The Blank Pony

Sunny skidded to a stop under an awning. She looked back as Izzy nearly barreled into her, out of breath, only for her to stop and be nearly knocked over by Hitch, who was breathing heavily. Pipp and Zipp caught up, with Zipp holding a rather wet Sparky and Pipp having somehow managed to double her weight with moisture.

The rain had started to fall in earnest—and it was cold. Far colder than it should have been for late summer.

Pipp was shivering. She looked at herself. “My mane is...no, I’m ruined. All of me. All of me is ruined.”

“We have to go back,” said Hitch, turning back to the rain. “Misty is still there—”

“So is that thing,” said Zipp, grabbing his shoulder and shaking some of the water off her wings. “We’re on the defensive, Hitch, we can’t just go running toward danger without a plan.”

“But—”

“Hitch. If the building was on fire, would you run into it?”

Hitch was conflicted for a moment, but scrunched his face. “No,” he admitted at last. “I’m not a firefighter.”

“At least it doesn’t look like it came after us,” said Pipp.

“It can’t see my while I’m holding this,” said Sunny, holding up the skull. The other ponies recoiled at its sight.

“Sunny, of all the things to bring—”

“What do you mean it ‘can’t see you’?” asked Zipp.

“I…” Sunny paused. “I have no idea. That’s what Synchronia said.”

“Who is...what kind of a name even is that?”

“On my phone. Somepony texted me. I think...here, it’ll be faster if I show you.” She pulled out her phone to show them the messages—and as it did, it vibrated.

Sunny looked at it—and saw that the message was from her.

“Here,” she said. “She just texted again.”

She held out her phone. The other ponies gathered around it.

“Zipp is correct,” read the message. “DO NOT APPROACH THE BLANK PONY.”

“All caps,” said Izzy. “It must be important.”

“Tell that to our mom,” moaned Pipp, with Zipp rolling her eyes.

“You need help,” said the next text. “I have searched the entirety of social media and identified the facilities required.” The next text dropped a pony-pin for the mapapp. Then another text. “According to her profile, her name is this.”

Pipp leaned forward. “That’s a...FeedBag profile. For...” She winced almost audibly. “Boy_Mom_Philly.Filly,XOXO37?”

“Weird that the pin is exactly where Sprout’s house is,” noted Hitch.

Sunny and Pipp exchanged a knowing glance of realization.

“Yeah,” said Pipp, nodding. “That makes sense.”

“But...what does Phyllis Cloverleaf have to do with any of this?”

“It looked like him,” said Izzy. “What do you think...” she gulped. “What do you think happened to the real Sprout?”

None of the ponies answered, even though the silence disturbed them all equally.

Rain was pouring down when they reached Sprout’s house. It was not hard to find. Simply put, it was the largest house in all of Maretime Bay, built from the extreme profits yielded by Canterlogic prior to its closure. It was built high on a hill, overlooking the town, ostensibly built like a smallish cottage but in truth oddly massive in a way that hid its true scale ominously well.

A pair of tasteful columns framed the door and the big window above it, the dim glow of the incandescent chandelier inside casting a slight warm glow through the glass. A warm glow which provided no heat.

When Hitch knocked on the door, it silently slid back. It was unlocked and already opened.

Hitch, his hoof still held in the air, looked back to the others.

“Come on,” said Zipp, pushing past him, Sparky running in at her side.

The foyer was dark, lit only by the light of the chandelier. The building was not exactly large enough to have a wide, mansion-like front area with swooping staircases. Rather, it was just spacious enough to resemble a fine upper-middle-class structure with expensive fixtures. Fixtures that sat shrouded in almost total darkness.

It was not warm inside, but at least dry.

“Hello?” called Zipp.

“Mrs. Cloverleaf?” called Sunny. “It’s Sunny Starscout. Hitch is here too?”

“Sprout?” called Hitch, seeming relieved that no pony responded—because there was no guarantee that if Sprout appeared before them he would be the Sprout. In fact, there was no guarantee any pony was who they said they were.

No one at all responded.

“Maybe they’re out?” suggested Izzy.

“No,” said Hitch. “I’ve known the Cloverleafs my whole life. Sprout used to be one of my best friends.”

“Mine too,” said Sunny. She looked to the others. “This place is built like a fortress. Phyllis installed most of the Canterlogic security technology her company built here first.”

“Greedy, much? That tracks,” sighed Pipp.

“It’s not that,” said Hitch, looking up at the high ceiling. “I think she wanted to prove to ponies that it was safe.”

“That’s adorable,” said Izzy. “And also? Somehow worse.”

Something deeper in the building made a sound and they all jumped. It was a metallic sound, as if a pan had fallen.

“The kitchen,” said Hitch.

Sparky, having heard the sound, began to run toward it—at least as fast as a baby dragon could.

“Sparky, no! That’s not safe!”

Hitch followed Sparky—and the others followed Hitch into the dark halls of the suspiciously large house.

Sunny paused, looking back to the door. She paused to close it and shut the deadbolt. Then she checked her phone, wondering if their mysterious benefactor had texted again. She was indeed met with a text message, but it was only a single animated, winking emoji. A pleasant smiling face urging her to continue.

Sunny texted back. “Am I safe here?”

There was a pause. Then a response.

“No. Of course not. Hurry. Please.”

“Sunny?”

Sunny looked up. “Coming,” she said, clutching the skull tighter to her side. When it looked into the darkness, the void seemed to become clear. She felt comfortable with it at her side and proceeded forward.

They entered a long hall lined with pictures. Hitch had produced a flashlight from his bag, and the bright LED glow reflected off the glass of numerous pictures. The majority of them were embarrassing and focused almost solely on Sprout. Sprout as a foal, being held by his mother shortly after birth, or wearing a tiny sailor suit in a posed picture—or in various cute outfits as a toddler, followed by oddly-fitting clothes that he wore on the first day of each school year. Him jumping, playing, at Hearthwarming opening copious piles of toys—and so many others.

There were others, though, which Sunny found surprising. She and Sprout had never been exceedingly close as children, so she had only been to his house once or twice—and she had never looked to closely at the pictures on the wall. But there were some—and the subject matter was odd.

One was a sepia tone of a young filly with big hair—which must have been Phyllis, standing beside a balding stallion that Sunny assumed was Sprout’s grandfather. They were both wearing lab coats and standing before a giant bank of beveled wood and vacuum tubes. Then another of the same stallion, now older, with an even bigger-haired Phyllis flanking what appeared to be a massive, hydraulically powered simulacrum of a pony.

Another picture showed Phyllis, dressed in some kind of tight-fitting, bright led flight suit, taking an almost seductive pose on something enormous and metal—which resembled the shoulder of a giant metallic pony, the head opened in the corner of the frame to reveal a kind of cockpit. In another, a group of ponies in lab coats stared upward at Phyllis—dressed in some kind of bulky, heavy armor, levitating above a test field, held aloft by jets and tethered to the ground by thin cables. Sunny paused because, although blurry and black-and-white, she was sure that one of the ponies in the crowd had been in possession of a pair of fluffy wings.

They often held similar themes. Phyllis dressed in a frame of some sort, surrounded by machines and wires, or at the foot of vast assemblies of metal or tank-tracks. Devices of various sorts, generally with a robotics theme. And one where she stood beside a tall stallion, holding him tightly. She smiled, but he made no expression. As enormous as he was, his expression was utterly blank. His seemingly luminescent eyes oddly red and empty.

“I had no idea Phyllis was into robots,” said Izzy, somewhat in awe. “That’s super cool. The closest I came to birthing sentient life was Senior Butterscotch. Who is pretty cool. But technically a construct, not a robot.”

“The closest Phyllis ever came to birthing sentient life was Sprout,” said Pipp, snapping a photo of one of the photos of Sprout covered in cake and having a tantrum. She paused. “Assuming he’s not a robot.”

“He’s not,” said Hitch. “Believe me. I know. Canterlogic never really built...robots...”

He trailed off as they came to the arching gap to the extensive kitchen—and as several yellow safety robots turned to face them. Safety robots surrounding an enormous block of beautiful blue ice, directing various fans and hair-dryers at it. A formation of ice which contained, frozen solid at its core, a terrified-looking Sprout.

The yellow robots regarded the interlopers and then continued with their work attempting to thaw Sprout.

Hitch looked to Sunny. “I always thought those were...you know...”

“No,” said Phyllis, trotting into the room from the other entrance, a batch of heat-guns draped across her shoulders. “They’ve always been robots. It makes testing...well, made testing much more realistic. After all, dummies don’t generally try to run away. Unless I program them to.” She stopped. “Hitch. Sunny. Hello! It’s so good to see you.” She looked to the others. “The rest of you, also. You’re all so adorable.” She sighed, gesturing toward her son. “But as you can see, the tribulations of motherhood never really do stop. So to speak.”

“Mrs. Cloverleaf, what happened to him?” asked Sprout. “Is he…?”

“Oh, it’s just a bit of metabolic stasis.” Phyllis sighed. “It’s not the first time, either. This happens periodically. Sometimes he tries to lick the liquid helium, or plays with the cryo-laser, or falls into a cooling vat. As all mischievous little boys do I’m sure. He’s just a little chilly.” She shook her head. “I just wish he had put the wigs away before he froze himself. Not something any mother wants to walk in on.”

“Wigs?” asked Sunny.

“Nothing you need to worry about. But I’m sure he’ll be very happy to see you all. Once he thaws.” She paused, her brow furrowing. “Although...that does beg the question. How did you know to come here to visit him?”

The various ponies looked at each other.

“Um...yeah, about that...” said Zipp.

“We don’t...actually know why we’re here,” admitted Sunny.

“Because a scary shapeshifter that only we can see broke into our house and is trying to eat us,” said Izzy.

“Izzy!”

“What?! It’s just about the truest thing I could possibly say!”

“Oh dear,” said Phyllis.

“Wait,” pleaded Hitch. “We can explain—”

“Changeling or illusion wizard?”

“W...excuse me?”

“Is it a changeling or an illusion wizard? I have countermeasures for both.”

“What’s a...changeling?”

“An awful, disgusting bug. Not sentient at all, of course. Even if they do talk. Pesticide does the trick. Especially if you go for their terrible, terrifying eyes. Illusion wizard is much harder, but basically the same countermeasures for any unicorn. Grab them and, you know...snip snip.”

Izzy grew pale. “Snip...snip?”

“I don’t think it’s either of those,” admitted Sunny. “I didn’t get a good look at it but it was...tall.” She shivered.

“Oh. Well I have no idea what that is, but you certainly came to the right place. I designed this house myself to defend against every possibly threat posed by both unicorns and pegasuses. Whatever is chasing you, I can guarantee there is absolutely no way it could penetrate my defenses without my knowledge.”

“Um...we walked in here, though?” suggested Izzy. Phyllis ignored this.

A phone rang with a slow, minor-keyed song. Pipp shivered and produced her phone. It was a text notification.

“That’s...not my ringtone,” she said. “Who...” She looked down and grew pale. “Sunny, I think it’s for you.”

She held it up. Sunny did not need to read the message. She saw the name.

“Synchronia. What did she say?”

“If ‘she’ is even a ‘she’,” noted Izzy.

“There’s no message. Just a .png that looks like...” Pipp squinted, turning her phone sideways. “Um...well, actually I have no idea.”

Zipp looked over her shoulder. “That’s a blueprint.”

“Then I think that’s why we’re here,” said Sunny. “Mrs. Cloverleaf, would you mind taking a look?”

“Sure. Forward it?”

Pipp did so, and Phyllis produced her own phone. She tapped around the screen for a moment, her eyes tracing whatever it was that had been presented to her. “Huh. Yeah. It’s a weird request but I think I have just the thing.” She put her phone away. “Come on. You can help me work on that while my son thaws. Based on what I saw down in my mannequin room, I think he’ll be very happy to see all of you.”