a series of happy chirps, high pitch screeches, and regular ole’ cheers.

“The daywalkers were stronger than us, given most of their troops were flesh and blood, while many of ours were… well, as I said, bonely barely alive. Hehehe.

Still, what we lacked in strength, we made up for in strategy.

Nightmare Moon’s number two was a military genius. A career admiral before we thestrals were barred from the Equestrian military (a story for another day), but one just as effective on land as on sea. He viewed war as a form of art. And as we all know, kiddies, the best art is rarely ever simple.”

“Settle down, settle down,” the chieftain grumbled. “This isn’t going to be a straight-forward process, especially for us. Parts of the Big Dead One are going to be doing timed flanking maneuvers.”

“With all due respect, chief,” Crypty asked. “The enemy lines stretch beyond the horizon. How could we possibly flank?”

The chief smiled, pointing to the vast forest behind him. “We’re going to be going through there. The Hollow Forest.”

Nopony said anything, but there was clearly tension in the air.

“According to our scouts, they don’t have many troops stationed near the other side. If we use the forest for cover, we can punch through em’ before they know what hit them.”

“A-And the forest?” another thestral asked.

The chief already had an answer prepared. “Leadership believes that if we use our echo-location and work together, we shouldn’t have a problem navigating it. Any dark creatures within we should be able to tame, recruit, or… otherwise deal with.” He then gave them a stern look. “I don’t want to hear any complaints about this. If you have any worries, leave them here now. Because we’re going in at high moon. Ready yourselves."

***

“Most ‘bat ponies’, as the ignorant called us, tended to live in caves. Hollow Shades was one of our few top-side settlements. The forest nearby had a reputation as grim as the Everfree Forest does today, however. Anypony who went in had a fifty-fifty chance of never coming back out.”

As the moon kissed the top of the sky, the Shadwbolts, now wearing light, leather armor and wielding crossbows, spears and swords flew low into the woods together. The trees were tall and ancient, and the canopy would have made seeing nearly impossible if not for their various torches.

And their natural night vision, of course.

In the distance, other groups were moving into the woodlands as well - hundreds of silhouettes against the backdrop of the stars and darkened grass.

***

“I guess the idea was ‘safety in numbers’. And for a little while, that seemed to be true. About a quarter way through, most of us were less worried about the forest and more about the battle ahead. There was one thing that was a little odd, though: the smell of cinnamon filling the air, though nopony knew where it was coming from.

We found out the hard way.”

“Ack! By the night, what is this thing?!”

“Can’t… move…”

“Kill it, night damnit! Kill it!”

“AAAAAAAAH!”

One by one, torches dropped to the ground. And if the brush wasn’t damp, it almost certainly would have started a forest fire. That was the least of a young Crypty’s worries, however. The real fright was the reason for it.

With almost no warning, a long, snake-like skeletal creature had begun grabbing her fellow thestrals, before dragging them, screaming, into the darkness of the woods. It happened over and over and over, and while some struggled and some attempted to hack at it with their swords, nopony was able to stop it.

Finally, Crypty was the last one left. But she wasn’t alone. The skeletal creature came for her; one with a pony’s skull at the end of it. Petrified, she couldn’t bring herself to act against it. And before she knew it, the creature began to wrap around her…

***

“We hadn’t gotten far into the forest when we came under ‘attack’ by your new friend. Even with our echo-location, nopony saw it coming. He was lightning-quick, and gave us the surprise we originally intended for the enemy. Before we knew it, almost every one of us had been grabbed by it and carried it away.

I remember his hold being tight enough not to let me loose, but not tight enough to hurt me. I reationalized it by thinking, ‘maybe it didn’t want to spoil its meat’..."

Crypty was whipped through the forest, her bony captor moving faster than the fastest pegasus she had seen. Tree limbs and leaves brushed against her, but otherwise, the creature seemed to be taking care not to harm her. This process lasted a mere minute, before a familiar sight glowed in Crypty's slit-like eyes.

It was the smoldering campfires of where they had gathered. The creature had brought her back where she had started.

She felt herself hit soil. The creature had dropped her. Deposited her, more like, given it was only a tiny fall. And before she could even react, it had sped off back into the woods.

As she stood up and regained her composure, she began to notice she wasn't the only one this had happened to. Her entire tribe was with her, scattered about the area, but to her relief, very much alive.

"Regroup!" she heard her chief barking. "Regroup on me!"

Taking a deep breath to compose herself, she took flight towards his voice.

Present

"As it turned out, I had it all wrong," Crypty smiled. "Long Horse wasn't interested in eating us. He didn't seem to want to hurt us at all. It was something else. When we regrouped, we argued for a bit, eventually agreeing he probably just wanted us out of the forest for whatever reason. Maybe it was his home? Maybe he was an adamant ecologist and didn’t appreciate us chopping through the brush? We didn’t know.

What mattered though was given how tough he was, there was no easy way we were going to get past him. So my chief made the call to stay put. Our tribe's contribution to the flanking maneuver wasn't happening."

"So wait," Octavia said, dismayed. "You're saying Long Horse actually made a huge effort… not to hurt you?"

"Mhm. And it wasn't just us, either," Crypty said. "About a quarter of the ghouls who went into the woods were taken back out by Long Horse. He even did this a few times to a small dumb few who decided to go back in."

"So Long Horse didn’t wanna hurt anyone that day," Vinyl scoffed. "Doesn't mean he isn't dangerous."

"And why would you think he's dangerous?" Crypty asked, giving her a pensive look.

Vinyl glanced about, thinking. "Well… I…"

Crypty laughed. "I'm just messing with ya', kiddy. May be a cliche, but it's natural for ponies, or even ghouls in your case to fear what they don't understand."

"Guess there's not much hope for me and Tavi, then, huh?" Vinyl sighed.

"Hang on there," Crypty smirked. "I don’t know why you want their approval so much, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. While what I said was true, it's also natural for ponies to try to understand what they don't understand. Ya’ understand? If they're smart enough, and if you give em' a little shove, they eventually might just figure it out. And many times, they’ll like what they see."

"A little shove?" Octavia pondered.

"That's what Long Horse did for me, at least," Crypty grinned. "Literally and figuratively. Whether he cared what we thought about him, I don’t know, but he did more than just disrupt a military operation. You see, when the dawn came the next day, we got word the attack was a success. We pushed the daywalker lines back towards Canterlot. However, three quarters of the flanking force - the ones Long Horse didn't carry out of the woods…”

She took on a hushed, haunted tone. “... were never heard from again."

"Hah" Vinyl cried triumphantly. "So Long Horse is evil! I knew he was a chud, not a chad!"

"Vinyl" Octavia sighed. "Does that make much sense?"

"Course it does! Who else would have done it?"

Octavia gazed at her blankly. "Why would Long Horse go through all the trouble to carry so many out of the woods, apparently quite delicately, just to kill the rest?"

"Maybe he just wanted some witnesses left to tell the story," Vinyl said. "I dunno. How should we know how it thinks?"

"A reasonable assumption," Crypty said. "Buuuuut not when you know the whole picture. For one thing, we did find a single survivor. He was bruised and battered, and could only say one thing about his attacker before he was passed out: 'Cat'."

"So?" Vinyl asked.

"Why would he say 'Cat' instead of 'Snake' or 'Bone Horse' or something?" Octavia asked.

“Hmph.”

"Clever kiddy," Crypty said. "Annnnd as it turned out, back in those times at least, there was a legend about something strikingly similar to Long Horse. Some of the older thestrals began telling it to us after the fact. In those, he was said to be a kind of omen of bad things to come, but wasn't the bad thing himself. Are ya' picking up what I'm putting down here?"

Octavia nodded, but Vinyl remained skeptical. “I still dunno…”

Crypty leaned back. "I admit, the tale leaves a lot of questions. But I truly believe Long Horse had saved my life that day. My entire tribe's. If he didnt start snatching us, we might have run into that 'Cat', whatever that was. And we know how that turned out for the others."

Octavia couldn’t help but shiver.

Crypty, however, seemed to be feeling the opposite, as she soon smiled warmly. "Anyway, I’m glad you told me about all this. It’s nice to hear that he's back. Like I said, he hasn't been seen in eons, as far as I know. Some said that he was a traveller: a cryptid that could move between different worlds. If that's true, maybe that's where he's been all these years? Off giving a helping hoof to other poor, unfortunate critters in the dark of the night. Good boys like him can’t help themselves."

Octavia looked at her curiously. "By ‘other worlds’, do you mean like that mirror world Princess Twilight said she visited?"

"Possibly," Crypty shrugged. "I can't give ya' all the details, kiddy. I'm just going off old stories and what I saw." She bobbed her head back and forth slightly. “Of course, they also say he’s a dream-walker. Can show up in somepony’s sleep and warn em’ about things there. Like Luna only delightfully creepier. So maybe that’s what they meant by ‘other worlds’. Beats me.”

Octavia raised her eyebrows. ‘That would explain a few things.’

Crypty raised a hoof. "I can tell you one thing, though. If Long Horse really is an 'omen of doom', it isn’t him you should be worried about, if you catch my drift."

Octavia's eyes widened. "Ponyville…"

"I still dunno about Long Horse," Vinyl said, her arms folded. "But yeah, we should be heading back. Just in case." She gave a warm, fang-toothed smile the wise-cracking bar keep's way.. "Thanks for this, Crypty. And for the drinks!"

She cocked an eyebrow. "Those weren't free, you know. But I can look the other way for now. At least until you fill up the old… bit coffins. HeheheHAHAHA!"

"Faust damnit, Crypty."

Long Horse

Octavia awoke from her slumber in the middle of the night. She squinted, glancing around her. Something felt unusual. She couldn't remember when she had even gotten home, let alone gone to sleep in her own bed.

Slowly, she uncovered herself and groggily got to her hooves.

There was a full moon outside, but she was still in pony form. Yet not even her potions would guard her from turning; just from going feral. Another note to add to the list of oddities. Perhaps she simply needed to get her eyes checked; maybe the moon wasn’t as full as it looked?

There was a familiar crackle coming from outside her room, and a soothing cinnamon odor. Perhaps because of the latter, she was actually feeling at ease. Enough for her curiosity to take over. She made her way to the door and opened it, revealing her home's upstairs corridor.

As well as…

"Oh, hello Long Horse," she said, nonchalantly.

She wasn't sure how she knew its name, nor why it wasn't scaring the hell out of her, but Long Horse's skull hovered in front of her nonetheless, the rest of his body twisting down the corridor.

"Fancy seeing you here," Octavia said, smiling.

Long Horse snapped its neck a few times, then cocked its head curiously.

"You're probably wondering why I'm not afraid of you," Octavia said dreamily. "Well, I'm not sure myself. Deep down, I just have this feeling… You're not a monster at all, are you? The exact opposite, in fact."

Long Horse stood motionless.

"You know, I can understand how you feel somewhat," Octavia said. "You see… I normally don't look like this on full moons. But you already know that, don't you? Heh. If other ponies saw what I looked like then, they'd run away from me. Try to lock me up, even. Now I have to take all the effort in the world just to try to get them to see through that. I just want to be able to play my cello again without having to worry about… all of it. Is that so much to ask?"

Long Horse actually nodded.

"You're a good listener, you know that?" Octavia said. "And a better person than me. You don't care what other ponies think of you. You do what you do regardless. I envy you."

She reached out and tepidly patted Long Horse on the head. He cracked some of his bones again. It was rapid, and Octavia got the distinct feeling it was out of happiness.

“Vinyl’s like that, too, deep down, I think,” Octavia noted. “She doesn’t really care about being accepted. She just wants to help ponies. Like you do.”

A moment later, he turned his head back and forth, ‘gesturing’ down the corridor towards the stairs. He seemed to want Octavia to follow him.

"You want to show me something, don't you?" Octavia asked.

Long Horse nodded, then with another sequence of cracks, led her to the staircase. She paused at the top of it, and Long Horse at the bottom. The two stared at each other for a moment, and Octavia was getting the impression he was thinking, 'Well, come on. What are you waiting for?'

"Sorry," Octavia said. "I just have this feeling… what you want to show me; it isn't going to be nice, is it?"

Long Horse slowly nodded.

"But it is important, isn't it?"

Long Horse nodded briskly.

With that, he was on the move. Octavia swallowed hard, but nonetheless, managed to find her courage and follow him. He led her to the largest of her living room windows, currently covered by blinds.

"S-Sould I open them?" Octavia asked.

Long Horse nodded, before bowing his head. It almost looked like he was ashamed.

“You… you don’t want to show me, either, do you?” Octavia said, patting the creature once again. “Don’t worry, whatever it is, I won’t judge you.”

Taking a deep breath, she flung open the shades. And despite having seen the moon only a few minutes ago, the sun shined through her window. Yet that wasn’t the most unusual sight.

That would be that what she was looking at wasn’t Ponyville at all.

Her eyes widened. She… recognized it, but from where, she couldn’t tell. A dream, perhaps? She didn’t know. But it was different this time. Instead of ruins, a great, living city spiralled towards the horizon. One populated by creatures she didn’t recognize. They were bipedal, almost like more slender apes, and all wore a variety of clothing to cover up their multi-colored, furless skins.

She seemed to be in a park of some sort. A variety of these creatures were walking about, happily enjoying their time in the sun. It was peaceful to a degree. Normalcy among the abnormal.

That was for one exception.

On a park bench a small distance from the window sat a distinctively male creature in a pitch-black suit. He seemed to be older; with grey, sagging skin, and held a blank expression on his face. His only movements were to occasionally check his watch. The creatures around him didn’t seem to notice him.

Suddenly, time fast-forwarded. The creatures were now moving in blurs, and the strange vehicles they drove in the background even more-so. In the sky, the sun began to move at a visible pace, soon replaced by night. This process repeated again and again: night, day, night, day.

All the while, the man in the black suit remained motionless. He may have been checking his watch occasionally, but things were moving too quickly to see.

The process continued. A month must have gone by in the blink of an eye. Strangely, foot traffic was starting to diminish, along with vehicle traffic. But the only change in the environment came from the construction of a small tower of sorts - one right near where the man sat. And at the top of it were adorned two sirens.

Time returned to a normal pace a short time after. It was the dead of night, the creatures’ street lamps being the only illumination. Long Horse, or a ‘ghost’ of him, could be seen, crackling into view and approaching the man in the black suit. Just like everything else, save for his watch, the man ignored him. This was even after the ‘mirror’ Long Horse made a series of crackling noises, dancing about the man as if he were desperately trying to get his attention.

Yet despite all his efforts, all he managed to goad out of the man was a small bit of garbled words:

“Rorrim a tuohtiw sienop h’tiw yalp tond uoy.”

He didn’t even look at Long Horse when he said them.

Eventually, the ‘copy’ gave up, moving away from him; his usual brisk, slithering motion slower, almost as if he was depressed.

Time sped up again. Further and further into the future they went. Eventually, there was next to no pedestrian or vehicle traffic at all. To Octavia, it seemed as if the city was slowly dying. And for some reason, it made her sad.

Finally, after almost two months had passed - all within two minutes from Octavia’s perspective - time returned to normal. The city at this point looked practically abandoned. Various junk was scattered about; trash and broken down vehicles. One thing in particular caught Octavia’s eye: a discarded newspaper. The only headline she could see on it was simple:

THE WAR DRAWS ON

Then, suddenly, came the voice. One which delivered a horrible, horrible message. Both the sirens next to the bench as well as those scattered throughout the city were broadcasting it.

“CIVIL CODE SIX, EIGHT ***SHRRRRRRRRK*** NINE, SLASH, ROMEO, ECHO, DELTA, STOP! THIS IS A FEDERATION EMERGENCY ALERT! ***SHRRRRRRK*** AIRCRAFT FROM ***SHRRRRRRRK*** EMPIRE ON APPROACH! ***SHRRRRRK*** ATTACK IMMINENT! ENTER FALLOUT SHELTERS IMMEDIATELY! REPEAT! ENTER FALLOUT SHELTERS IMMEDIATELY!”

It was fractured slightly, and referenced things that were unknown to Octavia, but either way, she understood the point of it.

“No!” she gasped.

It repeated over and over, echoing through the dead city. She could only hope that the creatures, whatever they were, had heeded its message and taken shelter.

With none of them visible, she assumed they had. This was save for the man in the black suit.

It seemed even he couldn’t ignore the blaring broadcasts and their accompanying, wailing sirens. He almost seemed nervous, glancing at his watch more and more frequently. Though for whatever reason, he never bothered to get up.

Then, as the sun dipped below the horizon, a new light came. A titanic flash from the distance, and one as bright as any star. Octavia was, surprisingly, not blinded by it, though she wished she had been, for the coming destruction was beyond comprehension.

A second later, the flash was replaced by a shockwave. One which tossed vehicles, mail boxes, and telephone polls about as if they were children’s toys, and blasted through the various skyscrapers in the distance, shattering their thousands of windows into pieces.

And all the while, near the horizon, a hellish mushroom cloud rose above it all, its evil form casting a hellish, red glow upon the ‘normal’ clouds above.

The man sitting on the bench lay back, seemingly content with his fate. But then… just as it looked like the blast was about to reach him…

Time slowed for the final time.

Long Horse entered the scene. If it were in real time, he would have been moving faster than a bullet. He circled the area, stretching himself to the limit. With his own body, he created a large, protective dome around not only the man, but parts of the surrounding area, including the siren.

As soon as he finished, he began to dematerialize - like a ghost fading into the afterlife.

Unfortunately, he only managed to do so half-way, however, when the blastwave ripped through everything surrounding them.

“NO!” Octavia screamed in horror, her voice barely a whisper in its roar. “NO! NOOOOOOOOOO--

“--OOOOOOOO!”

Octavia panted, her eyes bloodshot. The city! Long Horse! The man in the black suit… what… where…?

“Tavi!” Vinyl shouted, snapping her out of it. “Tavi, chill out, yo!”

Wait… wait where was she? She calmed herself slightly, taking a look around. A train cabin… moving cliff walls out the window. Of course. She was aboard the Ponyville express. She must have nodded off on the way back home from Canterlot.

It was all just a horrible dream.

“Hey, you okay?” Vinyl said, sitting across from her and giving her friend a concerned look. “That must have been a hell of a nightmare.”

“I-I’ll say,” Octavia said, shivering. “H-How long was I out?”

“Bout an hour,” Vinyl said. “Knocked out for the whole trip, ya’ sleepy head.”

“Ah,” Octavia said, taking a deep breath. “Well, I hope you took a nap as well,” she continued, finally regaining her usual classy composure. “If we’re going to keep a look out for… for Long Horse, you’re going to want your wits about you.”

“Eh, it’s cool,” Vinyl shrugged. “Haven’t needed as much sleep after turning.”

There was a moment of silence as Octavia gazed at her pensively.

"So…"

"So."

"Let's say we manage to find the Long Horse," Octavia said. "What happens then?"

"We break it until its new name is Not-So-Long Horse," Vinyl joked.

"Seriously?"

"Sort of," Vinyl shrugged. "I dunno, Tavi. All we know about it is from Crypty's story and what we saw. We still can’t say it isn’t dangerous. Not like a hundred percent."

"And what if it really is trying to warn us about something else?" Octavia said.

"Then we go, 'my bad', and go Captain Blasto on the other thing, too."

Octavia blinked. "Captain who?"

"Blasto, the first Seapony Spectre," Vinyl chuckled. "From the Blast Effect comics?"

"Blast Effect?" Octavia chided. "W-Why, why, you little nerd!"

Vinyl smirked. "Coming from the pony who geeks out over what Neighhoven liked to eat for breakfast."

Octavia blushed. "I… well…"

Vinyl gave a playful cackle. "You're cute when you get all flustered, you know that?"

Octavia put on an exaggerated, comic frown. "Oh, I see how it is…"

"Hehe," Vinyl giggled, her smirk slowly forming into a warm smile. "Hey, whatever we do, I'm sure it'll be the right thing. When our heads are together, we always find the right road. Ain’t it true?"

Octavia returned the smile. "We always do, don't we?"

The two shared a comfortable silence for most of the rest of the trip. Though the whole way, Octavia couldn't help but wish they could do more than just put their heads together. Vinyl's lips, with her cute little fangs hanging over them occasionally, were almost too inviting.

'Stupid, sexy vampire,' she chuckled to herself. 'Has me under her spell.'

Though at that thought, she began to think of the other thing that now had her under its spell. That being her strange dreams lately. It was possible they were simply due to stress. After all, they didn’t start happening until after they had seen the Long Horse. But then again, with them being completely different than anything she had ever dreamed before, and Crypty describing him as a dream walker…

‘If that’s true, why did he have to be so cryptic?’ Octavia grumbled to herself. ‘What were you trying to tell me, Long Horse?’

If it did turn out to be a warning about something, she could only hope they’d be able face it.

CONELRAD

That night, along with the next few, were fairly quiet. This included both Octavia’s dreams and Ponyville itself. Despite Vinyl and Octavia keeping their eyes out for anything unusual, there was no sight of Long Horse or any other monster.

This was aside from the various decorations ponies were putting out for Nightmare Night, of course. By the time they had reached the night before it, the entire place was starting to look like Crypty’s tavern. Fake cobwebs stretched across windows, Jack’o’Lanterns sat on every stoop, and banners with Nightmare Moon’s image hung everywhere they could.

Along with a few things… much tackier.

“Ugh, can you believe this?” Vinyl said, rolling her eyes at a particular cardboard cutout.

It was hung onto the door of Sugarcube Corner, and appeared to be the image of a stereotypical vampire, complete with the text…

“I vant to suck your blood!” Vinyl said, trying her best to do best to imitate the accent. “I wonder if the Tramplevanians ever get tired of being, ya’ know, linked to vampires?”

“You’d think it’d hurt their tourist economy,” Octavia agreed.

“Yeah, exactly,” Vinyl continued. “Also, I seriously don’t get how other vampires can do that.”

“Do what?” Octavia asked.

“Drink blood.”

Octavia raised an eyebrow.

“You know what I mean!” Vinyl grunted. “I meant like right from somepony’s neck. That’s like… that’s like drinking milk from a cow’s udder.. All warm and gross. Ewww.”

Octavia raised her other eyebrow.

“Also, the whole biting into ponies thing,” Vinyl said, blushing slightly. “Usually without their consent. That’s gross, too.”

“Thank you,” Octavia chuckled.

“Yep,” Vinyl rambled on. “That’s why this girl gets her blood the way Faust intended: mixing it in an iced drink.”

Octavia gave her a sarcastic look. “Yes, I know. I’ve seen you do it. But do normal, non-Crypty drinks even do anything for you anymore?”

“Na, but I still like the taste,” Vinyl shrugged. “One of the few things I miss bout’ being mortal, to be honest. Getting crunk easily, that is. That and not having to worry about vampire hunters, or being locked up in Tartarus, or…” She frowned. “Actually, now that I think about it, there’s a lot of things I miss.” She stamped her hoof in frustration. “Now, if only stupid Long Horse would show up. Maybe I could cross at least one thing off the list.”

“Maybe you scared him away with your wubstep the other day,” Octavia smiled cheekily.

“Hey, I turned it down!” Vinyl grunted. “I forgot you had super-sensitive hearing.”

“I suppose I’m only slightly deafer,” Octavia mused, rubbing one of her fuzzy ears. She then glanced away from Vinyl. “Still… about Long Horse. I’m… starting to wonder if he’ll be coming.”

“Huh? Why?”

Octavia took a deep breath. She supposed it was time to tell Vinyl about the strange dreams she was having at the beginning of the week.

However, before she could, her latest dream jumped forth to reality.

“Civil Code Six, Eight, Seven, Nine, Slash, Romeo, Echo, Delta, Stop. This is a Federation emergency broadcast. This is a Federation emergency broadcast. This is a *SHRRRRRRK*!”

Octavia froze. Shivers spiralled down her back, and her hair stood on end. The voice was coming from a distant part of the Everfree Forest. And the code it uttered was the same she heard in her dream. Far too precise to be a coincidence.

Unless she was going insane and didn’t really hear it, this meant her dreams really did mean something. But whatever the hell that was, she still didn’t know.

‘Damnit, Long Horse. What were you trying to say?’

“Equis to Tavi!” an annoyed Vinyl said, waving a hoof in front of the former’s eyes. Apparently, she hadn’t heard it. “Ya’ there?”

‘I have a very bad feeling about this… I should keep my mouth shut. Even if I told her, she wouldn’t know what it means.’

“It… nevermind,” Octavia said.

“Faust, Tavi,” Vinyl blinked. “You look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”

“Yeah,” Octavia chuckled nervously. “Got some rather odd chills for a second.”

Vinyl raised an eyebrow, gazing at her thick fur. “You? Cold?”

“Help! Help!”

Vinyl’s red eyes widened. She must have heard it, too. The voice of a filly coming from the woods; louder than what Octavia had heard before.

“Yo!” Vinyl said, now on guard. “The hell was that?!”

“It’s got me! Please, somepony, it’s got me!”

“Holy crap!” Vinyl cried, a little louder than Octavia would have wanted. “Looks like it’s game time!”

“W-Wait!” Octavia said.

“For what?” Vinyl said, frustrated. “Sounds like a little kid! We go save her, she calls us heroes, we become the first ghouls to get medals, it’s a win-win.”

“EEEEEP!” the voice cried.

“Alright, alright!" Octavia gulped, breathing slightly heavier now. “I’ll lead.”

“Now we’re talking!” Vinyl grinned.

The two of them sped off towards the Everfree Forest.

In recent years, what was once a terrifying place had lost some of its mystique. This was largely thanks to Princess Twilight and her friend’s frequent expeditions into it. Not to mention the large archeological dig currently taking place in it, led by Ponyville’s academic wiz, Doctor Whooves. With so many ponies coming and going day by day, all without incident, the formerly perceived eldritch location was starting to be viewed more and more as just another forest.

This complacency was not a good thing, however. Ponies treating it that way only made the dangers more potent, and there were still dangers. Timberwolves still prowled its ancient trees, and on rare occasions, larger monsters could still be seen.

Then, there was Long Horse. And though Octavia was fairly sure Vinyl blamed him for this recent event, she herself was not sure. However, what he was trying to warn them of, on the other hoof...

Oh, and speaking of the creature.

“WHAT THE--”

A small distance into the woodlands, Vinyl and Octavia nearly ran smack-dab into his twisting neck. It was stretching across the trees in front of them. Though like last time, and in Octavia’s dreams, his body couldn’t be seen, if he even had one.

“Ohoho!” Vinyl cackled. “Look who’s shown up at the scene of the crime!”

Almost shyly, Long Horse peaked his head out of a nearby brush, then slowly swung his upper neck, skull included, around to meet the two.

Vinyl gave him a glare, not having it at all.

“What?!” she growled. “You mad, bro? You mad we just found out you hurt a kid? So much for being some kind of hero, huh!”

“Vinyl, we don’t know that!” Octavia hissed, glancing warily at the creature. “But still… what are you doing here? Why are you blocking our way? Did you just hurt somepony?”

Long Horse made a series of frantic crackles, shaking his head back and forth.

"Help! Please!" the voice cried once more, now much closer. However, it didn't appear near enough to have been Long Horse’s doing.

"So… so it wasn't you!" Octavia said, almost relieved.

"Then get out of the way and let us beat up whatever it is!" Vinyl snapped.

Without warning, she catapulted herself forward in mist form, aiming to arc over Long Horse's neck, but before she could…

"HEY!"

The creature swung around, blocking her with its upper portion.

"DAMNIT!"

She tried a different angle, Long Horse blocking her again.

"FRIGGIN'--"

She crouched low, trying to barrel under him. No dice.

"MOVE!"

Long Horse shook his head once more.

"Heeeeeeeeelp!"

"Okay, no more Ms. Nice Mare!" Vinyl roared. "Block me one more time and I'm going through you!"

Long Horse stood his ground.

"Vinyl…" Octavia said.

"There's somepony in trouble and he's holding us up!" she spat, glaring at Long Horse. "Why? You helping out with that, huh?"

"Damnit, Vinyl!" Octavia shouted, stunning the vampiric made. "Will you stop assuming the bloody worst in him, already!?"

She gave Octavia a glare. "So what? You're on his side now?"

"No!" Octavia growled. "But don't you see what you're doing? You're treating him the same way that daywalkers treat ghouls! And unlike them, you don't even have a reason to!"

Vinyl paused, stunned. She glanced between Octavia and Long Horse, a confused look upon her.

"But… but…" she whimpered. "This is our chance to be heroes! To be accepted! And… and he's holding us back. Why!?"

Octavia gave him a knowing look. "Because you're trying to keep us safe from something, aren't you?”

Long Horse slowly nodded, making a new series of cracks that, to Octavia, almost seemed apologetic.

"You don't need to worry about us, my friend," Octavia smiled. "You know what we are, yes? We can handle it."

Long Horse shook his head once more.

"And how can you be sure we can't?" Octavia asked.

And before anyone could respond, she got her answer… one in the form of several, loud STOMPS!

"CIVIL CODE SIX, EIGHT, SEVEN, NINE, SLASH, ROMEO, ECHO, DELTA, STOP! THIS IS A FEDERATION EMERGENCY ALERT! ***SSSHHHRRRRKKK*** CONELRAD PROCEDURES INITI-- ***SSSHHHHRRRRRRKK***!"

Octavia and Vinyl gasped in horror. As high as the highest trees, a terrible figure stepped into view. It was bipedal, with grey, mummified, and in portions, charred skin.

But in place of its head was none other than a twin pair of sirens.

Sirens with teeth lining their cones.

"S-S-Sirenhead!" Vinyl shrieked. "He's real?! HOLY FREAKIN' FAUST HE IS!"

Then, almost as if to taunt them, that same 'filly's' voice echoed from his speakers. "HELP! HELP ME! PLEASE!"

"It was all a trap!" Octavia yelped. "He was just trying to lure somepony into the woods!"

"Just like in the stories," Vinyl said breathlessly. "And… and Long Horse…"

Long Horse slowly backed away, almost as if in fear.

"I think we owe him a few apples," Octavia simpered, before narrowing her eyes at Siren Head. "After we become heroes."

"What!?" Vinyl yelped.

"Siren Head probably doesn't know who he's dealing with!" Octavia said quickly, not really believing her own words a hundred percent. "He probably expected some defenseless little pony to come to the rescue! But if we take him down here and now, we can stop that from ever happening for real!

"The stories say he gets stronger the more victims he eats," Vinyl gulped. "S-So… yeah. Guess we shouldn't kick that can down the road." She began nodding to herself, as if she was trying to psyche herself up. "You know what? YEAH! LET'S FRIGGIN' DO THIS!"

Siren Head paused, eerily swaying his upper half as he 'looked' down on them. Almost as if he was sizing up his prey.

"Yo! Siren Man!” Vinyl bellowed. “Check yourself before you wreck yourself, bro! Otherwise, get ready to eat what Team Spooky is cooking!"

Long Horse gazed at Vinyl, than at Octavia.

"Yeah, guess we're going to be calling ourselves that," Octavia sighed in defeat. “Don’t mind it.”

Long Horse gave a few more neck snaps. And having interacted him with enough, Octavia was honestly starting to be able to loosely translate what he was 'saying'.

"You're nervous, aren't you?" Octavia said empathetically. "To tell you the truth, I'm nervous, too. And so is Vinyl, though she'd never admit it."

"Yo!" Vinyl grumbled.

"Before we became what we are, we were musicians," Octavia explained. "As peaceful of a profession as you can get. Well, save for those who do that Death Metal garbage, but you understand what I mean. I say this because I sense you don't like fighting. And neither do we."

Siren Head continued to observe them at an uncomfortably close distance. Then, it took a step forward…

"Tavi, might wanna cut the inspiring speech short!" Vinyl called.

Octavia took a deep breath. "But occasionally, when the moon is full and the bats circle in the sunless skies, we all have to go against our nature.”

At that, Long Horse seemed to have found his resolve. He stiffened slightly, and rose up into the air like a serpent. His head was nearly at the head of Siren Head’s chest when he finished.

“That’s the spirit!” Octavia cheered.

Siren Head, however, was not intimidated. His only response to this was to emit a series of eerie, high pitched tones.

Then, without warning, he attacked.

“WAH!”

He swung his right arm in a downward motion, trying to grab Vinyl. Fortunately, however…

“Hah! Nope!”

Vinyl morphed into mist, jetting forward and dodging his swipe. She then exited it, rolled, and leapt back onto her hooves. She pivoted to face Siren Head, her horn glaring to life. Ripping from it came a red, lightning-like projectile, which slammed into Siren Head’s upper body.

He didn’t even reel at it, but he was distracted, so Octavia took advantage. She galloped forth, leapt into the air, and dug her frontal claws into Siren Head’s lower body.

The monster was not pleased with this development.

"***SHRRRRRRK*** ONE, SIX, ALPHA ***SHRRRRRRK*** EXPUNGE!”

He began to swing his body rapidly side to side, trying to fling Octavia off it. Meanwhile, she was trying to get a grip into him with her hind legs. If she could climb to the top of him, maybe she could rip off his sirens - what she assumed was its nerve center - as gruesome as it sounded.

Unfortunately, Siren Head didn’t give her a chance. After a few moments of flailing, he changed strategies, instead grabbing Octavia with the long, spindly fingers of its left hand. It took him some effort to get her off of him, actually ripping the piece of flesh Octavia was attached to off with her, but it didn’t seem to bother him.

Octavia wanted to scream, but his grip was so strong she couldn’t breath. He lifted her upward, towards one of his waiting maws. As he drew her closer, he began emitting a series of horrible, deafening electrical noises, the toothy mouth opening wider and wider.

“TAVI! NO!” Vinyl cried, hitting Siren Head with a series of spells, but to no avail.

Fortunately, she wasn’t the only friend Octavia had in this fight.

Before Siren Head could take a bite out of her, Long Horse flung himself at the monster, wrapping around the arm that held Octavia before jutting towards a particularly ancient,nearby tree. He used it and his own body like a pulley and cable, dragging Siren Head’s arm away from his waiting mouth, which was now wailing an even more terrible screech.

And he was about to be further displeased, as with his arm now being lower to the ground, it allowed Vinyl to lunge forward and SLAM! a hoof, downward, into it.

"***SHHHHHHRRRRRRK***CIVIL CODE BRAVO, LIMA, ALPHA, CHARLIE ***SHHHHRRRRRRK*** --EMONIC INCURSION IN ***SHHHHHRRRRRRRK***!”

Siren Head reeled backwards. The force wasn’t enough to break his arm in half, but it did bend the upper portion of it into an L-Shape. Though he didn’t release his grasp on Octavia, it was just enough to allow her to do the job herself. Summoning all the power the moon could give her, she overpowered his grip, forcing his hand open and leaping out.

Somehow, she managed to land on her hooves, but her insides felt like they were on fire from the pressure Siren Head had put her under. She’d be very lucky if she hadn’t broken anything. She tried with all her might to remain standing, but to no avail. She was almost immediately forced to lay down onto her belly.

“Tavi!” Vinyl yelped, nearly in tears as she galloped over to her. “Tavi, thank Faust you’re okay. I almost thought…”

"N-Never," Octavia said, breathing heavily, and feeling light-headed. "Y-You're not the only one with somepony to lose, after all."

"Y-You romantic, you," Vinyl chuckled. "Just hang in there. We'll finish this up and-- ACK!"

Siren Head, who had been wrestling with Long Horse, finally managed to untangle itself from him. Then, with a terrible howl, he flung Long Horse at the duo, missing Octavia by an inch but hitting Vinyl, sending both her and Long Horse into a nearby tree. Long Horse seemed to recover from the blow fairly quickly, but Vinyl was either unconscious or...

"N-No!" Octavia cried, trying desperately to stand again. All that managed to do was draw her closer and closer towards blacking out.

The last thing she remembered before doing so was Siren Head lunging for her, the feeling of bones wrapping around her, and a heavy smell of cinnamon.

…

Octavia was in a black void, and still in here werewolf form.

‘What is this?’

It certainly wasn’t a dream, but it wasn’t reality, either. Her memories were still with her, but not the pain she was feeling before blacking out. Was she dead? This certainly wasn't the type of afterlife she expected.

Before she could ponder anything further, she realized something:

She wasn't alone.

Standing over her was the man in the black suit. The creature from her dream the other night. His expression was different from when she last saw him, however. Not completely blank, but one with… gratitude?

It wasn't the only thing different about him, however. He carried a briefcase this time, one which he snapped open, pulling out a sheet of paper. On it was a simple, hand-written poem. He handed it to Octavia, who slowly read it over.

All around the water tank,

Waiting for a train,

We're a thousand miles away from home,

Just standing in the rain.

Octavia blinked, confused. She turned her head back towards the man, wanting to ask him for its meaning, but he was nowhere to be found. He had vanished. All that remained of him was a garbled whisper from the distance:

“D’neirf ym rof.”

A moment later, everything else disappeared as well.

…

Peacefully, an eternity later, Octavia rose from her bed. Unfortunately, a sudden pain shooting through her muscles stopped her from rising too high. The pain triggered her memory; those of her last conscious moments flooded her mind. She coughed slightly - wheezed more like it - and lay back down.

Fortunately, her insides didn’t feel so bad that she couldn’t relax and try to get her bearings.

"Vinyl!" she suddenly blurted out, remembering the state of her friend when she last saw her. She tried to get up again, only for, "OUCH!" another spike of pain to shoot through her, forcing her to lie back down. "Ugh! Stupid body! Let me get up, damnit"

"Hey, hey, easy there, girl!" a friendly voice called, soothing Octavia's pain with the opium of relief.

"Oh, thank Faust," Octavia said, tears of joy nearly filling her eyes as they looked upon Vinyl.

Her friend was almost as beat up as she was as she walked into the room, with parts of her fur missing and a large, unhealed gash looming on her neck.

"Vinyl!" Octavia shouted, alarmed. "You… you have an open wound! We need to… to…"

Vinyl chuckled, walking over to her bedside. "Vampire thing, boo. Wounds heal quick, but they don't cauterize the same. It’ll be okay. Nasty sight, though, I know. I could guaze it if you want."

“No, no, that’s fine,” Octavia said, giving her a warm smile. "I'm just happy you're not…"

"Dead?" Vinyl laughed. "Na. Probably can't say the same for Siren Head, though. Not after Long Horse got done with him."

Shyly, the creature peaked its head into Octavia's room. He made a series of crackles she recognized as shyness.

"And hello to you, too," Octavia beamed. "I’m glad to see you’re alright as well. Though… I am a little worried."

Long Horse cocked his head as he slithered into her room.

"I'm not in another dream, am I?" Octavia asked.

Long Horse shook his head.

"Good," Octavia sighed in relief.

"Yeah, speaking of that," Vinyl said. "Why didn't you tell me he was a dream walker?"

"Wait, you know?" Octavia blinked.

"Mhm," she chuckled. "He visited me while I was knocked out. Showed me some of what he showed you. Didn’t get a lot of it, but I got the jist. He also showed what happened after we went out cold. Dude dragged us all the way back home! Just like he did to Crypty in her story. Even tucked us in, the big softy."

Long Horse made a few embarrassed crackles.

"Well, I'm glad to see you two made friends," Octavia beamed.

Vinyl rolled her eyes. "Well, if the big dummy had tried talking to me in my dreams a few times, maybe there would have been a misunderstanding."

Long Horse's expression was impossible to tell, but Octavia could just imagine he was staring at Vinyl blankly.

"Maybe if you didn't scare the hell out of him the first time you met," Octavia said, rolling her eyes.

"Haw haw," Vinyl laughed sardonically.

"But what about Siren Head?" Octavia asked.

"Hah!" Vinyl grinned, gesturing towards Long Horse. "After he brought us home, this dude decided he still wasn't done for the night. Crazy bastard went back into the woods and finished what we started. Beat the living hell out of Siren Man and sent him limping into the woods." She winked the cryptid's way. "Probably wouldn't have had the chance if we hadn’t softened the creep up first, though."

"So wait… it's not dead?" Octavia gulped.

"It was dying, definitely. But I don't think he'll be bothering this town again."

"But… but… what about the rest of Equestria?" Octavia said

Vinyl scratched the back of her neck. "I took care of that. Sent anonymous letters out to all the princesses, Starswirl, Starlight, anyone who might listen. Don't worry, I was pretty convincing. If the rumors of Princess Luna's blood templar attitude are true, retired or not, she's probably out hunting him down right now. If not, at least everpony will have a heads up."

"I suppose that's all we could do…" Octavia said, giving Vinyl a sympathetic look. "I'm sorry, Vinyl. I know how much hunting down a monster meant to you."

Vinyl winced in pain. "Heh. I think monster hunting is off the table for a while. But still… believe it or not, I'm cool with it."

Octavia raised her eyebrows. "Really?"

"Yeah," Vinyl said, nodding towards Long Horse. "Our new King Chad here kind of got me thinking. What we did? I feel pretty good about it. Stuck our necks out to help keep everypony safe. And though they might not ever know about it, we know about it, and that's what really counts, right? In the end, it ain't others we have to answer to, it's ourselves. And I think we're pretty awesome, you and me."

Long Horse bowed his head sorrowfully, to which Vinyl laughed at. "Yeah, and you too, dude," she continued, giving him an affectionate pat. "Ya' still got some apples left? Nod if you want me to buy you more later."

Long Horse nodded briskly, making a few excited crackles.

"Hah! Alright. Fair enough, buddy."

"So wait," Octavia blinked. "He actually likes apples? And can eat them?"

He nodded briskly.

"Don't ask me how," Vinyl shrugged. “Just kind of dissolves em’. Gross, but who am I to judge?”

Octavia shook her head, baffled, but decided to simply roll with it. “So… what happens now?”

"We all sit back, chill, and heal up," Vinyl smiled. "Long Horse included. He did take a few hits during the fight himself. Needs to regenerate some of his bone segment things. So… I offered him a place to stay for a bit. Didn't think you'd mind."

"Not at all," Octavia smiled. "The least we can do, honestly."

Long Horse wiggled in joy.

"Heh," Vinyl said. "Me thinks this dude could use some company, anyway. Got the feeling he's been on his own for a while."

He nodded sorrowfully.

"Hmmm…" Octavia pondered, smiling whimsically. "Well then. Since you may be staying a while… do you play any instruments, my friend?"

She half-expected for Long Horse to look at her like she was dumb, but instead, he whisked away for a brief second, before returning with a pair of bongos balanced on his snout. He quickly set them down, before beginning to tap them with his snout, making a surprisingly complex beat.

"Woah," Octavia blinked.

"I know, right?" Vinyl laughed. "Dude's a natural. Gonna have to tone some of my stuff down to go with it, though. Maybe break out the ole' acoustic."

"Some softer, peaceful music would be a lovely change of pace," Octavia said, the bongo playing suddenly triggering a memory of her last ‘dream’. “Though… speaking of bongo-related things. Long Horse… does this poem mean anything to you?”

He looked at her curiously, and Octavia cleared her throat.

“All around the water tank,

Waiting for a train,

We're a thousand miles away from home,

Just standing in the rain.”

There was a moment of silence. Long Horse simply hovered there motionless. Octavia was beginning to wonder if he even knew what she was talking about…

That was until she noticed a small bit of black mist gathering in his eye-sockets.

“Woah,” Vinyl blinked. “Yo, buddy… you okay?”

Slowly, Long Horse moved forward towards Octavia. She wasn’t alarmed by it, but she did raise an eyebrow. This was before he revealed his intention: to give her an affectionate, tearful nuzzle.

“H-Heh,” Octavia said awkwardly. “You’re welcome?”

“Daw!” Vinyl cooed. “I’d say group hug, but I’m pretty sure you’re still healing from internal bleeding, Tavi.”

Octavia smirked at her. “You really are the sweetest vampire in Equestria, you know that? I mean it.”

“And you’re the cutest werewolf,” she winked. “Cute enough to nom! Not that I ever would.”

Octavia rolled her eyes, looking towards Long Horse. “You sure you can put up with this sort of thing for a bit?”

Long Horse glanced between the two, before nodding.

“Hehe, what a champ!” Vinyl cheered.

And for quite a while, peace is what they had. Once Octavia had healed enough, their nights were spent making music, just as she originally wanted.

Eventually, Long Horse had healed enough to strike out on his own again, politely declining Vinyl and Octavia's offer for him to stay longer. Still, he had taken a liking to them, and made it a point to visit a few times a week at the very least. And every time he did, they spent at least a small part of it in the harmony of song.

Eventually, Vinyl even surprised Long Horse. Sharing a song she wrote after rediscovering her love for the acoustic guitar. One in his honor.

“It's the Long Horse,
Friendly long horse.
Maybe you don't trust him,
Nor did I,
But he's here for us.

He's on the move,
But he cares for me and you.
Little do we know of the woe ahead,
But at least we've got a protector and friend.”

What music they made, those children of the night.

Loving and content.

…

Author's Note

Whelp! That's it for this little (?) slice of ghoul life. I hope you enjoyed. It wasn't as horrifying as I wanted, unless you're like me and are terrified of nuclear weapons, of course. Still, only so far you can go when you're talking about a world of colorful, talking, ponies.

For those who don't already know, Long Horse was not created by me, nor is he based off of any cryptid. He is in fact the creation of the brilliant artist, Trevor Henderson. I'd highly recommend his work if you want more spooks.

I might revisit the Tavi, Long Horse, and Vinyl one of these days, and/or other parts of the Equestrian Underworld, if I can think of a neat idea and there's enough demand. Til then, check out some of my other fics, which do have loose connections to this.

As always, stay safe, and Happy Halloween!

P.S. That poem featured in the final chapter is also *not* my own. From what I can tell, it was written by an anonymous hobo. I found it to be touching in its own way, and fit in with the mysterious character who brought it up.

Team Spooky

“There are those who say Ponyville is totally safe…”

Two shadows walked towards Town Hall in the dead of a full moon night.

“That everything that goes bump in the night has been locked away…”

In total silence, one blurred up the side of it, and the other swiftly climbed it.

“Yeah, okay, sure, most of them have…”

They stood upon the upper balcony, gazing over the rustic little town they called home.

“But what about the things that fall through the cracks? Who’s gonna take care of that, huh?”

One of the shadows made a dramatic pose.

“Us, that’s who! Booya!”

The shadow grinned widely, basking in the presence of the night. With great flair, she removed the purple sunglasses covering her eyes, revealing two, fiery red orbs. Suddenly, while playing a metal air guitar, she began to sing:

“Vinyl and Octavia!
Guardians of the night!
We may seem scary,
But we clean up the frights!

We’re Team Spooky!
We’re here to stay!
Go Team Spooky!
Keep the creeps away!

Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!”

The second figure looked at her blankly, stepping up next to her. Despite looking like a fearsome wolf slash pony hybrid, her voice was in stark contrast to her partner’s: refined and dignified, though with a hint of a guttural growl.

“You’re such a dork, Vinyl,” she sighed. “You know that, right?”

“You know you love it,” the former said, giving a long-fanged grin. “So, how did you like our theme song, Tavi? Just needs some wubstep to back it up and some of your cello magic to add a little class, and I think it’ll be gold!”

Octavia rolled her eyes. “Is that why we’re up here? You just wanted to sing me this? Why didn’t you just do that at home!?”

“Cus it’s more dramatic up here, that’s why!” Vinyl said, reeling on her hind hooves and dealing two, almost lightning-fast punches into the air. “Wouldn’t have the same kick. Only thing that would have made it better is if I was wearing a cape!” She then smiled hopefully. “So…?”

“So what?”

“What’d you think?! Duh!”

“It’s um…” Octavia coughed. “Unique. That’s for sure.” She then raised a furry claw. “Though you do know that you won’t be able to sing it to anypony, right?”

“At the moment,” Vinyl said.

“At any moment,” Octavia sighed. “We’ve gone over this, what? A thousand times? If anypony found out about our… conditions, we’d be thrown into Tartarus at the blink of an eye. There hasn’t been one exception in Equestrian history where that hasn’t happened to… ponies like us.”

“Pffft,” Vinyl said, waving a dismissive hoof. “Not if we can prove we’re chill. That we’re not like those other chuds in the underworld. Just gotta prove we can use our spooky powers for good and not douchebaggery!”

“That’s another thing,” Octavia said, prodding her slightly. “Even if there aren’t any other werewolves or vampires living in Ponyville, what happens when one passes through? You know what happens to those who consort with ‘the enemy’.”

“Bleh, screw that oldschool Goomer talk,” Vinyl laughed. “I don’t give two craps about some stupid ancient feud. And I’m definitely not gonna stop hanging with my BFF cus of it.”

“Neither am I, don’t get me wrong,” Octavia reassured her. “But… why don’t we just spend the nights at home? Listening to radio shows, playing board games, writing songs, working on your music theory…” She put on a cute, almost irresistible ‘puppy face’. Something she knew would go straight to Vinyl’s non-beating heart. “And… not doing this? Please?”

“B-But,” Vinyl whimpered. “But if we don’t keep an eye out for monsters, we won’t find one to fight. And if we don’t fight a monster, how will we prove that we’re chads, not chuds?”

Octavia gazed at her sympathetically. “I know how much you hate having to hide who you really are, my lovely little extrovert. It’s hard to keep secrets like this. And it isn’t exactly right that we have to. But we have to face reality: Twilight, the Elements, the Pillars, and the princesses, they’ve already taken care of all the monsters. Proving we’re still decent ponies that way might be impossible. When’s the last time you’ve seen a hydra? Or a manticore?”

“Like… years,” Vinyl pouted.

“Indeed,” Octavia said. “The only ones left are those smart enough not to show their faces.”

“Vampires gotsta eat, and werewolves who don’t have those potions gotsta prowl,” Vinyl argued. “I kinda hope one does ‘pass through’. It’ll be a visit they’d never forget.”

“Vinyl, think for a moment,” Octavia countered. “Even if we did encounter one - which we haven’t in months out in the wild, by the way - what would we do?”

“Beat em’ up, that’s what!” Vinyl grunted. “And send em’ packing, promising to never say it was us. We do this when there are ponies watching and they’ll pin medals on us!”

Octavia looked at her with a ‘really?’ expression.

Vinyl grunted in response. “Come on, Tavi, work with me here: even if we don’t make a show about it, do you really want one of those creeps messing with our friends? We know best what to look for, so we’re the best ponies for the job. Any blood junkies or wolves gone moonacy stupid enough to make Ponyville their playground will be in for a huge surprise!”

Octavia felt a little guilty at that. Vinyl did have a point. Most werewolves didn’t have the luxury of Zecora’s specially-crafted repression potions she did, and vampires were incredibly unpredictable. Most of the time they’d take a little blood from one of their victims and leave them be, but sometimes… they’d take too much. It would be terribly selfish to just let it happen when they did, indeed, have the capacity to do something about it, despite the risk to their own persons.

“Well… alright,” Octavia sighed. “I suppose there’s no harm in keeping a lookout, yes?”

“That’s the spirit!” Vinyl beamed, slapping her friend on the back. “Kind of the second reason I brought us up here, by the way. Better and safer than creeping around town like we have been, right?”

Octavia smiled. Vinyl wasn’t always the clearest thinker, but she didn’t lack the capacity. “Sounds good to me.”

“Just wish I brought a pack of cards,” Vinyl said. “Gonna be a long night, ya’ know.”

“Chilly, too,” Octavia said, sniffing the air. “Well, it would be. This dog fur comes in handy from time to time.”

“Mmm, Nightmare Night’s only a week away, isn’t it?” Vinyl smiled. “My new favorite holiday.” She then smirked sarcastically at her partner. “Annnd one with a full moon. So, what do you want to go as?”

“Oh haw haw,” Octavia said, rolling her eyes. “Why, a fairy princess, of course.”

“You’d be cute in a tu-tu,” Vinyl grinned.

Octavia couldn’t help but blush at that. “Ahem. Seriously though, were you thinking of just going as… well, yourself. No costume needed?”

“Na,” Vinyl shrugged. “As much as I’d love to show off my awesome vampireness, I can’t exactly use any powers without giving it away, and that’s where half the fun is. Plus, I already had another idea in mind: gonna be hard to pull off, though.”

“Oh?”

Vinyl grinned widely. “Thinking about going as Siren Head.”

…

Crickets chirped.

“Siren Who?” Octavia asked. Whatever that was, she’d never heard of it before.

“A ghost story among ghosts!” Vinyl said. “How awesome is that? Heard about him at Crypt Keeper’s - the lil tavern in the Canterlot Underground.”

“Ugh, really?” Octavia said. “Why would you ever step hoof in such a rotten place? Nopony but dregs and ‘chuds’, as you call them, hang out there.”

“Cus Crypty’s cool, that’s why,” Vinyl said defensively. “Only other vampire I’ve run into who isn’t a complete ass. Anyway, so we were shootin’ the shizzle’ for a lizzle…”

“‘Shizzle for a lizzle?’” Octavia said, raising an eyebrow.

“I’m making another thing,” Vinyl huffed. “Don’t hate on the thing. Anyways, we were shooting the shizzle for a lizzle, when I heard one of the other ghouls talking about it. It was Prince Blueblood, actually. Prince Doucheblood, more like it.”

“I’m still surprised nopony’s figured out he’s a Lich yet,” Octavia noted.

“Pffft, I hope they do one of these days,” Vinyl said. “And when they do, he’s sooooo getting a Solar Spell up his flank. But yeah, anyway, I didn’t feel like asking his sorry ass about it, so I asked Crypty instead. And they start telling me this creepy awesome story. Bout someone from another world who somehow found his way to this one.”

She attempted to put on a spookier and spookier voice as she went alone. “But it wasn’t an easy passage, they say. The void between worlds wasn’t kind to him. He made it here, alright, but he came out of the void wrong… a twisted monster. One fused with objects from the other side.”

“I take it one of those objects was a siren?” Octavia said.

“How’d you know?!” Vinyl gasped.

Octavia gave a coy look. “Lucky guess.”

“Anyway, yeah, that’s how he got the name: Siren Head.” Vinyl’s voice grew deeper and darker as she continued. “Ever since he came to be, he’s stalked the dark corners of Equestria, a twenty foot tall monster of bone and mummified flesh!”

“Wait…” Octavia blinked. “He’s twenty feet tall?”

“Yeah? So what?”

“Wouldn’t he have a hard time, well, stalking?” Octavia asked.

“I’m getting to that, yeesh!” Vinyl grumbled. “Stop interrupting already.”

“Sorry,” Octavia giggled.

“But yeah, he would have a hard time stalking if he couldn’t easily blend in with trees,” Vinyl explained. “And now, telephone and electrical polls, too! He could be hiding in any town, in any woods, just waiting to lure innocent ponies to their doom! Like, with jaunty tunes he plays through his siren or something.”

“‘Jaunty tunes?’” Octavia mused.

“Yeah, jaunty tunes! Everypony likes jaunty tunes! Hush, you!” Vinyl then cleared her throat. “The worst part is he’s so good at hiding nopony has ever been able to take him down. He could still be out there, waiting… watching. He could even be… RIGHT BEHIND YOU!”

Vinyl gasped, pointing behind Octavia. Playing along, Octavia put on a look of mock fear, gazing at a newly installed double-warning siren sitting atop a nearby electrical poll.

“Le gasp!” Octavia said dramatically, letting herself fall over. “Hold me, Vinyl!”

Vinyl took the hint, smirking as she caught her. Despite the former’s fur being as cold as her undead skin, Octavia didn’t mind being in her arms. Nor did she mind snuggling up next to her as they sat down.

“So, what’d ya’ think of the story?” Vinyl asked.

“Suitably creepy,” Octavia said.

“Ya’ didn’t look that creeped out.”

“You know me,” Octavia said. “I’m not easily scared.”

“Pffft,” Vinyl said. “So, you wouldn’t mind if I got a pet spider?”

“Don’t push it.”

“Hehe!” Vinyl grinned. “Still, I guess it does take the punch out of it.”

“What does?”

“Us being what we are,” Vinyl said. “I’m sure we could kick the living crap out of Siren Head if we ever ran into him. Kind of takes the spookiness out of him, don’t you--”

She paused, and Octavia knew why. Both of their ears were perking, picking up sounds nopony else could. This included a strange, crackling noise coming from the edge of town. It almost sounded like thick twigs snapping, but with more fervor.

“Hey, you hear that?” Vinyl asked.

Octavia nodded. “It sounds like it’s coming from the forest. Maybe timberwolves?”

“Doesn’t really sound like timberwolves,” Vinyl said.

“You’re right,” Octavia nodded. “Crackling’s deeper.”

“Think we should go check it out?” Vinyl asked. “If it does turn out to be some, you can just tell em’ to vamos, right?”

“I can’t talk with them,” Octavia groaned. “I’m a werewolf, not a weretimberwolf.” She tapped her chin. “Though you are right. Perhaps it’s worth a look.”

“Sweeeeet!” Vinyl grinned. “Team Spooky, roll out!”

“We are not calling ourselves that.”

Silencing themselves, they made their way off of the town hall’s roof, following the sound of the crackling. As they moved, so did it, and fairly quickly, too. From the Everfree Forest towards none other than the School of Friendship. Octavia wasn’t sure why, but her gut was now telling her to pick up the pace. Something was feeling off about this.

As they neared a final row of houses before the fields in front of the school - one that blocked their line of sight - the crackling stopped. Instead, it was replaced by a rather odd smell. Octavia screeched to a halt, and so did Vinyl, blurring out of mist form into her normal appearance.

“Do you… do you smell that?” Octavia said, sniffing the air.

“Wasn’t me,” Vinyl said quickly.

“Ew, not that,” Octavia said, giving her a glare. “It smells like… it smells like cinnamon.”

“Cinnamon?”

“Trust the nose that knows,” Octavia said, pointing at her wolf-like nostrils. “It’s definitely that.”

Vinyl shrugged. “Maybe somepony’s baking something?”

Octavia raised her eyebrows. “At three in the morning?”

“Late night snack?”

“I don’t see any lights on,” Octavia reasoned. She held one of her paws into the air. “A light breeze is coming from the north, though. Hm…”

Just then, more crackling came. It was much more audible than before, and Octavia could now say for certain it wasn’t wood. It was something much denser. Bone, even. And it was coming from the same direction as the smell.

Slowly, they made their way past the final row of houses. The School of Friendship was now in plain sight…

Along with something else.

“What the--!” Vinyl began to cry, before Octavia threw a paw over her mouth.

Stretching nearly a quarter of a kilometer, from the edge of the Everfree Forest to one of the windows of the School of Friendship, was some form of thin, tube-like structure. Unfortunately, while Octavia did have heightened hearing and a nose that could beat any dog’s, her eyes weren’t much better than your average pony’s. Whatever it was, she couldn’t make it out too well.

Fortunately, Vinyl didn’t have the same problem.

“Vinyl,” Octavia whispered, drawing closer to her friend and removing her paw. “Vinyl… what is that thing?”

Vinyl didn’t respond. Instead, she continued staring at it. The look on her face was that of half-wonder, half-shock.

“Vinyl?”

“It’s like…” she started to whisper. “Like some sort of skeleton.”

“A skeleton?” Octavia asked, confused.

“I dunno how else to describe it,” Vinyl said. “It’s like if you took a bunch of ponies’ neck bones and like… like stitched them together.”

“Please tell me you’re joking,” Octavia gulped.

“No, for serial here,” Vinyl said. “Hey… I think I see something at the end of it. Maybe a head? It’s looking into one of the school windows. I think that’s one of the dorms.”

“The dorms?!” Octavia yelped.

There was another series of crackles. There was slight movement at the end of it near the dorm, but Octavia still couldn’t see exactly what it was doing.

“Yooooo!” Vinyl said with alarm. “That was freaky!”

“What?”

“Didn’t you see it? The end of it just moved to another window. Gave me a better look at what’s at the end, too. It’s like some kind of skull!”

“So… the whole thing is some sort of giant neck?” Octavia said, breathing slightly heavier, and with nerves creeping across her back. “And it’s undead?!”

More cracking. The end of it was moving again.

“Okay, game time,” Vinyl said. “It just stuck its head inside the dorm!”

“What?!”

Vinyl narrowed her piercing red eyes. “Unless this whole thing is a huge prank, I think we got a monster to fight.”

Octavia gazed at her warily. “I-I’m not sure about this. I mean yes, we need to do something, but I’ve never even heard of this sort of thing!”

“Well, we can’t just stay here and let it eat the students or whatever!” Vinyl argued. “Come on, Tavi, don’t make me do this alone.”

Octavia closed her eyes a moment and took a deep breath, before nodding firmly. “Alright… alright fine. But we don’t go through the school. We’ll go through one of the other dorm windows.”

“Nice,” Vinyl said, nodding. “Good plan. If it hears us, at least we’ll be its focus and not the kids.” With that, she actually started bouncing slightly. “Honestly, I got a good feeling about this! This could be the moment we become heroes!”

Octavia swallowed hard. “That’s a very large could.”

“Come on, be optimistic!” Vinyl said, smirking slightly. “Race ya’ to it!”

She blurred into her mist form and cascaded towards the tall, tower-like building that made up the dorms.

“Vinyl!” Octavia called nervously. “Vinyl, wait! We should do this together!”

Vinyl either couldn’t hear her or simply wasn’t listening.

“Ugh, damnit!” Octavia hissed, pouncing forward and galloping across the open field. With the full moon giving her plenty of strength, she was able to rocket forward, growing nearly as fast as Vinyl. So fast she didn’t even need to leap too high to completely fly over the pond that surrounded the front of the school.

All the while, the full moon was illuminating the strange creature and casting its shadow across the land. As Octavia drew closer, she was able to start making it out for herself. Like Vinyl said, it was indeed some sort of skeleton. Though one composed of multiple copies of the same bone, that being a horse’s neck bone. Each of them was about a foot long, and made up the length of the creature like finger joints. Terrifyingly, for it to stretch such a distance, it must have had hundreds, if not thousands of them.

Like Octavia had said, she really wasn’t easily frightened by things, but this… the more she looked upon it, the more she was beginning to feel out of her league. Whatever it was, it was no ordinary monster.

Still, she kept herself from panicking, and soon arrived at the base of the dorm. As Vinyl blurred up the side of it next to her, she gripped its stone structure with her near steel-like frontal claws. As quickly as a cat shooting up a tree, she scaled it, making it to one of the windows - one opposite the room of where the creature was entering - in less than a minute.

Finally, she found herself in a room full of young, sleeping students. Naturally, there were more than just ponies: there were many different creatures. This included a few famous faces she knew, everyone from the young changeling, Ocellus to Gallus the griffon to the dragon, Smolder. All were snug cozily in their beds.

In any other circumstance, doing this would be unthinkably weird. But they did have a good reason for it. A reason that was currently creepily hovering over the bed of Silverstream, the hippogriff. It was the ‘head’ of the creature; a pony’s skull, long decayed, from what it seemed, with thin black hair draping from its scalp that swayed despite a lack of breeze. It was attached to the aforementioned ‘neck’, which twisted in a strange pattern before leading out the window. It almost resembled a snake to some degree, though it was certainly more frightening than any she had run into.

Its close proximity came with a much stronger scent of cinnamon. If she was in her regular, pony form, it might have smelled pleasant, but in werewolf mode, it was assaulting her nostrils to the point where she felt the need to sneeze.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, Vinyl was about to distract her from it.

“Hey, what the hell do you think you’re doing?!” Vinyl roared loudly. “Get away from her!”

Octavia gazed at her, dumbfounded. She honestly thought about hitting her for this level of stupidity. Her yell would almost certainly wake up the students, and they would almost certainly see both them and the… the Long Horse.

‘This is it!’ Octavia panicked. ‘Our cover’s blown! They won’t understand - they might even think we’re working with the thing! Oh Faust, we’ll be locked up in Tartarus for the rest of our days and… and…’ She blinked. ‘...None of the students are waking up?’

Indeed, none of them stirred. For a split second, Octavia was worried that the Long Horse might have harmed them, but no, they seemed to be breathing fine, with one even snoring. In fact, they looked as peaceful as Vinyl did when she was napping soundly after a trip to the blood bank.

Momentarily distracted by their stroke of luck or whatever it was, Octavia had taken her eyes off the creature. And unfortunately, unlike the students, it was now distinctively aware of their presence.

“Yeah, that’s right!” Vinyl said, her voice filled with a mix of fear and testosterone. “Lookie at the cute vampire mare! Not them!”

Octavia was about to shout at her for this, but she stopped herself. This was the reason they were here, wasn’t it?

Slowly, with even more snapping sounds, the creature turned its head towards them. And as if gliding along a breeze, it slowly swayed over to them, more of its neck joints seemingly growing out of thin air as it did.

When it got within two feet of the duo, Vinyl again barked at it:

“A-Alright, that’s close enough!”

Whether it was out of fear or her somewhat pacifistic nature (despite what she liked Octavia to believe), Vinyl was showing a remarkable amount of restraint at the moment. While she was ‘young blood’ and didn’t know much in the way of vampire-specific magic, Octavia knew she still had her mist ability and enhanced strength at her disposal. With it, she could easily dash forward and attempt to break the creature’s neck. Being a unicorn, Vinyl also had her regular old spells to use, and given she had fed lately, a larger pool of mana than normally to work with.

Still, to Octavia’s shock, and to Vinyl’s as well, given the look on her face, the creature didn’t give them a reason to attack. Instead, it simply hovered a few feet away from them, cocking its head slightly. Despite the odd feeling Octavia was getting that they had just broken this creature’s normal routine, she wasn’t getting the vibe that it was upset about it. In fact, it seemed more curious than anything.

Not that this was helping her nerves much. They were still dealing with a complete unknown here.

“O-Okay, glad we have an understanding,” Vinyl said with a hint of false-bravado. “Now, we’re gonna need you to, uh…”

“Get the heck out of here!” Octavia yelped.

Vinyl nodded in agreement. “Yeah, make like a tree and leave, you freaky neck monster!”

The creature remained still.

“Can’t you understand us?!” Vinyl yelled at it. “Go away or we’ll make you go away! In fact, that’d be preferable. See, we’ve kind of been waiting for a monster like you to come along so we could--”

“Vinyl!” Octavia growled.

“What? It’s a monster!” Vinyl said, confused. “I’m not gonna hurt its feelings calling it that!”

“That’s not what I meant!” Octavia said. “We should be lucky everyone’s still asleep…” She calmed herself slightly, gazing at the creature suspiciously. “... Somehow.” She narrowed her eyes. “Did you do that? Are you keeping them from waking up?”

The creature didn’t get a chance to respond. For at that moment, there was a commotion coming from somewhere else in the school. From the windows facing the courtyard, they could see several lights turning on. Though they hadn’t woken the students up with their yelling, it appeared they had woken up a few teachers.

“Vinyl!” Octavia squeaked. “Time to go!”

“No way!” Vinyl cried. “We can’t leave these kids alone with this thing!”

“Don’t you remember who runs this school now?” Octavia asked. “Princess Twilight’s student. Starlight Glim Glam or something. She’s supposed to be one of the most powerful unicorns out there next to Starswirl. She can handle this!”

Vinyl shook her head. “Oh come on! Don’t you see? This is our chance! We can start beating this thing up as soon as Starlight comes in. And then-- oh, son of a bitch!”

Vinyl had turned her head back towards the creature.

Well, where the creature once was.

While they were arguing, it apparently took the chance to run, and now it was nowhere to be seen. And with the sound of hoof-steps and shouts coming from outside the dorm, along with a few now-stirring students, the creature certainly had the right idea.

“Okay, yeah, let’s scidaddle,” Vinyl simpered, a sweatdrop leaking from her forehead. “Team Spooky, away!”

She leapt out the window, Octavia following her, all the while angrily shouting: “We are NOT calling ourselves that!”

They made it to the base of the dorm and a bit into the field before lights were flicked on in the dorm, Octavia striking the ground with an ‘OOF!’, despite being unharmed. Gazing behind her, Octavia was relieved to see nopony peering out the windows, not that they’d have an easy time spotting the duo. While she was at it, Octavia also looked for the Long Horse, but other than some swaying trees in the Everfree Forest, there was no sign of it.

A minute later, they had arrived back at their humble little home at the edge of town, both of them having independently made up their minds to give up ‘patrol’ for the night. Despite their enhanced physical strength and stamina, they were equally exhausted, panting heavily as they opened the front door and made their way into their living room.

Both of them soon collapsed, Vinyl on a sofa and Octavia on her massage chair.

They sat for a moment, each regaining their composure, before Vinyl finally broke the silence.

“Hey Tavi.”

“Yes, Vinyl?”

“Was it just me, or did that escalate really quickly?”

Octavia gazed at her blankly for a minute, before actually managing to chuckle. “That really did escalate quickly.” She then put on a concerned look. “Though we’re going to have to talk about this tomorrow.”

“Yeah, I know.” She yawned loudly. “Tomorrow.”

And despite Vinyl rarely ever sleeping during the night, she was soon knocked out cold. It didn’t take Octavia long to follow.

She could have sworn she smelled a hint of cinnamon before she did, though.